Kinsey essay

Alfred Kinsey In the early twentieth century a time a time where sex was an unspeakable subject, when adolescents were taught that masturbation was not only a sin , but could cause blindness or hairy palms, along came Alfred Kinsey, who first started as a biologist studying gall wasps, and suddenly turned his interest from insects to people, disturbed by the lack of scientific knowledge concerning human sexuality he released a series of books called sexual behavior in the human male, next to human behavior of the human female based on the interview of thousands of people. These books purported to show that the average person engaged in all manners of sexual behavior such as homosexuality, adultery, masturbation and pornography at rates no one will guess. His studies are now considered immensurable, but are Kinsey’s findings a true liberator of truth or just a perversion that incites immoral behaviors? Kinsey’s interests in sexual behavior were mainly caused by the restrictions imposed at home by his father who was an extremist conservative. He imposed strict rules on the household including outlawing social relationships with girls, prohibited knowledge of anything remotely sexual that eventually lead Kinsey a bigger interest in the subject. By the time he got married he found himself ignorant of any sexual practice and he began his research. He started with a marital course and then he travelled throughout the country to interview people about their sexual life. He’s studies were not only based on the interviews of other’s sexual experiences, he puts himself into the test too and kept record of all of his sexual experiences. He claimed that humans are sexual from birth. Discussing that masturbation was a very popular practice. Approximately 87 per cent of men have had at least one homosexual experience, and of those a third would choose exclusive homosexuality, a third would remain in the middle, and another third would move onto heterosexuality. He talked about marriage saying premarital sex is common, and monogamy was not primary necessary. He even seeks out on subjects such as pedophiles and young boys sexual activities. We have to give credit to Kinsey for challenging our way of thinking, but not every finding he did is accurate nor was everything he preached positive, we have to let our common sense do the rest and have a real balance between morality and human behavior. We cannot say that monogamy is a dumb practice, that sex shouldn’t involve emotional attachment, and saying that 90% of the population is bisexual is totally wrong. One thing is for sure Kinsey led a way to knowledge on topics such as homosexuality, masturbation, pedophilia, zoophile or premarital sex. etc. Even thou Kinsey’s research brought out to the open many concerning subjects still today some places live with these ” social restrictions” as Kinsey called them. A never ending battle of common sense versus hypocrisy where People have known things like these were going on all the time, but they simply decided to ignore them and edit it as immoral or sinful, but thankfully not all societies work that way. Throughout time some positions have change and tolerance, diversity, psychological and marital help are present today.