Show me some skin

It is no secret that sex, and everything that comes with it, is taboo in the American system of values.

The thought of our nation being contaminated with teenage sex, homosexuality, porn and drunken one-night stands is simply too heavy for our puritanical culture.

While I don’t think we should all become sexual deviants and implement a new nation of nudity and voyeurism, I do think it’s time for us to accept that we don’t need more sex, we just need to be open about sexuality.

Usually the word sexuality results in a discussion of sexual orientation or gender identification, but sexuality is much greater than these things alone.

A person’s sexuality is based on an organic and basic instinct to react to the erotic.

Sexuality is about awareness of the body and how confident we are with how it looks and how we learn to use it.

Sadly, with sexuality watered down to the question of “Am I gay or straight?,” people forget that the questions should be much broader: “What turns me on, and am I okay with that?” “How will I express this?” “What does this all mean?”

Sexuality is an ongoing discovery. For something so incredibly natural to be taboo in American culture only hinders people from experiencing a beautiful piece of them.

In all honesty, I used to believe that America didn’t find sex as taboo as people say.

And sure, maybe some of it is exaggerated (we’re clearly not completely prudish), but in comparison with other parts of the world, we are the blushing virgins at the sex toy party, for lack of a better metaphor.

One small but significant example that I’ve come across is the difference between how American television portrays sex and sexuality as opposed to British television.

I’m an avid watcher of popular British television series like “Misfits” and “Skins”.

These shows air on digital channel e4, the British equivalent to America’s The-N.

When I first started watching these shows, I was shocked. Watching the vivid sex scenes and hearing sexually explicit language immediately made me think, “This would never fly in America.”

Turns out I was more right than I wanted to be.

“Skins” is a sensation in the United Kingdom. The show is unapologetic about how it portrays real teenagers and their relationships with one another, especially sexually. And why shouldn’t they be? Culturally, Europeans are far more comfortable with sexuality than Americans.

With nudity and sex on television, kids are exposed to it at a young age. Sexuality is a norm, not taboo.

While Britain airs these “explicit” shows alongside imports like “Glee” and “How I Met Your Mother,” America reserves such displays of sexuality suitable for the likes of late night HBO or Skinemax. Maybe this is why nine major sponsors, including Taco Bell, General Motors and Wrigley Gum have pulled out of their contracts with MTV’s American version “Skins,” obviously posing a threat to how long the show will survive.

We just aren’t comfortable with our sexuality, and it isn’t helping us like we would like to say that it is (check out information about U.S. teenage pregnancy rates compared to United Kingdom).  

By impeding ourselves from being open about the extent of our sexuality, we are hindering ourselves from being truly informed and satisfied.

Sexuality shouldn’t be taboo. It is as much a part of the human lifestyle as sleeping or using the bathroom. We limit ourselves to a very small box by thinking that questions like gay or straight, man or woman, and virgin or sexually active define all that we are. We need to be open with sexuality on every level: physically, emotionally and psychologically.

Sexuality is not something that jumps out of Pandora’s Box to provoke evil, and we shouldn’t be afraid of it.

It is a piece of a person that needs to be molded, ripped, kneaded and prodded at. To leave it untouched in a closet is to ignore a large piece of ourselves (I mean this on a personal and national level).

It’s time for us to come out of the closet, America.

— aysymatz@indiana.edu