Monday, October 29, 2012

Sex is not Creepy

I take offense at the notion that acknowledging a person's - any person's - sexual attractiveness is "creepy". Staring strangers down is creepy. Making rude comments is creepy. Making unsolicited advances is creepy. Certainly stalking and raping people is creepy. But acknowledging that a person - whether it's their body, their fashion sense, their personality, or what have you - is appealing to you in a sexual way is not, in my mind, creepy.

Why is noticing such a thing about a person creepy? We are sexual organisms, attracted to one another, why should we not acknowledge that attraction when it springs up, and why should we be so anxious as to put up arbitrary rules on who should be allowed to be attracted to whom and under what circumstances, when our bodies simply don't work that way?

What is it about sex appeal that transforms a person into meat, that degrades them for possessing it - isn't that illusion in the mind of the perceiver and not in the body of the perceived? What is it about sex that we are so scared of, that making any reference to it freaks us out?

"No, he can't think she's sexy because that means he wants to have sex with her, and that means he WILL have sex with her, and sex is rape, or sex is disease, or sex is power imbalance, or sex is freaky nonconsensual fetish, or sex is degrading! And even if he doesn't actually have sex with her, the fact that he thinks about sex - in association with her!, whom he doesn't even know!, or who is already attached to someone else!, or isn't attracted to him reciprocally!, or isn't ready for sex at all! - the fact that he thinks about sex is just gross!

"No, I don't care that he's a human being, a sexual organism, that sex is a pleasurable activity that makes people feel good. It's disgusting and he shouldn't be projecting it onto good, obedient virgins who know better, otherwise they'll be spoiled and defiled and perverted and oh god make all the sex in the world stop!"

I think it's fucking ridiculous.

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