{"id":1927,"date":"2026-08-08T23:07:23","date_gmt":"2026-08-08T23:07:23","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2026-08-08T23:07:23","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T23:07:23","slug":"a-culture-war-in-the-bedroom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927","title":{"rendered":"A Culture War in the Bedroom"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

In the new film I Want Your Sex<\/em>, characters are action figures in a staging of generational war.<\/p>\n

Read more The Human-Origin Story Is Being Radically Revised<\/a><\/p>\n

On one side is Gen Z, its members portrayed as anxious little prudes. Twenty-three-year-old Elliot is bumbling and directionless. His high-achieving girlfriend is far more interested in studying than she is in him. (When he tries to initiate intimacy, she accuses him of \u201cconstantly draining my qi energy.\u201d) His best friend, Apple, is angsty about her lack of interesting life experience\u2014yet she almost always seems to be home, donning pimple cream and loungewear. None of them is having much sex.<\/p>\n

Their Millennial foil is Erika Tracy: self-serving, insensitive, and ostentatiously sex-positive. She\u2019s a visual artist who has hired a league of underpaid Zoomer assistants\u2014including Elliot\u2014mostly to chew gum and then affix it to a giant drawing of a vagina. She has said publicly that a one-night stand \u201cknows you better than your mother or your best friend ever will.\u201d And she has no problem crossing lines. Amused by Elliot\u2019s innocent skittishness, she promptly suggests that they make their relationship sexual. Soon she\u2019s handcuffing him and making him crawl on the ground. In the bedroom as in the office, she\u2019s dominant and he\u2019s submissive.<\/p>\n

The film, directed by Gregg Araki, is hitting theaters at a time when many commentators (okay, myself included) are writing nervously about the \u201csex recession\u201d and the \u201cromance slump,\u201d wringing their hands about why the youths aren\u2019t getting laid. Some paint young people as coddled and fragile, too timid to put themselves out there. Meanwhile, many Zoomers point out that they\u2019re not growing up in the same world that older cohorts did: They have plenty of valid reasons to feel inhibited (a pandemic, a housing crisis, a culture of constant digital surveillance) and plenty of other priorities (saving, studying, worrying).<\/p>\n

Araki sketches each generation with a cartoonishly broad brush. But the caricatures help illuminate what each perspective might get a little bit right. In an era of shifting etiquette and vigilance against inappropriate behavior, the film seems to ask, can sex be liberating, transgressive, and respectful all at once?<\/p>\n

I Want Your Sex<\/em> knows that a person\u2019s most intimate experiences can be shaped by their historical context. At first, the choice to make Erika a 30-something struck me as odd; Millennials, who\u2019ve partnered later and less than prior generations, were the ones who kicked off the sex recession. But although they may have been having less sex in their 20s on average, they were also known as the \u201chookup generation.\u201d Compared with older cohorts, Millennials were more tolerant of gay and premarital sex, and more likely to report having casual sex. And they enjoyed a culture of relative erotic frankness and optimism.<\/p>\n

Araki, who is 66, grew into adulthood during the AIDS epidemic. In his 20s, he said in a 2023 interview, he felt as if \u201cthis black cloud of doom is hanging over you every fucking day.\u201d By the time Millennials were coming of age, some of that darkness had lifted. The HIV pre-exposure drug Truvada was approved for use in 2012, when the median Millennial was about 24. The internet opened up access to information about sexual health and kink. Last year, Match Group\u2019s Singles in America poll crowned Millennials \u201cthe horniest generation\u201d: Of all the cohorts surveyed, they reported the highest levels of sexual desire and the most boredom with \u201cvanilla sex.\u201d<\/p>\n

Erika is, in her way, a perfect encapsulation of the Millennial sex paradox: She has made the erotic a major part of her identity. But it\u2019s not clear that she\u2019s happier for it, or that she\u2019s scratching whatever itch she has\u2014one that might be more existential than physiological. \u201cSex is everything; it forges us as human beings,\u201d she lectures Elliot. Later, when he reminds her of this, she amends that point: \u201cSex is everything. It\u2019s also nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more How Trump\u2019s Priorities May Impact the Midterms<\/a><\/p>\n

If more Zoomers are openly questioning the value of intimacy, perhaps it\u2019s because they\u2019ve picked up on some of that quiet ambivalence. And in the time since Millennials entered adulthood, the rules and expectations about sex have gotten even more complicated. The MeToo movement heightened people\u2019s suspicion of uneven and potentially exploitative power dynamics\u2014perhaps especially in the workplace, one of the primary places where romantic partners used to meet. After decades of relaxing societal norms regarding what\u2019s appropriate to talk about and with whom, backlash arrived in the form of \u201cboundaries\u201d: a suddenly ubiquitous pop-psychology concept. And then COVID hit. By the time Americans emerged from isolation, many were socially rusty and fond of a good night in. The gaps between people aren\u2019t generally getting easier to bridge.<\/p>\n

Yet the idea of Zoomer sexlessness seems to have galvanized even just slightly older people to champion eroticism. In one slightly on-the-nose scene in the film, Erika confronts Elliot about what she sees as his age group\u2019s failure of joie de vivre, in sex and in general. \u201cGen Z is all about FOMO, and yet you\u2019re willing to miss out on the sexual prime of your life?\u201d she asks. He replies earnestly about spending formative years amid a pandemic: \u201cMy peers have not been well served growing up in a time where nothing feels safe.\u201d That\u2019s what Erika thinks is the problem with his generation\u2019s risk aversion, though. Why is feeling safe<\/em> their overarching goal? \u201cBeing outside your comfort zone,\u201d she tells him, \u201cis the whole fucking point.\u201d<\/p>\n

I Want Your Sex<\/em> isn\u2019t an anti-MeToo movie; it takes manipulations and abuses seriously enough to show that Erika is, at some points, truly acting egregiously. But you also get the sense that she\u2019s right about a few things. Elliot wants to let go of some control. He enjoys a lot of what happens between them. And what he doesn\u2019t enjoy, the movie insinuates, he\u2019ll learn from. Araki seems to be grieving a bygone era: one that felt a little looser, a little spicier, and perhaps more resilient. At one point, when Erika is encouraging Elliot to lighten up, she gives him a copy of Harold Robbins\u2019s Never Love a Stranger<\/em>, a raunchy novel that became the subject of an obscenity trial in 1949. Certain progressive impulses, the film suggests, somehow led the nation in a big loop\u2014right back to a puritanical streak in which pleasure is seen as threatening enough to suppress.<\/p>\n

In a perfect sensual landscape, everyone would feel safe and free all at once. I Want Your Sex <\/em>doesn\u2019t identify the secret to making that happen, of course\u2014and the film arguably avoids the trickiest parts of its own debate by making Erika\u2019s character a woman. Araki has said that the original script featured a young female intern and her male boss, but \u201cafter MeToo, I was like, I kind of don\u2019t want to have a male dragging a female around by the hair.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, by focusing on BDSM, he offers an alternative framework for navigating desire. The practice inherently involves power differences\u2014but also a code of ethics. When I talked with Yehuda Duenyas, the film\u2019s intimacy coordinator, he drew an analogy between kink etiquette and his own work: Having a clear permission structure and good communication from the start means that people might actually feel more able to lean into passion; they\u2019re not worrying in the moment about what\u2019s acceptable or desired, because they\u2019ve already established it. His job isn\u2019t to make people feel comfortable. It\u2019s to foster clarity and openness.<\/p>\n

Erika and Elliot don\u2019t exactly model a healthy dynamic. But the film makes a point of emphasizing his agency, even at his most vulnerable. When an incident brings Elliot to an interrogation room to be questioned about his relationship with Erika\u2014don\u2019t ask why\u2014he tells police that he was \u201cway over my head\u201d and \u201cunder her control.\u201d And how does he feel about that? Thankful.<\/p>\n

Read more Iran Goes Looking for Love in Jordan<\/a><\/p>\n<\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A new film pokes fun at Gen Z\u2019s inhibitions\u2014erotic and otherwise.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1926,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1927","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture"],"yoast_head":"\nA Culture War in the Bedroom - Commercial Relocation Pros<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A Culture War in the Bedroom - Commercial Relocation Pros\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A new film pokes fun at Gen Z\u2019s inhibitions\u2014erotic and otherwise.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Commercial Relocation Pros\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-08-08T23:07:23+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"7 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/?p=1927#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/?p=1927\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"admin\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/3a3374a445f1b5d4852b1d7c15b9fe3a\"},\"headline\":\"A Culture War in the Bedroom\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-08-08T23:07:23+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/?p=1927\"},\"wordCount\":1375,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/?p=1927#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/08\\\/ee097d07f7070b126c1863cda3ed2d6a-1.avif\",\"articleSection\":[\"Culture\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/?p=1927#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/?p=1927\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/?p=1927\",\"name\":\"A Culture War in the Bedroom - Commercial Relocation Pros\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/?p=1927#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/?p=1927#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/08\\\/ee097d07f7070b126c1863cda3ed2d6a-1.avif\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-08-08T23:07:23+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/3a3374a445f1b5d4852b1d7c15b9fe3a\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/?p=1927#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/?p=1927\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/?p=1927#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/08\\\/ee097d07f7070b126c1863cda3ed2d6a-1.avif\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/08\\\/ee097d07f7070b126c1863cda3ed2d6a-1.avif\",\"width\":1200,\"height\":625},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/?p=1927#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"A Culture War in the Bedroom\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/\",\"name\":\"Commercial Relocation Pros\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/3a3374a445f1b5d4852b1d7c15b9fe3a\",\"name\":\"admin\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/50b1ad2e498f523425ee0a8cc5180a210646db1622662a3d56cc405d3e0c346a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/50b1ad2e498f523425ee0a8cc5180a210646db1622662a3d56cc405d3e0c346a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/secure.gravatar.com\\\/avatar\\\/50b1ad2e498f523425ee0a8cc5180a210646db1622662a3d56cc405d3e0c346a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"admin\"},\"sameAs\":[\"http:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\"],\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/commercialrelocationpros.com\\\/?author=1\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"A Culture War in the Bedroom - Commercial Relocation Pros","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"A Culture War in the Bedroom - Commercial Relocation Pros","og_description":"A new film pokes fun at Gen Z\u2019s inhibitions\u2014erotic and otherwise.","og_url":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927","og_site_name":"Commercial Relocation Pros","article_published_time":"2026-08-08T23:07:23+00:00","author":"admin","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"admin","Est. reading time":"7 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927"},"author":{"name":"admin","@id":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/#\/schema\/person\/3a3374a445f1b5d4852b1d7c15b9fe3a"},"headline":"A Culture War in the Bedroom","datePublished":"2026-08-08T23:07:23+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927"},"wordCount":1375,"commentCount":0,"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/ee097d07f7070b126c1863cda3ed2d6a-1.avif","articleSection":["Culture"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927","url":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927","name":"A Culture War in the Bedroom - Commercial Relocation Pros","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/ee097d07f7070b126c1863cda3ed2d6a-1.avif","datePublished":"2026-08-08T23:07:23+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/#\/schema\/person\/3a3374a445f1b5d4852b1d7c15b9fe3a"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/ee097d07f7070b126c1863cda3ed2d6a-1.avif","contentUrl":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/ee097d07f7070b126c1863cda3ed2d6a-1.avif","width":1200,"height":625},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?p=1927#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"A Culture War in the Bedroom"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/#website","url":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/","name":"Commercial Relocation Pros","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/#\/schema\/person\/3a3374a445f1b5d4852b1d7c15b9fe3a","name":"admin","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/50b1ad2e498f523425ee0a8cc5180a210646db1622662a3d56cc405d3e0c346a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/50b1ad2e498f523425ee0a8cc5180a210646db1622662a3d56cc405d3e0c346a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/50b1ad2e498f523425ee0a8cc5180a210646db1622662a3d56cc405d3e0c346a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"admin"},"sameAs":["http:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com"],"url":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/?author=1"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1927","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1927"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1927\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1926"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1927"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1927"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commercialrelocationpros.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1927"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}