Human sexuality as it has been perceived is given a different twist in “Kinsey”. Denouncing the social attitudes of his time that simply repressed human sexuality, he is shown to be a pioneer of his time, shocking the world with the presented actual sexual practices, including premarital sex and masturbation.
The movie is clearly shows the sheer ignorance that distinguished societies of the 30s and even 400s and how misinformed people were back then in terms of human sexuality. For example, it was believed that oral sex had a devastating impact on a woman’s fertility, which is nothing close to the truth as we now know. That prevailing societal status urged Dr. Kinsley to start exploring and diving into the world of human sexuality and show them how much more intimacy they could have with their sexual partner if they left behind all primitive concepts of sexual behaviors. As a matter of fact, Dr. Kinsey managed to make people open up as he listened to their sex-oriented queries, which in turns fed his flair to provide the world with facts that would better their sex life and overall wellbeing.
Dr.Kinsey seems to be particularly intrigued by Freud’s sex-related psycho-analytical experimentations, and appears to be a successor of human sexuality behavior studies, which is what made him a research genius in sex-centered topics after World War II.
That being said, “Kinsey” demonstrates societal values as well. For example, when he decided to study at the university without first saying anything to his father, the latter was annoyed as he was the senior in the family and had the right to know about doings of his family. Kinsey’s father appears to be a close-minded individual as he thought down of his wife for being a 4th grade graduate, hence had no ability to participate and comprehend his and their sons’ conversations, who had much higher education, which is something that made Kinsey Jr angry. However, when Kinsey became a father, he seemed to be just as irritable with his son as his own father was, which makes us wonder if certain human behaviors are adopted and passed on from our early childhood to our adulthood.
Kinsey’s human sexuality research had run the extra mile, as he studied a wide array of aspects in human sexuality, including homosexuality, which was considered an outrage back then. He also submerged to people’s minds and revealed their inner thought and passion as to what makes them sexually challenged, such as asking their sexual partners to have intercourse with other partner, out of sheep pleasure deriving from watching or knowing that their sex partner had been having sexual experiences with another individual.
However, there are ethical issues arising in the movie. When does human sexual experimentation stop? According to Kinsley’s reply on that question, nobody can do whatever they want when having a sexual experience. No one should be hurt or forced to do something they do not want to do. An example of the boundaries people arise in regards to human sexuality is Kinsley’s assistant. It seems that he had a hard time staying unbiased when that doctor that knocked on Kinsley’s door with a huge volume of personal sexual statistics and data, alongside patients’ sex-related information, admitted to have more than 200 sexual experiences with males before their adulthood.
Human sexuality has definitely been introduced in an entire different way in “Kinsley”. Searching into deep, societal norms in regards proper sexual behaviors break and the world embraces new concepts, where humans can take much pleasure from a sexual experience. Of course, like Dr.Kinsley said, everything is allowed as long as there is consent and no one is hurting another individual.
References:
Bill Condon (director) (2004), Kinsey (motion picture). America: Fox Searchlight Pictures
