Women's history
Sex and reproduction

In the history of sex, the social construction of sexual behavior—its taboos, regulation and social and political effects—has had a profound effect on women in the world since prehistoric times. Absent assured ways of controlling reproduction, women have practiced abortion since ancient times; many societies have also practice infanticide to ensure the survival of older children. Historically, it is unclear how often the ethics of abortion (induced abortion) was discussed in societies. In the latter half of the 20th century, some nations began to legalize abortion. This controversial subject has sparked heated debate and in some cases, violence, as different parts of society have different social and religious ideas about its meaning.

Women have been exposed to various tortuous sexual conditions and have been discriminated against in various fashions in history. In addition to women being sexual victims of troops in warfare, an institutionalized example was the Japanese military enslaving native women and girls as comfort women in military brothels in Japanese-occupied countries during World War II.

Particularly, Black Women have been the most affected by hyper-sexualization, body policing, and sexual assault throughout time. Specifically during slavery, Black women were used both as human tools, as well as sexual devices for their white slave-masters. Such conditions continue to permeate in American society beyond slavery and the Jim Crow era. Black women have been conditioned to be silent on their experiences with sexual assault as a means of survival in a society that devalues their whole experience as a Black woman. This stems from the roots of slavery, where Black women were both dehumanized by society, while also being labeled as sexual, and deserving of sexual abuse.
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