Executive sex on the rise as monogamy loses its luster

JAKARTA (JP): Promiscuity and extramarital affairs are on the rise among executives, the majority of them men, a sexologist believes, but sleeping with prostitutes is increasingly disdained.

It presents a trend, not a moral issue, to the executives, Naek L. Tobing told a recent seminar organized by Bisnis Indonesia daily and Lions Club Jakarta.

"Executives do this in a very discreet way," he said.

Tobing said the practices had become more common in the last 15 years and were hard to curb, even with a fatal sexually transmitted disease to worry about.

"The AIDS epidemic does not discourage them. Instead, they are looking for well-educated partners as they avoid seeing prostitutes."

He estimated that 80 percent of the executives who engaged in promiscuous sex or adultery were men.

"This makes sense since women usually think about the greater risk in such affairs, like pregnancy.

"Based on the data from my clinic, I have indications that some 80 percent of executives have enduring extramarital relationships, 10 percent have occasional relationships and another 10 percent have permanent partners."

Government officials are among those who have promiscuous relationships, he said.

The frequency usually ceases after the age of 50 as most men experience declining sexual desire.

Men found reasons to justify their philandering.

"Some think that, as executives, they deserve extra pleasure as they are not 'ordinary people'. They think that if common people can marry two women, so they have to have two wives and two mistresses."

Others know that many women are attracted to them, even if much of the enticement is derived from the material trappings of their success.

"Many executives do not have to try hard to get women who are not looking for money. The women are fond of gifts, romantic dinner or romantic sex. They enjoy and are proud of that. Many women like executives very much as they are rich and have branded items."

Some men stray from the marital bond because they claim that their wives are sexually dysfunctional, such as frigid, or simply due to boredom.

"Many men fail to abandon their premarital behavior; having sex with more than one partner. That is why they still see someone else when they are married."

Psychiatrist Fidiansjah termed promiscuity and extramarital affairs as mental disorders.

Sex-related disorders include gender disidentity, sexual dysfunction caused by nonorganic disease, psychological disorders and paraphilia, commonly known as sexual deviation.

Paraphiliacs usually have unusual sexual fantasies or behavior to derive sexual gratification, he said. Fantasies occur repetitively and involuntarily.

Another speaker, humorist and owner of a herbal medicine factory Jaya Suprana, said men were victims of sexual myth.

"Sexual myth is one of the improper myths in this postmodern age. This is about masculinity, that men must have great sexual potency. They engage in affairs to prove it."

He said it should be remembered that the primary function of sex was procreation.

"Humans can still live without sex, so we have to avoid being enslaved by sex."

Promiscuity and adultery can have wide-ranging consequences.

Tobing said many executives were reluctant to buy condoms because of their efforts to keep relationships secret. "Sexually transmitted diseases (STD) is one of the risks."

He believed about 50 percent of men in continued extramarital affairs would lose interest in their wives, and only a few of the women would succeed in reestablishing the relationship.

Men may suffer sexual problems, such as difficulty in achieving or sustaining erections, in their marital relationships.

Other problems, such as the threat of blackmail, could not be dismissed, he warned.

Physician Lula Kamal said STDs were the most common risks of straying from a monogamous relationship. She named fungus and protozoa, gonorrhea, syphilis, genital warts, genital herpes and HIV, the virus which leads to AIDS, as major problems. (icn)