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While you were toiling over your examinations and then heading home for the break, your mate Sir Lloyd was undertaking a grand tour of the ancient world. In amongst the museums, Roman ruins and pizzeria visits, there was one thing that really struck me; that being the number of cocks I was looking at. Most of these cocks were either painted or carved from marble and some were among the most famous in all of history.

One of the more memorable of these cocks was David’s, from Michelangelo’s depiction of the Biblical character. I had to queue for more than two hours to see this particular cock. While the cock itself was fairly underwhelming, as a part of David’s overall physique the experience was quite remarkable. I sat and stared for quite some time at his naked form, as did thousands of other people that day.
So why did an exposure to so much cock have such a great impact on me? It seems that in our present Western society genitalia is something to be hidden because it is taboo or a source of shame. Indeed it is rare to see an image of a naked body outside of pornography. Most people would agree that this has been brought about by the influence of Christian sexual values.

This seems logical when you consider that from the mid 1500s a succession of Popes have ordered the censorship of art within the Vatican walls. This means that a host of priceless ancient and renaissance sculptures have had their phalluses removed and replaced with a fig leaf. Apparently these marble dildos are hanging out in a box in the basement waiting for a more progressive Pope to order them to be reattached!

Unfortunately this censorship didn’t just apply to statues as even some of the most famous paintings in all of history got some clothing added later in their lives. One example followed Michelangelo’s completion of his Last Judgement fresco in the Sistine Chapel. Cardinal Biagio da Cesena complained that “it was mostly disgraceful that in so sacred a place there should have been depicted all those nude figures, exposing themselves so shamefully,” and that it was no work for a papal chapel but rather “for the public baths and taverns.” Michelangelo retaliated by painting Cesena’s face into the scene as Minos, judge of the underworld, complete with Donkey ears and his willy being devoured by a coiled snake.
This act of artistic desecration wasn’t just the whim of a single Cardinal, rather part of a much larger societal shift. This was the time when the Protestant Reformation was heavily critiquing the Roman Catholic Church for its corruption, lavishness and hypocrisy. The Catholics responded with the Council of Trent which, among other things, decreed that in art, “all lasciviousness will be avoided; in such wise that figures shall not be painted or adorned with a beauty exciting to lust.”

These movements of Reformation and Counter Reformation have both hugely impacted the social mores of the Western world. In order to be more integrated with our sexual selves we all must become more integrated with our sexuality.