Sex is system critic Something I didn't understand for a long time about my fascination with eroticism is that there is far more to it than sexual arousal.
Long time before the internet, underwear catalogues were pretty much the only open access to a tantalising world I had yet to discover. Even as a child, I soon realised that barriers were being deliberately erected to deny me access to more exciting knowledge and material. This, of course, made the subject all the more interesting for me.
The Playboy and Hustler magazines of the kiosks was one of the first challenges. I mastered it by finding a kiosk whose corner was not in constant view of the cashiers. But as long as I, as a teenager, was not yet able to convincingly disguise myself as old enough, acquisition was only possible via older colleagues or otherwise forbidden methods. Entering a porn cinema was easier because people rarely looked closer - especially at an outside counter on a rainy night. As a teenager with privacy in my own room and the financial means to order material by mail, the possibilities of access suddenly increased enormously. Later, even more so with my own VHS player. The age restrictions when ordering from catalogues were lax and with a tick and a signature that no one really checked, it was no longer a hurdle. The remaining problem was the payment.
The allure of the forbidden
As a young adult, I first thought that it was finally over with the educational barriers of the small-minded lawmakers. But then I was surprised to discover that the world of erotica still had many corners with police cordons.
Not only did these corners contain the very fantasies that had moved me since childhood; precisely because they belonged to the most forbidden of the forbidden, I absolutely had to find ways to get into them. The extreme intimacy of fetishes. The total surrender in BDSM. It drove me all the more to find sources for the material that was not allowed at the time. And after a mailing was confiscated, to find a way to prevent that from happening again.
The satisfaction from circumventing the prohibitions - fooling the authoritarian self-righteous - was almost as great as the sexual satisfaction.
The feeling of freedom
Today it has become so much easier to explore this world that adults want to keep from the young. And don't think that the coming compulsory ID card for internet services (in Switzerland) will change anything (except that our government forces us to hand over our private data to the big international corporations). It's all a total joke, conceived by the same kind of authoritarian self-righteous politicians who had no idea even then that they were only increasing the appeal of the banned offers. But let's face it; even if they know, they don't care as long as they can sell it to their conservative voters as a political success.
The way they want to protect young people from negative influences is just absolutely amateurish and counterproductive.
Of course, they should prevent banners and pop-ups with naked people and porn from jumping out at you unexpectedly. But if you deliberately look for pornographic material, you will find it anyway - no matter what age you are. And that is good. Otherwise your only input may come from uptight parents who were indoctrinated with false religious morals.
What is really needed, however, is education. And not just biology and contraceptive methods, which are technically taught according to the curriculum, but what the boys are really interested in: What is horniness. How do you arouse the opposite sex? What methods are there to satisfy oneself? How do you satisfy a woman? What does your partner expect from you? How is what you see in porn different from sex with your partner? What can you learn from porn and what can you not learn? And many, many more questions that faculty bashfully hide from behind the curriculum.
But nobody really wants to hear that from their class teacher or their parents. For that, (cool) experts are needed who can communicate it with enthusiasm and attractiveness. But politicians are still more interested in enforcing the false moral concepts of their voters than in what would actually be useful for young people.
War permitted, love forbidden
The system we live in is still shaped by its origins, when citizens' sexuality was dominated and controlled by the morals of religion and government. Even today, there are many moralists in politics for whom sexual liberation - especially that of women - is a huge thorn in the flesh.
Even dominant big capitalists submit to them. You notice this on the internet, as a consumer, or as a provider of content of a sexual nature. Advertising on Google or putting content on Youtube, Instagram, TikTok etc. is extremely restricted. One nipple can get you ghosted or even banned. Using popular payment providers is not allowed (though you can try not to attract attention). On the other hand, it doesn't seem to be a problem that the Russian Wagner Group has been spreading its war propaganda and recruitment videos on TikTok for months.
Of course, we Western nations have also made progress. One is allowed to talk about it. One is allowed to live out one's inclinations in private. You are allowed to love and marry whoever you want. You can get paid for sex. But don't let your guard down when it comes to defending these newfound freedoms - the moralists strike immediately. Like in the summer of 2022, when an attempt was made at short notice to enforce a ban on prostitution in Switzerland. For once, our government has acted wisely and not forgotten what damage prohibition has done in history - and is still doing with the "Nordic model".
Sex is anti-authoritarian
Sex has always been at the forefront of innovation. Photography, video, internet; where there were no laws yet, a new medium spread or established itself quickly also thanks to pornography. What is unregulated is free and cool.
But wherever someone has the power to impose his moral views, he will try. Book censorship and dress codes in schools. Censorship and access controls on the internet. Age restrictions on the sale of Playboy magazines at newsstands.
Not putting up with this paternalism is resistance to the dictatorship of the moralists. Unconsciously, this has always been the reason why I feel very comfortable circumventing the restriction laws or supporting sex work.