Confusion, Consternation and Fascination - Sex Over a Lifetime

I feel obligated to write about what I've learned about sex over a lifetime, but I realize I actually don't know that much.  Which is a shame since sex seems to rule the world - well, money is the big ruler but sex is all mixed up with money anyway.

I guess that since sex is all mixed up with rules, shame, guilt, confusion, judgment and general ignorance, it's no wonder that it hasn't been a big topic of scientific research until the recent past.  Even now, it seems to be a bit taboo as a research subject.

I thought that by the time I reached a ripe old age (which I achieved when I reached 70 two and a half years ago), science would have gathered enough information to at least reduce the misery human beings are in because of sex a little bit.  But not so far as I can see.  I'm sad because I'm probably going to die before much gets better.

So, here's the thing - sex is one of the most powerful urges on the face of the earth.  Hunger is first but right after that comes sex.  And we are all ignorant but we passionately don't believe in our ignorance. Most of us seem to believe we already know everything about sex.  Not knowing that we don't know and believing that we do is the absolute worst kind of ignorance.

And our ignorance is causing misery everywhere.  Here's a partial list:

• Unwanted pregnancies
• Unwanted children
• Parents who never wanted to be parents and who don't know how to be parents or are so messed up themselves that they are unable to parent.  Leading to abused/neglected children who grow up to be dysfunctional adults
• Sexual jealousy leading to violence
• Massive guilt and shame
• Clueless adolescents misusing their sexuality
• Wars fought over beliefs about sexuality
• Rape
• Other types of violence against women
• Unhappy marriage partners
• Hate crimes against gays
• Subjugation of women
• Men believing they're not good enough for all kinds of sexual reasons.
• Young girls believing that their sexuality determines their worth in the world.
• All sorts of bad hard-wiring that causes sexual predation of children, serial killers, etc.
• Politicization of sex - laws governing it, etc.
• AIDs epidemic in Africa

Then, here is a list of the things I wish would happen:

*  Everyone gets operating instructions for how their own body works.  (When I was growing up, there was no information at all.  I guess they thought that if we knew nothing, we would do nothing.  Haha and good luck with that!)
*  Everyone gets operating instructions for how the other sex's body works. 
*  Everyone gets instructions on how to manage their sex drive so that our sex drive doesn't drive us to do things we don't want to do.  This instruction would be mandatory for kids going into puberty.  (I don't mean cold showers.  That's stupid.)  I'm not sure there's even been any research on how to do this.
*  Everyone in or past puberty has easy, free access to birth control so that there are no unwanted pregnancies, no unwanted children, and no parents that don't want to be parents.
*  Everyone who has a child and decides they don't want to be a parent can drop the child off at the local fire station.
*  People who are hardwired to be attracted to children or want to rape or other sadistic sex urges are encouraged to get medication to eliminate their sex drive before they hurt someone.  If they do hurt  someone, they are in prison forever or must undergo mandatory elimination of their sex organs - their choice.
*  Medication to temporarily eliminate sex drive would be readily available to anyone who feels their sexuality is a burden.
*  Last but not least - and this is just a hope that will probably not be realized any time soon - religion that condemns people for their sexuality and sexual expression that hurts no one would cut that out.