IM TALKING ABOUT SEX, GET IT, IM AN ADULT

Anyway, so I was watching "Inside the Medieval Mind: SEX" and now im going to write about it. The whole series is pretty good, you should torrent it or you can watch it on youtube or if you are really clever you can probably spoof your ip and watch it on the bbc website like a real briton!

The medieval concept of sexuality condemned sex. Every aspect of human sexuality was incredibly powerful and it took the most powerful institutions of the time to even attempt to contain it. God himself came down and smote sodomites. The holy roman church was more powerful than even the state and the true origin of the power of kings. All sex was condemned as a sin in every guise, the nocturnal emissions of the clergy not withstanding. Only "necessary" sex was "allowed", sex for the purpose of procreation. The position was codified, clothes on (as much as possible), no enjoyment, though truely everyone knows the tactile sense cannot be "turned off" or denied. Any sex that did not result in reproduction, or a stern attempt at it, was suspect and vilified if not out right grounds for execution. No allowance for love (a thoroughly modern concept) or a sense of conviviality or connectedness.

This notion of denying nature and the self of course never worked and sex then was as varied as it is today, just as common. Nature and evolutionary pressure being what it is it would be pure literary invention to believe that you could turn the creature against itself and stop it from engaging in sex. The semantic game of the church, drawing a line between sex and procreation was another folly. Procreation is the accident of sex, in as much as sleeping involves waking always at some point.

Look now, and for me, sublimated in our time, this is the really profound twist, look now at our concepts of sexuality and sexual sin. Choose any television portrayal you like, any movie plot, sex without reproduction is holy, codified in its emotional range and positions. The mood entirely strict in its fantasy. The modern depiction of sex is just as bizarre (though it assuages our spiritual and natural concerns in a way simple "reproduction" never could) hollywood sex, the way sex should look, the sex you want to have not the sex you have, no strange smells, no sweat, no lingering memories of yesterdays argument. The visual is coded deeply within its aesthetic. The curve of a breast or the crumpled sheet does not suggest the breast or sheet at all but the tactile sense of the thing itself. The breast is an enigma and a fleeting horror if it is not touched and then, the fourth wall broken, the visual trick vanishes, the curtain is pulled back, this is part of a human being, it smells like a human being, it feels like a human being, it pulls you tight like a human being. Real sex has nothing of the aesthetic of film. If you could watch yourself "doing it" you would be disgusted (or should) "If I knew sex looked like that I never would of done it!" Sex is not of the visual, no matter what so called experts claim, most of us still have sex in the dark or at least are blind during the act by provocation of the act itself.

So our modern sex is still swallowed in the obscene semantic/visual game, the tricks of wearing clothes or turning the lights out while "doing it". Surely the real of sex remains the same but, what of our notions of sin and sexuality? This is where we see true penetration, the truly obscene act, yet another ignorant negation of the self, the violence of this self loathing and defeat no longer involves burnings or such medieval pageantry but we have our own pageants and solutions in the guise again of  popular media.

Now, now we have twisted the medieval ideal on its head (completely by chance I dont mean to imply we actually have any knowledge or concept of medieval sexuality, or that anyone but perverts really care) It is no longer reproduction that is applauded as the core of true sexuality and tactile pleasure that is condemned. No, noww it is reproduction that is condemned, and the sin of our modern sexuality is not engaging in tactile or visual pleasure. Instead of physically flogging in public our sexual deviants we flog them on television, on jerry springer or oprah, in our sitcoms and popular films. "You didnt use "protection"!?" they say. Protection from what we might ask? From your mate? From nature? The hostility implied in this phrase "use protection" the most tender act something that must be defended against. Defense against the vaginal, defense against the phallic invasion. But the true sin, the true threat for our modern notion of sexuality is from that of procreation. Imagine the horror on the faces! "you are the father!" (shock! dismay!) "umm we need to talk about something, im pregnant" (existential horror! pee on a stick, primitive divination!) Now the sin, now the threat, it is not from god or all his holy angels, not from the church or purgatory, now the threat is the prison of parenthood. The stock of our modern age, the baby carriage. Procreation in our time is the sole providence of imbeciles, the irresponsible, uneducated foreigners, stupid teenagers and the behavior of strange religious sects. Procreation has become a burden, the pregnancy of a women, her cross to bear for 9 months, "child" support the cross for men, lasting approx 18 years. Not quite purgatory but it might seem it at times.

And I guess now, I would like to make my point succinctly, so there is no confusion about it: Sex is a normal adult activity, get over it.