Saturday 1 April 2017

#187 That which offends you

I learned a new word this week: sex-positive. It's one word because it's hyphenated. It means accepting and embracing safe, consensual sexual behaviour. I came across it in a "bloggers wanted" advert. "Who doesn't like sex?" I thought. I think it's more about the notion that it might be ok to like it, even if it's not within the confines of a heterosexual marriage between a couple intent on having offspring. You don't need to procreate to copulate.

I liked the look of the advert but replied that if I'd ever have to write about what I still consider to be a personal topic, I'd want to do so anonymously. It's not that I'm against freedom of speech in that area, at least not in principle. I just don't think everyone's ready for it. In fact I'd go further than that and say I don't think I'm ready for it. Would I write a blog post about the importance of using protection? Sure but I'd like some myself.

Having written a couple of weeks ago about a surge in the popularity of modest clothing, as part of an application for something, I went the other way a bit this week in some comments on a friend's blog post about the morality of dressing provocatively. I basically said that as long as a person is safe wearing what they're wearing, where they're wearing it, then I don't have a problem with people expressing themselves. It's not something that offends me. 

I got quite a churn about my comments from one of the other readers in a response to a later post. It was as if my nonchalance somehow threatened his right to be annoyed. The blog has a group of hardcore followers so I enjoy watching them messsage back and forth about such things. An advantage of being able to take a laid-back perspective is that the comments don't offend me either.


1 comment

Running on empty said...

Lol, I thought your opinions were perfectly valid. What are boring world it would be if we all had the same opinions!

Imagine late night chats in the living room over glasses of wine, between groups of friends :
"I like brie"
"I like it too"
"I agree with Dan"
"I agree to agree with Dan"
"I agree with whoever agrees with Dan"
"Dan is always right"
"I can't argue with that"

I would run internally screaming from the house, from boredom. There has to be a bit of cut and thrust to make a fun conversation.