Sexuality
Sexuality is the set of conditions that characterize the sex of each person. From the historical-cultural point of view, it is the set of emotional phenomena, behavior and practices associated with the search for sexual emotion, which decisively mark the human being in each and every one of the determining phases of his development. For centuries it was considered that sexuality in animals, in humans, was of an instinctive type. Theories were based on this conviction to establish the unnatural forms of sexuality, including all those practices not directed at sexuality. procreation.[citation required]
However, today it is known that some highly developed mammals, such as dolphins or some penguins, present a differentiated sexual behavior, which includes, in addition to homosexuality (observed in 450 species of animals), variants of masturbation.
A person is said to be sexually active when they have sexual relations with another person, where there is a risk of contracting a sexually transmitted disease or having an unwanted pregnancy.
Human sexuality
Human sexuality can be defined as the different ways in which we experience and express our sexuality, or how we do so as sexual beings.
Sexuality is a central aspect in people's lives. For many centuries it was considered exclusively from the biologist paradigm, reducing itself to genitality and standardizing binomials between natural and non-natural forms of sexuality (including all those practices not directed at procreation).
However, from the paradigm of integrality, sexuality not only encompasses genitality but also identities, gender roles, eroticism, pleasure, intimacy, reproduction and sexual-affective orientation.
According to the World Health Organization, sexuality is a central aspect of human beings that is present throughout their lives. It covers sex, gender identities and roles, sexual orientation, eroticism, pleasure, intimacy and reproduction. It is felt and expressed through thoughts, fantasies, desires, beliefs, attitudes, values, behaviors, practices, roles, and relationships. While sexuality can include all of these dimensions, not all of them are always experienced or expressed. Sexuality is influenced by the interplay of biological, psychological, social, economic, political, cultural, ethical, legal, historical, religious, and spiritual factors.
Because we are social beings, people build our sexuality with other people, so our corporeality transcends the biological dimension.[citation needed] Our bodies are crossed by culture and in this sense, it is necessary to consider different categories such as sex, gender, gender roles, gender stereotypes, gender identity and sexual-affective orientation to talk about sexuality.[citation required]
The developed sex characteristic comprises the degree to which belonging to one of the dimorphic categories (feminine or masculine) is experienced. It is of the utmost importance in the construction of identity, part of the sexual structure, based on sex, it includes all the mental and behavioral constructions of being a man or a woman.[citation required] We must bear in mind that it is very important that we know what our most personal and intimate attitudes towards sexuality are, since the human person is fulfilled in his sexuality.
One of the products of the interaction of these holons is sexual orientation. Indeed, when eroticism (the ability to feel desire, arousal, orgasm and pleasure), affective bonding (the ability to feel, love or fall in love) and gender (what makes us men or women, masculine or feminine) interact we get some of the sexual orientations namely: bisexuality, heterosexuality and homosexuality.
The working definition proposed by the World Health Organization also guides the need to address and educate human sexuality. For this, it is extremely important to recognize sexual rights (WAS, PAHO, 2000):
- The right to sexual freedom.
- The right to sexual autonomy, integrity and security of the body.
- The right to sexual privacy.
- The right to free sexual association.
- The right to reproductive, free and accountable and careful decision-making.
To the extent that these rights are recognized, exercised or respected, there will be healthier societies in the sexual sense.[citation required]
It is important to note that sexuality develops and expresses itself in different ways throughout life so the sexuality of an infant will not be the same as that of an adolescent or an adult.[citation needed] Each stage of life needs specific knowledge and experiences for optimal development. In this sense, it is important for children to know their body, their own sensations and learn to take care of it. A boy or a girl who can name the parts of his body (including the penis, scrotum or vulva) and who has accepted that it is part of him, is better able to care for and defend it.[quote required] It is also important for them to know the differences and learn that both boys and girls are valuable and can perform similar activities.[citation required] At this stage they learn to love their important figures first (parents, siblings) and the people around them, they may have their first childhood crushes (which are different from adolescent crushes) and also experience the first separations or losses, they learn to handle the pain before them.[citation needed] Regarding reproduction, they begin to learn to take care of the little ones (they can start with dolls or pets) and are developing their reproductive capacity. They also have great doubts about their origin, generally the doubts they have regarding the sexual relationship need clarification of the sense of love and the desire to have it that their parents had. They find pregnancy and birth interesting in a sense of knowing their own origin.[citation needed] Above all, it will be important to investigate the question and answer it at the level of knowledge according to at the age of the minor.
Adult sexuality contains all four elements in constant interaction. For example, if a woman feels satisfied and proud to be a woman, she is likely to feel more free to feel pleasure and seek it herself.[citation needed] This It generates an environment of affective and sexual closeness with the couple and a climate of greater trust, which in turn has an impact on personal or family activities that express reproductive activity. Actually we could start with any of the characteristics in these positive or negative repercussions.
Each of the features will present very specific problems. Thus, we find in sex, the problems of homophobia, violence against women, sexual inequality, etc. In affective bonding there are love/hate relationships, violence in the couple, jealousy, control of the couple. Eroticism will present problems such as sexual dysfunctions or sexually transmitted infections. As regards reproduction, fertility disorders are observed or, later, violence and child abuse, abandonment of children, etc.[citation required]
Like many animals, human beings use sexual arousal for reproductive purposes and to maintain social ties, but they add enjoyment and pleasure for themselves and others.[citation required ] Sex also develops deep facets of affectivity and awareness of personality. In relation to this, many cultures give a religious or spiritual meaning to the sexual act (See Taoism, Tantra), as well as see in it a method to improve (or lose) health.
The complexity of human sexual behaviors is a product of their culture, their intelligence and their complex societies, and they are not governed entirely by instincts, as is the case in almost all animals.[ citation required] However, the basic engine of much of human sexual behavior continues to be biological impulses, although their form and expression depend on culture and personal choices; this gives rise to a very complex range of sexual behaviors. In many cultures, women bear the burden of preserving the species.[citation needed]
From a psychological point of view, sexuality is the way of experiencing one's own situation. It is a broad concept that encompasses everything related to sexual reality. Each person has their own way of living the fact of being a woman or a man, their own way of placing themselves in the world, showing themselves as they are. Sexuality includes the sexual and gender identity that constitutes the awareness of being a sexual person, with the meaning that each person gives to this fact.[citation required]
Sexual diversity tells us that there are many ways of being a woman or a man, beyond rigid stereotypes, being the result of one's own biography, which takes place in a sociocultural context.[citation required ] Today, the acronym GLTB (or LGBT) is used to designate the group of gays, lesbians, transsexuals and bisexuals.[citation required]
Sexuality is also manifested through the erotic desire generated by the search for erotic pleasure through sexual relations, that is, both autoerotic (masturbation) and heteroerotic (directed towards other people, these in turn) sexual behaviors. They can be heterosexual or homosexual). Erotic desire (or libido), which is a complex emotion, is the motivational source of sexual behavior.[citation needed] The concept of sexuality, therefore, is not refers exclusively to "sexual relations", but these are only a part of that objective.
It develops slowly, and at a fair age, with generally new techniques.