Are sexual relationships in the Western World unhealthy?

brinkster130 said:
I think a large number of the children, teens and young adults in the Western Culture were raised with mixed messages about sex and sexual relationships. I think these inconsistencies with education has allowed for a large number of people to have an unhealthy attitude towards sexual relationships.
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ITA. I think a lot of it has to do with how people are raised, and also how those messages are perpetuated through media and culture.

That also ties in a lot with gender (which some people have already addressed here) and sexuality, and I've got to say, it's so frustrating to me that the focus when talking about sex to teens is always on heterosexual sex. Obviously people should learn about pregnancy prevention and things like that so that emphasis is there for a reason, but learning about sexuality of all kinds is incredibly important too when it comes to fully understanding safe sex.
 
brinkster130
brinkster130
Yes! Safe sex is about so much more than preventing unwanted pregnancies.
prophecygrrl said:
ITA. I think a lot of it has to do with how people are raised, and also how those messages are perpetuated through media and culture.

That also ties in a lot with gender (which some people have already addressed here) and sexuality, and I've got to say, it's so frustrating to me that the focus when talking about sex to teens is always on heterosexual sex. Obviously people should learn about pregnancy prevention and things like that so that emphasis is there for a reason, but learning about sexuality of all kinds is incredibly important too when it comes to fully understanding safe sex.
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TOTALLY agreed. One thing that drove me crazy about the friend I already talked about in this thread is he acted like because he couldn't get the guy he was having sex with pregnant, there was really no need for condoms. It took someone we know getting HIV to make him realize he needed to be practicing safe sex. Even after that though, me and some other friends had to BEG him to go get tested for STDs... and I had to go with him and get tested myself (although there was no reason) just so he'd go.
 
As a Christian, there is so much talk about sex ed. So may people think the only thing they should teach is "DON'T HAVE SEX OR ELSE YOU'RE GOING TO HELL AAAAAA" I am all for sex education that teaches kids about condoms, birth control, and of course abstinence. I mean, abstinence is the only 100% effective method of not getting an STI/STD and/or pregnant, but that can't be the only method of sex education. I mean, that's not even sex education, that's no-sex education.

When I am a parent, I'm gonna have a talk with my kids about sex. Tell them what it is, the mechanics, and how I hope they choose to engage in it in marriage, but at the end of the day, it's their choice and I want them to be safe. So I'll make it very clear that if they do choose to have sex, they need to make sure he/she is emotionally ready, they don't push their partner into doing anything they don't also want to do, and to PLEASE PLEASE BE SAFE! It's ridiculous to think every teenager is going to abstain.
 
Willow My Love agrees: Why can't you give rep?
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I can't give rep either at the moment, the icon isn't there to click on 😕


Once again I have to say, it's quite refreshing to see the healthy attitudes some people on these boards have to sexuality. From the media you get the impression that sex is all people ever think about, and that life revolves around the next opportunity to get layed, and I think here they have exploited the void I mentioned before for some of us in getting healthy sex education. Yet, in reality, if your family or peers help you whilst young to understand sexuality for what it is, it seems you are much less likely to be effected by this media outpour.

I have come myself through a long roundabout route to be not so influenced by the media, yet it has entailed having quite a harsh and strict view of sexuality and its expression. This, although not typical in europe is quite a common view for certain people in Britain. But I do think this view needs to change, as it is not healthy to deny something that is a perfectly natural part of being human. We may still disagree alot though about the way in which sexuality is expressed, as you do get extroverted and introverted personality types. Introverted tend to pursue more private means of self-expression, whilst extroverted people express themselves more publicly, and these different means of self-expression influence sexual expression.

Ultimately, I think it should be the parents responsiblity to choose the type of sexual education to give to their children. They shouldn't let the media form their childs perspective, nor religion, science, or even school. The first point of view children form here should be guided by discussion with their parents. As this will give them a solid platform for avoiding extremes of behaviour many in the west exhibit that can be unhealthy. All social institutions, like the media, and even school if it is the first source of sexual education give a slightly distorted view of sexuality I think, because they are coming to the child from a disinterested standpoint and so they will always tend to miss out on the importance of the emotional side to sexual expression.
 
I guess the very least a parent could do, if they wanted to avoid the subject, is go find an informative book to give to their child. At least they'd have the information they need, rather than get it from friends, or the internet. (Which sometimes can do a LOT more harm than good.)
 
Doppelgang said:
So, for the more experienced people on here 😉 I was wondering what your experiences are of whether sexual relationships are healthy in the West. I'm thinking in particular of the fact that much of life can become subverted to the one goal of getting gratification, and that people often play false gender roles for the sake of this gratification. Also, I'm thinking of people in long-term monagomous relationships who feel compelled to stay together for the sake of their children or because they feel it would be a sin to break-up, and so their relationship becomes more and more artificial, and bitterness develops between them.
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Well, I think it's problematic to say that the entire Western world has the same view on sexual relationships. Everyone has their own value system in which they operate, and their choice of sexual partners is informed by this system.

That said, I think we can all agree that the Western world is perhaps unhealthily preoccupied with sex. Sex sells. It's everywhere.

For me personally, all of this kind of thing makes me question how healthy sexual realtionships are in the western world at least. It's as if Christianity has given us this legacy of two extremes of people who are sexually repressed and people who are sexually expressive but in crude and destructive ways. So that it is maybe better to be single. That is my view based on my limited experience anyway, what do other people think?
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Well, I don't want to to get too into my views on Christianity (Don't want to offend anyone) but I'm glad you brought that up. Christianity proposes a very rigid set of rules for it's followers regarding sex, which for many is very difficult to follow, resulting in a lot of guilt when said "rules" are inevitably broken. There is an in-between, though - people who are neither crude nor repressed but just have a healthy attitude towards sex. They're hard to find, though, lol.
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Willow My Love said:
I guess the very least a parent could do, if they wanted to avoid the subject, is go find an informative book to give to their child. At least they'd have the information they need, rather than get it from friends, or the internet. (Which sometimes can do a LOT more harm than good.)
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It's at times like this that I remember two girls in the year above me at primary school (so they would have been about 11-12 at the time) reliably informing me that I could expect to start having periods soon. Still waiting....
 
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