Medscape Declaration of Sexual Rights

 

Medscape is an internet site dedicated to providing up-to-date information about healthcare and medicine. It is read by clinicians: doctors, nurses, aids etc. Medscape supplies readers with medical news, clinical references, and education. If you are interested in their statement (2005) concerning sexual rights, read below. 

Sexuality is an integral part of the personality.

The right to sexual freedom. Sexual freedom encompasses the possibility for individuals to express their full potential. This excludes all forms of sexual coercion, exploitation and abuse.The right to sexual autonomy, sexual integrity and safety of the sexual body, including the ability to make autonomous decisions about one’s sexual life within a context of one’s own personal and social ethics.The right to sexual privacy as long as they do not intrude on the sexual rights of others.The right to sexual equity, which includes freedom from all forms of discrimination regardless of sex, gender, sexual orientation, age, race, social class, religion or physical and emotional disability.The right to sexual pleasure as a source of physical, psychological, intellectual and spiritual well being.The right to emotional sexual expression, which is more than erotic pleasure of sexual acts. Individuals have a right to express their sexuality through communication, touch, emotional expression and love.The right to sexually associate freely, which means the possibility to marry or not, to divorce and establish other types of responsible sexual associations.The right to make free and responsible reproductive choices, including whether to or not to have children, the number and spacing of children and full access to the means of fertility regulation.The right to sexual information based upon scientific inquiry, generated through unencumbered and yet scientifically ethical inquiry, disseminated appropriately at all societal levels.The right to comprehensive sexuality education–a lifelong process from birth throughout the life cycle, that should involve all social institutions.The right to sexual healthcare, available for prevention and treatment of all sexual concerns, problems and disorders.

(adopted at the 14th World Congress of Sexology, 1999)

Comment: You might find reading this, that some statements are repetitive or possibly in some cases more than you have thought about, cared about or needed to know. Basically, the purport of the Declaration is to acknowledge that we are all sexual beings, and that as we grow and have relationships, we should never hesitate to set boundaries, speak out about our needs, or walk away from a relationship that does not support our rights and our comfort.

It is amazing to me while recently being exposed to statements made by politicians regarding pregnancy, miscarriages, labor, delivery, birth, even breastfeeding, the ignorance both willful and frightening some people in power display. And if it is deliberate, all the more reason for us to have a set of rights that we can turn to. Information is power. Thanks for reading, Beth 

Artwork: Nicole Roggeman 

Facebook Twitter LinkedInPinterest