Building Moral Sexual Attitudes

Good news, bad news! The good news is that the annual Sex Festival in Guangzhou (which kinda sound like some sort of VD) opened again! The bad news is that is now costs three times as much as it did in 2006. So if you're going to be all sex-fest-ing it up, it will now cost you a whopping $4.50. Hey, that's 30 yuan if you're using yuan! In 2006, that means it was only 10 yuan or...wait. A buck fifty? What kind of a sex festival only charges a buck fifty?

The article over at China Daily gives us a hint or two about that. It says that some of the "activities" that are featured this year are "talks on birth control such as condoms to sex toys, a photo show on sexual health and eugenics, forums on sexology, quizzes and lingerie shows." That doesn't sound very festival-y to me. It sounds like a college course almost.

Now, before the festival, they prepared ("they" being the festival preparers) by having "sexologists gave a series of lectures to middle school and college students, as well as migrant workers. The goal was to improve sexual knowledge and awareness of safe sex, said Zhang Feng, chief of the Guangdong Provincial Commission of Population and Birth Control." That's a diverse target audience there. From middle school children to migrant workers. That pretty much covers it!

Apparently Guangdong (again, such an appropriate name for a place to have a sex festival) has the most migrant workers in China. There are approximately 30 million of them. (That's a lot of migrants, indeed!) So of course, in order to do a study, the sexologists decided that if they survey only 65 of the 30 million migrants they'll have taken a fair enough sample to generalize the entire 30 million migrants from those select 65. Apparently, they're not real big on diversity in China.

From their 65-Migrant Study, they found that 45 of them who were unmarried had premarital sex. They also found that the migrants change partners more frequently than the "local urbanites". Well, of course they do! That's their name. They're migrants. They migrate. It's in their name, what do you expect?

They didn't say what they expected, but they did conclude "Migrants showed greater tolerance toward sex and were more liberal with sex partners." How much "tolerance toward sex" does one really need? Are the sexually intolerant non-migrant folks abundant in China? I didn't know that you had to be "tolerant" of sex. I don't usually think of it as something to be "tolerated". Welcomed, sure! Tolerated? Not usually. (Usually, it's not the "tolerance" that's the issue so much as it is the "availability".) They also stated that the promiscuity among the migrants (yes, those 45 slutty migrants) had "caused sexual and reproduction problems" and that it "was endangering the reproductive health of this group of people." When asked to elaborate on those statements, the individual declined. Thanks for that. Real informative.

Back to the middle schoolers for a moment. Apparently, "the city's Family Planning Commission advised parents to include condoms in their 12-15-year-old kids' schoolbag to prevent unwanted pregnancy and other consequences." Um, what? A condom in their schoolbag?! What would be the "other consequences" they're hoping to prevent?! Learning something instead of having sex (with the condom that was packed in your lunch next to a sandwich and a bag of chips)?! If you're putting a condom in your kid's schoolbag, are you thinking they're going to be having sex at school? That's where they're going! It's right there in the name of the bag! Are they enrolled in Underage Fornication 101! That is not a good idea, contrary to what the Festival folks claim is a method to "promote civilized concepts of sex." I don't know when 12-15 year olds having sex was accepted as a "civilized concept", but I'll pass on civility if that's what it includes. Thanks anyway.

The fourth sex festival that they held had the theme "building moral sexual attitudes". And that seems like a worthwhile theme or cause to have for something. But then I saw pictures of some of the activities that they had that year and they looked like this:

Um, I'm not so sure that my definition of a "moral sexual attitude" is the same as theirs over there. I mean, that's not what I pictured a wall full of "moral sexual attitude" to look like at all. Not even close. And I'm not so sure that the guys below knew what they were in for when they planned their little excursion to the festival. Or, at the very least, were surprised at the seemingly new and improved definition of "moral sexual attitude". (They also seem like they would be very "tolerant" of the "moral sexual attitude" that is on display.)


The women below who are promoting the "moral sexual attitude" seem to have misplaced the ass portion of their "moral sexual outfits." It doesn't appear, however, that anyone seems to mind.


But what is with this poster that seems to be about HIV?? Seriously? It that his ass?? Yes, yes, I believe it is! That guy in the photo is so surprised, he's calling people to tell them! "No, I'm not kidding! It's his ass! His ass, I tell you!" Come on, China!

One of the festival organizers was quoted as saying, "China has a totally different attitude towards sex from many countries. We should not only promote a bold, open attitude, as in Western countries, but also preserve healthy, traditional views on sex." OK, then. You guys let us know when you get to those "healthy traditional preservative views". Can't wait to see your interpretation of those!

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