teenage kicks

Watch me tie two tangents together ... I love Nouvelle Vague's cover of the Undertones' "Teenage Kicks."

I'm gonna call her on the telephone, and have her over 'cos I'm all alone,
I need excitement and I need it bad, 'cos its the best I've ever had.
I wanna hold you wanna hold you tight,
Get those teenage kicks right through the night, yeah!

And I also enjoyed this article about teenage kicks. I find it especially interesting that young women are finally letting go of a few damaging gender social constructs, and not just separating pleasure from reproduction, but actually embracing it.

Landmark Report on Teenage Sex Tracks Dramatic Changes
A new report shows teens are not only having more sex at much younger ages, but becoming dramatically less prudish about it. And young women are leading the way in dismantling old taboos, said Jean Twenge, a psychology professor at San Diego State University and co-author of the new report.

Between 1943 and 1999, according to the report, the age of first intercourse dropped from 19 to 15 for females (18 to 15 for males); and the percentage of sexually active young women rose from 13 percent to 47 percent.

"Cultural influence was so much stronger for women than men, and that was true across behaviors. The attitudes that parents have is also an influence," Twenge said.

Feelings of sexual guilt plummeted, especially among young women, the researchers reported. Approval of premarital sex increased from 40 percent to 79 percent among young men, according to the report, and from 12 percent to 73 percent among young women during the decades studied.

Certain sexual behaviors such as oral sex are becoming more acceptable, too, the report found. "In previous generations, oral sex was considered disgusting. Now young people see it as another way of being sexual," Twenge said.

"It's also part of the general trend of sexual behavior moving away from marriage and reproduction and toward pleasure," she said.