The term sodomy refers generally to anal sex and is normally used to depict anal sex involving two males, even though it has also be used to depict anal sex involving a woman and a man. According to John Boswell a historian, the word sodomy has over time had the meaning, ''everything from normal heterosexual contact in an atypical situation to oral sexual intercourse with animals. In history sodomy as a crime has referred entirely, to male homosexuality, while at other times nearly exclusively to homosexual glut'' (Gomes 1996, p.150).
All through the history America and especially North America, sodomy has been an illegal crime. In early times, death was included as one of the penalties for sodomy. This noting may be significant in that sodomy may be the one sexual crime nearly exclusively associated to the male sexual practice. Additional sexual crimes (mainly adultery) that deserve the death penalty have conventionally been viewed as crimes committed by women. However, the prohibitions in opposition to sodomy have hardly ever been prosecuted. Except in past moments of acute religious stringency, people have been charged with sodomy in general, in conjunction amid other crimes.
Decriminalization of Sodomy has been a very slow process in America. Bans against this practice were lifted in numerous countries in the late twentieth century although they in the United States, they were visibly reinforced. In Bowers v. Hardwick (1986), the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a resident of Georgia State could be prosecuted for the engagement in consensual sodomy in his own residence. After the review of the Lawrence versus Texas hearing a lot of things changed
The issue concerned an interpretation legally, of the U.S. Constitution's Fourth Amendment that prohibits against unreasonable seizure and search. In addition the Court found that Georgia's law prohibiting sodomy was legal. In 2003 court reversed itself and held all laws prohibiting sodomy as unconstitutional
In conclusion, based on the democratic understanding of consensual sexual activities among adults as a human right, sodomy was decriminalized in the U.S.A after the Lawrence ruling and is now widely analyzed and freely discussed.
Works Cited
Bowers v. Hardwick, 478 U.S. 186. 1986.
Gomes, Peter J, The Good Book: Reading the Bible with mind and Heart New York: William and Company 1996. Print
Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558. 2003
