“Sex is a taboo, Rape isn't”

- Anuska Bhattacharyya [Pursuing MSc. (Anthropology), University of Delhi]

Somewhere in the world of social media, I found a quote that stated “Sex is a taboo, Rape isn't”. This small quote with simple wording conveys a strong message about the truth of society. 

Sex refers to the act of being physically intimate and engaging in acts such as sexual intercourse, kissing, cuddling and sometimes mutually masturbating. Taboo refers to a social or religious custom prohibiting or restricting a particular practice or forbidding association with it. 

With the advancement of society and culture, family systems and systems of marriage came up. This led to restrictions on practicing sexual relations among people. Through the birth of the system of marriage and its development, a system of sexual monopolization of a particular individual by a limited number of people appeared. In the case of a monogamous marriage, only one person had the sexual monopoly of an individual they called their husband or wife and in the case of polygamous marriage, the same system had multiple people in this equation. 

Now it becomes clear to us, the probable reason, why the topic of ‘sex’ became a taboo. It was to restrict the sexual relations of individuals with multiple people without any legal or legitimate boundary. But this process of ‘sex becoming a taboo” led to a lot of issues, more negative than positive.

The urge to have sex or intimate relationships is a very strong and innate emotion but it is considered a sign of weakness in a society that runs on the pride of always feeling strong and ‘unbeatable’. 

With the tradition of the ongoing taboo, came up the concept of guessing. People start to guess what sex may look like from the time they get interested in it, which is adolescence for most people. This “guessing game” is not always good because people's perceptions differ on a lot of matters such as consent, pleasure, interest, voluntary will and so on. Some people faced with the wrath of adolescence and patriarchy feel like it is something on which only one gender has the right to receive the glee even if they perform the act with another person and sometimes even perform it forcefully while others feel like they do not deserve a chance to feel pleasure and are just endowed with the responsibility of giving pleasure to the opposite party. A common misconception in society is that “females have less sexual drive than males”. This misconception stems from the bestiality of confusion and power play. This is just one side of sex being a taboo, there is another side to it. There are multiple aspects to it. People whether they are sixteen or twenty-two don't understand what sex is accurately and what are the consequences of having protected (using any form of contraception) or unprotected (without using any form of contraception) sexual intercourse. Some people feel like if they even kiss or engage in touching or stroking, they might get pregnant while others feel like pulling out just before ejaculation will save one from the consequences of pregnancy. Some people fear talking to their parents when met with a pregnancy scare while some people make adverse decisions like getting an abortion from an illegal establishment just to get over the negative consequences of pregnancy quickly. These actions lead to even more adverse conditions in the long term. This feeble state of common people, especially adolescents and young adults, in their everyday lives, concerning sex and its consequences occurs because they do not have enough knowledge as well as reliance on anyone else who's knowledgeable and experienced. Every generation expects the next generation to learn about all the intricacies related to sex and relationships on their own. Older generations feel like, if they talk openly about sex to the newer generations, sex will not be a taboo topic anymore and people will start having ‘free sex’, just the thing our ‘ancestors’ felt like when making ‘sex’ a taboo. 

An adolescent individual who is just entering the world of puberty often feels some sort of sensation in their body that urges them to be romantically or sexually involved with another person of the opposite sex or the same one. These feelings are very normal, whether talked about or not, a young adult, when met with feelings of attraction and vulnerability towards another person or themselves will engage in some sort of act to release their bodily appetite. As parents, or society as a whole, all we can do is be by their side and make them possess the propensity to make informed choices regarding such a crucial aspect in their lives. In schools, curriculums and homes people should start collectively debunking the fear and myths related to sex and they should start having healthy conversations regarding the topic of sex, consent, sexuality, pleasure and the consequences of having sex. Girls should be taught about their own body, consent, and pleasure and boys should also be taught about consent, care, being gentle and respectful. From a very young age, one should be taught about the power they hold in making their own informed choices and the power they possess over their own life. Elders, especially parents should make the topic of sex education a norm so that their children feel like they have someone in case any mishap occurs, like abuse or unplanned pregnancy. Don't mishaps occur in every aspect of our lives? What's the problem if we mess up in these aspects as well sometimes? What's necessary is that we make informed, and healthy choices rather than being uninformed, confused and neglectful of our own needs and rights.