Human male sexuality - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Human male sexuality covers physiological

Physiology

Physiology is the science of the function of living systems. This includes how organisms, organ systems, organs, cells, and bio-molecules carry out the chemical or physical functions that exist in a living system. The highest honor awarded in physiology is the Nobel Prize in Physiology or...

, psychological

Psychology

Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...

, social

Interpersonal relationship

An interpersonal relationship is an association between two or more people that may range from fleeting to enduring. This association may be based on limerence, love, solidarity, regular business interactions, or some other type of social commitment. Interpersonal relationships are formed in the...

, cultural

Culture

Culture is a term that has many different inter-related meanings. For example, in 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions...

, and political

Politics

Politics is a process by which groups of people make collective decisions. The term is generally applied to the art or science of running governmental or state affairs, including behavior within civil governments, but also applies to institutions, fields, and special interest groups such as the...

aspects of the human

Human

Humans are the only living species in the Homo genus...

male sexual response and related phenomenon. It encompasses a broad range of issues, including male sexual desires

Libido

Libido refers to a person's sex drive or desire for sexual activity. The desire for sex is an aspect of a person's sexuality, but varies enormously from one person to another, and it also varies depending on circumstances at a particular time. A person who has extremely frequent or a suddenly...

and behaviors which as a part of human sexuality

Human sexuality

Human sexuality is the awareness of gender differences, and the capacity to have erotic experiences and responses. Human sexuality can also be described as the way someone is sexually attracted to another person whether it is to opposite sexes , to the same sex , to either sexes , or not being...

, have also been addressed by principles of ethics

Ethics

Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality—that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.Major branches of ethics include:...

, morality

Morality

Morality is the differentiation among intentions, decisions, and actions between those that are good and bad . A moral code is a system of morality and a moral is any one practice or teaching within a moral code...

, and religion

Religion

Religion is a collection of cultural systems, belief systems, and worldviews that establishes symbols that relate humanity to spirituality and, sometimes, to moral values. Many religions have narratives, symbols, traditions and sacred histories that are intended to give meaning to life or to...

Human male sexual response

Male homosexuality

The Western "homosexual" category has been related to the non-Western "third gender

Third gender

The terms third gender and third sex describe individuals who are categorized as neither man nor woman, as well as the social category present in those societies who recognize three or more genders...

" category. It has been cast as a redefinition and expansion of the third gender category to include all biological males who acknowledge having same-sex attraction

Same-sex attraction

Same-sex attraction is a term occasionally used instead of the more common term homosexuality to refer to a person's feelings of sexual attraction toward members of the same gender identity....

s (instead of only effeminate males). This extension of the third gender is due to various factors that were unique to the Western world, including widespread influence of Christianity

Christianity

Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...

and, as a result, encouragement of opposite-sex relationships. Before the concept of sexual orientation

Sexual orientation

Sexual orientation describes a pattern of emotional, romantic, or sexual attractions to the opposite sex, the same sex, both, or neither, and the genders that accompany them. By the convention of organized researchers, these attractions are subsumed under heterosexuality, homosexuality,...

was developed in the modern West, only the effeminate males who sought receptive sex from men were seen as a different gender category. The Western equivalents to the third genders, and not men with same-sex attractions, are the ones who started and propagated the Western concept of homosexuality

Homosexuality

Homosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, or romantic attractions" primarily or exclusively to people of the same...

.

While many non-Western societies show hostility towards the concept of homosexuality

Homosexuality

, they do accept both men who have sex with men

Men who have sex with men

Men who have sex with men are male persons who engage in sexual activity with members of the same sex, regardless of how they identify themselves; many men choose not to accept sexual identities of homosexual or bisexual...

and third genders who have sex with men within the indigenous cultural parameters, just not as "homosexuals."

Thus, there is a strong link between what the West calls "sexual orientation" and the non-West calls "gender orientation," what the West calls "homosexual" and the non-West calls "third gender," and what the West calls "straight" and the non-West calls "masculine men."

In the West, a man cannot acknowledge or display sexual attraction for another man without the homosexual

Homosexuality

or bisexual

Bisexuality

Bisexuality is sexual behavior or an orientation involving physical or romantic attraction to both males and females, especially with regard to men and women. It is one of the three main classifications of sexual orientation, along with a heterosexual and a homosexual orientation, all a part of the...

label being attached to him.

The same pattern of shunning the homosexual identity, while still having sex with men, is quite prevalent in the non-West.

Origins of the homosexual-heterosexual divide

In the 1860s, German

Germans

The Germans are a Germanic ethnic group native to Central Europe. The English term Germans has referred to the German-speaking population of the Holy Roman Empire since the Late Middle Ages....

third gender

Third gender

Karl Heinrich Ulrichs

for the periodical directory, see Ulrich's Periodicals DirectoryKarl-Heinrich Ulrichs , is seen today as the pioneer of the modern gay rights movement.-Early life:...

coined a new terminology for third genders that he called "urnings," which was supposed to mean "men who like men." These urnings were the "females inside male bodies" who were emotionally or sexually attracted to men. Ulrichs thought, as did most members of the third sex who popularized the term "homosexual" for themselves, that masculine men can never have sexual desires for other men, and a male necessarily had to be feminine gendered or had to have a female inside him to be attracted to men. This was as per his own experience as well as the fact that men had sex with men only secretively due to some religious persecutions of the act during that time.

Ulrichs also defined the men

Man

The term man is used for an adult human male . However, man is sometimes used to refer to humanity as a whole...

(as opposed to third genders) as "diones," meaning "men who like women."

Later, Austrian

Austrians

Austrians are a nation and ethnic group, consisting of the population of the Republic of Austria and its historical predecessor states who share a common Austrian culture and Austrian descent....

third gender

Third gender

and human rights

Human rights

Human rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...

activist Karl Maria Kertbeny coined the terms "homosexual

Homosexuality

" and "heterosexual

Heterosexuality

Heterosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the opposite sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, heterosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, physical or romantic attractions to persons of the opposite sex";...

." For most of this period, these terms were popular only amongst the third gender and scientific communities, the latter of which was developing the concept of homosexuality as a mental disorder.

Thus, the idea of "men who like men" being different from "men who like women", as well as the idea of differentiating male sexuality between "heterosexuality" and "homosexuality," was born. The underlying factor for division, however, remained gender orientation (masculinity

Masculinity

Masculinity is possessing qualities or characteristics considered typical of or appropriate to a man. The term can be used to describe any human, animal or object that has the quality of being masculine...

and femininity

Femininity

Femininity is a set of attributes, behaviors, and roles generally associated with girls and women. Though socially constructed, femininity is made up of both socially defined and biologically created factors...

). Mainstream men, who were now decidedly "heterosexual," however, rarely related with these terms, as they saw themselves as neither heterosexual or homosexual for a long time. Even to this day, "straight" men in the West, quite like men in the East, seldom relate strongly with sexual identities

Sexual identity

Sexual identity is a term that, like sex, has two distinctively different meanings. One describes an identity roughly based on sexual orientation, the other an identity based on sexual characteristics, which is not socially based but based on biology, a concept related to, but different from,...

. These identities, however, remain a strong focus within the LGBT community.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

Human male sexual response

Male homosexuality

Origins of the homosexual-heterosexual divide

See also

External links