Is Oral Sex Really Sex?

When President Bill Clinton addressed the people regarding his scandal with Monica Lewinsky, he told the people that he did not have sexual relations with Monica. Although oral sex was performed, Clinton's view of oral sex is not really sex. It has been ten years since Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky had a scandalous relationship in the Whitehouse however, oral sex still remains to be a mainstream topic. There have been a lot of debates over whether oral sex is really sex.

Federal data have found out that more than half of teenagers aged 15 to 19 have received and/or given oral sex and that these teenagers do not perceived oral sex as real sex. To be specific, 55 % of 15 to 19 year old boys and 54 % of girls were reported to have given or gotten oral sex. The percentages of teenagers that have oral sex are greater than those of teenagers who have been reported to have had sexual intercourse. This means that for most of the teenagers that are abstaining from having sexual intercourse, oral sex is a likely alternative since they perceive it to be not real sex. For most of these teenagers, their perception of real sex is through penetration, and anything else besides penetration does not count as sex. Teenagers also believed that you can still be a virgin even if you have had oral sex already (Sharon Jayson, 2005).

A 1999 study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association examined the definition of sex based on 599 college students spread over 29 states of the United States. In the study, sixty percent defined oral sex or the oral-genital contact did not constitute as having real sex (Sharon Jayson, 2005).
Many teenagers nowadays practice non-vaginal sex or oral sex because of their general belief that oral sex is safer and is simply not the same as having real sex. Teenagers also perceive that virginity is lost only with the first experience of real sex which they believe is penetrative sex. Teenagers also believe that becoming pregnant would not happen from having oral sex and that makes it attractive to many teenagers who are hesitant about buying contraceptives or having their dates pregnant (Susan Erasmus, n.d.).

The real question now is whether these teenagers of today and Bill Clinton are right in defining and believing that oral sex is not really sex. Let us try to answer this question by looking into the different definitions of sexual terms.

Sex is defined by different dictionaries, medical dictionaries and encyclopedias as the demographic difference between male and female based on their anatomical and physiological differences that are related to maleness and femaleness and are related to reproduction (Sex n.d.). If we based our answer on this legal definition of sex, then oral sex is definitely not real sex. However, sex is also referred to as sexual intercourse and therefore there is a need to define what sexual intercourse means.

There are numerous definitions of sexual intercourse which can be found in dictionaries and encyclopedias. Different definitions of this term would imply different answers to whether oral sex is real sex or not.

One definition of sexual intercourse is the act of sexual procreation between a man and a woman wherein the man's penis is inserted into the woman's vagina and excited until orgasm is reached and ejaculation occurs (Sexual intercourse n.d.). If we base our debate on this definition alone, then we would agree with Clinton and the other teenagers that oral sex is indeed not real sexual intercourse because there is no insertion of a man's penis into a woman's vagina. Oral sex between heterogeneous couples would often be man's penis to woman's mouth which is also known as fellatio or a woman's vagina to a man's mouth which is also known as cunnilingus.

The American Heritage Stedman's Medical Dictionary defines sexual intercourse as the sexual union between humans involving genital contact other than vaginal penetration of the penis (Sexual intercourse n.d.). In this definition, the phrase other than vaginal penetration means that sexual intercourse considers the insertion of a man's penis into other openings of the woman which might include the mouth or the rectum. If we base our answer on this definition then oral sex is indeed real sex.

All in all there are different definitions from different sources about what sex or sexual intercourse really is. Several definitions limit sex or sexual intercourse only to the insertion of the male genitals to that of the female genitals in the act of procreation or reproduction while others include different sexual activities other than that of the vaginal insertion of the man's penis.

The question still remains on what definition of sexual intercourse or sex to base upon. This would be answered by the values of the person choosing the definition.

For most teenagers and especially to Bill Clinton, they would choose the definition of sex as the penetration of the male penis into the female vagina so that they would get away with having oral sex and so that they would not feel guilty about losing their virginity or having casual sex. For older generations, oral sex, anal sex and other forms of sexual activities are considered to be real sex because it stimulates and arouses the genitals of male and female to have the end result of orgasm and ejaculation.

REFERENCES:

Sharon Jayson (10/19/2005). 'Technical Virginity' becomes part of teens' equation. Health and Behavior. USA Today. http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2005-10-19-teens-technical-virginity_x.htm
Susan Erasmus. Is oral sex really sex? Tips and Techniques. Health24. http://www.health24.com/sex/Tips_techniques/1253-1254,12205.asp
Sex. (n.d.). The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition. Retrieved May 22, 2007, from Answers.com Web site: http://www.answers.com/topic/sex
Sexual intercourse. (n.d.). WordNet 1.7.1. Retrieved May 22, 2007, from Answers.com Web site: http://www.answers.com/topic/sexual-intercourse
Sexual intercourse. (n.d.). The American Heritage Stedman's Medical Dictionary. Retrieved May 22, 2007, from Answers.com Web site: http://www.answers.com/topic/sexual-intercourse