Detail from The Procession of the Trojan Horse in Troy by Domenico Tiepolo (1773), inspired by Virgil's Aeneid ~Wikipedia
It is interesting that because of (at least in American culture) the general populations's disenfranchisement with the idea of having a large number of children, that we tend, as a culture afraid of said children, to inhibit and sometimes even annihilate the healthy sex drive of our children.
Even in adulthood, those who find themselves plagued by an excessive libido, yet not wishing to view sex as a sport, are often painted up and portrayed by modern psychiatry as having something significantly wrong with them.
My former therapist in Seattle, for example, did not seem to enjoy the variations in his ex wife's libido throughout the month, and attributed their differences in sexual preference to mental illness rather than a fundamental incompatibility in the marriage.
Which is why it can be so damaging to certain types of people, to make them feel trapped in their marriage or punished by it, incidentally. Far too many of us have felt this way.
I return a bit too often to my high school experience of not knowing that my potential partner was gay. I wholeheartedly believe that in spite of our wiring differences, we truly did love each other. But sex wasn't something that we were just racing toward. We attempted to establish courtship, in spite of terribly meddlesome families, and we cherished one another for our commitment to ideals.
The fundamental delight of the relationship was that in spite of feeling happy, excited, and predictably comfortable on the academic level, we often surprised each other with the level of familiarity we achieved, without ever once kissing or fondling or doing any of the things that kids on tv are depicted doing.
I guess what I am saying is that given enough nurture, relationships of surprising complexity may form, and this can happen fairly naturally, even among people who are later considered sexually deviant. As far as I know, this young man has been very committed in his relationships whereas my own faithfulness has been a happy (and sometimes unhappy) accident.
I'm saying that in terms of character, I'm worse off than the gay guy. And I accept that my perception of the demands of adult sexuality suggests it is not a one size fits all experience, pun not intended. Meaning that I forgive myself for allowing myself more freedom than a man permits himself, as men and women do not necessarily enjoy the same experience in the same situations.
Even worse than inequality (imo) are healers and preachers, even including the therapist whom I respected and loved, who adhere to the notion that restricting the sexuality of other human beings is ok.
Parents and grandparents who are so afraid of more imperfect offspring join the ranks of the eminently frustrating. They tend to deny the natural bent of their adolescent children that these normal hormonal reactions become choked, stressed, hyperconcentrated by media misperception and channeled away from healthy, daily, happy and down to earth love.
Not to mention our wonderful celibate crowd. The media does a terrible job honoring them. Politicians and smear artists portray the celibate as a caste of collective child abusers and dysfunctional side effects of the general population instead of the beautiful people they are.
We might not be able to prevent that stupid pipeline from being installed, ugh, but we can try to keep "our masters" from stealing our sexual power and channeling it also into their ugly, limiting structures.
anyway.