Not long ago, while wandering the echoing halls of a centuries-old temple, I noticed a guide skip awkwardly past a row of erotic sculptures—as if the stone figures themselves were too scandalous to mention. That moment captured a question at the heart of this post: why does sensuality inspire reverence in one culture, discomfort in another, and censorship in yet another? From sacred carvings in Indian temples to Greek symposiums, from colonial attempts to erase indigenous pr