Eros denied. Sex in Western society by Young (1964) is a book about the sexual mores of the West as compared to other societies and cultures. The author states that the subject of sex continues to have a sense of confusion and fear; he states that throughout the West, most spend their entire lives in this hesitant state regarding sex and love. Reasons for this state of mind may be due to human nature as well as societal mores stemming from the structure of Christian and post-Christian attitudes. Sex is excluded from the realm of normal.
Sex is excluded even in the form of certain words; as with English, the French, Italian and German have words which are taboo in conversation and literature. The author views this phenomenon as an example of how we are not at peace with ourselves regarding love and sex; anxiety and quilt is renewed in each generation. Images are also excluded; descriptions and depictions of people having sex are passed around by men in the absence of women. The author states that images of sex are excluded for reasons of discomfort regarding sex, rather than for aesthetics.
American law regulates access to these types of images and uses the word corrupt when regarding law of obscenity. In Britain the legal definition of obscenity regards the phrase deprave and corrupt; in 1868 the Hicklin Judgement provided this law for ninety-one years and the phrase was "corrupt and deprave those who are open to such influences" (p. 54). This is thought to have influenced the United States courts. In all states except New Mexico, laws against obscene publications define obscene with words such as filthy, lewd, or impure.
The author presents categories of erotic books and pictures. The Comic includes works that are not of erotic content but which use the erotic as a vehicle for satire. The Perverse describes and depicts whatever sexual oddity controls the desires of the artist and the beholder; both are locke...