This story by Freedman totally goes against what I've thought US/Western attitudes towards sex were in the 40s. (I thought the US was an uber-conservative sex-only-after-marriage & sex-only-for-producing children society.)
Does anyone have any links/references to articles/papers/studies that show that the US was already laissez-faire about sex as early as the late-30s/early-40s?
Don't ever assume that the US -- or any other country -- actually practices what it preaches, especially when said country spends a lot of time preaching.
The two Kinsey Reports (Sexual Behavior in the Human Male, 1948, and Sexual Behavior in the Human Female, 1953) are the groundbreaking sexual studies of their time. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinsey_Reports
sex-only-for-producing children is a bit of a stretch. The link to Ebert's blog post above describes pre-1960s society pretty well; couples were sexual, but if they weren't married (or at least engaged), they probably weren't having sex.
Does anyone have any links/references to articles/papers/studies that show that the US was already laissez-faire about sex as early as the late-30s/early-40s?