Sex in the US: an Observation

   I call it an observation, because I could say a lot more (and don’t feel like it) and of course endless volumes have dealt with the subject—which I have not consulted. But start by opening this NYTimes article.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/18/arts/design/new-gallery-to-emphasize-female-artists-and-collections.html?emc=eta1&_r=0  The picture is of the owner of a New York art gallery. Now tell me, what is her leg doing there? Read the article again; maybe you can find a reason that I failed to find. And that leg is in the NYTimes, not in the Daily News!
   I mostly don’t read any paper other than the Times and certainly no German or French ones, so I wonder whether stories similar to those I read are to be found in the European press or whether what I note is actually an American phenomenon.

   I am talking about sex. Are European adolescents and young adults different from German or British ones? Not likely. Surely they share all the same drives. But I read endlessly of sex on US college and university campuses and not analogous ones about Heidelberg and Göttingen or Paris and Lyon. Are our mores so different from English or Scottish ones that they give rise to the much-discussed scenes on American campuses and not the equivalent where there are actually campuses, such as in Oxford or Edinburg? There are deep questions here; the role of the press is surely a partial answer.
   Take another example. The papers—for me, as I said, that’s the Times—are full of stories about complaints and law suits by women in various roles and professions that they have been sexually molested by co-workers or bosses—from having to put up with unwanted touches to being raped. A lawyer who takes only such cases could, it would seem, make a good living.

    I don’t read about such incidents in connection with European companies and organizations. Are European men less demanding of sexual relations of their female employees and coworkers or are those women more uncomplainingly compliant? I’m doubtful about both of these alternatives, though perhaps there are some differences in degree.

   It will certainly take more knowledge or interest to sort out all these interconnected issues, but one of them is surely the role of the American press. I don’t claim that these goings-on are prompted by the fact that they will be covered in the papers. They do, however, “teach” protagonists on how to behave and how not to behave.

   Perhaps most in important, the almost daily appearance of such accounts about sex in American society fosters the belief that such activities are a normal part of American life, to be regretted, to be sure. But that attempts to eliminate them have to be regarded as futile. If true, sad.

Perhaps I will later have more to say on this subject; perhaps not.