Sex is Okay, Kissing is Not: New Flirting Rules for Pandemic Times

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – After this year, flirting will become stranger than ever. Achieving the difficult balance between protecting yourself and enjoying erotic pleasures seems to be the goal, but combining the wearing of masks, safe distancing and intimate closeness to new friends seems impossible.

One need not go too far to find examples: experiences like a simple kiss can be very sexual and trigger the physiological processes that follow arousal, but as Francisca Molero, doctor, clinical sexologist and president of the Spanish Federation of Sexology Societies says, “at this time, kissing a person we have just met is totally discouraged.” And what does this expert approve?

Covid-19 has changed many things and will inevitably reshape casual relations. “The rituals will have to be altered,” adds the sexologist. “Before the pandemic, romantic interactions had changed and many people were starting a romantic relationship through sex; if it worked, they would give themselves a chance to further get to know each other. Now they’ll need to feel safer to become intimate.” But how?

“It must be offset by visual communication, not verbal communication,” says Molero. “The gaze, the gestures will have great erotic relevance … It may be that we will start to give more room to seduction, to that erotic communication that is not bodily. More like the old-fashioned way? Certainly.”

Keeping one’s interpersonal distance will not prevent one from being very tactful when initiating the seduction tactics. The goal is still to attract the other party… not spook them. So be cautious about hygiene measures. They’re necessary, but one needs to know how to demand them. Telling someone they must wash their hands can make them do it, but they may not return.

To manage the situation, the first thing to do is to remember that one loves oneself very much. “The more self-esteem one has, the more one takes care of oneself,” says psychologist Miren Larrazábal. “Once mastered, we should express this directly and bluntly, knowing that we are claiming a right. You can say it like this: ‘We’ll be much better off, you and me.’ Still, as women did at the time of advertising campaigns to persuade men to wear condoms, you may offer your own sanitizer gel. Being proactive is convenient.”

As for masks, the guidelines released by the New York Department of Health on June 8th came as a surprise, among them the recommendation to wear this protective item during sex. If you are among those who were surprised, consider that, according to Francisca Molero, “you have to be present, it’s obvious”: include it with imagination in the erotic game, as a veil or costume. The guideline also recommends that people who have had different sexual partners submit to monthly tests or five to seven days after each date.

The normalcy of sex at two meters distance

Physical contact with someone else’s nudity, one of the sex stimuli among any couple, conflicts with the infamous two meters distancing. But there are practices that can replace the classic friction of bodies and are, according to Molero, equally pleasant. “Virtual sex is also sex, and can be an alternative through messages that generate such intimacy, and from then on, if you have greater confidence, decide if you can allow the face-to-face aspect. Furthermore, playing at asking the other person to do this or that thing while we watch; and masturbation, of course”.

This is preferable to asking about a person’s recent romantic background or wanting to see medical tests, as if the coronavirus were an STD. “Anyway, it’s rather pointless, because you may not have had covid a week before, when you took the test, but then you became infected. Here, the only measures are prevention and vaccination, when there is one,” Molero says. Psychologist Miren Larrazábal considers that asking or demanding proof “in this situation does not guarantee anything, because the person could have become infected later in a meeting.”

This is why the psychologist also advocates the retrieval of less frequent practices, assuming this will only occur for a while. “This new normalcy is also a new sexuality, although transitory,” she says.

“And so we should take exceptional measures and be more creative. We can practice masturbation together, keeping a safe distance. We must incorporate all of this into our repertoire of sexual behaviors and they must be the most frequent while this exceptional situation persists.”

Is there sexual transmission?

Studies on the presence of coronavirus in sperm are contradictory. The prestigious Mayo Clinic summarizes the issue as follows: “At present, there is no evidence that Covid is transmitted by semen or vaginal fluids, but the virus has been detected in the semen of people who have recovered, or are recovering from the virus. Further research will be required to determine if Covid can be transmitted sexually.”

In addition to the two meters distancing, health authorities note that contact needs to be longer than 15 minutes for it to be considered a risk. Will the world change so much this summer that it will drive fast sex away? “Actually, you shouldn’t joke about the 15 minutes,” says Francisca Molero, “because time may fly by and you don’t realize it, and it’s not the case that you’re checking your watch to keep an eye on the duration of exposure. The theoretical recommendations are excellent and based on evidence, but in practise, it’s difficult. It’s easier to keep a safe distance in mind.”

In short, as the sexologist says, “it’s not the summer to be promiscuous” – in Europe’s case. But neither is it the case of limiting the number of lovers. “If relationships are based on virtual sex, seduction and safe measures, people can have many.”