Adolescent Sexuality by Dr. Karen Rayne

This week has not been an uplifting one for those looking for progressive and women-friendly laws about sex. And frankly, I don’t have quite the energy to rage. Instead, here are the words of others:

RH Reality Check talks about how anti-abortion groups are subtly shifting their focus from narrowly protesting abortion to widely protesting all forms of birth control (including, most notably, the pill).

Paul Sunstone of Cafe Philos talks about the potential freedom of speech issues in the decision by the three largest ISPs to block all child porn sites.

And speaking of bad news, I gave some to a mom yesterday.

Here’s the situation: This mom’s teenage son is not doing as she would prefer. He’s smoking pot, having sex, and ignoring most of what she says. I tried to point out what he’s doing right - going to school, having safe sex, coming home. But she had a hard time acknowledging the good choices he makes.

So I was talking with this mother about how to maximize her son’s good choices and help them bleed over into the areas where she’s currently concerned about his behaviors. But in order for her to help her son, I was straight up and told her there were some things she was going to have to change before he would start to change. And these were big, lifestyle changes I was talking about. Not changing the laundry detergent brand changes. She wanted nothing of it.

I told her that I had bad news: That unless she changed, her son wouldn’t change. I’m hoping after sleeping on it, she’ll wake-up renewed and ready to start really grappling with her own issues in order to help her son start addressing his. But really, it’s in her court, in her power to break the pattern.

As long as we’re talking about the line between appropriate and inappropriate adolescent sexuality, I thought I would bring up Jock Sturges. There is much controversy about Jock Sturges‘ photography. Mr. Sturges primarily takes pictures of nude adolescent girls on nude beaches.

The contention is whether or not Mr. Sturges’ pictures are nude art or under age pornography.

The answer, of course, may lie in whether you’re French or American - that is, what kind of cultural and sexual understanding you have of the human body. This is really so similar to how people understand the FLDS debacle - so much is based on how you see girls between the ages of 12 and 16. (And yes, it is absolutely a tragedy and a debacle, regardless of which “side” you’re on.)

Me? I think that girls between the ages of 12 and 16 should be free to find their own sexuality - but should not be the objects of adults’ sexual desires. Basically, I think the FLDS folks shouldn’t allow their daughters to marry under age 18, and I don’t think it’s appropriate for Jock Sturges to publish images of girls under 18 naked.

Mr. Sturges talks at length about the quality of his relationship with the girls he photographs and their parents. And I commend him for that - or, rather, I don’t condemn him as I would if he didn’t make it crystal clear that he has a great relationship with them. Nevertheless, it’s hard enough for young teenage girls to make sense of their developing sexuality without their naked images being published online and in books.

Give teenage girls time and space to develop sexually and romantically. There is plenty of time - plenty! - for them to get married and pump out babies if that’s what they want or to pose naked for photographers if that’s what they want. I just don’t think that a 13 year old is ready enough to make those decisions - and I certainly don’t think her parents should be making them for her.

And to stave off the comments I already see in the rear view mirror: No, I’m not sure an 18 year old or even a 24 year old is always fully ready to make those decisions either. But I am absolutely confident that a post-adolescent woman of 18 is more capable of making decisions than a pre-adolescent girl of 13.

I am not including any of Mr. Sturges’ pictures in this blog post on purpose, but you can find plenty here and in the links above.

The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals ruled that a man taking a picture up the inside of a 16-year-old girl’s skirt in public is not illegal.  How is this even possible?  Apparently he was charged as a Peeping Tom - and apparently that law only applies to places where someone can reasonably claim privacy - their home, the bathroom, etc.  Okay, okay, fine.  But what about taking pictures of a 16-year-old’s vagina?  Last time I checked that was illegal regardless of whether the 16-year-old knew about it or not!

(Written by guest blogger JustAnotherTeen.) 

Although this post was originally supposed to be for Friday, I got so many good questions on Wednesday that I did not feel they would all fit in one post. That said, I am still open to more questions for the rest of today or until about 10 PM Eastern time. If you have questions, email me at justanotherteen@gmail.com.

I did not particularly ask people if they were OK with the use of their name with their question, so I will use caution and assume they wish to remain anonymous.

“I’m interested in your experience, and how you learned about masturbation … whether through self-exploration, or by being taught, either by another person, or from literature / porn.”

I have already said a brief amount about my masturbation experience, but not much, so I will go into more detail here. I started masturbating by rubbing on an old fleece jacket. I didn’t know what I was doing honestly, as I said I was extremely sheltered. Until I found jackinworld.com, I did not know what I was doing or how to “properly” do it, probably because I am circumcised and did not even think about lube. In my experience, I didn’t hear anything about it from others so I had no clue. Although many guys apparently share their knowledge of this pleasurable activity, I suppose I just did not have enough family members or friends close enough in age.

“Do you have any friends who are abstinent despite pressure to be otherwise? If so, why do you think they made that choice?”

As much as I should, I have not really talked to my friends about this matter. I am pretty sure many of them have never had sex but I do not know whether that is because of lack of opportunity or their own desire to abstain. Sorry I don’t have more information on this subject!

“Do you think that being in an all-male residential high school has had an impact on how you learned to relate with girls? Do you think it has been useful, or a hindrance?”

I’m sorry if I gave the impression that I live in an all-male school. In fact my school is open to both girls and guys, in separate monitored dorms. If I were in a single sex school, I would definitely think that would alter my ability to talk to girls. However, having lived the life that I have so far, I often have more female friends than male friends. I am by no means a player or anything, I simply have a strong feminine side in many ways and therefore relate better with females. That is actually one of the reasons I have such a strong relationship with my girlfriend. I am feminine in many of the same ways she is masculine and vice versa.

“So with uncommunicative parents and a rotten teacher at school, where did you get good information and a healthy attitude? What would you recommend to other teenagers in similar position.”

Looking back, it is really hard to tell where my attitude came from. I suppose it was partially because I wanted to be the opposite of my parents but more so because of the actions of my brothers, the Internet, and my life in a residential school. While my school itself is still rather conservative, living in a less supervised setting than at home as well as living with 300 other teenagers can lead to a large melting pot of ideas and values. The Internet also helped me learn about sex and masturbation before I arrived at school and likely laid the foundation for my current attitude. As for what I would recommend to other teenagers, remember to keep an open mind. Although the internet had laid the groundwork, I remember being shocked upon arrival at my school that they allowed an openly gay guy to be in a leadership position. My how my attitude has changed! I am now a member of our gay-straight alliance and I am wearing a new rainbow belt as I type this!

I apologize if this post does not seem as well put together as some others, but I only had about an hour to write this as opposed to more than a week for the rest! Thanks to everyone for the questions and comments/compliments. I have really enjoyed blogging here and love having an instant audience without having to build it myself!

A mother recently asked me if teenage boys need pornography - whether that visual stimulation is really, really important to them and their sexual development. My answer? No. Teenage boys do not need porn. They may want porn. They may seek out porn. They may be fascinated by porn. All of these things are really, really normal.  But that does not mean that they need it.

Three decades ago the porn that was available to teenage boys was their father’s Playboy stash in his closet.  The current situation is much more problematic, because now the porn that is available to teenage boys is essentially limitless and includes every kink possible (without the cold-shower-effect of suggesting their father is into it as well).

So what to do when you, as a parent, find the paper or electronic trail your teenager leaves that ends in pornography?

Well, first you get really, really clear with yourself about how you feel about pornography. Then you talk with your teenager about it. “It” being porn.

And what to do if you never find that trail? Well, you have to assume it’s just because your teenager is better than others at concealing what they’ve seen. And that includes girls.

Every person, by the time they are 16, has seen some kind of pornography. Most have seen it much, much earlier. So you need not fear that you are introducing something that they have not seen or thought about privately. Rather, you need to fear that they have seen something they don’t know how to talk about.

Conversation about pornography with an adult (parent or non-parent) who is very, very clear about their own perception of pornography and can still talk openly and draw out the teenager’s perception pornography is the most effective route to supporting teenagers in navigating these tricky areas.

Boys need to know that girls often feel insecure around pornography. Girls need to know that boys are often curious about pornography. And everyone needs to know that (a) the bodies shown in pornography are extremely unusual and (b) it’s important to talk about and ask questions about the visual images they find, strewn carelessly about on the Internet.

What do you think?  What kinds of conversations about porn have you had with your children?  What kinds of conversation did you have with your parents?

Last Thursday morning I had the pleasure of speaking with Robert Jensen about pornography and raising kids in a sexually saturated society. I have mentioned Jensen’s newest book on pornography in a previous post. Several articles he’s written are on his website.

What is a brief description of how you see porn?

When you look at pornography, you see the perfect storm of a predatory corporate capitalism, white supremacy, and male supremacy. Pornography is not only racist and sexist, but it’s also the commodification of one of the most central part of ourselves. You can literally buy your sexuality. If you actually look honestly at that, it’s incredibly depressing.

How is it that kids or teenagers typically get introduced to porn?

Well, there just isn’t much in the way of reliable research on kids’ use of pornography, or much research on adults’ use for that matter. I always use my own experience as a baseline for understanding men of my generation, the post-Playboy generation, I’m 49. But there have been dramatic cultural changes driven by the technology since my generation. The first of those changes was the VCR, which made it much easier for people to see the hardcore stuff in their house. And then of course the internet, which ramped pornography use up by about a factor of a thousand. The fundamental thing that hasn’t changed over the years is that boys are much higher users of porn than girls.

So how should parents talk with their kids about porn?

It seems that for teenagers, boys use porn far more than girls. Not surprisingly, because the vast majority of porn is directed for a man’s imagination. And the conception of masculinity in pornography is in line with the rest of the training that adolescent boys get in becoming a man.

The one footnote to that is this “girl power” trend. And there has been some writing on this, where girls are taking on more stereotypically male sexuality, it’s called the “hook-up culture.” And so girls are taking on the perception of sexual pleasure and dominance. This is the “Girls Gone Wild” culture.

However, I still think that porn is still overwhelmingly a male genre. It is made by men, for men, and addressing the male sexual imagination. It reinforces the worst aspects of gender training, particularly around male sexuality.

What can parents, particularly of boys, do?

Well, at the obvious level, parents have to deal with their own fear of pornography first. We have to get over the feeling that if we critique porn we’re prudes.

The second thing is that I think a lot of parents in the post-Playboy world saw porn as kind of a harmless indulgence when they were growing up. So parents sometimes avoid the topic by seeing it as harmless.

Mothers in particular have to deal with their own fears in order to have good conversations with their boys about it. Most adult women have this very visceral reaction to porn, for very reasonable reasons, because it generally turns them into an object. Porn and pop culture is a very scary thing, with threats of violence, and particularly sexual violence. And add on to that, there is often a very nervous relationship with husbands regarding their own use.

Fathers, on the other hand, have to come to terms with their own pornography use. It is my experience that if you get together 10 nice, liberal men who deny using porn, at least 5 of them are lying. My experience says that men don’t step up to their responsibility in talking to their boys about porn, and particularly if they’re users themselves, they can’t.

The thing to remember is that no intervention is too early. The earlier that kids have a framework to understand the negative cultural training the better. There are two main perspectives from which sexualizing teenagers and the sexual culture is critiqued: the right-wing religious framework or the feminist framework. Those are the only people who are being vocal out there saying that our sexualized culture is wrong. The right-wing approach is rooted in a fear of sexuality and male dominance. I think we need a feminist analysis, and it is never too early to introduce that to children.

So first parents have to come to terms with these things. And if you really come to terms with pornography, it is overwhelming. It has to be. Because it’s one thing to know that Hollywood movies objectify and sexualize women. It’s another thing to know that there is this huge corporate complex out there that directly supports men having sexual power and sexual dominance over women.

We also need to remember that boys often are struggling with this too. There’s a kind of surface bravado, like when they trade images and web links on e-mail. They have this kind of jocular, surface, male bravado kind of conversation that allows them to circulate the material risk-free because it’s just joking. But what that shows is that young men are very conflicted about porn. They know there is something wrong with this, that their sexuality is reduced to 7 minutes or less of masturbating while online. It produces an incredible amount of insecurity in men.

So whatever kind of bravado parents get from boys may just be masking the terror on the inside. Boys don’t understand sexuality, they’re scared of it, they’re aware that they usually are a step behind the girls in development. That’s scary to them. And then you put that fear into a situation where they’re watching a hyper-sexualized image of masculinity, that they know they will never be able to meet. That says to me that boys are a mess, and so the more conversation with parents the better.

Of course, all of this assumes a healthy communication between the parents, which is why I always say that the first step is for parents to get together and deal with their own fears.

That addresses boys, but what about girls? What can parents do to help their girls survive in this pornography-saturated, hyper-sexualized society?

If you’re a young woman, and you see the outline of the sexual culture that you live in (male dominant, hyper-sexualized, etc.), and you think it’s not going to change, many girls have the not unreasonable response that if you can’t beat it, join it. They take as an assumption that men are going to set the terms of sexual dominance as a form of pleasure acquisition (i.e., not intimacy). If you’re a woman, or a girl, you may not believe that is what sexual encounters should be. But nevertheless it seems to be the way things are, and if you don’t have any counter-cultural way to see the world, you may assume that if you can’t change it, you can take control of it. That’s where this hook-up, Girls Gone Wild culture comes from. So girls trying to use their sexuality as power may just be making the best of a bad situation. But the problem is that it still doesn’t meet teenagers’ deeply felt need for intimacy and love.

So what do you do as a parent in this culture? It’s mostly trying to provide an alternative when there aren’t many alternatives out there. Some teenagers take this into their own hands, and decide as a group that they are taking sex off the table and interact as a group, as close friends who don’t date, making a safe space for themselves. The problem is that as a kid, you can’t do that alone.

The reason we have to pay attention to pornography, and the reason we have to talk with our kids about it, is because we have to talk to them about their sexuality and we have to talk with them about what kind of people they are becoming. This is really just part of that broader question of what kind of people they want to be.

So I don’t have any great insights about helping kids worth through the issues inherent in pornography, just that it’s something as parents we have to talk to our kids about. And part of that is coming to terms, and talking with them, about our own struggles with the issue.

Dear Readers, I know that some of you have very strong, emotional reactions to pornography. I describe one pornographic image in the third paragraph. In my last paragraph, I ask for your comments on and personal experience with porn.

This post is in preparation for my interview on Thursday with Robert Jensen, author of Getting Off: Pornography and the End of Masculinity. This is a really fascinating book. It prompted me to examine my personal relationship with pornography for the first time.

I was maybe 11 when I saw my first porn picture. I was walking on a street near my house alone, and there was a piece of paper on the ground. It was maybe 4 by 6 inches and seemed to be torn out of a small book. So of course, always the avid reader, I picked it up. What stands out in my memory is a naked woman, bending over, with only the top of her thighs to her lower back showing. It was extremely lurid and disturbing. There were at least two other people in the picture, both naked, but all that I remember of them is what seemed to be vast acres of naked flesh. I did not really understand what I saw, but I was horrified, dropped the paper, and ran off. I was afraid someone would see me and think the picture was mine. I would have been able to describe the image in some detail, but I don’t think I could have identified the body parts I was seeing. It was only years later, looking back, that I was able to identify the subject of this image that still stood so clearly in my mind.

The next porn pictures I saw were maybe six months to a year later. A friend and I were in a neighborhood pharmacy. The staff knew me well. My friend and I peeked inside the blocked-out plastic cover on a Playboy and saw the picture on the front cover. We also peeked inside at a few pages. I remember the event more than the images. That we were clearly doing something illicit was delightful. We giggled and jostled for a better view. We may have also picked up a Playgirl and peeked inside. The pictures were not nearly as searing or painful as the one I picked up off the street. They seemed to be from completely different genres, and I did not connect them in my mind.

None of the men I dated in high school or college were particularly interested in porn. At least they didn’t admit to me that they were, and I remained blissfully ignorant. I probably would have thrown a complete fit and used it as grounds for a break-up had I discovered otherwise. I probably would not have been able to articulate why I was so distressed by my boyfriend using porn. Pornographic pictures became, while still uncommon, at least not-shocking over my college years. They continued to make me feel slightly ill, in an undefined, unexamined kind of way.

I am interested in hearing about your early experiences with pornography, both as a child and as an adolescent. Were they positive or negative? How did they shape (or not shape) your current perspective on porn? What kinds of experiences are common for boys versus girls? I would also love to know what place you think porn has (or does not have) in the adolescent mind?

I am currently working on several posts about the seedier side of sexuality. The first is about the recent article in the New York Times Magazine about adolescent sex offenders. (To be clear, these are teenagers or pre-teenagers who have engaged in sexual behavior with children who are at least two years younger than they are.) The second is about the new book Getting Off: Pornography and the End of Masculinity by Robert Jensen. After posting one or two discussions of Dr. Jensen’s book, I will post a conversation between me and Dr. Jensen here.

In the meantime, I am spending much of my time reading and thinking about these very painful issues. I am reminded that sex, for many, is something to be endured. For others, there is an obsession about sexuality, and sex becomes the focus of every waking thought. Sex is far to often tied-up with power, pain, and rape. These should be issues that adolescents are free from. Adolescents deserve the space to discover their sexuality without these unbearable forces breathing down their necks. Far too often, though, it is the teenagers who are just awakening to their sexuality who take the brunt of societal angst and anger around sex.

So I am asking for your input. How can we prepare our teenagers to stand in this social context and maintain a healthy sexuality? How can we help our teenagers respect their bodies and everyone else’s body? How can we bring about a sexual revolution?