Sexuality and Technology

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“Preparing children and young people for the transition to adulthood has always been one of humanity’s great challenges, with human sexuality and relationship at its core. Today, in a world with AIDS, how we meet this challenge is our most important opportunity in breaking the trajectory of the epidemic.” Michel Sidibé, Executive Director, UNAIDS.

This is where technology comes…. Very many innovations have been created by people to receive a range of conflicting and confusing or correct and informative messages about sexuality and gender as a whole.

Technology’s fundamental purpose is improve what we do better and it is no secret, we do a lot of sex! This is in the form of how we have sex, and with whom (or what) we have sex with.

A lot of people, myself included, focus a lot of our energy on sex, so it makes sense that a huge amount of effort has gone into applying technology to sex and sexual expression. We have taken it so far to creating fucking machines to cybersex and BDSM-geared software to teledildonics.

We even realized that eating food directly before sex is a hustle so we introduced chemical aphrodisiacs. While many things about the way we have sex physically have obviously been changed by advances in technology, there has also been a catalyst in the cultural sexual revolutions.

The Internet has forever altered how subcultures can communicate with one another and has largely destroyed limitations imposed by geographic isolation… *thank you f**kbook… sorry Facebook*. Even open-source software technologies are finding ways to enterprise software applications into sex toys for computer-aided play of all stripes and colors.

Today, there are still dildos (and butt-plugs) made out of stone and the like, but we also have synthetic materials like rubber, silicon, and even something called “CyberSkin” –a synthetic material that behaves like flesh–as well as materials like glass and stainless steel. These are all technological sex tools.

When we think about the advancements in biochemistry sciences, certain chemical toys are also appearing on the market. It’s becoming much more commonplace to see things like “arousal gels” and “warming lubes” on pharmacy shelves. Viagra, of course, is the most often talked about chemical and medical advance in years, it is even promoted in movies.

But that is not enough people are very curious to refine chemical substances for the purpose of bettering their sex lives. They have gone to the trouble to create substances called aphrodisiacs which range from foods such as oysters and garlic to strange items like rhino horns that are supposed to imbue the possessor with sexual potency and desire.

Then the telecommunication technologies, most notably the Internet, this has ignited a renaissance of exploration, discussion, and self-discovery across the globe. The technology effects on our sexual life have changed our society and the fundamental aspects of how we live, work and spend time with each other and the things we spend time with. In that regard our young people are suffering with sexuality issues and these technologies are answering the question for them.

In that regard Reach a Hand Uganda has a unique campaign called The Sautiplus with a unique approach that has been designed to embrace the growing and innovative technologies in social media, radio/TV, mobile phones, print and digital media to address sexual issues, effects of HIV/AIDS among young people in Uganda. They are using the available technological platforms to distribute comprehensive Sexuality Education messages to not only young people in-school but also by reaching to the out school ones.

If you check out their activities on their website and social media platforms you will see what I’m talking about.

I think with the use of the same technology that is develop/developed the above tools we can share our knowledge about sex. It should be known that the technologies used by young people change quickly and the use of digital technology is increasingly the norm among youth.

Young people use mobile phones and social media in order to communicate and obtain information. They also use it to meet and date other young people, and sometimes to “hook up” for casual sex. I think us adults can use the same means to educate them about sex values, risks and effects.

“We should be using automation to leverage data on consumer behavior to target appropriate messaging just the way advertisers do. Might we connect educational messages to people whose profiles are young and have searched for information on HIV/AIDS or have watched pornography? We must quickly learn to integrate messaging with the changing nature of social media; Tinder, a social media where you can “like” people nearby and meet them, would be a natural place to add in reminders on condom use.”

Let young people run their own sexual messaging…..