Sexual Recession in a Pandemic
The last time I had sex was February 2020. A few weeks before the first lockdown, I was at a familiar club night at the Wee Red Bar, in Edinburgh College of Art, and I bumped into someone who I’d been dating at the time. That was the last time I brought someone back to my flat and thinking back to the then familiar routine of lighting candles, diming my coloured lamp or playing the perfect playlist, it feels like quite a distant memory now. I had no idea, at the time, that would be the last time I would have sex for over a year. Like me, many single people have not had sex during this pandemic. For the most part of the past year, sex between single people has technically been illegal. I am interested in this prolonged period of not having sex and how that reveals/shapes attitudes to sex.
In the Refinery29 (2021) article ‘I’ve Been Celibate For A Year Because Of Coronavirus’, the author depicts a loss of intimacy and comfort and companionship in the absence of sex, which, as someone having a similar experience of sexuality in the past year, I can relate to. They describe the ‘sexual recession’ (Refinery29, 2021) which single people have been experiencing during the pandemic and defines this lack of sex as a form of celibacy due to their choosing not to have sex in order to follow the rules. The choice between protecting vulnerable people in our community and having sex has led to many people, a quarter of Brits, not having sex in the past year (Refinery29, 2021). The particular COVID-19 guidelines in Britain has been described as a major oversight in policy – other countries have recognised the need for intimacy and sex, even in a pandemic (Williams, 2021). Indeed, the ‘sexual recession’ in Britain reveals attitudes to single people/ sexuality within our society, which prioritises and values the nuclear family above all other sexual relationships. In other countries, such as Belgium, they invented the concept of a ‘knuffelcontact’ which is widely understood as a casual sexual partner (Williams, 2021). More generously, the oversight in policy in the UK could be seen as British prudishness, however I feel that this absence of sex can be a critique of sexuality in society.
The impact of this sexual recession is yet to be fully understood but I feel as though the pandemic has drastically changed my self/body image, my level of social anxiety and even how I view myself sexually. Although, the pandemic guidelines has controlled my sex life, I interviewed a friend who has been having sex during this time, she stated:
It sounds selfish but I wasn’t thinking about breaking lockdown, I saw it as comparable to going for a walk or seeing friends outside – it sounds very selfish but I felt I got similar things from having sex as doing those other things.
Inevitably, sex still happens – global pandemic or not. How governments respond to the need for intimate connection reveals normative attitudes to sex in society.
Anonymous, (2021). I’ve Been Celibate For A Year Because Of Coronavirus. Available at: https://www.refinery29.com/en-gb/2021/01/10269891/celibate-covid. (Accessed: 20 March 2021).
Williams, Zoe. (2021). ‘We are desperate for human contact’: The People Breaking Lockdown To Have Sex. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2021/feb/11/we-are-desperate-for-human-contact-the-people-breaking-lockdown-to-have-sex
This is a really engaging post, and you draw out some really important themes. You note that ‘the ‘sexual recession’ in Britain reveals attitudes to single people/ sexuality within our society, which prioritises and values the nuclear family above all other sexual relationships’ and while I agree, I also wonder what this approach tells us about ideas about sex and sexuality in the UK. It also raises the question of what sex is, as much of what you describe here and that I’ve read elsewhere is an absence of intimacy, which may or may not include sex. While the post is very strong, it really needs to engage with relevant course literature. The readings from the week on the absence of sex, and particularly the Moriki reading might be helpful.