Sexuality in South Korea has been influenced by culture, religion, and westernization. Viewpoints in contemporary society can be viewed as a conflict between the traditional, conservative older generation and the more liberal and 'modern' generation. Due to this conflict, several issues in Korea, including sexual education, homosexuality, and sexual behavior are highly contested.
Women have been marginalized throughout Korean history. [1] [2] Women could not participate in the main social system and were discriminated against on the basis of: their roles in marriage, fertility, lack of rights in divorce proceedings, and set roles in society. [1]
Historically, Korean society was patriarchal, especially due to Confucianism. [3] The position of a woman depended on the position of a male member of her family. Only the women of the ruling class could enjoy the same privileges of the men in the same class. Although men were allowed to have multiple wives, women were expected to maintain chastity and were compelled to remain unmarried if their husbands died. The aforementioned societal norms began to be enforced during the Joseon Dynasty. For instance, chastity of widows was enforced by forbidding the sons and grandsons of remarried women from taking the Gwageo. However, women were entitled to inherit property. [1]
In the family, women were expected to take care of the family finances. Women from lower class had jobs such as mudang, or shamans; folk healer; kisaeng. Female shamans outnumbered male shamans, and women were usually only examined by women folk healers. Women were excluded from schools until 1886, when Ewha Hakdang was established. [1]
During the Goryeo Dynasty (918–1392), monogamy was supported while divorce and remarriage were common. [1] However, the aristocracy in this period practiced polygamy, and a man was legally allowed to have up to four wives. [4] During the Joseon Dynasty (1392–1897), monogamy was established as the official policy. [1] However, elites were legally allowed to maintain concubines; however, children birthed with concubines were declared illegitimate since the early 15th century, and were banned from gwageo since 1471. [4] During this period, women's remarriage was prohibited from 1447 to 1897. Marriage with those with both the same surname and family origin was forbidden, and is still forbidden today. [1] [note 1]
During this time, early marriages were common. Early marriages were often arranged and can be traced back to the Three Kingdoms of Korea period (57 AD-668). Children about 10 years old could be presented to another family; this was done for both boys and girls. In the Joseon dynasty, the legal age for marriage was 15 for boys and 14 for girls. When a child assumed responsibility for the child's family, the child could marry at the age of 12. The society commonly believed that a higher age for marriage was associated with inappropriate sexual activity.[ citation needed ] This custom continued unto the 20th century. [1]
The traditional concepts of sexuality in Korea have been influenced by: Confucianism, Buddhism, Neo-Confucianism, Catholicism, and Protestantism. [1]
Confucianism became important in the 7th century. [7] During the Goryeo Dynasty, Confucianism served as the practical and philosophical structure of the state, and was the official ideology during the Joseon Dynasty. [8] Neo-Confucianism became prominent in the 15th century. [9] In Confucianism, men were considered to be positive (yang) and women negative (yin). As yang was considered more dominant than yin, men were considered to be comparably omnipotent, justifying male dominance and discrimination against female. Furthermore, sex was considered a duty to the family, rather than an act of pleasure. Although only three percent of the population has Confucianism as a belief system today, it remains the basis for sexual ethics and criminal law. [1]
Buddhism was introduced during the Three Kingdoms period. [10] It was the official religion during the Goryeo Dynasty, but lost influence during the Joseon Dynasty. [8] Buddhism was used to instruct people to give up all desires, including those related to sex, and sexual activities were forbidden in many sects. [1]
Catholicism was introduced at the end of the 17th century and began to become popular among the common people at the end of the 18th century. Though Catholicism was outlawed and banned, and the followers executed, it continued to have underground support. Protestantism was introduced on 1884. Both religions were involved in several intellectual movements, and promoted equal rights. [1]
In the Joseon Dynasty, unmarried men and women received a very limited form of sexual education. The education was focused on methods of becoming pregnant and consequent reproduction. Married couples received a calendar that stated information about the best days for fertility; this information was usually given only to the bride, although the groom sometimes received it. As producing children was considered a duty, families sometimes intervened. Prenatal care was considered important and was given even before conception. [1]
The traditional lack of information and education concerning sexual issues is currently conflicting with Western viewpoints of sexuality, and can be seen through the increasing rates of teenage pregnancy and sexual abuse. In 1968, the Planned Parenthood Federation of Korea (PPFK) has started sexual education. Since 1982, counseling centers for adolescents have been provided in schools and industrial parks. However, public education concerning sexuality is inadequate. Sexual education solely focuses on physical development and gender roles such as menstruation, pregnancy, virginity, sexual activities, and Sexually transmitted diseases. In 1996, the Korea Research Institute for Culture and Sexuality was established to develop sexual education programs. [1]
Starting in the early 1990s, interest in sexual education began to increase. Books, academic interests, and mass media focusing on sexuality began to increase. In 1998, the instructor of a public sexual educational program on television became popular. According to two Korean Research Institute on Sexuality and Culture studies done on 1996 and 1997, 37.1% of male students learned about sex from pornography, while 14% learned it from their peers; for female students, 37% received sexual education from peers while 25.7% received it from school. [1]
According to the Korean Research Institute of Sexuality, 70% of female high school students agreed that masturbation was natural, though only 15.2% of the surveyed students reported masturbating, and the biggest group felt guilty about doing so. In contrast, 49.9% of male high school students reported masturbating. For parents, 75.2% were positive about their own masturbation. The attitudes of the parents toward masturbation had a positive correlation with the attitude of the parents toward their children's masturbation. [1]
Production of pornography is illegal, although amateur material known as Yadong exists. Consequently, Koreans mostly consume pornography from overseas, especially Japanese pornography, sometimes using proxy servers to evade Korean Internet censorship. [11] There are also adult videos filmed abroad with Korean actors, recorded sex cam sessions, and K-pop deepfake pornography, manufactured adult videos with K-pop stars. [12]
In one study, 99.5% of male college students reported that they had been exposed to pornography (excluding participants who declined to answer the question), with 99.1% occasionally using it for masturbation. On average, participants masturbated to pornography 1-2 times a week. Women's pornography use was not investigated. [11]
Yaoi fiction and comics are consumed by a subgroup of women. [13] In 2005, there was a pornographic online magazine named Foxylove that catered mainly to Korean women and reportedly had over a hundred thousand subscribers. [13]
While the circumcision rates in Korea were extremely high (90% in age groups 17–19) as of 2002, [14] the rates have declined recently; the circumcision rate for males 14–29 is 75.8%, with the aforementioned group rate down to 74.4%. [15] It has been conjectured that the decline in the rate of circumcision was due to the increased availability of new information. [15]
This section needs to be updated.(April 2016) |
In a survey given in 1997, 44.4% of female high school students reported that they had had heterosexual relationships and 7.5% of the entire group had had coital experiences. Of the group who had had coital experiences, 38.7% claimed to have been coerced and 32.3% attributed the reason to love. In a group of students who had not performed vaginal intercourse, about half the students were open to the idea of having sex and blamed their lack of experience on the lack of opportunities. However, 44.7% of students accepted light kissing and 31.6% accepted holding hands as permissible behavior in dating. The majority view was that virginity should be kept until marriage, with 88.1% of the group. For the survey of male students, 16.2% admitted to having had coital experiences, mostly with their girlfriends (74.7%). On the other hand, 65.7% of male high school students indicated a positive attitude towards premarital sexual activity, but only 7.5% had had previous sexual experiences. As a whole, the rate of students who had had sexual experiences increased in the late 20th century. [1]
This section needs to be updated.(April 2016) |
A survey in 1991 indicated that, of surveyed adult males aged from 20 to 40, over 80% had had previous heterosexual relationships. Of the 80%, 44.7% reported their first sexual experience to have been with a prostitute. A study of married couples revealed that about half the people studied thought negatively about premarital relationships; in general, the female partners were more open to premarital and extramarital relationships. The double standard of relationships [note 2] was hypothesized to cause psychological and physical (especially sexual) stress for females. [1] Hymenorrhaphy, or hymen reconstruction surgery, is also popular in Korea, as the hymen is prized as the symbol for virginity. [16]
Homosexuality is not outlawed in Korea, but it is also not expressly permitted. [17] On September 7, 2013, the first gay marriage in Korea took place. [18] However, the marriage was not legally binding; [19] the couple has vowed to legally challenge this in court. [17]
Under the law, rape is punishable with a prison sentence from 7 years to life imprisonment. [20] The definition of rape includes adult males as victims, [21] [note 3] as well as marital rape. [22] As of 2009, the statute of limitations for sexual assault is ten years. [20]
As of 2009, reports of sex crimes have been on the rise, especially those involving child victims. [23] In 2012, there were 77,000 reported cases of sexual assault. [24] In 2011, 22,034 rapes were reported. [20] A study in 1997 found that 45.5% of female high school students reported sexual harassment, mostly by their male friends. [1] These statistics are not considered an accurate representation of the true cases; a 2010 survey by the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family concluded that only about 10 percent of all sexual assault cases were reported. [20]
Currently, there is a prevalent traditional belief that rape is a man's mistake that should be forgiven, especially for victims who had been drunk or wearing revealing clothes. [25] The Miryang gang rape incident in 2004 provoked controversy due to victim blaming and other mistreatment by police officials. This mistreatment ultimately led to a 2008 judgment against the police by the Supreme Court of Korea. [26] There are rape crisis centers available, run by the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family and the Korea Sexual Violence Relief Center. [20]
South Korean and foreign women and girls have been victims of sex trafficking in South Korea. [27] [28] [29] They are raped and physically and psychologically harmed in brothels, businesses, homes, hotels, and other locations throughout the country. [30] [31] [32] [33] [34] [35] [36]
Prostitution in South Korea is illegal, [37] but according to The Korea Women's Development Institute, the sex trade in Korea was estimated to amount to 14 trillion South Korean won ($13 billion) in 2007, roughly 1.6 percent of the nation's gross domestic product. [38] [39]
From 1953 to 2015, adultery was punishable by up to two years in prison for both the adulterer and their partner. In February 2015, the Constitutional Court of Korea overturned the law. [40]
The age of consent is the age at which a person is considered to be legally competent to consent to sexual acts. Consequently, an adult who engages in sexual activity with a person younger than the age of consent is unable to legally claim that the sexual activity was consensual, and such sexual activity may be considered child sexual abuse or statutory rape. The person below the minimum age is considered the victim, and their sex partner the offender, although some jurisdictions provide exceptions through "Romeo and Juliet laws" if one or both participants are underage and are close in age.
Sexual intercourse is a sexual activity involving the insertion and thrusting of the male penis inside the female vagina for sexual pleasure, reproduction, or both. This is also known as vaginal intercourse or vaginal sex. Sexual penetration has been known by humans since the dawn of time, and has been an instinctive form of sexual behaviour and psychology among humans. Other forms of penetrative sexual intercourse include anal sex, oral sex, fingering and penetration by use of a dildo, and vibrators. These activities involve physical intimacy between two or more people and are usually used among humans solely for physical or emotional pleasure. They can contribute to human bonding.
Virginity is the state of a person who has never engaged in sexual intercourse. The term virgin originally only referred to sexually inexperienced women, but has evolved to encompass a range of definitions, as found in traditional, modern and ethical concepts. Heterosexual individuals may or may not consider loss of virginity to occur only through penile-vaginal penetration, while people of other sexual orientations often include oral sex, anal sex, or manual sex in their definitions of losing one's virginity.
Sexual slavery and sexual exploitation is an attachment of any ownership right over one or more people with the intent of coercing or otherwise forcing them to engage in sexual activities. This includes forced labor that results in sexual activity, forced marriage and sex trafficking, such as the sexual trafficking of children.
Sex-positive feminism, also known as pro-sex feminism, sex-radical feminism, or sexually liberal feminism, is a feminist movement centering on the idea that sexual freedom is an essential component of women's freedom. They oppose legal or social efforts to control sexual activities between consenting adults, whether they are initiated by the government, other feminists, opponents of feminism, or any other institution. They embrace sexual minority groups, endorsing the value of coalition-building with marginalized groups. Sex-positive feminism is connected with the sex-positive movement. Sex-positive feminism brings together anti-censorship activists, LGBT activists, feminist scholars, producers of pornography and erotica, among others. Sex-positive feminists believe that prostitution can be a positive experience if workers are treated with respect, and agree that sex work should not be criminalized.
Sexuality in Islam contains a wide range of views and laws, which are largely predicated on the Quran, and the sayings attributed to Muhammad (hadith) and the rulings of religious leaders (fatwa) confining sexual activity to marital relationships between men and women. Sexual jurisprudence and marital jurisprudence are the codifications of Islamic scholarly perspectives and rulings on sexuality, which both in turn also contain components of Islamic family jurisprudence, Islamic marital jurisprudence, hygienical, criminal and bioethical jurisprudence.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to sexual ethics:
Feminist sexology is an offshoot of traditional studies of sexology that focuses on the intersectionality of sex and gender in relation to the sexual lives of women. Sexology has a basis in psychoanalysis, specifically Freudian theory, which played a big role in early sexology. This reactionary field of feminist sexology seeks to be inclusive of experiences of sexuality and break down the problematic ideas that have been expressed by sexology in the past. Feminist sexology shares many principles with the overarching field of sexology; in particular, it does not try to prescribe a certain path or "normality" for women's sexuality, but only observe and note the different and varied ways in which women express their sexuality. It is a young field, but one that is growing rapidly.
Masturbation is a form of autoeroticism in which a person sexually stimulates their own genitals for sexual arousal or other sexual pleasure, usually to the point of orgasm. The stimulation may involve the use of hands, everyday objects, sex toys, or more rarely, the mouth. Masturbation may also be performed with a sex partner, either masturbating together or watching the other partner masturbate.
Human sexuality covers a broad range of topics, including the physiological, psychological, social, cultural, political, philosophical, ethical, moral, theological, legal and spiritual or religious aspects of sex and human sexual behavior.
Sexual repression is a state in which a person is prevented from expressing their own sexuality or sexual orientation. Sexual repression can be caused by an emotional conflict, in which a person feels guilt, shame, or distress regarding their natural sexual impulses. These feelings of emotional distress can be exacerbated by outside factors, such as family, religion, and peer pressure. Sexual repression is often synonymous with internalized homophobia, in which a gay, lesbian, or bisexual person feels the need to suppress their own homosexual impulses and conform to heterosexual norms. Sexual repression can also be caused by external oppression, in which the laws of a society prevent someone from expressing their sexuality freely.
Surveys of victims of crime have been undertaken in many cities and countries, using a common methodology to aid comparability, and have generally included questions on sexual violence. The United Nations has conducted extensive surveys to determine the level of sexual violence in different societies. According to these studies, the percentage of women reporting having been a victim of sexual assault ranges from less than 2% in places such as La Paz, Bolivia (1.4%), Gaborone, Botswana (0.8%), Beijing, China (1.6%), and Manila, Philippines (0.3%), to 5% or more in Istanbul, Turkey (6.0%), Buenos Aires, Argentina (5.8%), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (8.0%), and Bogota, Colombia (5.0%).
The sex industry consists of businesses that either directly or indirectly provide sex-related products and services or adult entertainment. The industry includes activities involving direct provision of sex-related services, such as prostitution, strip clubs, host and hostess clubs and sex-related pastimes, such as pornography, sex-oriented men's magazines, women's magazines, sex movies, sex toys and fetish or BDSM paraphernalia. Sex channels for television and pre-paid sex movies for video on demand, are part of the sex industry, as are adult movie theaters, sex shops, peep shows, and strip clubs. The sex industry employs millions of people worldwide, mainly women. These range from the sex worker, also called adult service provider (ASP), who provides sexual services, to a multitude of support personnel.
Although Westernization and globalization have influenced Filipinos who live in the metropolitan areas, the overall culture remains quite conservative in its sexual values. Filipino sexuality is affected by education received by Filipinos from schools, the media, the rise of the internet, religious teachings from their churches or other similar spiritual institutions, legal policies and laws, and the influence of urbanization or urbanized regions in the Philippines. There are provisions and policies in the constitution of the Philippines which promulgates that the sexual act should happen only within the framework of married life between a man and woman, because this personal human expression is solidly connected to the family unit and to society as a whole.
Jewish traditions across different eras and regions devote considerable attention to sexuality. Sexuality is the subject of many narratives and laws in the Tanakh and rabbinic literature.
Sex trafficking in Thailand is human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation and slavery that occurs in the Kingdom of Thailand. Thailand is a country of origin, destination, and transit for sex trafficking. The sexual exploitation of children in Thailand is a problem. In Thailand, close to 40,000 children under the age of 16 are believed to be in the sex trade, working in clubs, bars, and brothels.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to human sexuality:
Feminist views on sexuality widely vary. Many feminists, particularly radical feminists, are highly critical of what they see as sexual objectification and sexual exploitation in the media and society. Radical feminists are often opposed to the sex industry, including opposition to prostitution and pornography. Other feminists define themselves as sex-positive feminists and believe that a wide variety of expressions of female sexuality can be empowering to women when they are freely chosen. Some feminists support efforts to reform the sex industry to become less sexist, such as the feminist pornography movement.
In South Korea, gender inequality is derived from deeply rooted patriarchal ideologies with specifically defined gender-roles. While it remains especially prevalent in South Korea's economy and politics, gender inequality has decreased in healthcare and education.
Sex trafficking in China is human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation and slavery that occurs in the People's Republic of China. It is a country of origin, destination, and transit for sexually trafficked persons.
Currently the circumcision rate for high-school boys is > 90%