Silence, Condoms, and Masculinity

Abstract

To investigate how some Japanese graduate students understand their masculine identity and negotiate sexual encounters and condom use, the authors interviewed sixty twenty-four-year-old to twenty-six-year-old heterosexual men during the summer of 1997. They used a set of three interviews covering three areas: home, school and/or job, and sexual life. In talking about sexual encounters and decision making about contraception, they found that male's responsibility and protection are considered the main reasons for keeping decisions under their control. Allusions to sexuality as an act closely related to reproduction make condoms to be regarded as a barrier, which negates the pleasure of sex and interferes with arousal. The authors did not find any reference to “safer sex.” Inaccurate information and ignorance about methods of contraception seemed to be constant. The association of condoms with contraception seemed to deny the possibilities of condoms as protection against sexually transmitted infections (STIs).