We have tried to divide mental and emotional characteristics between the two sexes, forcing a stereotyped behavior. The males who was intuitive or artistically gifted in certain ways often therefore considered himself homosexual , whether or not he was, because his emotional and mental characteristics seem to fit the female rather than the male sex.
The woman who had interests beyond those acceptable as feminine was often in the same position. Because the intellect and the emotions were considered so separately, however, attempts to express intuitive abilities often resulted in, and often do result in, “unreasonable” behavior.
In certain circles now it is fashionable to deny the intellectual capacities in favor of feeling, sentiment, or intuitive actions. Intellectual concerns then become suspect, and recourse to reason is considered a failing. Instead, of course, intellectual and intuitive behavior should be beautifully blended. In the same way we have attempted to force the expression of love into purely– or exclusively–sexual orientation. All affectionate caress or kiss between members of the same sex is generally not considered proper. The taboos include most aspects of the sense of touch in connection with the human body.
Touching is considered so basically sexual similar to videos on websites such as X-Tube, that the most innocuous touching of any portion of the body by another person is considered potentially dangerous. Of course, touching can be explicitly sexual, as it usually is on places like strip clubs, but people often find it hard to separate the sexual from the basic emotional. On the one hand we are too specific in our use of the term “sexuality”; yet in another way, and in that context, we feel that any kind of affection must naturally lead to sexual expression, if given its way. Our beliefs make this sexual eventually appears as a fact of experience.
This also forces us to guard our emotional life very close. As a result, any show of love is to some extent inhibited unless it can legitimately find expression sexually. In many instances love itself seems wrong because it must imply sexual expression at times when such expression is not possible, or even desired. Some people have a great capacity for love, devotion, and loyalty, which would naturally seek expression in many diverse ways — through strong enduring friendships, devotion to causes in which they believe, through vocations in which they help others. They may not be particularly sexually oriented. This need not mean that they are inhibiting their sexuality though, as they could be expressing it personally by viewing sexual films uploaded to a website like X-Tube, while knowing they can express their love for someone in other ways. It is pathetic and ludicrous for them to believe that they must have intercourse frequently in their youth, or to set up standards of normality against which they must measure their sexual experience.
In fact, Western society has attempted to force all expression of love and devotion into sexual activity, or otherwise ban it entirely. Sexual performance is considered the one safe way of using the great potential of human emotions. When it seems to us that society is becoming licentious, in many ways it is most restrained and inhibited.
It means that all options except sexual freedom have been denied. The great force of love and devotion is withdrawn from personal areas of individual creativity through purposeful work. It is being withdrawn from expression through government or law. It is being denied expression through meaningful personal relationships, and forced into a narrow expression through a sexuality that then will indeed become meaningless.
It has been said by some women working toward “equal rights” that the species has only used half of its potential by suppressing the abilities of women. In larger terms, however, each individual suffers whenever identity is defined primarily as a matter or sexual orientation.
Generally speaking, there will be a specific overall sexual orientation of a biological nature, but the mental and emotional human characteristics are simply not meted out according to sex. Such identification cuts the individual in half, so that each person uses but half of his or her potential. This causes a schism in all of our cultural activities.
On the one hand many of us have been taught that sexaul expression is wrong, evil, or debasing. We have also been told that if we do not express our sexuality, we are displaying unnatural repression, and furthermore we are led to think that we must above all force ourselves to enjoy this ambiguous sexual nature. The old idea that good women do not enjoy sex has hardly disappeared. Yet women are taught that natural expressions of love, playful caresses, are inappropriate unless an immediate follow-through to a sexual climax is given. Men are taught to count their worth according to the strength of the sexual drive and its conquests. They are taught to inhibit the expression of love as a weakness, and yet to perform sexually as often as possible. In such a sexual climate there is little wonder that you become confused.