Basic Types of Sexual  Behavior

3. Homosexual Intercourse

Oral Intercourse

Female couple in loving embrace. Japanese woodcut, 19th century

Oral intercourse is here defined as involving sexual contact between the sex organs of one person and the mouth of another. The sex organs and the rnouth are the two most easily stimulated erogenous zones of the body, and it is therefore hardly surprsising that they should sometimes be brought into direct contact. Indeed, such behavior is quite common in nearly all mammals, and, from a biological standpoint, there is no reason why human beings as the most highly developed and most sensitive mammals should be an exception. However, in some human societies and historical periods oral intercourse was considered sinful, criminal, or sick, and people who engaged in it were severely punished. Still, in spite of its past religious, legal, and psychiatric condemnation in Western countries, oral intercourse was and is widely practiced by both heterosexual and homosexual couples. The techniques employed are, of course, also the same in both cases.