We love to joke about sexuality, but the subject must be taken more seriously to curb sex crimes, according to a prominent researcher.

“We are used to joking about sexuality but have failed to study it seriously,” said Khuat Thu Hong of the Institute for Social Development Studies (ISDS).

“As a result, we are always confused or avoid discussing the issue when coping with the bad consequences of the lack of sexual understanding,” she said.

She was speaking at a press conference on Tuesday in Hanoi unveiling a study of the social structure of sexuality in Vietnam.

Truth behind every joke?

Hong conducted the report together with Le Bach Duong and Nguyen Ngoc Huong, also from ISDS. The study is included in the book “Sexuality in contemporary Vietnam: Easy to joke about but hard to talk about.”

Hong said Vietnamese people had many misconceptions about sex. While it was a funny subject to joke about, Hong argued that it was time to learn how to talk about sexuality seriously.

“Anything about sexuality that we don’t normally joke about, like homosexuality, is considered sick, unusual or imported from outside the country,” she said.

She said the lack of understandings about sexuality was the main cause of underage sex, premarital abortions, HIV/AIDS, adultery, prostitution and the sexual abuse of children.

“People have mistakenly blamed these issues on the impacts of the market economy and western culture,” she added.

Researchers have said sexuality remained a difficult topic to study, from both a scientific and policy perspective as there was not a body of research to build off.

Experts have also argued that the lack of knowledge about sexuality would threaten any policy and even socio-economic development programs.

Uneven scales

The study, conducted from 2003 to 2008 under the sponsor of the Ford Foundation, found many parents teach their daughters that sexuality is just something that could cause disadvantages, losses, and shame for the girl as well as her family.

The most important message from parents to daughters is to keep themselves away from sexuality, but this is not the message delivered to their sons, researchers said.

Young women thus grow up with the conception that men are dangerous because they are full of sexual desires and that women have to protect themselves.

Up to a quarter of people surveyed for the study said they had had sex before marriage, with 45 percent of men and 23 percent of women answering in the affirmative.

The research group said sexuality outside marriage has been accepted more widely throughout society, but especially by men.

Many men don’t even debate whether or not to have sex outside marriage, instead only thinking about how to conceal affairs with their wives, researchers said.

However, sexuality outside marriage among women is harshly criticized and carries deep social stigma, the study found.

A 45-year-old woman surveyed said that men having sex outside marriage was “just for entertainment” without any intention to marry the mistress. But she said a family could be torn apart when a wife has sex outside marriage.

Family ties

Many people accepted their partner’s infidelity as the cost of maintaining their marriage, while the lack of love and unsatisfied sexual demands were not among the top reasons cited for divorce by the survey.

In these cases, the spouses often maintain their family for the future of their children, saving face for themselves and their family and maintaining the same living standards for all involved.

Unsatisfied sexual demand was not strong enough to break a family but could force people, including the middle-aged, to find sex outside the home. Those having sex outside marriage often said that it was to satisfy their personal demand and that they were trying to find a “solution.”

“A marriage in Vietnam is often protected by any means necessary by all those involved people as well as other social institutions,” the report said.

Reported by Tue Nguyen