(no subject)

[shadesong]

What = sex, to you?

Where is your boundary?

I've been sitting here trying to articulate what brought me to the question without bringing Other People's Stuff into it and without going into a 5,000-word essay (which I'll later write anyway, for the person whose Stuff it is anyway).

But it's something I'm curious about in general, as I know that my boundaries tend to be a bit fuzzy and amorphous in that regard.

Comments

[terracinque.livejournal.com]

What = sex, to you?

Something other people get to have.

[rhiannonhero.livejournal.com]

Well, I'm exceedingly conservative in this regard. Kissing with tongue is enough for me to consider it to be a sexual act. I don't kiss people with tongue unless they are my sex partner, i.e. husband. But, as I said, I'm personally quite conservative in this regard.

[shawnj.livejournal.com]

This is where I'm at with it as well.

[mister-wolf.livejournal.com]

You're conservative? I'd say, kissing on the lips. =:)

[indrani-prime.livejournal.com]

Clarify?

What is it psychologically? Metaphorically? Biologically?
My first impressions? My cosmic understanding?
All of it?

Sex = Too much to be summed up easily

[slipjig.livejournal.com]

*nods* That's about where I'm at.

[moonfire77.livejournal.com]

idk if i'm on your flist, but this question merits an entry to itself, so check me out in a few minutes.

[zarhooie.livejournal.com]

Hmm.... To me, sex is the physical act of putting a male thingy into a chick thingy. Sexual things, like oral and kissing and wandering hands, are similar to sex because they elicit similar physical and mental reactions (orgasm, hardness for guys, wetness for chicks) but they aren't SEX sex. There are levels to stuff like this. Sex is the final step, the sign of a serious committment. The oral is a step below sex, wandering hands below oral, and kissing below that. I'd kiss just about anyone I was relatively attracted to, would have wandering hands with a few of those, oral with a few of THOSE, and actually fuck maybe 2 or 3 of the ones I'd suck off. Maybe. That's being generous. Then there's the fact that sex with women holds different boundries and levels. Also, you need to take into account that kink play holds different boundries as well, similar to those of sex, but I'm not entirely sure where those lie right now.

Did that make any sense at all?

[silversmoke.livejournal.com]

Questions like this make me dissapointed that I'm not filtered on your flist. If this makes public eye, I wonder what I'm missing. *grin*

I'm a serial monogamist, by nature (though not always by trade, I'll admit), so sex is (in my reality) anything I do with my partner that I wouldn't do with anyone else. By that definition, sometimes sex is an incredibly intimate conversation -- a sharing of secrets that no one else gets -- and sometimes sex is that kiss that's far beyond a European hello, and ends up naked in the afternoon.

Fucking -- as is defined in the Book of Ariana -- is an entirely different matter; Making love is a nauseating term (if you have to remind yourself it's love in the terminology, there's something terribly, terribly wrong); and Getting It On is a broad sweeping generalization that may very well be practiced on the dance floor and perfected with strangers.

[shadesong.livejournal.com]

Questions like this make me dissapointed that I'm not filtered on your flist. If this makes public eye, I wonder what I'm missing. *grin*

*laugh* Not much! Many's the time that I say "Oh, I gotta make a sexfilter post!" and then forget. I don't actually make them all that often. Almost invariably, what I filter is filtered because my partner, whoever it is at the time, wants an audience of under a thousand people. :)

(I never post ANYTHING involving a partner without the partner's specific permission, mind.)

[dindin.livejournal.com]

What = sex, to you?

*blink*

Error, Will Robinson. Question does not compute.

You mean "is oral sex sex" sorta thing? I don't think you'd ask that sort of question.

[shadesong.livejournal.com]

Mmmm. I guess the way the discussion with the person is developing, it's more of an intellectual context. At what point does flirtation with sexual context become sex?

Ach. Hard to describe. He's not awake yet, most likely - time difference. I may be able to elaborate more later.

[eyewrist.livejournal.com]

Hmm...

[nishar.livejournal.com]

What = sex, to you?

She gets me off, it's sex. Doesn't matter if she uses her hands, mouth, hair, vagina, boobs, legs or anus to do it.

[nishar.livejournal.com]

Same applies to women, if i get them off it's sex... or if I try attoo at least. Toys, foreplay, cuffs, etc... all = ssex to me.

[moocowrich.livejournal.com]

For me, sex = intercourse. But I don't think that's what you're really getting at, so I'll babble free-form for a bit about sex.

I make a distinction between what's sex and what's sexual. I think that's more of what you're getting at here, as I understand it: what is sexual? I could be entirely wrong, but I think that's right from the way that I approach it.

A lot of things can be sexual. I'm an extremely touch-sensitive person, so many forms of touching can have sexual undertones. If it's from the right person and in the right context. I think that's the line I'd draw between what is sexual and what isn't. There's got to be some sort of mutual feeling/magnetism/attraction/what-have-you in order for something to be sexual.

As a quick example, I could have sex with a total stranger but not find the experience sexual. I mean, sure, there was sex involved. But it was nothing more than that.

Does that make any sense or relate to what you're asking at all?

[unixwiz.livejournal.com]

Hmm.... As one of the poster above said, To me, sex is the physical act of copulation. Things like oral and kissing and wandering hands, are similar to sex because they elicit similar physical and mental reactions (orgasm, hardness for guys, wetness for chicks) but I tend to view it as foreplay before the final act of copulation. Then there's the fact that sex with a person of your own sex holds different boundries and levels. Also, you need to take into account that kink play holds different boundries as well for both persons. For example, kink play a lot of times isn't about the sex, but more the mental and psychological aspect of each individual with sex being a minor part of the issue.

[wispfox.livejournal.com]

Uh.

Depends on context.

I will shorten sexual activity to sex, depending on context.

So, I have the following boundaries and definitions:

Kissing is the very beginning of things I do not count as simply friendship.

Kissing may or may not mean that I want to do anything else, but anything which involves fooling around above the waist does not need verbal confirmation (but may involve it, if I'm having trouble with body language, or knowing what I want). I tend to shorten this to 'making out'.

Fooling around below the waist, but still clothed, is borderline, here, as I include 'intent to cause orgasm' as something which is beyond simply making out, but I don't have the hard and fast 'must talk at this point' until there is possibility of sexual fluid contact (which includes anal play, even though it's not technically sexual fluids).

Anything which might involve sexual fluid contact a) requires a safer sex conversation, b) requires a fair amount of trust and regular interaction for me to be comfortable with it, and c) requires protection (this can get modified somewhat depending on my trust in other people's safety and care, and on their history and testing status). I think that anything involving sexual fluids is what I tend to think of when I say 'sex'.

I will use 'sexual activity' for any behavior which has sexual intent behind it. Or 'sexual behavior'. Something longer than 'sex', most of the time.

[wispfox.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Much more briefly, sex is any activity which has intent for orgasm behind it. This is often mixed up in my head with the parts of sex which involve sexual fluids and/or anal play, as that specific subset is simply the kinds of behavior which require a safer sex talk, in my world.

Sexual interaction/behaviors is any activity which has intent for arousal, but which may or may not involve intent for orgasm.

[ian-gunn.livejournal.com]

My simplistic definition is: anything involving genitalia, on someones part, with and at least one other person and intent to climax, or at least working in that direction.

[beowabbit]

The boundaries are fuzzy and amorphous for me, too. Rather than come up with an arbitrary bright line, my way of cheating has been to consider it sex if I think the other person would consider it sex. (This means that the same act, with the same personal emotional meaning for me, may count as sex with one person and not with another.)

If I need a bright line, I phrase the question more explicitly (and talk about penetrative sex, genital stimulation, attraction, kissing, etc.).

On a bit of a tangent, I recently had a long-ago ex, with whom I had genital intercourse fairly regularly for the better part of a year, tell me that she’d never had sex with me. I don’t know if she genuinely doesn’t remember or if that’s some sort of weird alternate-universe way of communicating something else. Anyway, I found it truly disturbing, and I think it may take her off my safe-person list. :-(

[beowabbit]

...my way of cheating...

Er, I meant of cheating at answering the question, of course.

[azurelunatic]

Deliberate orgasms is definitely sex on my radar, though I don't pin it down until it actually goes to sticking Tab A in Slot B.

[auryn29a.livejournal.com]

I really, really don't know. My view of sex, sexuality, and sensuality are all screwed up. Some people see an attractive woman and fantasize about throwing her on a bed, ripping her clothes off, and putting bits of themselves inside her orifices. I see the same woman and want to press her against a wall and sink my teeth into her neck. Or, I just want to braid her hair and have her tell me a story.

That "Yours, yours" thing you posted? Pretty damn hot to me. And I'm normally not very domly. It's the emotion of it, though, that gets me. Love is sexy to me. Intimacy is sexy, all sorts of intimacy. hmm. Yes. Hearing a secret is very erotic to me, as far as I understand the concept of erotic. I wonder if that's a fetish.

[fmh.livejournal.com]

I suppose any act that attempts (even unsuccessfully) to bring another person to orgasm.

[miintikwa.livejournal.com]

Sex=passion. Passion/always=sex.

It can be rolling around on the couch with a nekkid friend, it can be serious deep intimate fucking, it can be making love.

It's more tied up with who I'm doing it with than with the actions. Eating can be totally sex with the right person. But then again, I'm weird.

Sex at its finest is a sweaty activity you do until many orgasms have passed. :)

[ysabel.livejournal.com]

Given that I've said things, in all seriousness, like "sex is just advanced flirting" (and the related "flirting is just very casual sex")...

When I had to pin it down at one point, I came up with, "Sex is when one or more people do something with the intent of one or more people reaching orgasm." Doesn't require actually getting there, or intent for more than one person, or what have you.

The one case that I really consider "sex" that this doesn't obviously cover is largely because I don't have a word for that floaty place that sensation play can get you to. It isn't 'orgasm', really, but it's in the exact same category in my head, so for the sake of brevity, yeah, that's covered when I say "orgasm" up there.

[enderfem.livejournal.com]

I like the idea of phrasing it as intent to bring someone to orgasm (and the sexual behavior as intent to arouse, or even arousal without pure intent). I like it partly because I think it is a good definition. I like it partly because it sounds legal, and I am a lawgeek.

[soph-nyc.livejournal.com]

Being close to someone I love in a way that I share with only that person. Can't really think of other people in a sexual way if I have true feelings for someone.

Actually, I wanted to ask if you'd really, really mind adding me back? I can't see your filtered entries as I'm not on your flist anymore, and to minimize and keep from spamming your fpage I could keep you out of additional filters etc. Just... I donno. If you don't mind. I'd make me happy. :)

[azhure.livejournal.com]

For the past few years sex = bad bad. Something I never wanted, something that was painful, something that hurt. Something that violated. Thank you rape.

But recently, it has been slowly changing. Thanks to very understanding people, it is becoming something more. About being free from everything for a while, no baggage, no shackles. Just connecting, and not thinking, and being close.

[shadesong.livejournal.com]

*hugs* I'm glad it's changing...

[thejunebug.livejournal.com]

Anything intimate, even if it's just lying naked next to each other, caressing and kissing. It's all part of the same.