“Sex is no longer a serious taboo. Teenagers sometimes know more about it than adults.”

—  Alan Watts

Inside Information p. 4
The Book on the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are (1966)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Sex is no longer a serious taboo. Teenagers sometimes know more about it than adults." by Alan Watts?
Alan Watts photo
Alan Watts 107
British philosopher, writer and speaker 1915–1973

Related quotes

“How would you describe your transition from teenager to adult? The truth is that I barely notice it, I spend all my time between studies and filming, I live between Madrid and Barcelona, I barely have time to think about it, I think I lived more as an adult than as a teenager, but very happy.”

Berta Castañé (2002) Spanish actress and model

¿Cómo describirías tu paso de adolescente a adulta? La verdad es que apenas me estoy dando cuenta, paso todo el tiempo entre los estudios y los rodajes, viviendo entre Madrid y Barcelona, casi no tengo tiempo de pensar en ello, creo que llevo más vida de adulta que de adolescente, pero muy feliz.
From the interview Hablamos con Berta Castañé, la estrella en ascenso de la pequeña pantalla https://www.marie-claire.es/moda/modelos/fotos/entrevista-a-berta-castane-241588061091, marie-claire.es, 28 July 2020.

“I spent the rest of the night pondering over what was in store for me at that point in life. I was no longer a teenager, and I’ll never be able to experience having sex as a teenager.”

Elliot Rodger (1991–2014) American spree killer

My Twisted World (2014), 19-22, UC Santa Barbara, Inceldom

John Scalzi photo

“Teenagers can be idiotic and stupid, but teenagers also model their behavior from the signals they get from adults.”

John Scalzi The Last Colony

Source: The Last Colony (2007), Chapter 4 (p. 72)

Philip Roth photo

“You know, the dirty little secret is no longer sex; the dirty little secret is hatred and rage. It's the tirade that's taboo. Odd that this should be so a hundred years after Dostoyevsky (and fifty after Freud), but nobody nice likes to be identified with the stuff. It's the way folks used to feel about fellatio in the good old days. "Me? Never heard of it. Disgusting."”

Philip Roth (1933–2018) American novelist

But is it "hostile," really, to take a look at the ferocity of the emotion they call "hostility"?
Paris Review Interview (1986)

“We don't need teenage bouda sex fiends as interns.
How do you know he is a sex fiend?
He is fifteen and he's a bouda. Hello?”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Magic Slays

“Adults are constantly telling teenagers that it's what's on the inside that matters. It's always painful to find out that adults have lied to you.”

Janette Rallison (1966) American writer

Source: My Fair Godmother

Steven Crowder photo

“Sex. Some of us do it, most of us like it and we all think about it…. A lot. I know I do (though I was told that it’s normal). Gettin’ busy really isn’t the taboo subject that it once was.”

Steven Crowder (1987) American actor
Carole Morin photo

“It’s hard work and it takes longer than murder or sex.”

Carole Morin British writer

Chin Wag At The Slaughterhouse (2013)
Context: Murder and sex are both Dionysian.
Creative work is first anarchic; and then it’s structured. It’s right brain then left brain. Anarchic then controlled. To be a really good writer, you have to be able to do both. It’s hard work and it takes longer than murder or sex.

Bertrand Russell photo

“When I say that children should be told about sex, I do not mean that they should be told only the bare physiological facts; they should be told whatever they wish to know. There should be no attempt to represent adults as more virtuous than they are, or sex as occurring only in marriage. There is no excuse for deceiving children. And when, as must happen in conventional families, they find that their parents have lied, they lose confidence in them, and feel justified in lying to them.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

Our Sexual Ethics http://www.utilitarian.org/texts/oursexethics.html (1936)
1930s

“When we are children, we think that adults know how the world works. When we become adults, we know enough about the world to know that we know nothing about it…”

Carlos Gershenson (1978) Mexican researcher

Zire Notes (May 2004 - December 2006)

Related topics