POLITICAL, PERSONAL, AND COMMUNITY ASPECTS OF SEX ON THE INTERNET
POLITICAL, PERSONAL, AND COMMUNITY ASPECTS OF SEX ON THE INTERNET
Earlier, I discussed some of the meanings that sexuality has for human beings and the ways that the dissemination of cultural values, and confl icts about sexual expression, occur in human societies. An important difference with the Internet, however, from these more traditional organizational activities is the emergence of the individual as a potential force in the promotion of both established and oppos- ing ideas. Given the relatively inexpensive means available at the present time in the United States to publish one’s own personal “home page” on the Web, as well as the emergence of blogs of every conceivable nature, it is possible for individuals to empower themselves to express opinions and offer new insights about virtually any topic. On the Internet, all such sites are roughly equal, supported only by the power of the words and arguments expressed by the person presenting them, and, with respect to blogs, the community that develops around them. Certainly, as in any medium employing words, written or spoken, the clarity, sense, internal logic, and external support of the ideas are called upon to bolster the views promoted. It is then left to the readers or listeners, based on their own experience, education, temperament, and so on, to evaluate the persuasiveness of the arguments and either reject or accept them, and, again with respect to blogs (and to a lesser extent, list- servs) to offer one’s opinions. There are typically no editors or censors mediating the process or telling us only what we are supposed to hear or read.
This, of course, can cause some problems, particularly for authoritarian orga- nizations and personalities. Anyone can believe that what she or he has to say is worthwhile, which can result in support for truths that threaten existing power structures. Power tends to relinquish itself reluctantly, because power is an advan- tage in today’s competitive world where rights seem to be considered scarce com- modities gained only at the expense of taking comparable rights from others. This faulty thinking is maintained because it fragments political opposition, thus main- taining the status quo, in which the needs of the majority of people are often either ignored or manipulated in the interests of those already controlling society or important subsections of it (see Noonan, 1998a, for insights to how this might affect public policy, including the direction of research on sex-related issues). Others have noted that censoring sexual content, thereby controlling people’s sexuality, helps to control them in other ways. The Beat poet, Allan Ginsberg, for example, whose
128 Raymond J. Noonan
poem Howl was banned from the public airwaves by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), said:
Censorship of sexual discourse or public communication about sex is one way of keep- ing the populace under control. If you can censor the seat of one of the greater emotions, then you’ve got the other varieties under control. In a sense, metaphorically, once you get people by the balls, then you’ve got them. (Quoted in Stefanac, 1993, p. 39)
In the national and international political arenas, participatory democracy is often seen as a value that may fi nd its ultimate expression via the immediacy of the anticipated ubiquitous Internet (see Katz, 1997). Yet, similar confl icts are often seen in the territorial disputes among various professionals who lay claim to particular areas of expertise or specifi c ideologies that have developed within them, such as those referred to today as “politically correct.” In most arenas, communities have developed on the Internet that challenge or support—or simply supply informa- tion about the subject involved. These may involve Web sites or blogs devoted to
a singular passion, newsgroups focused on a specifi c cause, or listservs via email in which “subscribers” debate and support each other in their various viewpoints about an issue. In the sexual arena, the Academic Sexual Correctness listserv men- tioned earlier, for example, has generated much discussion among college educators on false accusations of sexual harassment and similar abuses in academia. Similar debates among proponents of various men’s and women’s issues—as well as vary- ing viewpoints about all sorts of sexual health issues—exist on the Web, which are highlighted with links at http://www.SexQuest.com/SexQuest.html.
Meanwhile, sexologists, like psychologists and other social scientists, have begun to look seriously at the sexual issues raised by the Internet and communicating online (Cooper, 1997a). Cooper (2002) has provided the fi rst manual for psychologists and others who are encountering the various sexual problems related to Internet use in his Sex and the Internet: A Guidebook for Clinicians. The achievement of sexual health has been illus- trated as well by various studies over the past few years that have shown some potential for reaching the sex partners of individuals infected with HIV or STDs through email and Internet chat rooms and referring them for testing and treatment (CDC, 2003, 2004a, b).