Your views on Ancient India and today's Indian culture regarding sexuality

Hi Loving

As per me, I don't think indian sexual values is a product of British Influence. British were always open about their sexual values, they are even now.

India is a land of Kamasutra. The ancient Kamasutra has existed even before British came into picture. It has been there thousands of years before. So I don't think British has anything to do with indian sexual values.

Sex is still a taboo in India. Everyone likes or love doing and talking about sex but its has always been behind closed doors. If someone talks about it openly then hypocrites start creating problem for those people. I would say India is struggling in this arena is because of diversity. India has so many religions, caste, languages. So its very easy to create problems among people in the name is religion, language etc. Political parties like BJP, ShivSena has come to power on such religion topics. They have exploited it very well.

I would think ancient India was liberal in sexual values. But as I said political parties and other social elements have used subjects like " sex" "religion", " language", " caste" for their personal gains.

I am not saying Politicians are the only reason for this. So don't quote me on this. There are other factors as well. Like movies, our culture that has many diversities, our upbringing etc. are few of those.

 

You are right... Kamasuthra is the proof. I watched a program about India's devadasis and the respectable position they occupied in olden days and the current Indian mentality towards it.

 

No one knows for sure how ancient india was like. kamasutra or kujarao can not be a conclusive evidence about olden times.

 

You are a thinker, aren't you?

 

I think India was influenced significantly by the moslem invaders/settlers/rulers and then the British. The earliest influence may have been of the Greeks.

You can see ghunghat in North India which is a moslem influence. Many of the Victorian values are still a big part of how we look at sex. So much so that many posters at IL write it as *** even in 2012!

I think the TV show Chanakya (Hindi) tried to portray India during the Nanda dynasty. I thought the TV show did a good job showing the bars/pubs of the time, the bar girls and the family women etc.

One thing that has pretty much come down the millennia almost unchanged is the women's blouse and saree. The design of the blouse (skin tight and showing the midriff) tells anyone who wants to study fashion in India even 2000 years ago leaving them to come away feeling that we were way more (fashion) evolved even at that time. I think we got trampled upon from 16 the century through the 20th century. 400+ years of foreign rule/influence has turned us into what we are today. Very touchy about every thing and intolerant and sexually unexpressive.

 

You are confusing religious beliefs with a country culture. Not Orthodox Christians, all christians are against pre-marital sex. Its just not about masturbation or oral sex or whatever. Its a religious belief nothing to do with culture. I think most religions are against pre-marital sex for that matter.

 

A friend from Sri Lanka loaned me a copy of a commentary on the Kama Sutra written in Srinigar in the 1930's. The explanation of the culture at the time it was written was very interesting. Women were topless, there was a class of female courtesans that held a prominent place in society, and men would leave bruise love bites on their female lovers in patterns on their chests as a sign of beauty (OUCH!!). If you see the ladies on say the temples of Belur or Halebid, this is what folks were wearing in earlier times.

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I think that the Victorian era and in specific Queen Victoria were horrendous worldwide on their impact to making unhealthy views to a normal human function. I don't know what her problem was but I pity her husband.