In movies, music videos, and soap operas, romantic encounters are still continually presented as sexually irresistible moments of intense combustion between two people, who couldn't care less about condoms or each other's sexual histories.

So, it makes perfect sense to me that teenagers would see casual sex as a way to have excitement and romance in their lives. And of course what's really dangerous about this is that in this era of AIDS, you need to be able to say "Whoa, yes, I really am attracted to this person, I really want to be with this person, but I better be a little cautious about it." All these images are saying exactly the opposite - that the only way you can find sexual bliss is to lose your mind, to abandon control.

So, on the one hand, popular culture provides images and music which heighten desire and excite fantasy. But the culture also creates obstacles to that desire unfolding in a spontaneous and pleasurable way.