Bin Laid

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The Times of India Oct 12, 2001

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Terrorised Americans turn to terror sex

CHIDANAND RAJGHATTA

WASHINGTON: They are calling it end-of-the-world sex, post-disaster sex, post-terror sex, and even Bin Laden sex, the inelegant post coital expression for which is "bin laid." The terrorist attack on the United States is sending Americans scurrying for cover - bed cover, that is.

Sociologists and psychologists are reporting that Americans are taking recourse to intercourse - frequent, random, and even reckless sex to cope with fear, sadness and vulnerability stemming from the September 11 terrorist attacks. Dating services are seeing a significant increase in clients and singles bars in New York and Washington are humming again. From the no-no nineties, America has leapt into a mating millennium after the worst-ever terrorist carnage last month has left them feeling bewildered and bereft.

Experts say the horrific disaster and fear of prospective danger are combining to stimulate the sex drive of Americans young and old, single and married. Some people want it out of sheer gratitude that they are still alive. Others because something worse could happen and they may never have it again.

"The act of sex is a very elemental, primal feeling of being alive and connected to somebody. When asked, 'How do you want to die?' a lot of people say, 'Making love or having an orgasm.' What they are saying is, 'I want to be most alive the moment before I am dead.'" Pepper Schwartz, a University of Washington sociologist, told the Los Angeles Times, which first noted the post-disaster trend in Birds & Bees, a weekly column on sexuality and relationships.

Behavioural scientists are coming up with familiar explanations for the new behaviour. When people are afraid, they say, the body releases several hormones and neurochemicals, driving up levels of dopamine and testosterone among others, resulting in the libido being stimulated. Helen Fischer, an anthropologist at Rutgers University, says she first noticed the disaster-libido linkage during the Los Angeles earthquake when many people confessed wanting to experience a different kind of earth movement.

Other experts have since endorsed the observation in the present context. Therapists are also noting that couples are bickering much less. Young people who have been dating casually are suddenly finding themselves saying "I love you" to partners ahead of schedule. One sexologist noted that just as people are reaching out to show compassion, they are also reaching out for passion - copulating compulsively to relieve terror-induced feelings of anxiety and stress.

The sex drive is so pronounced that demographers are expecting a baby boom in May and June 2002, somewhat akin to the summer of 1997 when there was a bump in the birth rate in the Washington area after a blizzard the previous winter kept people indoors for a whole week.

The phenomenon of post-terrorism sex is being compared to the more familiar occurrence of pre-war sex, when departing soldiers and their spouses just do it believing it may be the last time. Many soldiers marry before they are sent off to war, not because they are magically seduced, but because of something more instinctual, says Schwartz.

One other explanation for the post-WTC sex drive phenomenon is that a large number of people who died in the carnage were young. The average age of the victim was less than 40, according to one report. The urban legend goes that single women outnumber single men in New York and Washington - one to four in the latter case.

Amid all the fear and trepidation came some ironical news today. The US government released a report that showed life expectancy for Americans had reached a record 76.9 years because fewer people were dying of heart attacks and cancers, the two biggest killers in the country.



-- Lars (lars@indy.net), October 11, 2001

Answers

They must be screwing like crazy in Kabul.

-- Carlos (riffraff@cybertime.net), October 11, 2001.

Putin Bush? Bin Laden!

-- Unreel (cometo@tention.net), October 11, 2001.

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