Consider the following scenarios:
A fear-mongering pop psychologist asks the public whether or not the Internet is creating legions of porn-addicted adulterers.Someone wonders out loud to their partner why they spend more time on Facebook than they do talking to each other.
A client asks their therapist if it's OK to be engaging in anonymous violent cybersex.
A “dating expert” suggests that online dating has changed the world of dating forever.
These might seem like different situations and issues but they share an underlying question and anxiety. Is technology changing who we are and how we’re sexual? Or, put another way, which came first the sex or the tech?
The problem with this question is that sex and technology can’t be understood as apples and oranges, they’re more like apple peels and an apple peeler. Apple peels existed prior to the peeler (just as sex existed prior to the Internet). But what we can do with apple peels, how they appear on our plate and in our composts, and even what they taste like has changed a lot since we started having an easy way to remove the peel from the apple (which is what the Internet is really for).
The analogy may not be perfect, but my point is that the chicken-and-egg question is a red herring. It’s something journalists, editors, and TV personalities like to focus on as it suggests there’s an answer that can be found (and they who find it will become wise and happy). But reality is messier and more complicated. The juicy stuff (about both sex and tech) can be found by looking at how technologies influence the way we experience ourselves as sexual and vice versa.
