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Sexual Arousal
Sexual arousal is the process and state of being ready for sexual activity and feeling an urge for sexual contact.
Human sexual arousal
Unlike most animals, human beings of both sexes are potentially capable of sexual arousal throughout the year, therefore, there is no human mating season. Things that precipitate human sexual arousal are colloquially known as turn-ons. Turn-ons may be physical or mental in nature. Given the right stimulation, sexual arousal in humans will typically end in an orgasm, but may be pursued for its own sake, even in the absence of an orgasm.
Signs of possible human sexual arousal
Female sexual arousal:
Increase in breast size
Vaginal lubrication
Vasocongestion of the vaginal walls
Clitoral tumescence and erection
Elevation of the uterus and expansion of the back of the vagina
Change in shape, color and size of the labia majora and labia minora
Male sexual arousal:
Penile tumescence and erection
Retraction and tightening of the foreskin if present, often exposing the glans penis if not normally exposed
Emission of pre-ejaculatory fluid
Swelling of the testes
Ascension of the testes
Tensing and thickening of the scrotum
Sexual arousal phases
It is proposed that human sexual response is comprised of three independent but generally sequential components.
The first stage, ''aesthetic response,'' is an emotional reaction to noticing an attractive face or figure. This emotional reaction produces an increase in attention toward the object of attraction, typically involving head and eye movements toward the attractive object.
The second stage, ''approach response,'' progresses from the first and involves bodily movements towards the object.
The Third Stage ''genital response'' stage recognizes that with both attention and closer proximity, physical reactions result in genital tumescence.
There are various forms of Arousal stimuli, of which Erotica is considered the main one.
Erotica (from the Greek Eros - "desire") - refers to works of art, including literature, photography, film, sculpture and painting, that deal substantively with erotically stimulating or arousing descriptions. Erotica is a modern word used to describe the portrayal of the human anatomy and sexuality with high-art aspirations, differentiating such work from commercial pornography.
Genres and themes
There are various sub-genres of erotica. As with fiction as a whole, there are erotic stories with a science fiction, fantasy, horror or romance focus. Additionally, erotica can also focus on specific sexual behavior or fetishes such as BDSM, wearing uniforms, cross-dressing, polygamy and sexual promiscuity. Fan fiction featuring characters engaging in male homosexual acts has become known as slash fiction.
The distinction between erotica and pornography
As well as the lesser known genre of sexual entertainment, ribaldry, is difficult to identify as it is, to a degree,
highly personal.
Essentially, the difference lies in the individual's approach to sexuality and the sex act.
Inexperience and a simplistic social model of sexuality tends to produce a prurient and undeveloped approach to sexual pleasure, which revels in the deliberate flouting and perversion of accepted moral principles. A more open view of sexuality tends to set the moral view aside and accepts that sexual gratification is the right of each human being and each has the right to pursue that in their own way without judgmental burdens being placed on them by external sources.
Erotic art tends to spring from this latter, more amoral viewpoint. Proponents for erotic art argue that such work is intended to be artistically interesting and deliberate rather than simply sexually stimulating, and is therefore not pornographic. Opponents see this as a pretentious stand as they believe that erotic art is indeed intended for sexual arousal.
The issue of whether a distinction can be made between erotica and pornography raises multiple complicated questions. These questions include whether aesthetic and erotic feelings are mutually exclusive, how the level of commercialism and tastefulness in an artwork can be objectively measured, and at what point they make the work pornographic.
In general, "erotica" refers to portrayals of sexually arousing material that hold or aspire to artistic, scientific or human merit, whereas "pornography" often connotes the commercial, prurient, morally valueless depiction of sexual acts, with little or no artistic value.
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