I ran across a forum where the person was asking how to make crossing a sexual taboo believable. My assumption was that this was meant in terms of writing about it happening.
My forum posts are generally infamous for being a) poor attempts at humor and b) almost more long winded than my submitted stories. However this one began to even give me pause as the hours rolled past and I didn't run out of things to say on the subject.
And so, I pasted what started as a simple forum discussion response into a working document and began to get more serious.
To be honest, I have no good reason beyond the fact that it stirred my imagination and began to make me question my own perceptions of just what is taboo and, more germane, what makes crossing a taboo sexual rubicon believable.
The first question that came to me as I began to get more serious is just who the hell I thought I was to address the topic with anything remotely resembling authority. I have the overwhelming desire to stand and say, "Hi. My name is Acktion and I am a sexual addict."
That small attempt at humor probably offended some people. But, the fact is that it is true. I am a medically diagnosed sexual addict. I think that is why, in my misspent youth, I wasted a lot of time and money taking college courses and studying outside materials to become an addiction counselor and sex therapist which I then chickened out of.
Or, perhaps I just realized that putting me in a situation where I would be counseling someone else with a sexual addiction would be a lot like handing a three year old a flare gun. You aren't sure what will happen, but you can be sure it will make the papers.
But, I digress.
Despite going in a different direction professionally, I had a strong drive to learn and understand sexuality as fully as I could. By that, I do not just mean watching pornography and reading erotic fiction. Although I have certainly done more than my fair share of that. Usually with the hand that isn't on my mouse in my pants.
I also read research papers. The kind with abstracts at the beginning and statistics laced throughout. I knew I was different. Now, I needed to know how I was different. And if it was possible for me to be normal.
Normal, by the way, is a myth in my studied opinion. There is no normal. There's just that little voice that is telling you to clear your browser history before you log for the night. But, that may just be my addiction talking.
We're going to be at this a long time if you keep letting me get off topic that way.
As a result of my studies into the topic of sexuality, both prurient and non, I know a bit more than some on the topic and a bit less than others. I don't pretend to stand atop a mountain of research guided by my own hand or to have more than the two degrees I actually possess.
Instead, I merely challenge any who have made it this far to read on and decide for themselves if what I have to say makes sense, to research the scattering of topics I have hinted at rather than boldly citing just one or two, and at the end, to make up their own damned minds.
What is a taboo?
If you look through the categories on Literotica.com, you will find, about halfway down, one marked "incest/taboo".
Meaning absolutely zero disrespect to Laurel or Manu, I have often wondered about that seeming redundancy. Is there anyone who doesn't think incest is taboo whether it horrifies or tittilates them?
But, what about gay or lesbian sexual relationships? Don't those meet the definition of a taboo relationship? What about Anal sex in a heterosexual relationship? Are there not people out there who think such is wrong and possibly even sinful?
Just what does the word taboo mean anyway?
According to Wikipedia (since I'm too lazy to turn on the lights and look for my three dictionaries);
"A taboo is a vehement prohibition of an action based on the belief that such behavior is either too sacred or too accursed for ordinary individuals to undertake, under threat of supernatural punishment. Such prohibitions are present in virtually all societies.
"The word has been somewhat expanded in the social sciences strong prohibitions relating to any area of human activity or custom that is sacred or forbidden based on moral judgment and religious beliefs.
"'Breaking a taboo' is usually considered objectionable by society in general, not merely a subset of a culture."
Hmm. Okay. I'm not smart enough to disprove that and smart enough to know it and not to try.
However, what precisely constitutes "a society"? Just what is the cut off point that marks the number of people that can be a society? Is a belief any less strongly held because it is held by a family of four when just up the street a family of two is openly violating it?
Does the ostracism when one within the sociatal construct of four violates it hurt any less than if it had been a village of four hundred?
Is the naughty eroticism and guilty pleasure of courting disfavor by breaking it any less?
I'll let wiser and more interested heads than mine explore that to their heart's content. If it doesn't fall under the heading of sex, it doesn't touch upon my interest nor upon the titular topic of this paper.
I will only argue that for the purpose of this paper, something is sexually taboo to the individual if they are raised within a belief system, however large or small, that professes it to be. In short, if they believe it to be sexually taboo then it is for them.
And a taboo is by definition "a vehement (or extremely strongly held) prohibition of an action".
Anybody who thinks that racism is dead has their head buried in the sand. It may not be as prevalent as it was in the sixties or as open. But it's still around. Hell, less time ago than most would believe I watched a town be [B]forced[/B]to change a city ordinance and take down a plaque that read, "Nigger don't let the sun go down on you in town."
Ageism is alive and well too regardless of what we read in the Hollywood tabloids. So are anti-Semitism and other religious differences. As are the separation of classes. Hell, regardless of the popularity of "Fifty Shades of Grey", bondage and dominance are still anathema to John Q. Public and his upright community bearing. And many professed religious peoples still frown on anal as sodomy and a sin worth turning the ones who commit it into pillars of salt.
Hey, think about this one for a minute. The three most volatile subjects statistically are politics, religion, and sex. Yet, sex is the only one of the three that we hide not only from our neighbors but often from people living in the same house with us!
What's taboo now, eh?
Peer and family pressures are so abundant that I often wonder just how the hell anyone gets together at all to continue the species.
So what would make someone violate a long held taboo, beit personal, familial, or larger? More to the point for this particular work, what would make a reader have absolutely no choice but to believe that a character would break a taboo?
The answer is both simple and complex. Human sexuality is a direct result of three primary factors amidst secondary and tertiary causes.
The first and, arguably, most important is the biochemical balance (or imbalance) of the individual. I could cite chemical equations about dopamine and prolactin and other neurotransmitters, but the papers are out there for any who wants to Google "neurotransmitters in sexual response", so I will try not to bore any who don't care about the science of it.
The second is that it is an emotional response for the human animal as much, and in some cases more, than a physiological one. Very few people that have had a near death experience have not noted an overwhelming desire for sexual contact once the shaking stops.
We are not animals and are not driven purely by procreation, else we would not seek out sex during time periods when the eggs can not be fertilized. Again, there are papers about "the emotive drive of human sexuality" for those so inclined, so I will not belabor the point.
The third and final point I would posit as the last of the primary palate for sexual desire is a mental one. To be brief, curiosity.
Ask what someone was thinking when they broke a taboo and you may as well ask why it was that Columbus sailed the ocean. Or why Lewis and Clark walked across what we know as the American continent. Curiosity has often been cited as a driving force behind what, in some cases, made no sense otherwise. Hasn't almost everybody heard "if it ain't broke, don't try to fix it" at some point or another?
Other factors do have their part to play as well. Age for example. Generally, the older a person becomes, the more set they become in their ways unless there is some [B]radical[/B] life changing event to set their preconceived notions on end. The younger they are, the more likely they are to be experimental without some perception altering experience thundering down like Thor's hammer.
However, if you examine it closely, this is actually just a composite of the curiosity of the third and the physiological aspects of the first combined. While there may be a fourth primal cause that is not a combination of these factors, it is beyond what I have found in my studies.
So, what would make a scenario plausible in which someone ignored pressures to stay within determined sexual boundaries from virtually everyone around them?
First, they would have to have the biochemical drive. To wit, horny. Then they would have to have an emotional cue. Rebellion works. So does "love", whatever emotional response is intended by that four letter word. Finally, they would have to be curious.
