Or as she elaborated in this month’s Men’s Health Magazine, she believes the sex act itself is overrated. Given her status as a world-renowned sex symbol and Men’s Health’s #5 “Hottest Woman of All Time” I was pretty surprised to read what she had to say about sex, pornography and the sexualization of media, and I wanted to include a few excerpts for your thoughts….
MH: Are you surprised by how mainstream sexuality has changed in the last four decades? There seems to be a lot less subtlety.
Raquel Welch: There really is. You see it the most in the music business. It used to be about a great song, great lyrics and a great voice. And now everybody is more concerned with being cutting edge and pushing the envelope. You have to be more audacious and more provocative than anybody else. When there’s somebody like Adele, it seems revolutionary because she’s not out there in a g-string and pasties. You forget that all music, all art, isn’t about T&A and girls spreading their legs for the camera.
Raquel Welch: I think we’ve gotten to the point in our culture where we’re all sex addicts, literally. We have equated happiness in life with as many orgasms as you can possibly pack in, regardless of where it is that you deposit your love interest.
MH: Okay, admittedly that doesn’t make sex sound very appealing at all.
Raquel Welch: It’s just dehumanizing. And I have to honestly say, I think this era of porn is at least partially responsible for it. Where is the anticipation and the personalization? It’s all pre-fab now. You have these images coming at you unannounced and unsolicited. It just gets to be so plastic and phony to me. Maybe men respond to that. But is it really better than an experience with a real life girl that he cares about? It’s an exploitation of the poor male’s libidos. Poor babies, they can’t control themselves.
MH: I cannot dispute any of what you’re saying.
Raquel Welch: I just imagine them sitting in front of their computers, completely annihilated. They haven’t done anything, they don’t have a job, they barely have ambition anymore. And it makes for laziness and a not very good sex partner. Do they know how to negotiate something that isn’t pre-fab and injected directly into their brain?
MH: You make some good points, but it could also be argued that railing against kids today and their sexual obsessiveness could come across as a little over-the-hill cranky and prudish.
Raquel Welch: I know it does, and I’m fine with that. I don’t care if I’m becoming one of those old fogies who says, “Back in my day we didn’t have to hear about sex all the time.” Can you imagine? My fantasies were all made up on my own. They’re ruining us with all the explanations and the graphicness. Nobody remembers what it’s like to be left to form your own ideas about what’s erotic and sexual. We’re not allowed any individuality. I thought that was the fun of the whole thing. It’s my fantasy. I didn’t pick it off the Internet somewhere. It’s my fantasy.
So, do you agree with Ms. Welch? Would love to hear your thoughts, and if you’re a parent, and you believe that your son or daughter is struggling with these subjects, check out our parent resources here. If you think you may be struggling with a sex addiction or an addiction to pornography, then take our simple quiz here.