Sex Blah-sitivism
October 15, 2015 6:20 AM Subscribe

We tell women to have sex with as many partners as they desire while neglecting to tell men to study up on female anatomy. But who wants sex if it’s not good? A woman’s right to say ‘meh’
posted by almostmanda (182 comments total) 103 users marked this as a favorite

A-men. Nothing worse than a dud root. I sometimes worry that I'll never have sex again, but then I remember how awful the last few were.
posted by h00py at 6:24 AM on October 15, 2015 [8 favorites]

It is more emotionally laborious for a lot of women to explain why they don’t want to have mediocre sex than to simply have the mediocre sex.

QFMFT.
posted by Kitteh at 6:27 AM on October 15, 2015 [100 favorites]

I was just going to post the pull-out quote of the article, but I see that Kitteh has beaten me to the punch.
posted by which_chick at 6:30 AM on October 15, 2015

We pathologize women’s entirely rational reactions of “nah” and “meh” to sex as the result of antiquated values. Often, these reactions are because sex might be perilous to a woman’s well-being – and often, if we’re honest, a physically substandard experience.

It also ignores the fact that libido is something that varies wildly from individual to individual, as well as over the lifespan of a single individual.
posted by soren_lorensen at 6:32 AM on October 15, 2015 [6 favorites]

It is more emotionally laborious for a lot of women to explain why they don’t want to have mediocre sex than to simply have the mediocre sex.

I actually beg to differ (although I admit this could be a your-mileage-may-vary situation). If we're talking about a guy that I've been with for a while and have a stake in, I see that kind of "um, I think we need to talk about something" as part of the process, and fortunately I've been able to get my point across in a way that sinks in and it improves things.

But it doesn't seem like that's the kind of thing this article is talking about - it seems to be talking about refusing offers of what you know is going to be bad sex from guys who just don't appeal to you. And I have no problem whatsoever just brushing them off because who the fuck cares what they think. I have no investment in their feelings, so if they get pissy because they can't figure out why I'm saying no, I don't give a shit.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:48 AM on October 15, 2015 [16 favorites]

Life is too fucking short to fake orgasms whose only purpose is to coddle some dude's ego.
posted by Windigo at 6:53 AM on October 15, 2015 [27 favorites]

Life is too fucking short to fake orgasms full stop.
posted by Kitteh at 6:58 AM on October 15, 2015 [44 favorites]

Nothing worse than a dud root. I sometimes worry that I'll never have sex again, but then I remember how awful the last few were.

You and me both, sister. I'm not worried that I'll never have sex again, I'm worried that I'll never have good sex again. Encountering a generation of men raised up on internet porn left me utterly bereft, like how if I turned down a specific act, nine times out of ten, the dude I was with implied that it was because I'm a prude, *~*sex negative*~*, uncomfortable with my body or my sexuality, or simply falling victim to society's puritan hang-ups. Chances were always vanishingly slim that he'd just let it go without pushing. So I can't even describe how much sex I've had that I didn't want to have, for no other reason than because it was easier and, frankly, less dangerous for me to just let it happen than it would have been to extricate myself. I wouldn't call those encounters rape, but they certainly weren't good, and I deeply regret sharing my youth and my body with so many selfish assholes.

Too often, sex positivity feels rooted in a feminism that secretly wants boys to like it. It wants to be cool. [...] We tell women to have sex with as many partners as they like, but then don’t vigorously encourage those partners to be any good at sex. Women who opt out of frequent sex or sex entirely are considered repressed, and women who opt in are considered worthy of disrespect.

This article had me doing the Kermit flail all the way through, but for these sentences especially. So much rank bullshit and male entitlement gets swept under the rug without any examination whatsoever under the guise of "sex positivity," moreso as the liberal, individualist equality movement continues to move ever nearer to the type of dude-centered pseudo-feminism I despise with every cell of my being. And don't even get me started on how other women are almost always the most ruthless, unforgiving enforcers of "sex positivity," because that shit depresses me more than almost anything in the world.

Whew, having a lot of feels about this! Infinite praise to the author (MeFi's own!), and thanks to almostmanda for the FPP.
posted by divined by radio at 6:59 AM on October 15, 2015 [113 favorites]

One comment deleted. Coming into a thread about how a dynamic affects women, to talk about how the author is wrong and it affects men too, isn't a great conversational move; please don't do that here.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 7:24 AM on October 15, 2015 [64 favorites]

I know that I have reached a point in my life where I am like, "Listen, I am not really down with getting it on unless I can be absolutely sure that there will be an orgasm. And I mean, a really really really good one. I can even give you instructions."
posted by Kitteh at 7:28 AM on October 15, 2015 [14 favorites]

I guess I was never under the impression that "sex positive" meant "having boring sex with people you aren't really that into."

It isn't a sex-negative thing to know what you want and get it and to exclude what you don't. You are under no obligation to get nekkid with anyone who isn't smart enough to fuck you.

Sure, there are a lot of clueless fumblers and selfish boors, but the world is not completely bereft of men who know how to listen and pay attention, if you can establish a rapport with them. Good sex can be really fun and life affirming and it has not vanished utterly from the face of the Earth, contrary to apparently popular belief.

There is even sex that is so excellent that the only adequate explanation, beyond patience and skill, is some kind of witchcraft.
posted by louche mustachio at 7:31 AM on October 15, 2015 [10 favorites]

No I am not telling you how I know this or where it is.
posted by louche mustachio at 7:32 AM on October 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

I think part of the problem is there are a lot of men that don't think they should have to bother being smart enough to fuck, or even put forth the effort of faking being smart enough. Teaching grown men how to have sex with every new partner is exhausting and shouldn't be necessary. to be honest its a lot of men that need to learn how to be SEX positive instead of just their-own-orgasm positive.
posted by anthropophagous at 7:36 AM on October 15, 2015 [34 favorites]

So much rank bullshit and male entitlement gets swept under the rug without any examination whatsoever under the guise of "sex positivity,"

AMEN.
posted by the_blizz at 7:37 AM on October 15, 2015 [2 favorites]

Be honest, how many other people sat around making the cupping motion on their elbows for a while?
posted by Justinian at 7:38 AM on October 15, 2015 [57 favorites]

Actually, I realized that my comment isn't actually addressing the comment I was responding to:

It is more emotionally laborious for a lot of women to explain why they don’t want to have mediocre sex than to simply have the mediocre sex.

Upon reflection, that is indeed probably empirically true. And my comment was actually proposing a third option, and possibly expanding the comment thusly:

It is more emotionally laborious for a lot of women to explain why they don’t want to have mediocre sex than to simply have the mediocre sex, but it costs no emotional labor to simply tell a guy to get lost.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:38 AM on October 15, 2015 [4 favorites]

This is a problem with men in general, straight, gay and everywhere inbetween. It's not impressed upon us that the other partner's enjoyment is something that needs consideration or that what works for one person could be completely wrong for another.

As a gay man, I've been with too many guys who didn't seem to know their way around equipment that functioned a lot like their own, so I can't even imagine how bad it must be for women.
posted by C'est la D.C. at 7:40 AM on October 15, 2015 [23 favorites]

This pull-quote for me:

I am icy, certainly, but I am not uptight.

That should be my email signature.
posted by amanda at 7:43 AM on October 15, 2015 [34 favorites]

but it costs no emotional labor to simply tell a guy to get lost.

I wish this were true for everyone. It wasn't for me back when I was dating; I know it isn't for a lot of my friends who are still dating. Telling a guy to get lost risks the guy deciding that you're the appropriate receptacle for his FEEEEEEEELINGS and nagging and "But I'm a nice guy [and I deserve you]" and all that bullshit.

Hell, I've seen Mefites tell women over in Ask that they can get stalked if they don't use the right incantation to tell a guy to get lost. And that they can get stalked if they DON'T tell the guy to get lost but just ghost.
posted by pie ninja at 7:47 AM on October 15, 2015 [44 favorites]

My ex used to complain when I wouldn't give him head, but what he didn't seem to care about was that if I gave him head he would then be finished for the night and I wouldn't get my orgasm. It was infuriating. He'd also complain that I'd take too long to come if he went down on me, as if that was going to impede on his eventual, inevitable orgasm.

I'd like to amend my initial statement because I agree with divined by radio - it's the good sex I miss but it's so very rare - I'm much happier having sex with myself because that is so, so much better than the bad sex I put up with for such a long time (it wasn't always bad, by any means, but when it was bad it was terrible).
posted by h00py at 7:49 AM on October 15, 2015 [14 favorites]

"Sex-positive" has always struck me as a totally disingenuous term anyway. Like "pro-life", it usually means the speaker is staking out one very specific position in the debate, but trying to pretend that it's the only reasonable position, and that anyone who disagrees is suffering from some kind of personality flaw.
posted by oliverburkeman at 7:50 AM on October 15, 2015 [32 favorites]

It seems like somewhere along the way the original idea of sex positivity, which was to shed the shame associated with expressing female sexuality, got subverted to mean "you must love sex all of the time with everyone" with the associated shame of not expressing female sexuality exuberantly enough. It should mean that women are free to express or not express their sexuality however and whenever they goddamn well please.
posted by grumpybear69 at 8:00 AM on October 15, 2015 [35 favorites]

Seconding what dbr said above, I spent a lot of time in my 20s having very unsatisfactory experiences but feeling like I owed the dudes that naked time. Time machine, please, so I can go back and tell Past Me that she doesn't owe any dude that and the guilt trip isn't because of her.
posted by Kitteh at 8:01 AM on October 15, 2015 [10 favorites]

It is more emotionally laborious for a lot of women to explain why they don’t want to have mediocre sex than to simply have the mediocre sex, but it costs no emotional labor to simply tell a guy to get lost.

I wish this were true! I'm married and, if saying "I'm good, thanks" doesn't work I tell people hitting on me I'm married (I'm uncomfortable doing this in some ways because "I don't want to fuck you or even talk to you" should carry as much weight as "I belong to another man" but you do what you have to do) and it still doesn't work! So I have to keep talking to them and explaining why I'm not going to fuck them which is pretty exhausting. There's also the emotional cost of the fact that I am literally afraid to say "get lost" because I don't know what they'll do. I'm in a position where I am definitely NOT going to have sex with them because, again, married, but if I weren't 100% precluded from it by a specific commitment odds are good that I'd say yes even now and then because, you know, whatever.

Hell, I know a number of women (including myself) who have confessed to, at at least one point in their lives, initiating the giving of a blowjob to get a man to stop talking and frankly if this were still an option for me (with anyone other than my husband) I'd probably still do it.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 8:04 AM on October 15, 2015 [13 favorites]

When did "sex positive" mean "never refuse?" I guess I thought it meant knowing your body, knowing how to ask for what you want, not being ashamed of having the kind of sex you want with whomever you want as much as you want and not shaming others for the same thing.

Feeling compelled or even forced to have sex with people who aren't interested in making sure the experience isn't mutually satisfying isn't sex positive, at least not by my standards. Sometimes, the truly sex positive thing to do is to say" No thank you, sir" and go home and play with your favorite toy.

"No" can be positive too, when it means you're taking care of yourself.
posted by louche mustachio at 8:05 AM on October 15, 2015 [14 favorites]

Women who opt out of frequent sex or sex entirely are considered repressed, and women who opt in are considered worthy of disrespect.

This. Such an old, old story. Why does it never change?!

I've always considered myself sex positive, and it hasn't done me a damn bit of good. When I got to college, I heard all the rumors about how guys would complain about how women never wanted to do it. Great, I thought, I'll help fill in the gap! I remember going to a frat party and trying to strike up conversations with guys, and failing to get anywhere. Whether it was because I was ugly or because the guys preferred the hunt to the actual thing I have no idea, but I'm guessing it was mostly the latter (granted, I did not dress in a little black dress with fuck-me pumps and was kind of shy).

On preview: amen, grumpybear69 and oliverburkeman.
posted by sockerpup at 8:09 AM on October 15, 2015 [7 favorites]

Sure, there are a lot of clueless fumblers and selfish boors, but the world is not completely bereft of men who know how to listen and pay attention, if you can establish a rapport with them.

Sure, but regardless of the established rapport, you almost never know how generous or selfish someone is going to be in bed until you're actually in bed with them, which is how the more unfortunate among us can encounter numerous dudes in a row whose idea of "good sex" comprises 10-15 minutes of rabbit-like jackhammering followed by eight or more hours of deep and unremitting sleep. As much as I'd love to, I'm probably not gonna ask a man on the first or second date, "So are you one of those jackhammer dudes, or no? If you are, let's just split the check and go our separate ways right now, because I am so over that shit."

And that's not even touching on the fact that women shouldn't have to expect that most every sexual encounter we go into is likely to require us to perform verbal and physical instruction. Having to teach each new partner what/where a clitoris even is, in addition to simply being laborious, is a bummer, and just another way of shifting the brunt of the responsibility for [whatever, but in this case, receiving sexual pleasure] onto women. I've learned my way around male anatomy very well, why do so many men get away with refusing to learn their way around mine? (A: IBTP, which informs straight men that caring about whether their female partners get off is innately emasculating, and unnecessary to boot.) Like the author notes, "We tell women to have sex with as many partners as they like, but then don't vigorously encourage those partners to be any good at sex."

It seems like somewhere along the way the original idea of sex positivity, which was to shed the shame associated with expressing female sexuality, got subverted to mean "you must love sex all of the time with everyone" with the associated shame of not expressing female sexuality exuberantly enough.

See also: the American "free love" proselytizers of the 60s and 70s, ostensibly progressive in theory but often deeply misogynistic in practice, albeit a movement in which the roots of second-wave and radical feminism were able to grow.
posted by divined by radio at 8:10 AM on October 15, 2015 [63 favorites]

Feeling compelled or even forced to have sex with people who aren't interested in making sure the experience isn't mutually satisfying isn't sex positive, at least not by my standards. Sometimes, the truly sex positive thing to do is to say" No thank you, sir" and go home and play with your favorite toy.

"No" can be positive too, when it means you're taking care of yourself.

Well sure, I think that is great and I think many of us in this thread agree with you (I definitely do!) but once again the patriarchy has coopted something for misogyny and now, like so much in life, "sex positivity" has become another way to make women feel bad about any choice they have ever made.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 8:10 AM on October 15, 2015 [18 favorites]

"So are you one of those jackhammer dudes, or no? If you are, let's just split the check and go our separate ways right now, because I am so over that shit."

This is so true, divined by radio!! Favorited a million times!
posted by sockerpup at 8:12 AM on October 15, 2015 [6 favorites]

That's what it should be, louche mustachio, absolutely. Unfortunately, things don't always go to plan.

The sheer number of times men have been twiddling aimlessly around my vaginal opening and then getting all huffy when I've told them to go up a bit makes the whole thing so bloody depressing.

It's the huffiness that makes me meh and meh again.
posted by h00py at 8:13 AM on October 15, 2015 [27 favorites]

but once again the patriarchy has coopted something for misogyny and now, like so much in life, "sex positivity" has become another way to make women feel bad about any choice they have ever made

I have to fight somebody now, don't I
posted by louche mustachio at 8:13 AM on October 15, 2015

It seems to me that this all points to the need for decent sex education that is really relationship education.

The mechanical shit we got in school in no way addressed these issues. This combined with the drive of hormones with their own logic probably means even the most well-meaning males had not much clue from high school into our twenties. Then wrap that some eventual realisation that our sex drive alone won't lead to the result required, now some guilt, and voila.

Men should be educated that men and women want sex, that this is ok, but they might get their needs met differently and bridging the gap is a connection and communication thing not some magic spell invoked with hope.
posted by C.A.S. at 8:14 AM on October 15, 2015 [8 favorites]

ugh the number of times a dude has called me uptight on a dating site because I didn't want to talk to him after he SO CLEVERLY segued a completely normal conversation about like, tapas or something into sexual territory is... high.

who told dudes this is how they get laid? did someone teach a class and the first thing on the syllabus was "make sure you steer the totally normal conversation into sex as soon as you can"? I NEED TO KNOW. IT'S AN EPIDEMIC.
posted by kerning at 8:15 AM on October 15, 2015 [50 favorites]

I've learned my way around male anatomy very well, why do so many men get away with refusing to learn their way around mine?

This is so true and reinforced by a lot of gendered magazines; multiple publications I read in high school (e.g. Cosmo) taught me about the sensitivity and anatomy of penises and testicles (generally at least every couple of months) but I used to read a lot of Maxim and you know never once did I see an issue that talked about what feels nice to anyone with a clitoris or vagina. Maybe (hopefully) this has changed but at least when I was reading them both men's and women's magazines were focused on male anatomy and pleasure.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 8:15 AM on October 15, 2015 [11 favorites]

Maybe I'm just old? Or really dominant? Perhaps the advent of text based flirtation has worked to my advantage?
posted by louche mustachio at 8:18 AM on October 15, 2015

Oh god, so timely. I've been thinking a lot about whether or not I want to try dating again, and remembering all the times I've been with a new guy who seems pretty confident about his sexual prowess and he's not terrible at the making out so I give it a go and UGH. I've run into so many men who claim to be really into making sure the woman they're with gets off, by any means necessary, and then they make barely any effort to be even a tiny bit good at sex. Nothing like having a guy tell you how badly he wants to go down on you, then hearing "come already!" from between your thighs after less than three minutes of halfhearted lapping.

Yeah, sure, I miss being touched by another person, and there have been some dudes I've dated that have been truly sex-positive and very concerned about my pleasure and I'm glad for them and I know there are more dudes out there like them, but my god, the crappy ones are so thick on the ground that I'm like, fuck it, I like taking myself on dates and I'm extremely skilled in the art of getting myself off like a golden god, maybe I'll just keep not dating other people.
posted by palomar at 8:20 AM on October 15, 2015 [20 favorites]

The information content of any magazine article can be measured out in teaspoons, but there was this book a few years ago. I thought we were at the point where this was a discussed topic.

GoodReads reviews of the book "She Comes First"
posted by C.A.S. at 8:20 AM on October 15, 2015 [4 favorites]

who told dudes this is how they get laid? did someone teach a class and the first thing on the syllabus was "make sure you steer the totally normal conversation into sex as soon as you can"?

I always assumed it was the same underlying logic behind the poorly written email scams. It's minimal effort on their part, hits a high volume of women to increase the chances, and stupid on purpose to weed out people who know better upfront.
posted by C'est la D.C. at 8:21 AM on October 15, 2015 [10 favorites]

When did "sex positive" mean "never refuse?"

I think this gets into the whole "good, giving and game" thing, where you're supposed to be "game" to anything or you don't really care about your partner.
posted by Elementary Penguin at 8:23 AM on October 15, 2015 [34 favorites]

I've run into so many men who claim to be really into making sure the woman they're with gets off, by any means necessary, and then they make barely any effort to be even a tiny bit good at sex.

I'll stop commenting after this but I think there's actually correlation here; I don't always actually have an orgasm from sex (although I enjoy it very much) and I would much, MUCH prefer someone who is okay with that and takes my opinion on whether or not this is a priority into account. Someone who is really into making sure the woman gets off in this way is often more concerned with their own ego and whether they can brag about how good in bed they are than with what their partner wants.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 8:24 AM on October 15, 2015 [41 favorites]

It is more emotionally laborious for a lot of women to explain why they don’t want to have mediocre sex than to simply have the mediocre sex.

Some parts of the article rang true for me while others were not my experience. This pull quote fits me, but not in the context that my sexual partners are necessarily bad at sex. Sex for me is a big mental thing, and if my brain isn't in to it, it is too much damn work to try to convince my brain to think otherwise. Full time job, potty training toddler, bum knee, and seasonal ennui make digging myself out of my own mental crap to try to enjoy the experience just ... more work.
posted by jillithd at 8:25 AM on October 15, 2015 [4 favorites]

I think this gets into the whole "good, giving and game" thing, where you're supposed to be "game" to anything or you don't really care about your partner.

Yes. As helpful as Dan Savage has been for many people in many ways, the GGG thing has actually turned out to be really fucking toxic for a lot of people. Being GGG shouldn't mean that you get to tell your partner she's being an uptight prude when she doesn't want to have a foursome with the strangers you just found twenty minutes ago on Craigslist, but that's how it's interpreted by a lot of people: If you're not willing to do anything, anytime, anywhere, with anyone, you're not GGG, and if you're not GGG, you're a bad person.
posted by palomar at 8:29 AM on October 15, 2015 [35 favorites]

I think this gets into the whole "good, giving and game" thing, where you're supposed to be "game" to anything or you don't really care about your partner.

Someone who does not care what you are comfortable with is not your partner.
posted by louche mustachio at 8:32 AM on October 15, 2015 [8 favorites]

I have a hypothesis that sex for a lot of straight/masc dudes is about neither female pleasure nor male physical pleasure but about stroking their own ego by scoring Man Points and soothing their insecurities about being a Real Man.
posted by Zalzidrax at 8:41 AM on October 15, 2015 [11 favorites]

But this article is not really about sex with partners. It's about sex in general and unfortunately that seems to be about the male orgasm.
posted by h00py at 8:43 AM on October 15, 2015 [3 favorites]

I've been saying "um, no", "nah", and "meh" for years, starting when I was a teen.

Seems fair that it should work for everyone that same way.

My assumption growing up was that we all mostly said "meh", to some degree. I mean, sure, there are outlier times and situations, but one's default should probably be "meh".

I mean, sex is, generally, abundant and low quality in a post religious and post marriage-first society.
posted by clvrmnky at 8:44 AM on October 15, 2015

So, so down with the critique of "sex positive."

Until the day that every “how to please her” article on AskMen.com comes with a realistic anatomy chart and clear instructions that this can take some time, we might get a little closer

And here's the tragedy: these articles exist for a reason, and that reason is that many men are quite interested in being better at making the experience pleasure-full with their partners. Unfortunately, they exist to convert that interest into pageviews/impressions (and, I guess, the occasional checkout magazine sale) as much as to actually provide any information.

But that brings us to the question of how much help such an article could actually really provide. Sure, they should all probably say "this can take time" (and suggest that, hey, maybe that's actually part of the sexy sexy fun, because it sure can be), but is the anatomy chart really what's missing?

More half of it is probably instead tuning-in to your partner and making it a collaboration rather than a performance. And maybe this is one of the damndest things about lad mags and toxic masculine culture: they make it about performance. And for all its merits even this article is doing it too by reinforcing the idea that there's some set of knowledge and charts and skills that, if properly disseminated to the general male population, would provide a sufficient supply of well-performing lovers for women who have sex with men, which, again, is pretty much the same idea that sells lad mag articles on sex in the first place.
posted by namespan at 8:52 AM on October 15, 2015 [16 favorites]

I would like to add that “meh” doesn’t have to just be for individual potential partners. It can be for the entire endeavor/engagement with the search for partners in the first place.

This is often assumed to be indicative of asexuality these days, but I think it is way more complicated than that. I know single women who dearly love the idea of dating, of relationships, of sex. But attempting to date is an enormous time suck, and an emotional pit, and a lot of women just say “meh” to that.

Figure out which websites are for what kinds of relationships. Figure out what kind of profile pictures. If you aren’t thin and white and straight, figure out the terminology that you are supposed to use. Figure out how much positivity your profiles have to have so that people respond, but not so much that you sound like a MLM devotee. Figure out the pop culture totems of the moment that help you find “your people”. Figure out how many missteps from another person you will endure before deciding it isn’t worth it. Figure out whether or not wanting to try a new restaurant is worth enduring the potentially horrible experience of trying it with a stranger who might end up calling you an ugly slur. Figure out how many messages about your attractiveness (or lack thereof) you can handle receiving before your soul feels bruised. Figure out whether it is worth it to keep your profile active just so that you can truthfully tell friends/family “oh yeah, I have a [dating site] profile” in case they ask if you are “getting out there”.

I have things to do. I have books to read. I am tired after work, and sometimes the thought of meeting someone for a drink and having to make “nice to meet you” conversation rather than going home to put on pajamas sounds like actual torture. I like my friends and family. I have chores to do. I have medical appointments. I have places where I want to volunteer. I have movies to watch, that I want to watch by myself. I have a life that needs living, and the thought of wasting any of my time or mental energy on the enormous crapshoot that is modern dating just seems like punishment. My “meh” is for all of it. I believe my life is larger now that it has more “meh” in it.
posted by a fiendish thingy at 8:58 AM on October 15, 2015 [118 favorites]

"What do you mean, you didn't have an orgasm? I used my PENIS."
posted by delfin at 9:08 AM on October 15, 2015 [56 favorites]

Certainly I don't think much improvement would come from some sort of Rube Goldberg sex instructions

I now so badly want a Rube Goldberg sex toy though you have NO IDEA.
posted by louche mustachio at 9:12 AM on October 15, 2015 [9 favorites]

I would like to add that “meh” doesn’t have to just be for individual potential partners. It can be for the entire endeavor/engagement with the search for partners in the first place.

YES. That's where I am in my life right now. I have other shit to do, man! Trying to date is a full-time endeavor and I've already got full-time work and full-time school and full-time trying to manage the rest of my life going on, you know? Why carve out precious time to search for date-worthy partners when the payoff is so very, very low?
posted by palomar at 9:17 AM on October 15, 2015 [7 favorites]

That's why we're moving to Crone Island, where the only personal life prying we'll ever encounter is being asked whether we like our margaritas blended or on the rocks.
posted by divined by radio at 9:21 AM on October 15, 2015 [53 favorites]

MetaFilter: I used my PENIS.
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 9:27 AM on October 15, 2015 [10 favorites]

Encountering a generation of men raised up on internet porn left me utterly bereft, like how if I turned down a specific act, nine times out of ten, the dude I was with implied that it was because I'm a prude, *~*sex negative*~*, uncomfortable with my body or my sexuality, or simply falling victim to society's puritan hang-ups. Chances were always vanishingly slim that he'd just let it go without pushing.

Yeah. The ratio of exposure to fictional depictions of sex acts acted out by a performance artist paid to simulate enjoyment of whatever she's surprised with (or is literally begging for like a sexy sex sex lady who loves sex!) vs. exposure to actual human partners is more skewed now than it has been in any other point in human history, and I can't help but also feel some pity for much younger women who will never know what it's like to have sex with a man who hasn't already been exposed to 5-10 years of hardcore, live action porn on demand before ever experiencing naked time with a real life partner.

The pressure to engage or tolerate acts right off the bat that would have been considered edgy and VERY optional menu items just 10-20 years ago (and that I don't find appealing or pleasurable no matter how much you try to paint that as killjoy closemindedness or lack of generosity on my part) is fucking tiresome. I've had more than one man admit to me that he only gets a yes for _________ with a small minority of women, and yet every goddamn time I'm with someone new I feel like we have to play "You'll probably say no but on the very minor chance you'll say yes I have to ask or attempt it with every goddamn woman who lets me get this far, so be ready for it by the third encounter, latest." And it's all from the kind of porn I don't even care to watch because it's literally impossible for me to identity with the role being played by the lady.
posted by blue suede stockings at 9:33 AM on October 15, 2015 [30 favorites]

Look on the bright side: this could be the new face of birth control.
posted by tspae at 9:39 AM on October 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

The only time I can really remember my mom talking to me about sex (rather than me realizing that there was a section of my shelves that had What's Happening to Me, Where Did I Come From, Our Bodies Ourselves, etc. in it) was a short conversation that boiled down to consent and enjoyment. Of course, being a 12 year old boy, I was incredibly embarrassed by this, but the bit about making sure that your partner enjoys the experience is something that every boy should hear. Hell, that should be a unit in all sex education classes. Not just how to avoid pregnancy and disease, but also how to communicate so that sex is enjoyable for all parties involved. Of course, any mention of the fact that people have sex for enjoyment in a sex ed/health class would bring down the wrath of Fox News in minutes.

I have a hope that the attempts to teach positive consent will result in this, but I may be being overly optimistic here.
posted by Hactar at 9:41 AM on October 15, 2015 [5 favorites]

And that's not even touching on the fact that women shouldn't have to expect that most every sexual encounter we go into is likely to require us to perform verbal and physical instruction.

QFMFT, divined by radio!

And that doesn’t even get into what I’ll call the “You only really understand something if you can explain it to someone else” echelon of orgasm (which I have yet to reach). I have never quite found the space to learn my own “Yes, 100% guaranteed orgasm” method well enough to be able to teach it to the man I am naked with.

Boys are coming all over the place in their tweens, and I’m still trying to find the time and energy to decode my own sexual pleasure enough to explain it to others. I mean, honestly. It feels like such a chore.
posted by sazerac at 9:45 AM on October 15, 2015 [13 favorites]

Hell, I know a number of women (including myself) who have confessed to, at at least one point in their lives, initiating the giving of a blowjob to get a man to stop talking

To increase the effectiveness, put something in the dude's mouth, not yours.
posted by desjardins at 9:45 AM on October 15, 2015 [20 favorites]

This is one of those rare moments where it is completely reasonable to drop a pornhub link into a metafilter discussion. Nina Hartley teaches you how to eat pussy. Do I even need to mention it's NSFWness?
posted by special agent conrad uno at 9:46 AM on October 15, 2015 [34 favorites]

I am 41 years old and I have not the slightest idea if I'm good at sex or not.
posted by josher71 at 9:50 AM on October 15, 2015 [2 favorites]

Special agent Conrad uno: That's literally the only porn video I have bookmarked. Which is to say: excellent link, good call, etc.
posted by sazerac at 9:53 AM on October 15, 2015

Nothing like having a guy tell you how badly he wants to go down on you, then hearing "come already!" from between your thighs after less than three minutes of halfhearted lapping

You get three whole minutes?!?!
posted by triggerfinger at 9:56 AM on October 15, 2015 [9 favorites]

I can't help but also feel some pity for much younger women who will never know what it's like to have sex with a man who hasn't already been exposed to 5-10 years of hardcore, live action porn on demand before ever experiencing naked time with a real life partner.

This. I'm a Gen Xer and I've been fortunate enough to have consistently excellent partners. I suspect it's because the window of time in which I had multiple partners, etc. also coincided with a period in which the pool of available partners had been raised mostly on Playboy magazines or the occasional porn movie they had to drive to a store to rent in person.

Anecdotally, the partner who required the most communication and assertive "No, I like this, not that, and you need to pay attention or this stops now" was the only one who admitted to a regular porn habit. Also anecdotally, my best lovers all admitted at some point that they read their mom's Judith Krantz/Jackie Collins/romance novels at a formative age and used those as how-to guides. God bless Judith Krantz for the favors she did me.
posted by sobell at 10:03 AM on October 15, 2015 [40 favorites]

did someone teach a class and the first thing on the syllabus was "make sure you steer the totally normal conversation into sex as soon as you can"?

Quite a lot of the PUA types basically did, yeah, except they made it sound 100x creepier than that.
posted by Jon Mitchell at 10:15 AM on October 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

Floweringjudas, that is so right on! I have had to do the same. "Oh, you mean, YOU aren't interested in being penetrated that way? Why do you think *I* would be, necessarily?" The answer is, basically, porn, and I guess a weird idea that women are used to being penetrated so we shouldn't care where? Totally bizarre. Men, be reasonable and don't push for anything...especially if you saw it in porn and think all women should be wild for it.
posted by agregoli at 10:15 AM on October 15, 2015 [9 favorites]

We tell women to have sex with as many partners as they desire

We do? Would someone please tell the Republican Party? Thanks.
posted by maryr at 10:17 AM on October 15, 2015 [5 favorites]

I was dating a guy who was, so so SO predictably, really interested in trying anal. He'd heard anal was great! Did I want to try it? Was I sure I didn't want to try it? How about now? Didnt I trust him? til finally one night I lost my temper, whipped out my strap-on, and said brightly "Okay! YOU FIRST."

My first experience with a guy who pulled this stunt on me was much less amusing than this, and honestly pretty traumatizing in retrospect, but this is GENIUS. I once had a guy try to fuck my armpit, which is hilarious enough, but he also did it without even consulting me first, which means I really should have responded by jamming a few fingers between his bicep and sideboob and saying something saucy like, "Yeah, baby, I know this is just how you like it!"

The last dude I boned, who was so awful in bed that I actually had to laugh, felt the need to stop his jackhammering every couple of minutes and ask, with all earnestness, "Did you come yet?" (No, dude, I'm way too busy mentally organizing my nail polish collection.) This was after repeatedly asking him to do X instead of Y was only met with a brief pause followed by immediate resumption of the kind of humping whose speed can only be classified as "frenetic." When I conferred with my friends about it, I tried to stick up for him -- maybe he could learn! maybe if we did it a few more times, he'd figure it out! -- but I was being much too generous, and the sex never got any less depressing. It's on me for giving him more than one chance, but damn, it's really on him for being 40 goddamn years old and having absolutely no idea where my clit was.
posted by divined by radio at 10:24 AM on October 15, 2015 [19 favorites]

a weird idea that women are used to being penetrated so we shouldn't care where

nostrils! ears! it's all the same to us!
posted by poffin boffin at 10:26 AM on October 15, 2015 [27 favorites]

This was after repeatedly asking him to do X instead of Y was only met with a brief pause followed by immediate resumption of the kind of humping whose speed can only be classified as "frenetic."

Yeah, this is really the worst fucking thing. Because in general we like to believe that if we're just OPEN AND HONEST and TOTALLY UPFRONT about what we want and what we don't want then it will suddenly be okay and there will be banging as glorious and awe-inspiring as the lighting in a fucking Vermeer but instead you say "i don't like it when you do X, please do Y instead" and then you get absolutely nothing else but sustained X until you slip into a fugue state and commit atrocities. It's not even that they don't know what to do, it's that they Do Not Care.
posted by poffin boffin at 10:29 AM on October 15, 2015 [43 favorites]

I would like to add that “meh” doesn’t have to just be for individual potential partners. It can be for the entire endeavor/engagement with the search for partners in the first place.

I concur. I realised a couple of decades ago that there is nothing in the dating game that appeals to me, neither in process nor in product, and got on with enjoying my life. I don't think that it is especially a female experience either (I'm male) – at least in Denmark, the number of single male and females are roughly equal. The more, the merrier, say I. The need for a new generation is strongly overstated.
posted by bouvin at 10:34 AM on October 15, 2015 [5 favorites]

The answer is, basically, porn, and I guess a weird idea that women are used to being penetrated so we shouldn't care where? Totally bizarre.

(cis girls) don't even have a prostate to stimulate. It is a mystery.
posted by sukeban at 10:35 AM on October 15, 2015 [2 favorites]

I tried to stick up for him -- maybe he could learn! maybe if we did it a few more times, he'd figure it out! -- but I was being much too generous, and the sex never got any less depressing.

Dick: the ultimate sunk cost fallacy.
posted by floweringjudas at 10:40 AM on October 15, 2015 [18 favorites]

but instead you say "i don't like it when you do X, please do Y instead" and then you get absolutely nothing else but sustained X until you slip into a fugue state and commit atrocities.

Oh, that's my favorite, when you try really hard to preserve their ego by being nice and asking really nicely for them to please stop fucking you in a way that is not pleasurable but instead please try this slight adjustment that will make things better and maybe even get you off, and their reaction is not to be nice and try to make sure you actually enjoy fucking them, but to double down on being a terrible lay and make the experience of fucking them so unenjoyable that you never want to see their stupid face again.
posted by palomar at 10:42 AM on October 15, 2015 [11 favorites]

So much rank bullshit and male entitlement gets swept under the rug without any examination whatsoever under the guise of "sex positivity," moreso as the liberal, individualist equality movement continues to move ever nearer to the type of dude-centered pseudo-feminism I despise with every cell of my being.

I think there ends up being a disconnect in axioms which causes our conversations to go pear-shaped.

A lot of people have brought up the Good, Giving, and Game mantra. Dan Savage fundamentally didn't understand the amount of pressure women are under to be sexually available for bad sex, and near as I can tell it even now only tangentially occurs to him that women will endure pain and trauma trying to be "game" and that men would use GGG as a weapon. He was shocked and disturbed when a woman contacted him about wanting to be game but having severe trauma around anal sex and not wanting to do it - and his response was such an "obviously, if you don't like it or want to do it, don't do it" that it made his axiom of "it has to feel good" more obvious, but I don't think that's a reasonable assumption for women since we do so much that actively hurts us in the service of other people, and are praised for doing so.

Likewise, a lot of the strongly sex-positive feminists I know are in the kink/sex work communities and are pushing fundamentally for being respected for the types of sexual activity they enjoy within the context of feminism. The important part here, I think, is the that they enjoy. I'm submissive and into bondage. I'm also a feminist. Having to reconcile these two things has been a real struggle because of a lot of the language around women, women's bodies, and the sex acts women do. I see sex positive feminism as fundamentally pushing the idea that "women's pleasure is important", but I think it often gets diverted by the pressure and weight of "men deserve whatever sex they want" (going gender binary here because I'm not sure about experiences of gender-queer people and I think the larger context is the same).

I've run into so many men who claim to be really into making sure the woman they're with gets off, by any means necessary, and then they make barely any effort to be even a tiny bit good at sex.

OMG THIS. I'm incredibly easy to get off - like five, ten minutes max. Had sex with a guy, could not get off, took things into my own hands, he was shocked I got off before he did (because it's easy! and I can do it several times in a row!). He was a self-proclaimed fantastic lover.

MEH. All the meh in the world.
posted by Deoridhe at 10:43 AM on October 15, 2015 [35 favorites]

Related: Local Creep Enthusiastically Sex-Positive.
posted by ActionPopulated at 10:46 AM on October 15, 2015 [6 favorites]

I think part of it is that men don't enjoy sex as much as they say/been told to think they do. I have had a mixed bag over the years - the ones who were into it as an activity rather than an expression of love have been fun as all get out- making it an adventure instead of a chore for us both. The ones who have something to prove are an enormous pain in the ass- (pun intended) - they seem to think if you do whatever it is they ask it proves how much you like them. They could ask, but that would cause them to have a Feeling , and that would never do.
posted by LuckyMonkey21 at 10:49 AM on October 15, 2015 [4 favorites]

I don't know, I think this is something that has really changed in the past few years, and that it has changed in part because of "sex-positive feminism".

I've been bingeing a bunch of Sex And The City lately (it's on Amazon Prime, please don't hate), and it's kind of shocking to me how retrograde the sexual expectations on the show are. Cunnilingus is almost never depicted, and despite the fact that the premise of the show is supposed to be a group of liberated women enjoying sex on its own terms, the main characters experience very little pleasure from sex. And very little of what they do experience is pleasure deliberately given by a man. And when they do get that, it's shown as this exceptional thing, like OMG THIS GUY WENT DOWN ON ME and then he's referred to as Pussy Guy for the whole episode. Sex in Sex And The City is still pretty much a transactional thing women give to men. Even in the case of sexually liberated Samantha.

Fast forward a decade, and we've got Trainwreck, which is a traditional romcom where the main character is shown literally taking on the male role of conning a guy into servicing her, then rolling over and falling asleep immediately after she comes. She's presented as kind of selfish, and yeah, it is a bit, and that bit is meant to prove a point, but still. We believe that a woman could be this way, and that said woman would still be lovable and end the movie happy and "having it all" and whatever the ideal resolution for a romcom is these days. We're laughing with Amy Schumer, not at her.

And, yeah, we got there with a decade of sometimes politically awkward mainstream white lady "sex positive" "feminist" media. But you know what? Things have gotten better, they couldn't have gotten better without the awkward shit, and thus I can't be that mad at the awkward shit.\

You don't win a battle by being silently right forever. You win a battle by fighting. And sometimes fighting is dirty.
posted by Sara C. at 10:50 AM on October 15, 2015 [11 favorites]

double down on being a terrible lay and make the experience of fucking them so unenjoyable that you never want to see their stupid face again.

GOD like the dude who was smashing his thumb down onto my clit like a coked up MBA waiting for the elevator. he just WOULD NOT STOP no matter how many times i yelled OW and slapped his hand away and said THAT FUCKING HURTS. i eventually had to pinch the head of his dick like i was squeezing a zit to make him stop.

him: what the fuck!
me: OH WOULD YOU LIKE ME TO STOP I WONDER WHAT THAT'S LIKE

in retrospect i should have just broken his thumbs not only for my personal enjoyment but also for the protection of future female victims of his badness
posted by poffin boffin at 10:53 AM on October 15, 2015 [53 favorites]

As a middle-aged woman, I despair. I've been married for twelve years, had double-digit sex partners prior to marriage, and yet I've never had a truly satisfying sexual relationship or been with a man who's been very good at sex. This has weighed on me heavily in the past few years as I've wrestled with either accepting that I'll die without having the satisfying sexual relationship I really want or that I'll need to cheat to get it (an open relationship has been proposed by me and shot down).

I think a lot about what I need to be teaching my two young sons about sexual relationships as they get older. The most important thing I want to convey to them is that their female partners' pleasure (should they have female partners) should be their absolute main priority since they will likely enjoy sex no matter what. I plan to give them She Comes First when the get to the right age and talk to them very openly about how important a woman's pleasure in their experience of sex. Imagine a world where women's sexual pleasure was considered the whole point of sexual relationships? The idea feels (sadly) absolutely revolutionary.
posted by puppetsforlife at 10:57 AM on October 15, 2015 [10 favorites]

Are there some big surveys about what women of various demographics tend to experience during sex with men? It seems like I hear from totally reliable narrators both about the jackhammer/all-the-porn-all-the-time/whataboutanalnow?whataboutnow? brigade and about men who tend to expect that they'll give oral, etc. It would be really worthwhile to have some detailed information to try to figure out whether men-who-learned-from-porn are more pervasive now, less pervasive, etc; and whether they frequently or rarely grow out of it; whether there's other demographics in play, like is it worse in New York or is it worse in small towns, etc.

My secret, depressing assumption is that sex robots (as previously discussed on the blue!) are probably the future, if the growth in inequality doesn't just mean that poorly compensated sex workers are the future. It seems like there's so many men who just really, really actively don't want to pay any attention to women as people, and as soon as they can use money, coercion and technology to solve the problem, they will give up the pretense at actual relationships.

Women, of course, will have better options - Crone Island and/or sexual fluidity. But it seems like a bummer for those women who are really completely heterosexual and would like a relationship.
posted by Frowner at 10:58 AM on October 15, 2015 [5 favorites]

oh god the clit button-mashing is the most painful thing i nearly had to scale the wall to get away from a guy trying to do that who just DIDN'T GET that doing it harder and faster wouldn't make me finish sooner
posted by burgerrr at 11:04 AM on October 15, 2015 [4 favorites]

The last three guys I have been with (all Gen X, if it matters) weren't into anal, at all. One of them was decidedly un-vanilla, and it was actually me that brought up anal, somewhat begrudgingly because I assumed it would be a thing he would want, and then even he specifically was turned off by anal.

I was starting to think I'd fallen into some kind of bizarro world.

Then again, I find this bizarro world pretty damn refreshing.
posted by Sara C. at 11:07 AM on October 15, 2015 [3 favorites]

I think part of it is that men don't enjoy sex as much as they say/been told to think they do.

I don't think men are socialized to think of physical affection as anything other than "this will lead to sex," and it's a tremendous loss for everyone.

Every partner I've been with seemed to crave/need/enjoy simple snuggling and affection as much, if not more than, the actual foreplay-and-sex-act portion of our physical relationship. But the sad thing was, they often didn't realize this or articulate it until I said something.

So a surprising percentage of the time, if they were DTF, it was because they needed some physical affection, not sexual release. The challenge was usually getting over the internalized expectation that they could want to skip sex, go to the cuddling, and still be considered A Man.
posted by sobell at 11:10 AM on October 15, 2015 [35 favorites]

He was a self-proclaimed fantastic lover.

Which is the first sign that you might be better off with your hands or something that buzzes.

No one is a fantastic lover when first getting into bed with someone. They have the _potential_ to be a fantastic lover. You may enter an encounter with past experience to draw upon, a healthy attitude, an appropriate state of arousal, a working knowledge of anatomy and technique and a trick maneuver you do that you think is guaranteed to astound and amaze even though it did put one person in the ER once but you're sure you've got it mastered now... but if you're not ready to communicate or demonstrate what you like, learn what your partner likes and work together to fulfill both of those needs, you're barely scratching the surface of 'adequate lover.'

Not caring if your partner reaches orgasm is bad. Treating him/her like a video game where they MUST ACHIEVE MAXIMUM ORGASM POTENTIAL FOR HIGH SCORE is also bad. Less ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED, more enjoying the trip.
posted by delfin at 11:33 AM on October 15, 2015 [10 favorites]

Women, of course, will have better options - Crone Island and/or sexual fluidity. But it seems like a bummer for those women who are really completely heterosexual and would like a relationship.

I get what you mean, but I'm deeply skeptical of positioning "sexual fluidity" as a "better option" for women who are attracted to men yet left wanting by their male partners' selfishness in bed. I can't count how many times I've been told that I should just date women if I'm sick of having bad sex/awful relationships with men, which leads to me having to awkwardly explain that yes, even though I'm not feminine at all, even though I have short hair and don't wear makeup and I dress "like a man," I'm still straight, no, seriously, I'm really completely straight. And even if I wasn't, "just sleep with women instead" relieves men as a class of any responsibility for upping their game. Not to mention the fact that I'm tired, on lesbian and bi women's behalf, of seeing their sexuality appropriated as a way for (and most often by) het women to either 'spice it up a little' or escape disappointing sex lives with men.

The phrasing "women who are really completely heterosexual" is so familiar and uncomfortable to me -- why doesn't "heterosexual" suffice, sans qualifiers? -- and speaks to just how often women are, ime, expected to be at LEAST "bi-curious." (Insert rant on how much I resent "everyone's a little bit bisexual" here; this is also something that usually gets flagged, even and possibly especially in progressive circles, as one of those "if you won't even try it, you're *~*sex negative*~*" things.) I definitely like to fuck dudes and only dudes, I just wish we didn't live in a world that steadfastly refuses to educate its citizens about the reality of women's bodies, expecting us to give freely of ourselves while punishing us for it AND without asking for anything in return.
posted by divined by radio at 11:33 AM on October 15, 2015 [55 favorites]

wayback, (sorry late again): 'never under the impression that "sex positive" meant "having boring sex with people you aren't really that into.' Well, like everything else, it gets co-opted by manipulative, self-serving jerks.

It first cropped up in the 90s I think (or at least in post-AIDS panic SF, where lots of people considered themselves 'sex radicals' and jerks could appropriate that) and it reminds me of what Dorothy Parker referred to in the 30s as 'being a good sport'. In another words, not at all about liberation of your sexuality, but accommodation of someone else's. The same old shit, different decade. I shudder to think what women are going through in Pornotopia now... so far, it doesn't sound good...

Though my dating/fucking pool days are over, Empress's comment, fuckyeah:
And I have no problem whatsoever just brushing them off because who the fuck cares what they think. I have no investment in their feelings, so if they get pissy because they can't figure out why I'm saying no, I don't give a shit.
I remember my roommate thinking I was 'square' for lying to a guy that I had a boyfriend. Like I gave a shit, and I should work up some intricate rationalization. I don't care if I sound like Marcia Brady saying I have to wash my hair tonight. I certainly hit a bottom when I asked myself "I risked AIDS for THAT?" Mostly, it was 'I risked emotional pain for that', but you should never risk anything for mediocrity and to paraphrase a 70s gem, random fucking means never having to say you're sorry. It can work both ways.

It all comes down to living for approval, and fuck that. It's right up there with blaming harassment victims, myself included, who complain for 'being uptight'. No one owes you shit, dude. And fuck emotional labor. Embrace your inner Idontgiveafuck, it will be there for you when nobody else is, and it's multipurpose and a lot of fun. For me that special day came when I responded to a catcaller by audibly farting. And If I were young again, I'd turn every sexist conversation or transaction into an opportunity to discuss my menses *at length*. You want vagina? I got vagina, lemmetellyallabout it.

Maybe young ladies are not as crass, disgusting and willing to be an outcast as I am, but you know, it's an option, ladies, it's an option.

....oops I said way too much again...
posted by GospelofWesleyWillis at 11:39 AM on October 15, 2015 [25 favorites]

I don't think men are socialized to think of physical affection as anything other than "this will lead to sex," and it's a tremendous loss for everyone.

Cultural heterosexuality is broken. I'd say bring on the robots and sex toys, but even they are coded in creepy ways.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 11:43 AM on October 15, 2015 [4 favorites]

And even if I wasn't, "just sleep with women instead" relieves men as a class of any responsibility for upping their game.

I got this when I was frustrated with dating men, too. Call me crazy, but I don't think non-hetero women are lining up to be a consolation prize for straight women when men disappoint them romantically or sexually.
posted by almostmanda at 11:46 AM on October 15, 2015 [34 favorites]

more TMI in case more is needed.... I just gave up in the end & even when in bed w/partner, I just take the matter into my own hands. He volunteers cunnilingus, and actually likes going down more than I like receiving it- I'm actually bored by it. Maybe I ruined myself from a very long career in wanking, but like my therapist says, I know me better than anyone else does. So I just DIY and let him do other stuff. Hey, it works for me; even the best of my partners could not solve the riddle of the sphinx.
posted by GospelofWesleyWillis at 11:47 AM on October 15, 2015 [5 favorites]

I'm a Gen Xer and I've been fortunate enough to have consistently excellent partners. I suspect it's because the window of time in which I had multiple partners, etc. also coincided with a period in which the pool of available partners had been raised mostly on Playboy magazines or the occasional porn movie they had to drive to a store to rent in person.

Gen Xer here too.

....Holy crap, have we actually found the one thing that Gen X didn't get shafted on? SWEET!
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 11:50 AM on October 15, 2015 [24 favorites]

GenX was definitely pre-obligatory-anal and pre-remove-all-pubic-hair. It's a consolation to me that as generally crappy as my collegiate sex experiences were, at least I never was guilted for not wanting it up the poopshoot or reviled for having "dirty" pubic hair. So, yay?
posted by soren_lorensen at 11:53 AM on October 15, 2015 [24 favorites]

Porn was definitely less ubiquitous in my Gen X teenage years. But then again, to hear the experiences of my husband and all my male friends tell it, the woods were just rife with discarded porn. (Me? I got off using Anais Nin and the Anne Rice Beauty books mostly.)
posted by Kitteh at 12:00 PM on October 15, 2015 [2 favorites]

I spent most of my teenage GenX years looking at one image called cucumber.gif. Those were spartan days.
posted by grumpybear69 at 12:02 PM on October 15, 2015 [9 favorites]

The article was nice, but I'm enjoying the hell out of this discussion. And coming from a male/male perspective, it's been an interesting mix of you have just described my life and seriously? straight guys are like that?

Case in point: an early comment from divined by radio. This:

I'm not worried that I'll never have sex again, I'm worried that I'll never have good sex again. Encountering a generation of men raised up on internet porn left me utterly bereft.

describes sex in the gay community with amazing accuracy. There have been so many times I just want to stop and explain to my partner that that position he is trying is designed to provide a good camera angle and has nothing to do with good sex.

But then the follow up:

like how if I turned down a specific act, nine times out of ten, the dude I was with implied that it was because I'm a prude, *~*sex negative*~*,

is something that seems more rooted in sexism. If it does happen with male/male interactions, no one is talking about it. My guess is that men feel free to criticize women, but are more intimidated by other men, but that's just a theory. The single time someone tried that line with me I snapped and ordered him to get the fuck out of my bed, and that was the end of it.

In the end, I've ended up in the same position that so many others have here: I'm tired of meh sex, and don't even want to put in the investment any more to trying to find partners. I have too many books on my reading list.
_________________________

It's also interesting to see how many complaints there are about jackhammer-men. As awful as they are, a more common difficulty in my world is the man who takes hours and hours to reach orgasm, but feels that the night isn't over until he does. And lord help him if he describes himself as 'tantric,' or brags about his endurance.
_________________________

The best advice I ever got about avoiding meh sex was actually from a straight woman. She was describing a date, which went well, and the sex, which didn't. She stopped him and told him that she wasn't feeling it, and that was it. And that was such a revelation to me: that you could just stop mid act and say I'm not feeling it. I don't know where I got the idea that, once you started, you should follow through. Midwest politeness, maybe? It was liberating to realize that I had the power to end a night at any point.
_________________________

And I'm sad to read about what "sex positivism" has devolved to. I still remember when the concept felt like a breath of fresh air.
posted by kanewai at 12:19 PM on October 15, 2015 [23 favorites]

He volunteers cunnilingus

Note that shouting I VOLUNTEER AS TRIBUTE as loud as possible every time your partner takes her panties off is rarely endearing.

...So I've heard.
posted by delfin at 12:29 PM on October 15, 2015 [8 favorites]

Yeah what the fuck is even with the no pubic hair thing? Thank god I'm married, because the temptation to punch guys who said I "might want to clean that up"(read, Brazilian) was starting to get out of control.

Also a public service announcement: it is not enough to be able to find the clit on a map, you have to figure out what to do with it after you get there.
posted by corb at 12:41 PM on October 15, 2015 [6 favorites]

Speaking as a straight guy, I wish both I *and* my first partner had been better at communicating about what we wanted. I was too shy (and worried that she would take any suggestions as criticism), and I suppose she probably was too.
posted by The Card Cheat at 12:52 PM on October 15, 2015

like maybe if you'd consider taming that impenetrable manthicket such that i don't need a machete and a team of native guides just to find your junk i'd fucking consider ever doing any kind of Extreme Grooming just for you but otherwise, as the lady said, what have you done for me LATELY
posted by poffin boffin at 12:53 PM on October 15, 2015 [36 favorites]

that position he is trying is designed to provide a good camera angle and has nothing to do with good sex.

This reminds me of a thread on /r/askwomen (back when it was only mildly invaded by misogynistic trolls, rather than the cesspool all of reddit is now) - someone asked what position does nothing for the women users and the overwhelming answer was reverse cowgirl (not that it was bad, just that it was "meh"). There were multiple male users who were shocked that their suggestion of "just put a mirror up so you can watch yourself" was not the panacea they thought it would be. They were just flabbergasted when the women were like "um, looking at myself doesn't really do anything for me...." Like, dudes, if that worked (for those women), why would you be in the equation at all? It was a completely male-experience-centric view of sex, to the extent that they didn't even consider that what turned them (heterosexual men) on was not the same thing that would turn their partners (heterosexual women) on.
posted by melissasaurus at 12:55 PM on October 15, 2015 [31 favorites]

Couple of comments deleted. Coming in to a thread like this to point out how it's wrong, this isn't a real thing, or how sex is probably mostly the same for men and women, ignoring the context that the article talks about, isn't a good way of engaging here.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 1:05 PM on October 15, 2015 [20 favorites]

the overwhelming answer was reverse cowgirl

Haha, actually I like that position better because it doesn't hurt my knees so much.

sometimes the thought of meeting someone for a drink and having to make “nice to meet you” conversation rather than going home to put on pajamas sounds like actual torture.

So true!! And when I say all of this to some of my friends and relatives, they respond with "oh, well I guess you really don't want a relationship, then."

This article had me doing the Kermit flail all the way through, but for these sentences especially. So much rank bullshit and male entitlement gets swept under the rug without any examination whatsoever under the guise of "sex positivity," moreso as the liberal, individualist equality movement continues to move ever nearer to the type of dude-centered pseudo-feminism I despise with every cell of my being. And don't even get me started on how other women are almost always the most ruthless, unforgiving enforcers of "sex positivity," because that shit depresses me more than almost anything in the world.

divined by radio, you are on fire today. Is there a Metafilter award for "best insightful fucking sex comments of the day" anywhere?
posted by sockerpup at 1:07 PM on October 15, 2015 [11 favorites]

> who told dudes this is how they get laid? did someone teach a class and the first thing on the syllabus was "make sure you steer the totally normal conversation into sex as soon as you can"? I NEED TO KNOW. IT'S AN EPIDEMIC.

My sense is that it's a minimum viable effort thing. Like, they don't want to put in the effort of putting in coins by listening to you talk any longer than they absolutely must before sex falls out.
posted by zug at 1:09 PM on October 15, 2015 [9 favorites]

Just popping by to thank everyone here for contributing to this discussion with some very thoughtful and heartfelt responses. Sex positivity comes up a lot in radical circles, and I find it increasingly frustrating how many - usually straight men - cannot (or more likely, will not) get their heads around how sex positivity combines issues of consent, coercion, stealth misogyny, not-so-stealth misogyny, and the continued policing of what women do or do not do with their own bodies. Much of what you all have brought up here has been extraordinarily helpful in my being able to articulate and clarify my ideas better in such discussions, so thank you all for that.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 1:11 PM on October 15, 2015 [18 favorites]

I get what you mean, but I'm deeply skeptical of positioning "sexual fluidity" as a "better option" for women who are attracted to men yet left wanting by their male partners' selfishness in bed. I can't count how many times I've been told that I should just date women if I'm sick of having bad sex/awful relationships with men, which leads to me having to awkwardly explain that yes, even though I'm not feminine at all, even though I have short hair and don't wear makeup and I dress "like a man," I'm still straight, no, seriously, I'm really completely straight. And even if I wasn't, "just sleep with women instead" relieves men as a class of any responsibility for upping their game. Not to mention the fact that I'm tired, on lesbian and bi women's behalf, of seeing their sexuality appropriated as a way for (and most often by) het women to either 'spice it up a little' or escape disappointing sex lives with men.

Yeah, I dunno - my best friend has the same experience as you. She has short hair and a commanding presence and only dates men, and she's often told that she should just date women, which doesn't work for her. (Actually, a friend told us both that we should solve our respective romantic problems by dating each other, which....would really, really, really not work.)

I think what I was trying to express (badly! I am doing some reflecting lately about how my thinking on gender - though, I contend, basically sound - needs to be more careful and cautious) is that there's more cultural space for women who are in some way not completely straight to express that than there is for men, and so for a larger percentage of women than men, it's possible to consider women romantic partners as real partners, instead of having to depend on longing for a man who isn't an asshole.

For me, although I'm attracted to men, I'm equally attracted to people of other genders, and that has meant that I could just write off dating men and it improved my life. That's not possible for my best friend, and I've seen how much of a bad situation that is for her.

I guess the one thing, though, is that I think if you're actually dating women successfully, you're not het as it's conventionally understood - I know folks sometimes prefer to identify as heterosexual while sometimes dating women, and I respect that, but I don't think it's the same as "using women to get over disappointment with men". Maybe that's because I did, in fact, decide one night that I just wasn't going to bother with men anymore, and it did in fact improve and enrich my life. I've never really identified as straight, but I did date guys more often when I was younger, and I did pursue guys sometimes. I don't feel like I've been a sexual tourist, I feel like I was fortunate to have another option and fortunate to be able to take it with little social cost.
posted by Frowner at 1:19 PM on October 15, 2015 [8 favorites]

And I'm sad to read about what "sex positivism" has devolved to. I still remember when the concept felt like a breath of fresh air.

Some of the alternatives at the time were complete renunciation, political lesbianism, or meticulously negotiated and deconstructed relationships. And when millions of us were dying from HIV, we needed ways to talk about condoms and non-penetrative sex. Unfortunately sex-positivism has been taken over by GGG, and radical feminism has been claimed by TERF.

Personally, I find myself more sympathetic to radical feminism as I discover that most people are ticking time bombs of patriarchy and heterosexism. What's said over dinner and drinks means very little when you're both raw and emotionally naked.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 1:26 PM on October 15, 2015 [9 favorites]

divined by radio: It's on me for giving him more than one chance, but damn, it's really on him for being 40 goddamn years old and having absolutely no idea where my clit was.

Yet another shortcoming of Google Maps.
posted by dr_dank at 1:30 PM on October 15, 2015 [9 favorites]

Be honest, how many other people sat around making the cupping motion on their elbows for a while?

That was the one thing that took me out of the article, actually, as I've got this ongoing pain in my right elbow that is either arthritis or a strain. I'd let floweringjudas do her thing on me without prep before I'd clap my elbow.

Sex And The City [snip] Cunnilingus is almost never depicted

Media attitudes about heading south are just stunning. I haven't seen Trainwreck yet but hooray for a turnaround. I rented Kentucky Fried Movie a few years ago to see if it was still funny (yes, but some really gross casual racism and sexism that is no surprise in a movie from its era) and I listened to a bit of the commentary as well. A bit from the last scene, which involves a young couple having sex in front of a tv, included one of the makers commenting that they originally had the young man seeming to be going down on her but the censors would have none of it. However they were more than happy to have him visibly tonguing her chest.

A few decades later there was news that the censor boards were bothered that there was some visible public hair in such a scene in The Cooler. I'm sort of amazed they let it through in American Pie but I guess it's okay if it's played for laughs.
posted by phearlez at 1:47 PM on October 15, 2015 [3 favorites]

phearlez, i'm assuming that edit window closed before you noticed that "...public hair..." typo.... or... WAS it ?
posted by HuronBob at 2:09 PM on October 15, 2015

"But you yada-yada'd over the best part!"

"No I mentioned the bisque."
posted by macrael at 2:19 PM on October 15, 2015 [10 favorites]

Not to mention the fact that I'm tired, on lesbian and bi women's behalf, of seeing their sexuality appropriated as a way for (and most often by) het women to either 'spice it up a little' or escape disappointing sex lives with men.

I'm another completely heterosexual, even when drunk, woman. I have liked and loved women a great deal. Platonically. Sometimes I wish I was bi, because I have had several completely awesome women who said they'd be happy to date me and it was kind of like 5 star restaurant food made completely out of food I don't like to hear that. "THIS IS SUCH AN AWESOME OFFER".... still not interested.... damnit.
posted by Deoridhe at 2:34 PM on October 15, 2015 [6 favorites]

Certainly I don't think much improvement would come from some sort of Rube Goldberg sex instructions: "turn this knob 3 times to the left, press that lever upwards, flip that switch on and off exactly 8 times." That's just as insidious of a denial of women's individuality, agency and humanity as viewing her as a simple input propositions/output sex device. And creates a hell of a lot of emotional labor for any woman with sexual difficulties. "But I did this and that and the other for precisely 21.543 minutes and you didn't orgasm! What is wrong with you?"

And yet this gets really confusing when you are trying to be a decent guy? Like resolving the chasm between "women shouldn't have to teach men" with "not all women respond the same at all" is... Kinda hard?

You can have a decent understand and still need to have the "this is how to sex with me" conversation. I don't think I've had any two partners that the same things worked with, or who wanted the same things in the same order, or whatever. I guess whenever I read a lot about this I start to get very conflicted because men need to put in more effort, but female-bodied people also have more variation?

I dunno, I kinda see both sides in here and neither meeting in the middle all that much? It always starts to feel like there's a really delicate and unclear balance between not being a willfully clueless dude demanding more than a fair share of work and actually listening to your partner. And this thread pretty much only showed how much variation there is in what's considered right, and makes me wonder how much of this can just be a mismatch of what was right repeatedly for someone in the past, but not the other person involved.
posted by emptythought at 2:59 PM on October 15, 2015 [9 favorites]

@emptythought.

A happy medium, and something I saw a lot in the emotional labor thread, is the idea that the man asking, taking the initiative of knowing that it's something to be worked on an acknowledging that they are proactively seeking information -- makes big difference!

Someone who *initiates* a "what do you like in bed" conversation doesn't hit the same frustration button as having to, as a woman, tell/ask that my needs aren't being met.

YMMV, I have two beers in me. It's a good question you're asking though!
posted by sazerac at 3:07 PM on October 15, 2015 [19 favorites]

Note that shouting I VOLUNTEER AS TRIBUTE as loud as possible every time your partner takes her panties off is rarely endearing.

That cracked me up. I picture it as a Tshirt slogan, along with 'Beaver Patrol'. Seriously, I know it sounds like total horseshit, but he really wants to and really gets into it, but I don't so much, I genuinely just don't feel it (that's the 'ruined by wanking' thing in action). Yep, I'm accommodating by getting head...that's how selfless and generous I am!
posted by GospelofWesleyWillis at 3:10 PM on October 15, 2015 [2 favorites]

The whole, you should go play for the other team is reductive and unkind to all involved. Given how many men have bitched to me about their SO's - never once did it occur to me to tell them to go find a nice gay boy to set up house with. These are often the same men who tell me I should find a nice lady (or suspect that I already have and am not telling. ) Sadly, my straight is cast iron.

My takeaway is this - and it's a super simple fix for the gentleman that want to please their partner- listen to her and ask that she do the same. Radical honesty can result in a whole lot of fun- if you set aside your ego(s) and play, you can both learn from one another. My favorite gentleman friends have told me what they liked and vice versa- it's my dream I can find another Real Man who isn't afraid to say he doesn't know .
posted by LuckyMonkey21 at 3:10 PM on October 15, 2015 [12 favorites]

^QFT, it's absolutely unkind. Nobody wants to be a consolation prize/recovery center & I thought this mentality is supposed to die in college.
posted by GospelofWesleyWillis at 3:12 PM on October 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

AH YES.

For me personally I am emotional, I like love, I like intimacy and I like commitment. I also can't deal with birth control and not only that put I am PISSED that I am supposed to take pills I don't want to take or jam something up myself that I don't want there so I can supply men with sex that isn't that great so that I can have intimacy that I am also probably kidding myself even exists other than that a body to hold and play pretend with feels good, I guess?

When I know that in the event an accident did happen the guy is NOT down to help me with this unspeakable task of child-rearing, to support me through how difficult it all is and help create a space where I could say actually spend some time at home with the baby and nurse and bond since our communities don't do any of this, and it's more normalized for rightwing gender essentialists to provide what is basically a common decency service to women birthing and nursing and bonding with babies which is that we should NOT be told we can't see the birth and bonding as no big deal since it's no big deal to some people, and we should NOT be forced to accept the model that it's no big deal as if this is more feminist.

That the sex and the babies and the birthing and the need for love and bonding and physical presence of another adult who will help and financial resources are all no big deal and being a man or woman are the exact same thing and sexist to dare question that!!! No one should have to rear a baby so obviously all this free love means women who are assholes enough to refuse to get an abortion deserve to be poor and struggle and not have the support of a man because how DARE they even think they could ask a man to make that commitment before the sex! That's antiquated!

And then these guys all want to have sex right away and see commitment before sex as antiquated and silly but I ain't getting wet until I feel love and security so for me it was always an act, supply what they want because apparently the new feminist world thinks my emotional needs are silly.

How many men, LITERALLY have gotten up in my business about how monogamy is selfish, and how I must have hang ups and I need to free my sexuality because they want to fuck and I don't.

Not to mention the first few guys I started having casual sex with who literally told me that they would not be my friend unless we fuck and if I want to trade we can do that. Friendship for sex. Uh. I guess. I mean I was destroyed and drowning in PTSD and had no friends so I guess, it fills some of the void. Adds a new kind.

I don't feel like the popularized goals of feminism helped me at all. They did feel like they were all used against me, to make my body more available to men, to act the existence of abortion means that I am "free" from feeling trapped in a pregnancy in terrible circumstances and if I don't get one therefore the suffering I and my child will endure is my own fault.

You want to lay that kind of fucking blame on me don't be surprised I have no interest in this "casual sex" where so many women are destroyed, left with children they are struggling to raise because they found abortion didn't work for them at the time (WHICH SHOULD BE OK FOR A WOMAN TO DECIDE IF ONE IS PRO-CHOICE), and statistically a lot of pro-choice women find they surprisingly are not as comfortable with abortion for one or more of their pregnancies nor should they have to be (conversely a woman feel not ok with an abortion for one pregnancies and totally find with it for another. That is how pro-choice works).
posted by xarnop at 3:30 PM on October 15, 2015 [17 favorites]

Like resolving the chasm between "women shouldn't have to teach men" with "not all women respond the same at all" is... Kinda hard?

The chasm between the two is men learning to do some emotional labor and paying attention to their partner. Seriously, women are not some mysterious enigma. You can get a pretty good read of how things are going back based on your partner's body language. Are they getting into it too or just sitting there? Do they look happy or are have they completely disassociated to another plane where they can wait until you're done? And if they don't seem to be enjoying themselves then ASK WHY and then LISTEN and then do your best to adjust things.

The common thread with all the times I've had really good sex is it's always been with people who will periodically check in with me to make sure I'm enjoying it as much as them.
posted by C'est la D.C. at 3:33 PM on October 15, 2015 [18 favorites]

it probably helps if you come to the table with some basic knowledge, like "it'll take more than 3 minutes," "surprise butt stuff: NEVER OK," "giving a handy is not like playing the car-smashing bonus level in Street Fighter II," etc
posted by prize bull octorok at 3:42 PM on October 15, 2015 [11 favorites]

In reference to a thing upthread: Dudes won't say this because it's, like, weird or admitting weakness or something, but a guy who fucks for hours and doesn't cum (and hasn't done so in the really recent past) isn't trying to be "tantric;" something about the situation is making him really uncomfortable and weirded out. It might just be a matter of needing to feel cool with one's partner, it could be something completely unrelated to one's partner, or it could be the existential pull of encroaching death at the nape of one's neck we all feel sometimes. (We...all feel it, right.) Whatever it is, though, it is not letting him settle in. Guys will try to play this off as their incredible stamina in action, etc., but they too would like to get off, I assure you. This is just as a The More You Know type datapoint, because men will not tell women this, generally. Men won't even tell themselves this. We make shit up. But it's true.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 3:47 PM on October 15, 2015 [10 favorites]

I kind of agree with this: I don't feel like the popularized goals of feminism helped me at all. Key word 'popularized'. I forgot who said it upthread, but they referred to needing to revisit radical feminism because of timebombs of sexism. I certainly feel like one of those timebombs quite often, for all the manipulation we endure & it seems like we fight the same fights over and over. Kind of a tangent from the original article, but yes...

And what someone said about for all the good Dan Savage did, his GGG shtick is toxic. Ironically, he was an absolute godsend at one point in part because he'd call out certain 'transgressive' sex (pedophilia, non-consensuality, bestiality) as screwed up. There was a certain context at one time, at least in parts of SF, where you were supposed to be non-judgemental and that it was 'all good'. He was one sex-positive person that seemed willing and able to risk being labelled a prude simply by having common sense & boundaries. Sad that he was so blind on the GGG front. (sorry for my time-lag responses).
posted by GospelofWesleyWillis at 3:49 PM on October 15, 2015 [11 favorites]

And yes, C'est DC, the sex-friends manipulation is the WORST. As a 'one of the guys' kind of woman, this destroyed my trust. Then they said they did it because they were hurt, sad, lonely or whatever pseudo-sensitive bullshit they thought would put them in a sympathetic light. I'm saddened to hear that young women are being jerked around so much, that it's not much better at all; just a different type of bullshit.

Yep. Radical feminism, let's get together and chat about old times. It's been so long since I've seen you.
posted by GospelofWesleyWillis at 3:55 PM on October 15, 2015 [2 favorites]

Radical feminism, let's get together and chat about old times.

From what I can tell, the new intersectional feminism is trying to get to the same root that radical feminism did with an attempt at less of the other -isms. I'm finding a lot of worth in focusing on and following women marginalized on more than one axis - queer women, trans women, women of color, disabled women - because I have a lot of privilege blindspots and I think getting to the root of sexism HAS to take into account every other axis of marginalization or it's not helping all women.
posted by Deoridhe at 4:03 PM on October 15, 2015 [22 favorites]

"Are they getting into it too or just sitting there? Do they look happy or are have they completely disassociated to another plane where they can wait until you're done? And if they don't seem to be enjoying themselves then ASK WHY and then LISTEN and then do your best to adjust things."

I remember once, after about four guys in a row telling me it's unfair if I flirt and then don't have sex, or even just hang out with a guy and don't have sex, or smile too much, or want friendship and don't have sex.. it went on and on but I got the idea... if you want company with men you give them what they want or it's not fair. Men don't want to cuddle, they don't want to play naughty truth or dare and then dry hump with clothes on all night (WHY NOT THIS IS GREAT)... and they definitely don't want to stay up late talking about feeling platonically without having sex because that is not fair to them at all. After all night time makes them think of sex, and feelings make them think of sex. Pretty much everything makes them think of sex so don't do anything unless you will have sex with them.

So I am enjoying this guys company, one of our friends disappears to talk to ex's mom for hours and we are left talking, I drink a lot of beers and think I don't want to drive and I sort of like his company, he's cute. I'm not really horny but I figure I don't mind if we have sex and he asks if I'll stay. So we go to have the sex and I'm, well the same as always, as one ex said "Like a limp fish protesting the sounds of penetration".

We start having sex and he says "Do you really want to do this?" I say "sure." whatever. It's fine. I don't care anymore.

He says "I don't think you really want to do this." And I start bawling curled up in a ball crying on and on. He was the first one who ever even noticed-- or cared enough to stop.
I thought it was so amazing and he was such a great person even though I was embarrassed.

Then he told all of his/my friends that he thought badly of me and they all said (even the females) well why would get in bed with him if you weren't going to have sex?

I mean. I was. I tried to be a good sport, I just failed.
posted by xarnop at 4:09 PM on October 15, 2015 [26 favorites]

Yeah, my impression as a wee millennial lady was that the great failure of radical feminism was that it posited that all oppression stemmed from sexism, basically. Which is just not true and created all kinds of intersectional problems.

Is that inaccurate?
posted by sciatrix at 4:09 PM on October 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

a more common difficulty in my world is the man who takes hours and hours to reach orgasm, but feels that the night isn't over until he does. And lord help him if he describes himself as 'tantric,' or brags about his endurance.

From my bi female perspective, YES, THIS EXACTLY. If some others in this thread want to ask men on the first date if they can find the clitoris on an anatomical chart, I want to ask "How often do you masturbate and with what kind of grip?" Because an impossibly large number of guys I have been take tooooooooo longgggggggg/can only come with certain very specific and difficult to achieve techniques. Or possibly worse, think that I'm an olympic sex judge and they're going to score points for lasting longer. Which probably comes from exactly the same sort of toxic masculinity that causes a lot of the other issues folks are talking about here. (You're not a real man if you can't have sex for hours, if you don't think about sex constantly and masturbate 30 times a day, and "good at sex" = "has sex for a long time".)
posted by Sara C. at 4:20 PM on October 15, 2015 [8 favorites]

Dudes won't say this because it's, like, weird or admitting weakness or something, but a guy who fucks for hours and doesn't cum (and hasn't done so in the really recent past) isn't trying to be "tantric;" something about the situation is making him really uncomfortable and weirded out.

I think that's kind of an unfair thing to be saying: they could be on antidepressants or some other medication that affects their ability to reach orgasm, for one.
posted by un petit cadeau at 4:25 PM on October 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

It coulllllld be true, yes, but anyone who is on medication with this side effect would probably say so.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:30 PM on October 15, 2015

I really love @moscaddie, who talks and writes lot about sex from a feminist perspective. She will often poll her female followers on twitter on what kinds of things to include in the sex-advice-for-men articles she writes (e.g. 1, 2) and those tweet strings are worth reading too.

Although, really, starting from a place of good communication, a real willingness to listen to your partner and genuine enthusiasm is a very good starting point. And (at least in my mind) a man who possesses all of the above attributes is a turn-on in itself.
posted by triggerfinger at 4:32 PM on October 15, 2015 [3 favorites]

Oh. You know when it's not good. There are layers of denial, but you know.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:38 PM on October 15, 2015

I'm curious as to why it's on women to know when their male partner isn't coming because they have the heebie jeebies about some nebulous something, and on women to bring it up, but not in like an emasculating type of way, and without making any kind of assumption, and with the caveat that if we don't handle this with aplomb/psychic powers, we are in "denial".
posted by Sara C. at 4:41 PM on October 15, 2015 [11 favorites]

Sorry; by "you" I meant the person with the issue, not "you" the person who, yes, should not be expected to be psychic and understand there is an issue.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 4:47 PM on October 15, 2015 [3 favorites]

I think kittens for breakfast meant that it's men who are in denial, because of toxic ideas such as men should always accept sex, regardless of the situation, and never feel uncomfortable. I read his comments as descriptive rather than prescriptive.
posted by Freelance Demiurge at 4:55 PM on October 15, 2015 [5 favorites]

It took me a while to decide that I was going to share any details of my sex life with Metafilter, and I'm certainly not going to share a lot but since people keep talking about this so (**not a solicitation for advice**)

As awful as they are, a more common difficulty in my world is the man who takes hours and hours to reach orgasm, but feels that the night isn't over until he does.

In reference to a thing upthread: Dudes won't say this because it's, like, weird or admitting weakness or something, but a guy who fucks for hours and doesn't cum (and hasn't done so in the really recent past) isn't trying to be "tantric;" something about the situation is making him really uncomfortable and weirded out.

If you, as a man, want to step your game up there is one easy thing to do: Stop centering sex around your orgasm. Stop thinking that the point of sex is an orgasm for you. Treat it as a (genuine) bonus if it does happen instead of as a given. Assume you will not orgasm.

I (a guy) not infrequently take forever - especially lately because of medication I'm taking. I don't have a problem bowing out when I know it's not going to happen - it's not that big a deal to me. Sometimes when this happens though my long-term partner (a woman) gets upset because even though she knows the situation she feels like she must be doing something wrong.

I'm not bringing this up to contradict the stories that women are telling in this thread - if it wasn't an uncommon situation she would probably have an easier time believing me when I say everything was great - or brag about how little I care about having an orgasm. I'm just saying even in a multi-year relationship where I know for a fact we are practically falling over each other (sometimes literally) to "center the other person" we still have a hard time communicating certain things, we still end up feeling awkward or inadequate at times. I know sometimes I can't help but feel disappointed in myself if she doesn't like something I'm doing.

I think almost all of us in this world have a Complex or three about sex. Certainly I think a lot of us feel like we should be automatically, instinctively good in bed, even though it's completely divorced from observable reality. Fucking is fucking complicated.
posted by atoxyl at 5:30 PM on October 15, 2015 [20 favorites]

It coulllllld be true, yes, but anyone who is on medication with this side effect would probably say so.

In a long term relationship, sure, but in a casual context?

I'm not sure why we're talking so much about why though. It's not as if there's a "correct" duration of sex - the issue is how you handle a mismatch.
posted by atoxyl at 5:37 PM on October 15, 2015 [5 favorites]

Another great thread. Oh internet, where were you when I was 18?

My college boyfriend was a jackhammer guy and he could go at it for a loooong time-- so long I used to have permanent bruises on the inside of my thighs. Of course I felt guilty because I never came. A healthy women should come if her man is fucking the bejesus out of her for 30 or 40 minutes, right?

One of the reasons I married my first husband is because he was the first guy who gave me an orgasm in bed, in fact he showed me I could have multiple orgasms. Holy shit. That was mind blowing. He wasn't perfect though. When the G-spot hoopla hit the media, my husband made a point of rooting around for it while going down on me. I remember he was jabbing me with his finger so hard I got angry and told him to knock it off. He stopped that time, but the next time we were in bed he did it again. I had to slap his hand away and he was still trying to convince me that I needed to experience this thing. Ugh.

Maybe it is time to return to the days of the mature woman initiating the young man into the secrets of the bedroom. Better than a diagram showing where to locate the clitoris.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 6:57 PM on October 15, 2015 [8 favorites]

The casual disregard by the men in many of the stories here is appalling. I don't know where that level of lack of empathy comes from, but it shouldn't be so common.

GenX was definitely pre-obligatory-anal and pre-remove-all-pubic-hair. It's a consolation to me that as generally crappy as my collegiate sex experiences were, at least I never was guilted for not wanting it up the poopshoot or reviled for having "dirty" pubic hair. So, yay?

I'm Gen X and I can remember those things being discussed at college (and portrayed in the media), but with not even a tiny fraction of the current pervasiveness.
posted by Dip Flash at 7:09 PM on October 15, 2015

I think almost all of us in this world have a Complex or three about sex. Certainly I think a lot of us feel like we should be automatically, instinctively good in bed, even though it's completely divorced from observable reality. Fucking is fucking complicated.

^^100%
posted by naju at 7:32 PM on October 15, 2015 [4 favorites]

"So are you one of those jackhammer dudes, or no? If you are, let's just split the check and go our separate ways right now, because I am so over that shit."

Is that what it's like these days? Is dating really this cold and impersonal? Damn. If you think so little of the person you're with, I can't see anything about this situation that's preferable to a vibrator.

Think I'll stick to my Conair Touch 'N Tone.
posted by Bassariscus at 7:45 PM on October 15, 2015

Sex And The City [snip] Cunnilingus is almost never depicted

Well, there was one episode where Samantha gets a girlfriend and spends on camera time between her legs looking blissful, as well as describing the wonders of the vagina to her friends. Just saying...
posted by diode at 10:10 PM on October 15, 2015

One episode.
posted by futz at 10:20 PM on October 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

For me that special day came when I responded to a catcaller by audibly farting.

You are the wind beneath my wings.
posted by louche mustachio at 11:01 PM on October 15, 2015 [27 favorites]

Just wanted to drop in and thank everyone for a good, informative thread.

Carry on
posted by JoeXIII007 at 4:49 AM on October 16, 2015 [1 favorite]

Is that what it's like these days? Is dating really this cold and impersonal? Damn. If you think so little of the person you're with, I can't see anything about this situation that's preferable to a vibrator.

The jackhammer question could be rephrased as, "are you incredibly selfish and ignorant about women's pleasure?" I think that's actually a pretty important question.

Also, yes, some of us would prefer a vibrator. That's the point.
posted by chaiminda at 4:56 AM on October 16, 2015 [10 favorites]

I don't know where that level of lack of empathy comes from, but it shouldn't be so common.

Aside from the weird bit about "all guys who take awhile to orgasm have this problem! So I have declared", I think the lack of empathy is probably a direct result of the guys not having empathy or concern about the people they're having sex with. It seems a little much to expect women to be emphatic about people who have demonstrated physically their lack of empathy for them.
posted by Gygesringtone at 5:55 AM on October 16, 2015 [2 favorites]

Oh shit, completely misread the comment I was responding to. It's by the men, not of the men. My apologies.
posted by Gygesringtone at 6:05 AM on October 16, 2015 [1 favorite]

Wasn't really sure if I wanted to comment in this (great) thread but it keeps nagging me so here we are.

I relate a lot to so much of what's being said. Basically I spent a huge portion of my life just 'getting through it', you know? Because it was either a) expected of me or b) demanded of me or c) just not worth not doing it because otherwise I might stay up literally all night just trying to not do it.

To add insult to injury, I've had partners where if I didn't act like I was into it enough they couldn't finish. At some point in the relationship (I don't do one night stands) I tried to verbalize these things to my partners but it never worked. A lot of them I don't think were really listening, and probably a lot of them just weren't ready to take that kind of hit to their ego.

And the ego thing was frustrating too, because I have never, ever been able to convince a partner that I don't need to have an orgasm, or that for a lot of women there are various levels of orgasm, and I don't require 'the big one' or whatever to have had a good time. Or that at some point? That thing you keep rubbing? Is too sensitive to get me to one anyway. No one has ever taken it at face value when I've said, no really, I'm totally fine with not having an orgasm, can we just be done now. And then you feel obligated to say you had an orgasm just so that they stop, because otherwise they'll a) keep going (can we fucking sleep now or?) or b) feel bad, and then you have to console them (no really, do you feel better and can we sleep now).

So for me, sex has either been something I don't want to do and have been pressured into, which results in me not having a great time and with some partners even though they've made no effort to find out my opinion on how it's going (or listen to the ones I've voiced) I end up having to make them feel better about it either by faking it or consoling them after, or they actually do want to give me a good time but I don't give them the level of good time they want me to be having, and I end up having to make them feel better about it. Honestly? In most of these scenarios? My presence and participation has very rarely seemed like it's actually For Me. It's usually felt like when it's 'about me' it's not so much about me as much as it's about the man's ego. So honestly what's the fucking point.

Anyway! Luckily I never have to do it again because (I'm sure in no small part because of all this) now I'm severely sex repulsed and I'm totally fine with that. More importantly probably I now have no problem saying 'no, fuck off'. I've often wondered if I ever really wanted to do the sex anyway, but no one ever bothered to ask and I was under the impression it was requisite. Kind of wonder if I wasn't asexual all along.
posted by nogoodverybad at 6:25 AM on October 16, 2015 [19 favorites]

I don't see how honesty or empathy is even possible within heterosexuality given pervasive sexism and heterosexism. But I'm a bitter queer and my experiences with intimate partner violence have made me more than a little bit paranoid on that front.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 7:05 AM on October 16, 2015 [4 favorites]

This thread is amazing. Thanks to everyone for posting, for your own benefit, hopefully!

I'm still stuck on the "well have you tried women?" thing. Like, if you're not close friends, why would a guy even suggest to casually alter sexual preferences?
posted by halifix at 7:06 AM on October 16, 2015

phearlez, i'm assuming that edit window closed before you noticed that "...public hair..." typo.... or... WAS it ?

If the choice is between believing I was clever or sloppy I would be endlessly grateful if, in the absence of other information, you assume clever. This is actually completely flipped from what the odds of the truth are, but I'd still appreciate it.

And if they don't seem to be enjoying themselves then ASK WHY and then LISTEN and then do your best to adjust things.

Are attitudes better now about women actually saying what they want in bed without judgment? My exclusive relationship is over a decade old now so maybe it's better (for all I know the costumes have completely changed), but as a GenXer my experience was that women had gotten the message they couldn't be too clear about knowing what they wanted so new partners had to be treated like a game of 20 Questions. I'm sure the problem continues to be shitty male partners who don't care/ask more than anything else, but there was still enough sex negativity soaked into everyone that it was a damned if you don't get asked... cultural programming working against both sides.
posted by phearlez at 7:51 AM on October 16, 2015 [1 favorite]

This thread is yet another chance for me to silently thank whichever angels or ministers of grace saw fit to bless me with the ovarios to speak up for what I want in sex, the security in myself to know what I do and don't want, the assurance that sometimes if I don't get what I want, that that is his problem, the instinct to screen out the dud guys way early on in the process, and the luck that save for a small handful of ultimately-laughable scenarios* , I've had really good luck. (The healthy appetite is also a blessing, although in lean times it can feel a bit of a curse.)

* There was a one-off bar pickup who took care of me just fine, but then when it came to me ministering to him, he wanted me give him a blow job during which I was to chew on his dick like it was a particularly fatty piece of steak; but then before I could we got interrupted by a phone call from his employer and we had to stop and I still think I kind of dodged an especially weird bullet there.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:52 AM on October 16, 2015 [10 favorites]

Are attitudes better now about women actually saying what they want in bed without judgment? My exclusive relationship is over a decade old now so maybe it's better (for all I know the costumes have completely changed), but as a GenXer my experience was that women had gotten the message they couldn't be too clear about knowing what they wanted so new partners had to be treated like a game of 20 Questions.

Another GenXer here, and I think this depends entirely on what circles you're running in. I have had partners who were very open about their wants and needs, partners who were decidedly reticent about it, and partners who didn't actually know what it was they wanted - which is also a symptom of Man's Orgasm First. But overall male satisfaction does have pervasive primacy, unfortunately.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 8:00 AM on October 16, 2015

Two points. I think asymmetry is a big underlying problem. Staring with "I'm interested in boning you, why isn't this pants feeling automatically reciprocated? My mental projections are confusing me." (This relates to the unwanted sexual attention from professors thread.) But we also see asymmetry in "This feels good to me, and it feels like it should be the same for you, but it isn't." It's confusing, but with some experience I hope people could figure it out. Sad that our own emotions and sensations are so much to the forefront as we swim through life.

Do we have studies proving that death grip masturbation causes penile insensitivity? I'm not counting Dan Savage as a scientific source, although he does put in a fair amount of research. I'm working with a small sample in my personal life, but it seems to me that penile insensitivity could be the *cause* of very rough masturbatory techniques rather than vice versa.
posted by puddledork at 8:16 AM on October 16, 2015

True, puddledork.

Frankly, in my experience the issues result from too much masturbation, and may have nothing to do with exactly how it's done. I don't expect my partners to permanently abstain from masturbating and save themselves for me and only me, but if it's date night, would it hurt not to masturbate twice today? Or, alternately, if you do, to not also imprison me in sexytimes until you orgasm again?
posted by Sara C. at 9:51 AM on October 16, 2015 [4 favorites]

"better rub one out before date night" is one of those chestnuts of bro-to-bro sex wisdom that gets passed along
posted by prize bull octorok at 10:05 AM on October 16, 2015 [4 favorites]

Is that what it's like these days? Is dating really this cold and impersonal? Damn. If you think so little of the person you're with, I can't see anything about this situation that's preferable to a vibrator.

Well, if I'm with someone that I've fallen for and want to have a relationship with, but they are completely uninterested in me except for getting into my pants, then yeah, it's going to make me upset.

When you're on a date, it gets pretty easy to tell after a while when someone is genuinely interested in pursuing a relationship with you and when they're thinking "ok, I need to make sure I do all the right things in order to sleep with her later." It gets to the point where you can tell by the way they hold your chair in the restaurant.
posted by sockerpup at 10:30 AM on October 16, 2015 [2 favorites]

GGG has been called out in this thread, but it seems less like a problematic concept, than a concept that's been perverted and wielded as a weapon in the same way that "sex-positive" is.

Yeah, the third G is for "game (for anything - within reason)," but the first two Gs ought to cover not asking something of a partner that is ridiculous. Both partners are supposed to be GGG, not just one.

"Game" is supposed to just mean to be open to trying or at least considering new experiences rather than dismissing them without consideration. Not that you have to actually do those things. A "good" and "giving" partner will accept limits their partner has without badgering them about not being "game."

GGG doesn't mean your girlfriend owes you anal, it means you're able to ask her if she'd like to buy that 50 Shades of Gray starter set without worrying that she'll laugh at you or judge. Holy fuck, every day I'm just embarrassed on behalf of my entire gender.
posted by explosion at 10:58 AM on October 16, 2015 [7 favorites]

When you're on a date, it gets pretty easy to tell after a while when someone is genuinely interested in pursuing a relationship with you and when they're thinking "ok, I need to make sure I do all the right things in order to sleep with her later." It gets to the point where you can tell by the way they hold your chair in the restaurant.

Uh, can someone run a clinic on this skill? Because it's not exactly easy for all of us to tell who's genuine and who's not.
posted by palomar at 11:07 AM on October 16, 2015 [5 favorites]

Here are the magic words, and when to say them, that will relieve women of feeling like they're doing something wrong.

I will never dissuade someone from open and reassuring communication, but to say this is going to relieve people of a feeling borne out by tons of social conditioning is a fallacy. Mostly relieve, maybe, though I think a certain amount of personal self-assurance is necessary here too and that's not work we can do for others. We all carry around a lot of this crap and you can't just there-there that away, even with the additional caveats you add in subsequent paragraphs. Those lessons and the jerkbrain are always with us.
posted by phearlez at 11:53 AM on October 16, 2015 [3 favorites]

When I was younger, this is what terrified me about the opposite sex. I never felt comfortable with the self-centered machismo of mainstream masculine sexual expression, and my interest in a hypothetical partner's pleasure alienated me from my peers. It was inconceivable to me to have sex with someone and not be aroused by or focused on their own enjoyment. This may have made me unique as a teenager, but it also made me "sensitive" and "lame" or "boring".

Simultaneously, a lot of my female friends reiterated that things I could not be or did not have were essential to female pleasure. It took me 'til two years ago to finally feel like I could have sex with someone without presaging my being a disappointment. Even then, sex still makes me nervous as shit.
posted by constantinescharity at 11:55 AM on October 16, 2015

say "I don't care about having an orgasm tonight. I just want to make you feel good, and when you're happy and satisfied sex is done even if I haven't come."

Definitely. Or the simpler (gayer?) version: I don't always cum. Don't sweat it.

The counterpoint to a lot of this is that a surprising number of men aren't aware how their own bodies work, much less how anyone else's body works. Which is odd, given how much of our plumbing is on the outside & it's usually kind of obvious when everything is working and when it isn't.
posted by kanewai at 11:56 AM on October 16, 2015 [4 favorites]

not asking something of a partner that is ridiculous

I think this is the crux, though.

I don't want an out on golden showers or swinging or auto-asphyxiation.

I want to be able to say, "Not tonight, babe," and not have it produce HIGH DRAMAZZZZZZ.

I want to feel OK not coming, and not worry that it's going to destroy my partner's ego, or worse, mean I'm confined to sex-jail* until I can perform orgasm-like behaviors to my partner's satisfaction. But not faking it, oh no!

I want to be able to tell my partner, "You know, I'm not really sure squirting is a thing, and I'm not interested enough in it to find out whether it's something I'm capable of."

I want to be able to take anal off the table without having to have a big emotional sitdown (often with someone I'm not terribly intimate with) about how I was repeatedly anally raped by a previous boyfriend.

I want to be able to take receiving oral off the table for right now, with the understanding that just because I didn't want it on our third date doesn't mean it's something I'm never going to want.

Anyone should be able to opt out of any sex they don't want to have. Whether it's "ridiculous" or not.

*By sex-jail I mean that thing where the sexual encounter continues until the relevant party HAS AN ORGASM GODDAMMIT because of course we cannot conceive of sex that doesn't end in orgasm.
posted by Sara C. at 12:11 PM on October 16, 2015 [27 favorites]

These magic words are not the magic cure all you think they are, unless you also accompany them with why exactly you the man are anorgasmic. Otherwise we're going to be wondering why, as someone said above, you are feeling weird and uncomfortable.
posted by corb at 12:56 PM on October 16, 2015

Here are the magic words, and when to say them, that will relieve women of feeling like they're doing something wrong.

Do we really need "magic words" to explain basic sex ed?

Personally, I want continuous consent because I can't say I'm uncomfortable, triggered, or anorgasmic before it happens.

Sometimes I can't say it at all.

And I reserve the right to be frustrated by the failings of my aging and abused sexuality. If I blame it on the dog, past trauma, the lateness of the hour, or my current prescription drugs, "that sucks" or "I hate it for you" is a good response. If sexist stereotypes get in the way, let's sit down and unpack them.

If, Goddess forbid, I ever have to date again, I'd want all of that on the table as possible potholes in advance, along with buying the latex, views about penetration, is my fantasy of Sir Ian and Sir Patrick a threat (more often than I'd like), what to do with the dog, don't feed me after midnight, and where to put the toothbrush.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 1:03 PM on October 16, 2015 [2 favorites]

These magic words are not the magic cure all you think they are, unless you also accompany them with why exactly you the man are anorgasmic.

We should stop.
OK
You have visitors.
I didn't even hear the door.
They're in the room.
What the fuck who's in my room?
You can't see them
... uhhh ... what?
Your third eye isn't open. They're in the corner. Watching.

Sometimes I prefer not to know 'why.'
posted by kanewai at 1:26 PM on October 16, 2015 [3 favorites]

"Game" is supposed to just mean to be open to trying or at least considering new experiences rather than dismissing them without consideration.

That's all well and good, but I think moving from "GGG" theory to practice is so problematic because the value of "game"/"consideration" varies so much from person to person. For some people, an instant yeah-no-never will suffice, and for others, it might involve a sit-down conversation about boundaries and personal autonomy. Like, does "considering" something mean can I just say no and be done with it, or do we need to talk about it? If we need to talk about it, how much detail do we need to go into, and how long does the conversation need to last? If "no" is enough, are you still gonna try to bring it up again later? &c.

As an example of something that many straight dudes apparently consider to be a totally reasonable* request for a woman to "consider": threesomes. I've never tried having one, never even considered it. When dudes have asked me whether I would be interested in engaging in said activity, I say, "No, I don't want to do that." Is that the end of the conversation? It has literally never been the end of the conversation. Instead, they'll give me something like, "c'mon, I know a girl who'd be into it..." or "how do you know you don't want to do it if you've never tried it?" So I'll zing back something like, "I dunno, I've never tried self-trepanation either, but I still feel very comfortable asserting my lack of interest in trying it." Is THAT the end of the conversation? Again, it has literally never been the end of the conversation.

If I don't just walk away, chances are high that the conversation will veer into a straight-up bargaining session, where the item up for bargaining is theoretically whether or not I've done enough "considering" to have the right to say no, but in practice, we're going to be arguing over where I have the right to draw the line when it comes to letting other people have access to my own body. It's dehumanizing and demoralizing and goddamn, I could totally use a Crone Island margarita right about now. On the rocks, no salt, please.

I wish these kinds of experiences were limited to the realm of boundary-pushing creeps you can spot from a mile away, but they aren't. A lot of it comes from men who seemed utterly normal and nice right up until I said no, so the sudden introduction of HIGH DRAMAZZZZZZ* hits like a freight train. To that end, I think male entitlement is poison and "GGG," at least how it plays out in many straight relationships, is very often just another dose.

* as long as the third is a woman, duh
posted by divined by radio at 1:28 PM on October 16, 2015 [20 favorites]

"This thread is yet another chance for me to silently thank whichever angels or ministers of grace saw fit to bless me with the ovarios to speak up for what I want in sex, the security in myself to know what I do and don't want, the assurance that sometimes if I don't get what I want, that that is his problem, the instinct to screen out the dud guys way early on in the process, and the luck that save for a small handful of ultimately-laughable scenarios* , I've had really good luck."

I am going to assume you mean this in the best way possible, because I know you're a really awesome human being, and I'm pretty sure you do and nothing I want to write applies to how you intended this to come across- but the way this is written might unintentially hit some sore spots for me, mainly because of how many people think the problem here is that women need more assertiveness training. You have NOT stated that, so allow me to make the counter to that simply for anyone who does think that because I've heard it stated all over the place including metafilter in the past. So assume the following is to the idea in general that asseritiveness is the missing ingredient here in fixing this, or that assertive women can't be broken down.

A lot of people talk about those who have developed "learned helplessness" as if a rat who has been shocked with no ability to change it over and over again is wrong and weak for eventually laying limp and failing to even scramble away at the sign of shocks coming.

Learning form epigenetics fear programming runs deep, as in likely much deeper than we realize and for many generations.

I think many of the women who learned that men are terrifying beasts you can't safely say no to, actually faced more men who were terrifying beasts you can't say no too.

Both of my grandfathers were violent drunken abusers, one a repeat child molester, the other busy out being drunk womanizing, buying sex, or otherwise ignoring his kids who trained or at least profited from the fact his wife, my grandmother who was raised in an abusive orphanage (because that's how it was done then) was taught that once a man tries to have sex you just need to lay back and let him have his way, a life lesson she shared with my step-mother on her marriage to my dad. And you know what my dad was dealing with while both his parents were busy being gone and drunk? His older brothers daily rampages, rage beatings, fearing for his life while his brother smashed shit and raped him and screamed and went insane and my dad learned a lot of talking skills, he learned how to talk him down, he learned he needed to rotated his entire existence on appeasing this guy, getting him to cool down, making sure he was ok and got what he wanted and went unchallenged.

I was born knowing when a man creeps in your bed at night you don't fight because we have generations of child abuse burned into my blood, it's etched into my soul, YOU WILL BE DESTROYED IF YOU FIGHT THIS BATTLE.

The problem is not women being to passive, the problem is that we have terryifying beasts among us that we have been surviving for thousands of years and we have complex processes built deep within us to survive these hells we are thrust into.

I also was once outspoken, once I too said "I don't feel like having sex" thinking that was on ok thing to say and when I was 16 a 21 year old form work said that was fine, he just wanted me to come to his house to meet his kittens. We don't have to have sex or anything.

When he makes a move on me and I'm terrified he says "Did I scare you? I hate when I scare my friends. I'm gonna buy a gun, I want to die." He showed me the marks on his wrists and the blood on his porch and he went on and on, on and on, and I begged him to be ok, everything can be ok, it's fine, just don't do that again. Yeah. So then he does it again but I don't protest this time. He just has sex with me. I ask if we could use condoms he says no, an dI say I would rather not have sex and he says ok, we won't have sex any more. Then he does it again. I tell him I can't handle it I'm dissociating it's destroying me, he talks about suicide more, rinse repeat.

Me crying, him crying for me crying, me comforting him. Add a year. Once his roommate says he think women are weak, I ask him if he would still think women are weak if I smash a big marble ball I'm holding in his face. He gets up and screams insults and smashing the wall by my face.

A pregnancy. A daughter dtalking form my arms and given to better people, who deserve her. They adopted just to fix the broken marriage and divorced anyway but nevermind everyone agrees they were better than me. Screams. Add more screams blood curdling screams, going to the hospital and they want me to wear a gown and I scream NO NO NO N NONONONONONONONONONON over and over and over because of all the times my no meant nothing NO I will not get naked for you and my tiny little friend, also a survivor telling them I have experienced abuse and I need to not wear a hospital gown.

Losing all the friends. Alone. Lot's of therapy and healthy living in isolation. Apartment with no TV, just a bed no furniture. Trying to make friends, hope the neighbors don't hear all the sobbing, can't have a roommate they can't deal. Then I meet my first friend. Then I finally make a friend, therapist recommended us both to a cooking class- we both like healing and health! He has no friends too. But after hanging out a bit he clarifies he just wants sex. I try that arrangement but he winds up telling me he thinks rape and child abuse should be ok, I tell him he's a horrible human being and we never talk. Oh. Right now in my apartment by ex is still living in my parking lot in his cab. So at night he sleeps there. I have dreams about him taking my life and crying "I'm sorry I'm sorry" I know. He's sorry. He too was broken, I know. I meet a new friend, this guy is 34 to my 22- he says he understands I'm hurting, his girlfriend is nice, I cry with her and tell her I miss my daughter. I tell him about my first friend and he says "It's better to be the wolf than the sheep." That didn't wind up going very well.

I think sometimes people who make soul crushing compromises for the comfort of another human presence might have deeper pains and huge gaps in very needed social support and comfort for trauma and pain that make these decisions make sense.

The same that when sweatshops exploit human suffering and willingness to consent to bad work conditions in duress, the people who have less capacity to bargain successfully for proper treatment in relationships are not necessarily weaker or lacking is assertiveness skills any more than the next person.

The problem may be bigger than just that these people don't have enough assertiveness skills and the same as I don't think we will end sweatshops by telling impoverished workers to be more assertive, the treatment women are facing by men is not going to be solved just by women being more assertive, it's more complex than that.
posted by xarnop at 2:19 PM on October 16, 2015 [24 favorites]

Some of my broadly directed anger-at-culture here is that The Orgasm that Did Not Happen(tm) has been one of those points at which partners of multiple genders became rapey or abusive. That's a culturally constructed thing because The Orgasm that Did Not Happen(tm) is treated as the truthy subconscious vote on the current state of the relationship and one's value as a person. In orgasmo veritas I suppose is the cultural myth. And granted on the other side there's a lot of people who feel entitled to the Happy Ending(tm) or giving the Happy Ending(tm). (On that point, masturbation with a partner needs to be less taboo.)

But I don't know that it's necessarily one of those things that needs explanation more than the bathroom break, the charley horse, or the other mundane things that bounce people out of the mood.
posted by CBrachyrhynchos at 2:24 PM on October 16, 2015 [5 favorites]

I am going to assume you mean this in the best way possible, because I know you're a really awesome human being, and I'm pretty sure you do and nothing I want to write applies to how you intended this to come across- but the way this is written might unintentially hit some sore spots for me, mainly because of how many people think the problem here is that women need more assertiveness training. You have NOT stated that, so allow me to make the counter to that simply for anyone who does think that because I've heard it stated all over the place including metafilter in the past. So assume the following is to the idea in general that asseritiveness is the missing ingredient here in fixing this, or that assertive women can't be broken down.

Oh, GOD no. Quite the contrary - I realize that a lot of women have had that kind of assertiveness ground out of them, either accidentally or on purpose, and realizing that it was not ground out of me - even though I was raised Catholic, which usually is like ground zero for that kind of thing - makes me feel extremely fucking lucky.

that statement was not a "y'all should be more like me," it's more of a "I have no idea how I didn't up in y'all's boat". With a subtext, too, of "and I wish I did know because then I could tell you how and y'all could get out of that boat too".
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 2:26 PM on October 16, 2015 [5 favorites]

(BTW your comments are always awesome I know you didn't mean it that way! It just felt like so much rose up that I really wanted to share about that idea that I wanted to counter it anyway? I really wanted to make it clear I assume you didn't mean it that way!!!!!!)
posted by xarnop at 2:29 PM on October 16, 2015 [3 favorites]

As a man, this thread is horrifying and depressing.
posted by grumpybear69 at 2:31 PM on October 16, 2015 [5 favorites]

I received some very nice emails from mefites after my last post (thank you mefites!). I am ok and have a much better support structure now. I really was mostly sharing that because this is where some women are when you're trying to negotiate consent, in fact, it's where too many are, and even those with far less trauma have been through a LOT of breaking down in unsafe ways by men, and it's deep in our programming that men can be unsafe because historically they can, and as women we are often at a physical disadvantage in combat situation, knowing that we have HAD to cater to men in a lot of ways, and an emotional disadvantage because more of us are empaths and sensitive and find hurting others feelings difficult whether by social training or physical programming or both (I think it's a combo). There are so many reasons including pregnancy, single parenthood, having to get an abortion when you're not all that comfortable with it, emotionally being overwhelmed, that a woman who deals with fertility might have that might be different from man in addition to all the programming. So many reasons sex can be scary and that standing up to a man can be scary, unpleasant, and difficult because no to sex at all or to specific kind of sex really doesn't work. That's the starting point for negations and maneuvers to break someone down or put the whole relationship in check until submission is achieved. I find that while I know a few women who have ultimatums relating to sex, I think men feel far more entitled to demand whatever they want sexually and threaten to leave if they don't get it knowing that so many other men do the same thing and women will be facing a shortage of anyone willing to do anything differently.

So yeah women not being interested in sex, selectively not wanting sex at a particular time, selectively not wanting a particular kind of sex or intimacy but wanting others, not wanting advances, or preferring other forms of intimacy than sex, is something that really does need a lot of advocacy and we have a long way to go there.
posted by xarnop at 3:04 PM on October 16, 2015 [15 favorites]

that statement was not a "y'all should be more like me," it's more of a "I have no idea how I didn't up in y'all's boat". With a subtext, too, of "and I wish I did know because then I could tell you how and y'all could get out of that boat too".

...we're gonna need a bigger boat.

<3
posted by Deoridhe at 3:07 PM on October 16, 2015 [6 favorites]

When dudes have asked me whether I would be interested in engaging in said activity, I say, "No, I don't want to do that." Is that the end of the conversation? It has literally never been the end of the conversation. [...] I wish these kinds of experiences were limited to the realm of boundary-pushing creeps you can spot from a mile away, but they aren't.

this is the story of like my entire goddamn life and it's so pervasive and sneaky and insidious and enraging. I think I may have had more/worse experiences than other people (?) but honestly this kind of thing has come at me from all different angles, and apparently I was really bad at dodging it. there comes a point where honestly you just don't trust dudes anymore. yeah, it's unfair, but I can just barely fit on one hand the number of men who 'just wanted to get to know me' and explicitly called themselves feminists and pretended they actually cared for a month or so before it became clear that, actually, that they just wanted in my pants and were just waiting for the opportunity. I got suspicious once and told a guy I didn't want to have sex with him. his response was 'not even when you're drunk?' great sign.

anyway this thread has been really cathartic and, sad as it may be, it's kind of a huge relief to see some of the other people's stories in here. I wish it'd been here seven years ago. sometimes it's really easy to think it's all in your head until enough evidence stacks up that it can't really be excused anymore. so yeah. thanks.
posted by nogoodverybad at 3:33 PM on October 16, 2015 [10 favorites]

You guys, this is an amazing thread, and incredibly valuable in so many ways. Thank you from the bottom of my fucking heart for that Nina Hartley video posted up thread. My husband and I watched it together, and then he dove in to practice and holy shit my head spun Exorcist style. Nina Hartley is a goddamn national treasure.
You are all wonderful people.
posted by msali at 7:37 PM on October 18, 2015 [8 favorites]

...we're gonna need a bigger boat.

There's a little man in this one.
posted by clew at 8:24 PM on October 20, 2015 [1 favorite]

Why sex that's consensual can still be bad, and why we're not talking about it

"A lot of sex feels like this," [Reina] Gattuso wrote in May, after her popular [Harvard] Crimson columns drew the attention of Feministing, a website at which she has since become a contributor. "Sex where we don't matter. Where we may as well not be there. Sex where we don’t say no, because we don't want to say no, sex where we say yes even, when we're even into it, but where we fear... that if we did say no, or if we don't like the pressure on our necks or the way they touch us, it wouldn't matter. It wouldn't count, because we don't count."

This is not pearl-clutching over the moral or emotional hazards of "hookup culture." This is not an objection to promiscuity or to the casual nature of some sexual encounters. First of all, studies have shown that today's young people are actually having less sex than their parents did. Second, old-fashioned relationships, from courtship to marriage, presented their own risks for women. Having humiliating sex with a man who treats you terribly at a frat party is bad but not inherently worse than being publicly shunned for having had sex with him, or being unable to obtain an abortion after getting pregnant by him, or being doomed to have disappointing sex with him for the next 50 years. But it's still bad in ways that are worth talking about.

posted by divined by radio at 9:57 AM on October 22, 2015 [9 favorites]

I can't wait till this generation of feminists discovers Andrea Dworkin and Intercourse.

The Second Wavers basically already talked about this stuff, concluded it was in the territory of "grey rape" or at least needed to be discussed that way for feminist purposes, and, well, I don't know that they solved this problem, but they at least put forth a better model than GGG or "sex-positive means always saying yes".
posted by Sara C. at 10:05 AM on October 22, 2015

1) GGG isn't feminist.

2) Sex positive means always saying yes is this generations "free love" - that is something sold as "empowering" to women by men who want access to women's bodies without concerning themselves with women as people. We didn't invent this problem, and women won't be able to make it go away because it is largely perpetuated by men and women who want to please men.
posted by Deoridhe at 12:01 PM on October 22, 2015 [7 favorites]

Oh, yeah, I 100% agree with all of that.

But I think it can trip up younger feminists who haven't figured this stuff out yet. There's a whole world of feminists deconstructing heterosexuality, consent, and female sexual pleasure/agency. And they were doing it when Dan Savage was riding a tricycle.
posted by Sara C. at 12:15 PM on October 22, 2015 [2 favorites]

I want to chime in and say thank you, all my sisters and aunts and gurus for sharing your thoughts and stories. I'm mostly a listener, a lurker, and a learner, on the young side in the Mefi community, and am trying hard to figure out how to be a good human in the world. You gals continually, in threads like this (and the emotional labor thread) teach me and tell me stories that make that amazingly more possible. So thank you for sharing your wisdom (often hardwon) and making me stronger, less willing to put up with bullshit, and more understanding.
posted by Grandysaur at 7:34 PM on October 23, 2015 [1 favorite]

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