Sexual Orientation in the Early Years

Topic: Sex

Source: Robbins, ANTHRO (124,125)

Relation:

I was skeptical to blog about sex at first, but as I read about the Trobriand people, Ju/Wasi, and Chinese cultures, I found I was too interested in the topic to avoid it. I considered how demographics and social upbringing play a major part in orienting young adults to sex. It made me think about my upbringing, how I was introduced to the idea of sex and what I was led to think about it.

Description:  The first time I saw sexual content I wasn't more than 5 years old, thankfully it was on a TV, but my eyes were covered by mom before I could watch more than a few seconds of it. I had no idea what it was, but I knew that my mom didn't want me to see it. It became habit for me to turn away if breasts were shown in a movie; I'd even leave the room if a sex scene was shown for more than a few seconds. I can vividly remember the first time I actually looked; I was on the all-stars basketball team in seventh grade, and on our road trip back from a victory we decided to watch the hilarious movie "Old School" (The unrated version). So reacting to habit, when the KY-Jelly wrestling match took place in the movie, it wasn't odd to me that I looked away. Sure enough about half my team noticed, and they had been peer pressuring me all season to break away from my somewhat nerdy approaches to things. After being called a "fag" probably 50 times in a minute, we agreed that if I watched the scene we'd just continue the movie, so I watched, and if you've seen old school you'd know it was nothing terrific. I wasn't scared or excited; it felt as if nothing had changed, so why did my mom shield my eyes from the images when I was 5? My take is that she was helping me hold out longer than others, and be able to better control myself for the testosterone filled years ahead. The high school I went to was to put in the nicest way possible: very un-classy. Some kids were losing their virginity at 12, and if you got to be 16 with your "v-card" then you would be ridiculed. I doubt with early years like mine my mom wanted me growing up in a place like that.

Commentary/Analysis:  The importance of sex varies culture to culture, and I think the ease of restriction a society practices reflects the lack of importance sex is to that society. In Chinese society, a woman is to hold her virginity until marriage, and her life can change if she loses it. That requires quite a bit of devotion to the power of sex, more so than the Ju/Wasi, who believe it healthy to practice sexual activities when the cravings begin. A Ju/Wasi said "if a girl grows up not learning to enjoy sex, her mind doesn't develop normally." (Robbins 124) I figure based on other Ju/Wasi customs that men follow similar logic, and personally I've found my life is less problematic when I don't have any sexual relations. My experiences through high school taught me it's easy to get distracted, and that sexual relations lure focus away from more pressing matters.

In a way I envy Chinese women for their self-control, but even after marriage it seems like their sexual relationships never prosper, as husband and wives have specific function. The Trobriand Islanders are the opposite in the sense that they portray their sexuality before marriage, and then cease to afterwards so they can focus on their fertility and motherhood. I guess my approach regarding sexual orientation is to be as physically appealing as possible while seeking someone with particular traits and interests for a long-lasting, healthy, fulfilling relationship. It's not your typical male sexual outlook, but I am not a fan of systems involving multiple partners over short periods of time. So in a way, I use the Trobriand technique to be appealing before I find a long-term partner, but I also derive some from the Chinese method of celibacy until my long-term partner is found, just not to the extent of marriage. Like I said earlier, practicing restriction shows control, gives focus, and it also allows one to wait for the right partner.

Topic: Rituals

Source: CC readings on ritual: 31-33 , Chapter  4 ANTHRO reading

Relation: After reading what creates rituals and how they affect our lives, I witnessed my barber enact her ritual before she began to cut my hair. It helped me realize how very often we go about our rituals without even noticing it.

Description: A few days ago I visited my favorite barber, Mary Glavich, to get my regular haircut. The appointment started with me walking into a room of older women exchanging news and gossip, which is what I expected based off my previous visits. Mary greeted me, and then proceeded to enact the exact same process of preperation to cut my hair as she had done the last time. She began by asking "Jim off the office?" (the haircut I always ask for), and once I nodded she busily began her process. Her first step began by arranging all the needed implements for the cut on a tray with a towel, pulling most of them out of a cleaning solution and going over them with hot water. Next, she spun me around and dipped me back to wash my hair, following with a pre-cut shampooing. Once that wass complete she dried my hair and spun me so I'd face the main mirror again. She ran her fingers through my hair multiple times, to make sure it was straight, and to determine how it would change a cuts look once dried. After a quick run-through with a comb, along with the addition of a fantastic smelling hair product, she is ready to proceed. Here is where I initially realized Mary conducted a ritual before every cut: once my hair was fully prepared, Mary walked over and checked her cell phone, drank out of her canteen, and complimented her co-workers work on another customer (which reminded me of juicing in tattoo parlors).  The only reason these few minor actions caught my attention was because I had seen her do this the time before, and the time before that, each time a minute or two before my cut would begin. Once I had put it all together, I realized that Mary had been conducting her ritual from the time I had sat down to the beginning of her cut; the same ritual she performs over 20 times a day on her customers.

Commentary/Analysis: Rituals are very important, I go through many in a day and I find that if I miss any single one then my mindset will take a turn for the worst. Going about a ritual or routine can relax people, "giving their practitioners a sense of control, and with that, added confidence." (CC, 319) Mary's pre-cut routine is pretty simple, yet makes sense because it makes every one of her customers start at the same page, reguardless of the variety of hair she cuts. The drinking of her water and checking her cell phone are probably just habit, woven into the ritual over time. I'm a satisfied customer of Mary's, and i'd be worried if she was ever to deviate from the pre-cut ritual because it has proven successful so far. Like I said, I can lose it if I'm denied a ritual, and I've found that almost every action throughout my day is a scheduled set of rituals, with few changes day to day. Once we have a ritual down, we have trained ourselves to follow a process we believe leads to a more fulfilled life; and continue to do so until it is proved otherwise. Rituals are empowering, and they serve as a self-imposed training system for us to look to when we need comfort or control. Everyone needs their rituals; without them, we'd have little to revert back to, nothing to practice daily, and a lot less peace in situations when it would help.