{"id":1795,"date":"2018-11-06T07:00:34","date_gmt":"2018-11-06T13:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/?p=1795"},"modified":"2018-11-06T07:01:32","modified_gmt":"2018-11-06T13:01:32","slug":"are-baby-boomers-bringing-the-sexual-revolution-to-aging-are-seniors-today-re-defining-sex","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/2018\/11\/06\/are-baby-boomers-bringing-the-sexual-revolution-to-aging-are-seniors-today-re-defining-sex\/","title":{"rendered":"Are Baby Boomers Bringing the Sexual Revolution to Aging? Are Seniors Today Re-defining Sex?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Reposted from Psychology Today<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Americans live longer than ever before, with life expectancy increasing from 60 to 80 years of age over the 20th Century. Baby boomers are living what sociologist Phyllis Moen calls a\u00a0Third Act,<\/a>\u00a0discovering new ways to experience healthy active years after\u00a0retirement<\/a>. With a rapid increase in life expectancy and rising expectations for the quality of life, baby boomers are forging new ways of aging. So what does this mean for\u00a0sexuality<\/a>? Are we beginning to see gender equality between the sheets among the aging boomers?<\/p>\n

Remember, it was only 40 years ago that women were considered\u00a0sexually obsolete after menopause<\/a>\u00a0(and, many times, even earlier). Men defined their virility by their ability to get and sustain an erection. Today these may seem like ridiculous calculators of age and sexual fitness as both culture and technology has changed the ways we think about sex and gender.<\/p>\n

Boomers pioneered the Sexual Revolution of the \u201860s and yet, they did so after having been raised with the sexual script that men pursue and women submit. This permitted men to interpret an awkward \u201cno, thank you\u201d rejection as a possible \u201cyes\u201d in the making. Still, it was a radical shift in our cultural norms for men to be able to take a woman to bed before promising\u00a0marriage<\/a>\u00a0and for women to seek sexual pleasure outside of relationships. After all, the one night stand of the boomer generation precluded the \u201chook-up culture<\/a>\u201d of today\u2019s Millennials.<\/p>\n

While much misogyny remained, and gender inequality is still a futuristic goal, the boomers did liberate sex from marriage and made the right to sexual pleasure a human right. Now, it appears that boomers must\u2014once again\u2014break the gender rules set by generations before them when it comes to\u00a0sex after 50.<\/a><\/p>\n

For men,\u00a0erectile dysfunction<\/a>\u00a0or ED (an inability to get or maintain an erection) can feel emasculating although such physiological changes are actually explained by the biology of aging. Even with the advent of Viagra and Cialis, which are impressively effective at treating erectile issues, research suggests that some men still feel\u00a0uncomfortable bringing up sexual difficulties with their doctors.<\/a>\u00a0And doctors, too, are\u00a0reluctant to ask patients over 50 about their sexual health<\/a>\u00a0due to old stigmas surrounding sex later in life. Gender stereotypes that men are powerful, and always ready for sex, still haunt the boomer men who were raised in an era when talking about sexual problems held negative stigmas. We do see boomer men working around some of these stigmas though, for instance, many men are ordering ED meds via online prescribers like the popular\u00a0Roman website.<\/a><\/p>\n

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For women,\u00a0menopause<\/a>\u00a0is often cited as the primary culprit affecting their sexual lives. However, research finds that social and psychological factors such as\u00a0emotional well-being and a strong emotional connection with one\u2019s partner<\/a>\u00a0as well as\u00a0positive body image<\/a>\u00a0may be more predictive of sexual activity later in life than the hormonal changes associated with menopause. That\u2019s not to say age has no physiological impacts on sex for women; discomfort during sex due to\u00a0less blood circulation in the genital area (reducing vaginal lubrication)<\/a>\u00a0is a biological factor that reduces sexual comfort during sexual intercourse in later life. Of course, technology, here too, can come to the rescue with products to increase lubrication and blood flow. In fact, many women find menopause liberating sexually because they no longer have to worry about\u00a0pregnancy<\/a>\u00a0every time they have intercourse. Even more promising, most women who desire to remain sexually active as they age will do so, albeit with a bit more prepping.<\/p>\n

The boomers want fulfilling relationships as they age and our culture is beginning to reflect this. Women in their 60\u2019s and 70\u2019s are now being cast in leading roles involving romantic and sexual relationships. Both Jane Fonda\u2019s and Lily Tomlin\u2019s characters in Netflix\u2019s, Grace and Frankie have\u00a0love<\/a>\u00a0affairs, and of course, so do their ex-husbands\u2026 with one another. What\u2019s more, people over 50 are the fastest growing demographic of online daters. Indeed, women over 50 who date\u00a0report frequent and satisfying sex<\/a>\u00a0and boomer men can usually find an intimate partner if they are in the market for one.<\/p>\n

Boomers are by far the\u00a0most sexually liberal generation<\/a>\u00a0of older adults that we\u2019ve ever seen.\u00a0 And by pushing against the pre-existing molds of what sex after 50 looks like, boomers are showing us that they want gender equality and sexual satisfaction between the sheets in their\u00a0encore adulthood, the third act<\/a>\u00a0of their lives.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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References<\/p>\n

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Risman, Barbara J, Carissa Froyum and William Scarborough (co-editors). 2018.\u00a0\u00a0Handbook on the Sociology of Gender.\u00a0<\/a>\u00a0Springer Publishers.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Nicholas Velotta is a Freelance writer and graduate of the University\u00a0of Washington, and can be contacted at ndvelotta@icloud.com<\/a>. Barbara J. Risman is a Distinguished Professor of Sociology in the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences at the University of Illinois at Chicago.\u00a0 She is also a Senior Scholar at the Council of Contemporary Families.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reposted from Psychology Today Americans live longer than ever before, with life expectancy increasing from 60 to 80 years of age over the 20th Century. Baby boomers are living what sociologist Phyllis Moen calls a\u00a0Third Act,\u00a0discovering new ways to experience healthy active years after\u00a0retirement. With a rapid increase in life expectancy and rising expectations for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2095,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[211,8959,88829],"class_list":["post-1795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","tag-aging","tag-families","tag-sexual-activity"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2095"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1795"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1795\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1800,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1795\/revisions\/1800"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/ccf\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}