Sex is a natural action and there is and should be nothing wrong with that. It should be embraced, taught (properly in schools I could write a whole other article solely on this), and practiced safely without fear of judgment. In fact, that’s how most of us are here to read this post in the first place. Someone most likely gave birth to you through the means of birth induced via sex. Taking the physical act aside what about how people are viewed sexually?
Are there limits to how we view people sexually and are there boundaries and misconceptions related to how some are seen compared to others?
That’s what I’ll be looking to dive into in this article focusing on why and how people are sexualised by society. But first a random fact.
Did you know that Prostitution is the oldest occupation in the world?
The earliest known record of prostitution dates back to 2400 BC in ancient Babylonia.
Yesterday and Today’s View
It’s always important to look into history as a reference point for almost anything and when it comes to sexualization of women, specifically Black people, history has no nice way of showing this. Now the name Sarah Baartman might ring a bell for some but she was a woman from South Africa who in the early 1800s was trafficked to London and Paris to perform in “freak shows” because of her enormous buttocks. She died at the age of 26 and her body was shown in a Paris museum up until 1974.
Fast forward to the present times and the situation still remains. Now I’ll focus more on the male side of the equation and allow space for women to voice their own thoughts on this but having spoken to my ample amount of friends they all have said similar things about this topic.
When it comes to Black men and women they are seen almost always as sexual objects and are constantly targeted because of the way the look.
One might argue, well that’s in the past and these things don’t happen now in such manners. Well, take a look at this short clip below and let me know what you think.
Fetishisation or Love?
Changing trajectory to relationships, it begs the question if there is actual love in certain relationships (mainly interracial ones) with certain types of people or some warped fantasy of fetishization being played out. Do other women/men feel this way when they see their partner? This question doesn’t mean that much to me personally as I tend to date women from the same race however, I have been with someone who wasn’t. To counter my own point fetishizations I believe can even exist within races so it’s really on a case-by-case basis.
Why are Black men in particular seen as objects of sexual pleasure to be used and abused and even feared by other men.
I ask myself this question at times.
This might come as news to some but not all black men have a large penis. Yep, I said it! Ok another random fact, according to data it is South American men, and specifically Ecuadorians who have the largest penis. On top of that, not all black men are great at sex despite how good or bad Ben Stiller’s acting is in the movie Heartbreak Kid.
Not only are they seen as objects for sexual pleasure they are even feared by other men who have severe insecurities about black men “taking their women”. It sounds very much in light with the phrase “these foreigners coming over ere taking our jobs”
So let me get this straight. Your inability to attract and keep women isn’t to do with your charm, personality and none of that, its solely because a black guy is in the room that the game is rigged? Yeah, get some help buddy.
Here is a tweet I saw recently on this.
Grand misconceptions
Ok so now we know not all black men have a large penis let’s look at another misconception that tends to play out involving black women. One of the most common cases involves the word “Latina” and its almost immediate association with someone being sexy and having an attitude. Now I’ve been to Latin American countries and indeed a lot of them are sexy but that’s not the point. A large proportion of men would allow certain behaviors to slide all because she is a so-called “Latina”.
The number of times I’ve heard the word Latina and crazy used in a short span within each other is beyond belief. How many times have you heard
“She Latina so you know she’s “crazy”. Or … “that’s how they are man, Latinas are wild”
First of all, not all Latinas are crazy. I know plenty of them who won’t hurt a fly. Secondly, when we even use the word “Latina” we really mean a certain type of woman. Those who look like the stereotypical version with a certain hair type, skin tone, and accent. On the flip side, this so-called trait seen in Latin women that are accepted as part of the hot & spicy package is almost always challenged when done by any other woman. That’s a bias.
Conclusion
To end the article I will pose a few questions which can be asked and answered by you the readers.
‣ What role does the media have to play in maintaining these images of over-sexualization?
‣ Are there people who are also under-sexualized?
I’ll lightly touch on both questions with my thoughts. Yes, the media in all aspects is heavily responsible for how people are seen and treated sexually at least. A clear example is the Ben Stiller movie. Yes again, certain people are under-sexualized and not given a fair shake because they are not “sexually appealing”. If we are ever to remove these negative stigmas around sexualization let’s first look towards the accurate representation of how people truly are and stop these archaic misconceptions. Media companies have a role to play and so do we in educating ourselves on the history of these ideas. Once we do that we can then begin to uproot them from the source.
