Rethinking sexual modesty and normative family values (x-posted in <lj site="livejournal.com" user="

The following sentence in this week's NY Magazine caught my attention: "A decade ago, blow jobs were what people whispered about; then three-ways became the naughty bedroom act. " My first thought was that the authors of the article must be very young and think they've discovered what has always existed. But rereading the sentence I realize that the operative word is "whispered." Since graduating college, when no topic of conversation was taboo, very few of my RL acquaintances ever even mention sex, and when I do I'm told it's inappropriate or TMI. What cannot be mentioned is rendered shameful: we are still a far too repressed society.

This has been of particular concern to me since the publication last August of my translation of a book of erotic poems by an Israeli poet which has yet to find an audience. The resistance I've encountered in the Jewish community saddens me. For centuries Judaism was the most pro-sex of the world's religions. In recent decades, however, we have fallen to third place behind Wicca and Unitarian-Universalism. I'm beginning to think we need to rethink the virtue of sexual modesty and the conformist consequences of normative family values. Thoughts?

Rethinking sexual modesty and normative family values (x-posted in <user site="livejournal.com" user

The following sentence in this week's NY Magazine caught my attention: "A decade ago, blow jobs were what people whispered about; then three-ways became the naughty bedroom act. " My first thought was that the authors of the article must be very young and think they've discovered what has always existed. But rereading the sentence I realize that the operative word is "whispered." Since graduating college, when no topic of conversation was taboo, very few of my RL acquaintances ever even mention sex, and when I do I'm told it's inappropriate or TMI. What cannot be mentioned is rendered shameful: we are still a far too repressed society.

This has been of particular concern to me since the publication last August of my translation of a book of erotic poems by an Israeli poet which has yet to find an audience. The resistance I've encountered in the Jewish community saddens me. For centuries Judaism was the most pro-sex of the world's religions. In recent decades, however, we have fallen to third place behind Wicca and Unitarian-Universalism. I'm beginning to think we need to rethink the virtue of sexual modesty and the conformist consequences of normative family values. Thoughts?