“There’s a new sense in which young women feel that they are now in competition with porn, and if they don’t put out, it’s easy for the guy to go home, log in to Pornhub and get what he needs there,” Coles says.
In fact, of the men who "go home and log in to Pornhub," few will say that they get what they need there. Love is the thing. It's just much more difficult to find, even more to keep once you've found it, but there is no substitute.
37
Who says we shouldn't go back to sock hops and going steady? It was a lot of fun! Without the pressure!
64
Imagine- elders chastising the mating habits of a younger generation. How original! And make sure to add in a scolding about the “dangers of alcohol” and “emptiness”, just for effect. Tow the line, Puritans!
14
Two fingers in a v shape down her throat? That's affectionate? I think it's a threat to life.
29
I hope Ms. Dowd understands this works both ways. Men are at times in positions where they have encounters with people they are not fully attracted to and also end up acting out porn scenes for the benefit of their partner (or their perceived understanding of what their partner desires).
33
We can't easily define "good sex" for people. It's complex. Nor can we easily explain why people sometimes make bad choices about sex or regret them. But, it's not different than other aspects of life like making friends with someone we probably shouldn't or taking a bad job.
I also see in this article the trend to blame men when a woman regrets having consensual sex. Freedom comes with consequences. When the woman who publicly shamed and harassed Aziz Ansari after consensual sex (imagine if he had publicly written about her what she wrote about him) or Stormy Daniels, whose job, after all, is fantasy sex, and is trying to explain away having sex with a celebrity billionaire she made six figures off of, are portrayed as at least emotional victims, I can only shake my head. We should not castigate them for having casual sex or regretting it. But, both publicly exploited it for their own benefit and I feel no sympathy for them. Really bad examples.
In my lifetime our society went from a world where women had few choices about sex to one where they have the same choices that men have. That's a good thing. But, it is also a choice not to have casual sex. When they do choose to do so, they have to live with it the same as men do.
73
OK, I confess - I had to look up "limerence". Good show, Maureen!
But seriously, thanks for a thoughtful look at some of the current ways of finding - or not finding - a companion. For me, the most successful has been (35 years and counting) to go do something that you enjoy and find someone else who also enjoys that.
22
Graham Greene said it best: Never be afraid to be alone.
76
As opposed as I am to censorship, I can’t help feeling that open access to porn is a blight on society. Porn is numbing and addictive, and destroys the capacity for intimacy. No, I don’t have a specific solution but wouldn’t be surprised if 12-step-type programs to break porn habits were to begin popping up.
30
I saw the movie, Blocking, last night about 3 High School Seniors who decide to lose their virginities on Prom Night with my teenage daughters. There are several diatribes about young women being allowed to pursue and enjoy sex as much as men. How the notion that they need to be protected is patronizing and sexist.
Then you read an article like this which suggests how unsatisfying most women find casual, emotion-free sex. Yet to say that to the younger generation makes you a dinosaur, and a sexist. I hope women, young and old, will speak out about this. I hate the idea that women are hooking up against their better judgement to make some random guy happy. But, as a man, I fear my voice is mute.
37
I looked up "limerance" in the Webster's New World College Dictionary and it's not there!!!???
6
I want to hear what Kevin has to say.
7
Transactional Sex vs. Relationship Sex delves into the complexity of a young woman having the agency to exercise the freedom of articulating the choice of "yes" or "no." My Millennials have explained that, courtship doesn't exist, consequently dating culture has morphed into "hookup culture." Sadly, the second wave of feminism has become a dream, deferred.
16
The process was probably never fun, but I cannot imagine how a male might negotiate this sort of minefield today and find an intimate relationship.
My grandmother once mentioned in passing (many ages ago for this generation); "it is important to discover and explore that part together". Does anyone have any patience anymore?
31
What should come as no surprise is the fact that women require intimacy to enjoy their sexual encounters. If they do not love, and feel loved in return, sex is not satisfying and they simply go through the motions.
Men, on the other hand, can enjoy sex whether or not the heart is engaged. It's a fundamental difference between the sexes.
And then we are told that the sexes are interchangeable in every possible way. This is certainly proof of the fallacy of such a theory.
36
Great article. I know very few women my age (late twenties, early thirties) who feel in physical danger if they leave instead of having sex with someone they aren't attracted to. I also know very few women (of any age) who do not feel awful about themselves if they aren't polite, nice, or 'responsible' for others. The unbelievable pressure to accommodate is stifling.
27
The Internet has apparently turned those who grew up knowing nothing else but the Internet into robots with no belief that they have agency in their lives. Before computer algorithms began herding this generation like sheep, young adults knew that face to face social risk was unavoidable in order to meet peers. You had to talk to them, joke with them, dance with them even, in order for them to: 1) know that you existed and 2) maybe "like" you. A drawn out evolutionary process preceded any possibility that a "date" might happen. The gamit from timid to bold conduct among peers was wide. Asking someone you had only seen a picture of (in a yearbook of some other school, maybe) to meet and have sex was unimaginable. Time consuming interactive labor had to be undertaken before a date was even thinkable. No "arms length" digital shield protected you from public embarrassment as you revealed your ego hoping for a favorable response. It was real life. The Internet is a virtual robotic experience. Video games are not real, but when that's the only reality you experience and value day in and day out it becomes your reality. 20 somethings who have lived 20 years in Internet virtual reality naturally must turn real life into virtual reality because its the reality they know. This may explain the soulessness of real life experience for them. It also may explain why they rebound to computer "realities" when adventures in the actual world don't satisfy them.
27
I thinks it’s cultural and has a lot to do with upbringing.
In a society, like the USA , where people must have everything and right away, the quality of being able to choose and discern has sometimes been lost .
It’s appalling that in an intimate situation one is not able to apply the brakes of common sense , caution and not least self respect and good taste !
10
“The Cat Story,” or whatever it’s called, is a fictional story, with a fictional character. If people want to learn lessons about women and sex and men from that story, that’s fine, but they have themselves to blame. It would be just as easy to write up another story, equally compelling, about a man who has sex with a woman he does not find attractive. Maybe not so compelling, however, to those only seeking to confirm what they already believe.
14
Too many women sell themselves short, and too many empty vessels find each other for one-night stands, out of loneliness, boredom, or trying to rack up notches on their sexual prowess belts.
And it doesn't help now that lying and cheating are no longer shameful--at least according to Fox News and all those hot-sex TV shows and movies. A couple of my divorced friends signed up for 1 or 2 of those internet dating services, only to find out that some of the guys they were paired up with as "compatible" were married and cheating on their wives and/or had lied about their backgrounds on their application forms.
I keep thinking we have hit bottom in terms of human relationships and behavior and will soon rediscover true intimacy, romance, caring for others, and truth-telling. Wouldn't that be novel!
14
Technology accelerates and multiples what we already know.
That in each one of us, resides the animal and the human, at war and at peace.
It should be no surprise that this dynamic does not dissolve when you add another individual.
3
One of the most popular cooking movements now is the "slow food cooking" movement.
Perhaps it is time for a "let's get to know each other slowly" movement. There is nothing more seductive than anticipation.
27
anticipation won't change a lack of attraction, which is the issue being discussed here.
10
I think Dowd and Coles are assuming that all men want is sex, porn-style, and that the dynamic described here is one-sided. It isn't. Men frequently go through with sexual encounters that they would prefer not to, in much the same way that women do. Yes, men do assault women way more than women assault men. But this article is about legally consensual sex, and the idea that most consensual encounters are an unalloyed positive for men involved in them (whether straight or gay) is, maybe a little typically, simplistic.
36
So women don't want to say no because they fear hurting someone's feelings? As someone who grew up and spent most of his life obese I can assure you that is an absolutely laughable opaque and self-serving delusion.
18
Primary reason I sleep with men that aren't attractive to me: I have needs too. Let's grow up and understand that as adults we don't have to explain why we have sex.
19
> I worry that the college date rape trend is related to this phenomenon. Boys EXPECT to have sex at every party they attend so if the girl is reticent, they get angry and take what they believe they should have. I never heard of date rape when i was young and cant figure out why it is happening now. It must be part of this hookup culture and could be one reason girls go along with undesireable sex in the first place.
4
Oh I forgot to add drinking a bunch of alcohol to the mix. And it's a recipe for unclear messaging and regrettable outcomes.
Yes. College girls have been known to drink on occasion.
12
First hand of the reply didn't go through.
Equality. My daughter just graduated from a Pac-12. Over the years I've been shocked listening to her sorority sisters and roommates talking about "getting laid tonight". These comments were made while they out on makeup, perfume and tight jeans, tight tank tops, short skirts, provocative clothing. All proven to be powerful tools of attraction for the opposite sex y decades of empirical data.
Healthy sexual encounters are everyone's responsibility. Not just men's.
7
Girls expect to have sex too. My daughter just graduated from a large Pac-12 school. The things I heard her sorority sisters and roommates say about "getting laid tonight" shocked me. That is sad part of EQUALITY I guess.
And let's remember that getting ready to "go out" a lot of the time means wearing makeup, perfume and skirts/high heels/tight t-shirts. All of these things are DESIGNED TO ATTRACT THE OPPOSITE SEX as proven by decades and decades of empirical research.
Healthy sexual interactions are everyone's responsibility. Not just a man's.
18
Real sex is surely better than porn, but it is hardly free! Not when you factor in the costs of birth control; access to medical care including Ob/Gyn; and enough police, lawyers, and judges to ensure that a "civil society" stays civil. Not even "freedom" is free.
4
Reading articles like this would make me hate men if I was a woman . As a man,it makes me want to hate women who apparently can only express themselves ,to other women ,with a key board.
I believe it was Norman Mailer who once quipped "The best hope for humankind,is its earliest demise.".
11
I find this to be an archaic question. It is also extremely complicated, and there isn't one answer. First of all, would you be surprised if a man had sex with someone he wasn't particularly attracted to? Why are you holding women to another standard? Sex is different to every person, male or female. I would also say that in a person's life sex may mean different things at different stages. If a person is unattached then it is their right to choose the path of least resistance. I think that is what women may do from time to time when they just don't feel up to the possibility of an uncomfortable or negative situation. Unlike a man they don't have to "get it up", so they can easily fake it and move on. And if they do, it is no one else's business.
13
I'm 56, which, in terms of the sexual revolution, is not "old." I can't speak for now, but back when I was single, girls knew how to say 'No.' I can attest, for a fact, that I actually witnessed that happening. Girls who have sex with people they don't want to have sex with have one person to blame -- themselves. As for guys, this may shock you, but many also get very drunk, such as to get over shyness, because they are not natural Lotharios. So, you have guys getting drunk, in part for courage, and girls getting drunk, for much the same reason. The problem is that many people, many nice people, of both sexes, are not great at courtship, perhaps especially when they're younger. I feel like I'm asking to get shouted at but my problem with most of these stories is that the women are treated as individuals, with thoughts and frailties, whereas MEN are treated as MEN -- a species of sex predators, all of whom are basically the same. I would also add that the phenomena of single men having sex with someone they really don't want to have sex with is something males deal with as well as females. Shocking, I know, but it's true.
56
It seems that women- all women- are lesbians. We just didn't know it until now. Reading pieces like Dowd's column enforces the fact that women are just not attracted to men. Guys should face the facts. If the playing field were level, they wouldn't be getting any play. They are unwanted unless a pregnancy is sought. How soon will women seek that without direct contact with a man? As a gay man, it's fine with me if men can only find sex with other men. But the women? Did they all agree to be lesbians when we weren't looking? Me too no longer includes men too.
6
Kristen writing about Margot and Robert. An anonymous woman writes about her disappointing sex with Aziz. Stormy on Stormy and Donald. Joanna, formerly of Cosmo, nonplused by young women at a liberal arts college who say they get drunk on Friday nights and need Plan B Saturday morning. Leah, disillusioned with hookup culture at Middlebury. Mary on the dangers of losing your inhibitions in the immersive environment of cyberspace, designed by men.
So the column seems to be about sexual encounters in which there are two people in the room, only one of whom is a woman. But it consists entirely of women expressing a woman’s viewpoint; one would think such a column would be about sexual encounters in which both people in the room are women.
If anyone’s interested, heterosexual men sometimes have second thoughts about an imminent sexual encounter. But one doesn’t want to hurt her feelings. There’s the question whether perhaps after a certain point there’s a duty to have sex with her if she’s risked rejection and made it clear she wants sex. And there’s the old saying, hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, which might give one pause.
Why pursue hook ups if you need an emotional connection? Did science not show women ultimately make the choice in these matters based on pheromones, DNA compatibility, her unconscious sense of smell, signaling, etc.?
In any event, if we’re only going to hear women’s viewpoints, at least tell us: What do women want?
21
This column and the one by Roger Cohen speak to similar things. Other countries are looking at democratic societies in the west hellbent on destroying all that makes human life pleasurable and worthwhile. Job is a competition, sex is a game of perversion, religion is corrupt and unsatisfying. No wonder they’re turning away.
16
As a male, a teen in the 70's, 20 something in the 80's, etc....I too have slept with women I was not that "into". And not for the belt-notches most people would think. At the party, bar, club, concert, etc- she seemed really cool. Dressed in that way that attracts me, dug the same music, knew the same people...but outside the Event, on the way to her place (always her place) under different lighting, in her safe-place, etc...the attraction wore off. Then there we were...in her place, she's un-belting me...dropping her clothes, and I wanted to stop, to leave...but...I'm a guy and I'm supposed to perform in these circumstances. Right? man-up and perform. Don't be a baby, and go get-some.
I think many women - no, in fact I know from conversations, that many women feel the same. We're all supposed to perform when we've long ago (an hour or more and several drinks ago) agreed to the social contract of hooking-up.
Extricating oneself at that point feels (the alcohol effects those feelings) so much harder to do then just having some sex. As once the sex is done, the exit-act is much easier...as leaving is what expected of you.
In hindsight, the few "I'm not really into this, or you" incidents all turn into Lifes, "Oh well..." moments.
Ms. Dowd seems prudish in her basic question of Why? Making me think she, and so many others with the same Q, really were never "out-there" mixing it up on the singles scene. Its a crazy place, always has been. As the say'n goes; "Stuff happens."
30
I saw this:
A very attractive woman about 5 5" in shoes shaking hands (full arm extension) with a nice looking, well-dressed man no taller than 5' 6" in shoes. It was a friendly yet decidedly non-flirtatious farewell handshake. They were outside Mr. Chow in TriBeCa, which is a pricey, upscale restaurant. Both were dressed well for a first date. My first thought was that the man had lied about his height (saying he was taller), and the woman would not have met him, if she knew he was 5' 5" (his apparent height). The handshake made it clear to any onlooker that she was not interested in him. That woman found herself in this situation: She met a man not her type (too short) who was probably super nice and funny and well dressed and not unhandsome who took her to a very upscale restaurant for a first date. I guess some women would feel obligated to sleep with him (it was an expensive date). Some, like her, would just make a polite exit. I know I read a LOT into that gesture, but it was a very eloquent gesture. She was shaking hands in a friendly way while maintaining as much physical distance as her arm length would allow.
20
Can't tell if this is a lament about sex without romance and/or consent, or an observation on a cultural trend with as-yet undefined lasting social consequences/benefits, or simply generational tongue-clucking disapproval.
While primordial evidence of sexual behavior at the 'dawn of time' is more than sparse, sex at its core has always been primarily a hormone-driven reproductive activity (engaged in by every species) whose appeal for humans can be greatly enhanced, ruined, ritualized or regulated by culturally-developed cues, derivatives and 'standards.' Frankly, if sex did not involve - at a minimum - a hormonal/orgasmic reward, the activity itself is about as 'sexy' as painting a barn or washing the dishes; its choreography can be downright comical.
As long as unintended offspring don't result -- recklessly adding to the planet's ecosystem overload -- it seems any Consensual sexual trend free of physical injury is just another free choice decision that humans make for whatever their reasons. Free choice always comes with emotional risk of Regret at some level, be it aunt Tillie's 10-gallon mayonnaise buy at Costco's or cousin Bert's unfortunate attempt at skydiving.
11
What's lust got to do with it? EVERYTHING!
When Sir Abraham Maslow came up with the Hierarchy of Needs level one included our most basic needs: air, food , drink, shelter, warmth, sleep, and guess what - SEX!
8
How can we expect young men to provide intimacy to someone they just met? What else would there be to do than go through some motions. Drunken college sex isn't a very good baseline for judgement. For one thing, men in college usually aren't total strangers.
Liberal commentators are beginning to look like prudes, as though men didn't get oral sex in the Seventies. Taking advice from baby boomers is obviously not working for young people in America.
There has never been more information for people to get it right, yet young people still use lack of information and porn as an excuse for their victimhood.
Few point out the uncomfortablity we used to have for going on a blind date, or going in a car with a stranger. Young men and women aren't 'professionals', like Stormy Daniels. Commentaries like this have political outcomes, the nuances of sex and love for people in the modern age deserve better. Otherwise conservatives will find their ear.
8
“It’s very easy to imagine someone online in a positive way,” she says, “but it’s only when you sit down, with all five senses in play, that you can really tell, ‘Do I find this person attractive?’”
Substitute truthful, moral, well-intentioned, honest, or any other term for "attractive", and Coles has just defined what is wrong with "social media" and why its negative impact upon society far outweighs any "good" that might come from it.
I've hired hundreds (professionals) and interviewed thousands in my career, and never found a resume, or a phone interview to convey the character and ability of the candidate as accurately as a face to face conversation did.
22
I don't believe Stormy Daniels had sex with Trump because she felt she had to because she went to his hotel room. She is a porn actress, where sex is work and work is sex. She was working with the hope that it would lead somewhere advantageous to her. Nothing wrong with that but she isn't a good example for this article.
There is an implication that there are significantly more women than men in the U.S. and a woman has to have sex anytime, in any way, or she will be passed over, never date, never marry, never have children. Sex has become like a cheap commodity given just a tad bit too freely. Has sex been added to the female repertoire of "I need to acquiesce so that I am liked?" A one-night stand is fine if that is what both parties want; however, this article doesn't address that the double standard is still alive and well: men are players and women are vilified as cheap, easy and worse. In an age where photos and videos are recorded on cell phones and passed effortlessly from person to person, one would think that everyone, but especially women, would be more careful of who they hook-up with because the consequences may be more far-reaching than just regret.
23
America, and most of the world, has moved to streamline processes. For the most part, this is great: online banking; drive-thrus with happy meals; automated tax-refunds; online shopping; etc., etc., etc. . This means that people move from A to Z quickly and they are not particularly interested in all the steps along the way. People are very goal-oriented, they want what they want now. This is the zeitgeist and unquestionably it contributes to a hook-up culture that our brains and emotions have not necessarily evolved to accept. As with all new technologies and advancements there will be dislocations, consequences, and costs. Soon there will be three printing of human organs and artificial intelligence added in, so people will have relationships with cyber-mates instead of "real people." At that point, you can adjust the dial and request a quick hookup or a long and drama-filled romance. That is progress folks. That is what we are building.
6
Perhaps one day 10, 15 or 20 years from now, we’ll look back at tech designed to “connect” us with rides, food, pet food and sex - and decide we really weren’t so smart about using tech for simple things, that it was early and as humans, we were trying new things with new technology. Perhaps we’ll figure out ways that technology can solve truly meaningful problems, and realize finding a partner is a more mysterious and personal endeavor left to personal judgment and trust.
104
So a state of debauchery leading to sad outcomes for mankind. The movie has played before.
An objective introspection on what brought us all here would help.
However, one wonders if articles such as this one- women talking to women, quoting each other, on how they are being shortchanged etc., then writing about it - and, indeed the arc of most narratives these days, are helping much.
Pertinent questions: (a) what motivates women to participate in these acts - dating, mindless sex, to begin with, (b) why are they not learning from others’ experiences that are public, (c) where is the male perspective for balance?
Seeking pleasure all the time - like the need for shareholders to continue to see growth in a company - will start to go wrong at some point, wouldn’t it? In addition, might it be that human bodies - male and female - are created for being more than pleasure-yielding-kiosks?
8
Cyberspace is an immersive experience designed by men? Are highways also an experience designed by mem, or maybe the airline flight corridors. How about telephones, supermarkets, the space station, parking meters? I guess men design all that stuff just to subjugate women.
12
At 75, I can finally echo Leonard Cohen on sex: "I've finally tamed that raging beast."
11
He also said that, he'd passed through the phases of being irresistible, resistible, invisible, repulsive and finally "cute."
19
Well, what's realistic when the marriage age continues to be extended? For college educated folks, getting married is an add-on to a career: marriage before 30 is a risky proposition. Can one realistically expect a healthy person to abstain so long? To have great sex without some sort of commitment?
The problem with these sorts of articles is their subjective breast-beating similarities; it's most probably some sort of repressed Puritanism.
As far as the sort of sex these and similar articles appear to favor: how many films and novels recount the passing of that initial fervor after but a few first years of bliss? I'd suggest those most in agreement with the author to consider dog ownership: emotional bonds all-but-guaranteed.
The perfect, indeed, is the enemy of the good.
8
Something that hasn't been said is that many women are afraid to say no because they fear that their no will be ignored and lead to violence. Many women, and I'm sure men as well, have said no to their partners and then been met with verbal and physical violence because of it, not to mention emotional abuse.
Many men do not like hearing the word no from women, and turn nasty when they hear it. If you're in the middle of a hook up, and decide that you no longer want to participate, in the back of your head you're thinking "can I get out of this safely?". It may sound like I am exaggerating, but I know many people have had this experience.
16
Before the internet Tina Turner sang 'What's Love Got To Do With It?'. Today her plea, when compared to Maureen Dowd's title, seems almost quaint.
Assessing the revolution that's taken place with the advent of internet technology, some years ago a writer for New York Times said it best, and I'm paraphrasing:
"the internet offers the illusion of companionship without the demands of intimacy"
"it's communication without emotional risk"
"new technologies have made convenience and control a priority while diminishing our emotional expectations of others".
5
We live at a time where virtual reality is becoming preferable to reality. We even now have something called "enhanced reality" emerging. We have elected a gameshow host as President who barely poses as a President. We prefer are own narratives to the actual facts. So, the fact that young men and women are really engaging in sex not with another person, but with what really amounts to a sexual avatar that they ultimately have no feelings or connection with seems understandable.
9
This is one of those areas where heterosexuals are lagging a bit. As a gay man I have primarily dated (or hooked up) from digital venues for nearly 20 years. I learned to be very skeptical of the illusory person on the other side. I'm sure I dissuaded a handful of would-be partners who would have been great but I'm confident that I filtered out a majority of "icky" experiences. I also learned to be very clear with myself and with others about what I was looking for at any given time online and then I focused on that objective, whether it was making a new friend, dating or seeking a hookup.
Younger heterosexuals--yes, women too--will learn these things as well. They will get beyond the banal porn-fantasy version of sexual freedom and arrive at the real thing. Sexual freedom includes responsibility, to yourself and to others.
6
In a fascinating way, this #metoo movement, this alcohol infested hook up culture, the arbitrariness of almost anonymous sex, is like the new AIDS for the 21st Century. But this time, the shackles are of the mind. Actually, I agree with the women's change of mind, and their hesitation. Women aren't built for this kind of promiscuity, at least most women aren't--most men really don't know themselves to say, but women tend to be just a notch more mature, and only a notch, so they sense the emptiness and pathetic nature of the whole enterprise. It's like an old-fashioned moral uprising, but on a biological level.
8
Men now feel that thousands of women are at their fingertips because of the dating apps, release is never hard to get thanks to Pornhub, so women who are assertive and seek to find a connection (or at least a few dates) before sex end up alone and wondering why their texts aren't being answered.
8
Your description is essentially the opposite of my experience and every account I've heard. Women in online dating are often inundated with messages - they are the ones with a choice of men at their fingertips. Men have a choice between the women who actually respond to their messages with interest, the proportion of which might depend on his attractiveness or charm, but can only ever be a fraction of his total attempts.
10
I'm a man who does online dating. I'm short. I don't feel like I have women at my fingertips. I've met guys who are 6' 5" who feel like they have women at their fingertips. When I can list my income, I feel more popular. I think the number of men who have women at their fingertips can be counted on your fingertips.
Most women can't find good men, because (their idea of) good men start at 6' 1".
Most of us Jewish guys (not tall) have to meet women in the Hamptons or at fundraisers ;)
5
Six to eight minutes? Try 60 to 80 seconds! If you doubt this, look at the typical duration of gay male porn clips, viewed almost entirely by (gay) men (ok, and some lesbians). This is male biological fact, and straight men are exactly the same, except for the object of their attraction.
Men by Nature are more visual/physical, women are more emotional, re: sex, by and large. And porn just exacerbates this imbalance. But women still hold the keys; it's all in how they use them. I would suggest an online version of Lysistrata: women, no online contact with men until the second or tbird date! But easier said than done....
6
The truth of this article makes me profoundly sad.
12
I think this column deserves a response from someone published here saying something like: "I'm a prominent liberal feminist of the past and I admit I helped promote this culture and this conduct and I am self-disgusted. I respect now that it was wrong to promote the view that men are irredeemably promiscuous and that men and women are the same in all respects and women should act like men in all contexts".
Those seeking greater respect from others are advised to demonstrate that they respect themselves. "Rape-enablement" is unacceptable. No wonder sexual harassment is rife. Just horrifying.
5
Wonderful challenging article, Maureen; things must change!
4
If this is at least partially the result of pornography, certainly it's pathological to individuals and society.
2
Seems like college age people ought to be able handled something like eating, yet they are not always taking in only what is good for them, or not enough, or too much. Then there is sex. Is anyone buying it any more? How about giving it away? Does truly anonymous sex require a blindfold? What do you do when all undressed and not wanting to go anywhere? Got a least four years to get through college and no time for romance. Yet there are masters.
1
What's wrong with sock hops and going steady? I suspect women would be happier if more men wanted to dance with them and then have actual relationships.
It doesn't even need to be dancing. Bowling would probably be fine too. The main thing is to have common activities that are neither drinking nor sex. Both drinking and sex have their place, of course, but life is pretty bleak if that's all you do.
18
Women, pay attention to Ms. Dowd! Good sex isn't found after "Will he love me in the morning?" Gilda Radner, rest her good soul, showed us that in one of her SNL bits years ago, as she stumbled down the stairs from his apartment, with one shoe on and one off, and a look of puzzlement beyond belief. Believe this: women are the ones who pay the price for such assignations. They look for love in all the wrong places. It can be found in commitment and love. It can be found in a good marriage of commitment and love. It won't be found in lust mistaken for love or careless sex mistaken for a gift between two caring lovers.
9
Have never used an app. Don't own a smart phone.
But the bar scene has been universal all around the country. Here and abroad. It serves a purpose/need. It does take two (...well...different strokes etc....) thus both sexes are out prowling.
Ms. Dowd, the stories depicted are all sad.
Did you also happen to ask your subjects about the successes? There is a reason for hook up apps. Just as the bar scene has been happening for centuries.
SEX! If one gets lucky, (not the first kind...) they may find a connection and companion.
Yes, if one gets cold feet or other regions, then by all means back out. Nicety's be danged. If one happens to be in a giving mood...?! Your choice. Hopefully if a women is playing around on a hook up app or other scene she is aware and playing as an empowered adult. Just as a man should be. From the anecdotal stories, these ladies maybe shouldn't have been playing.
Yes Lust has a huge reason for all of it.
Ya roll the dice and take your chances.
Feeling lucky...?!
3
Exploitation in sex goes both ways. I would like to see an article on how women have been exploiting men's biologically driven sexual desire in exchange for resources for millennia.
6
What struck me most about this piece is there is no mention of respect..either for self or others. I really don’t think you can have that proverbial “good sex” without self-respect. Because really, without self respect, you will indulge in activities which you will regret in the morning.
5
You cannot work your way out of the jungle of contradictions that sex has created without biologically analyzing the question: How come males are blessed/cursed/afflicted with a drive that has nothing to do with their individual survival?
6
I will never understand how behaving like men, when it comes to sex, is liberating. Copying the worst in men (promiscuity) is a step backwards. I sometimes think the goal of sexual liberation for women was the brainchild of men.
14
I went drinking with some young women this week in Scotland. I’m 60; they were 36, 30 & 20. We spent hours discussing how the 20-year-old could get rid of her virginity. She’d had her first kiss this week with a stranger & “it felt like nothing.”
I grew up in the ‘70’s where we had sex on the first date. We all had sex with men like in “Cat Person.”
I tried to explain to “The Virgin” that virginity is not something to be rid of like taking out the recycling. I explained that I’m not a prude, that I had plenty of sex with near-strangers & that her virginity does not have an expiration date.
She feels such pressure to “get rid of it.” I fairly begged her to at least care about the person she has sex with for the first time. To know his middle name & the number of his siblings & where he went to grade school & if he votes.
Life is complicated for the young today & most of that complication was wrought by my generation.
Mea culpa.
12
Sex for men is visual and emotional for women. For most of human history women had the power to control the frequency and who they had sex with. The rapid changing world with easy access to porn, working girls, gadgets and life like dolls, average women are losing their sexual power over men.
7
It’s sad to look to a Cosmo editrix for wisdom on this subject when they promote the same casual sexual relationships that are disappointing the young women you write about. The best sex is found in mutually committed, lifetime relationships called marriage.
8
For some reason this reminds me of two things: One -- Lt Joe Kenda's saying, "Nothing good ever happens after midnight," and Two == (for some unknown reason) some fools in California want the bars to stay open til 4 a.m.
4
This is bad for women? As opposed to 100 years ago when they had no choice really?
4
More man-bashing from the NYT.
Even if you dont know what a woman is thinking, or wanting, a guy should still take all the responsibility; Assume she is incapable of being assertive whilst keeping in mind that we men are finally starting to understand that we are naturally and obsessively self-centred and aggressive from birth.
Come on NYT, give us a break!
7
Lots of women think hooking up with strangers and having sex with them and never seeing them again is empowering. That seems doubtful to me but when our culture and entertainment constantly promote this as normal and even desirable, who are we women to argue? Our culture is still overwhelmingly male-dominated. Anyone who doesn't believe the culture is still dominated by what men want or thinks young women are successfully changing the dialogue about sex should spend half an hour on 4Chan and see what men there are saying and posting about their wives, girlfriends and strangers they they hook up with. Your eyeballs will bleed....
8
Hilarious. A magazine editor spends a career making it seem like every woman under 25 is having sex, sex, sex, with entire articles serving as essentially "how to" manuals for servicing men, and then she criticizes college students for not having meaningful sex? LOL
18
I recently heard this quoted: "Learning how to have sex by watching porn is like learning how to drive by watching The Fast and the Furious"... I have a teen daughter and I am anxious about the effect that easy access to porn will have on her sexual emergence. I read everything I can about this current landscape of sex and intimacy to be able to answer questions or guide conversations so she has liberated but healthy and safe (physically and emotionally) experiences. Scary territory for a parent.
7
Sex as sex was never brilliant. Yes, I know, there was supposed to be the Golden Age — the years between The Pill and AIDS, but I was sexually actively then, and I saw clearly that sexual compatibility is rare. That skinteenth percentage gets even more reduced when you jump into bed with a person — even when it goes well. Guys in particular freak out. Now why is that? Is it the old “two head” thing? Is it “performance anxiety”? In that case sex as sex is just another consumer item in a senseless consumer culture.
Basically, sex as sex is overrated. No one ever finds what they’re looking for from it. Porn? It’s much better experienced from within head #1.
I could feel very sorry for this PornHub generation, but something tells me they have a chance at real sexual liberation: being liberated from it.
6
Relationships between people are complex and when sex is a part of it the complexity and confusion increases. Here's a simplification which may appear crass or insulting, it's not meant to be but I'm not writing a book here.
Women own a vagina, men want access to that vagina. Men want that access sufficiently that they are willing to put up with the often annoying and irritating hoops women demand for that access. The main reason men need and tolerate women is for the sex, not companionship. It's a transaction.
Stormy Daniels was a professional sex-haver for money. She went with Trump purely because of his fame and potential value to her, not for love. It was a deal and they both got something of value out of it.
If Aziz Ansari's date was unhappy with his wine choice, tough. You pay for the meal, you choose the wine. Aziz was a less than stellar lover? How does he feel about her performance? Was she worth the price of the meal and the tsuris afterwards? He has wisely chosen not to critique her competence and performance publicly.
The solution to this crisis for women is simple. Legalize prostitution, make the transaction explicit. That way men have a choice between a simple and straightforward physical encounter or the baggage and aggravation that a relationship can require.
8
Ms Dowd, you're thinking too much.
What is the primeval tale "Beauty & the Beast", about other than great sex with an ugly guy?
"Fairy tales like Beauty and the Beast can be traced back thousands of years, according to researchers at universities in Durham and Lisbon.".
Of course, men also have sex with women they are not attracted to, sometimes because they feel obliged to. There is an overlap in our emotional makeup, but common wisdom is that men always crave sex. That stereotypes men just like Ms. Dowd stereotypes women. Nothing is always true about the sexuality of either men or women.
14
Online and app based dating is just another tool. We don't seem to be able to use it well yet, but it would be a mistake to throw the tool out in protest. There is a balancing wave coming in which women feel empowered enough to accept only men and sex that genuinely please them.
2
Flip the coin , in a world where human activity is stressing every system on the planet casual sex with no plan to procreate is a supportable position. Someone who decides to have sex "anyhow "is exhibiting a degree of self confidence . She has made a judgement that this man probably won't become a pest and she will likely not have to hear from him again,so why not hope the sex is good and go home not wasting the entire evening. It's when it doesn't work out that way that it becomes a problem. Of course she has already made her decisions on the risks of STD's as well.
1
So in our increasingly obese population including the aging 50 year old men people are watching porn featuring lithe 20 somethings. Remember when we worried about how air brushing photos impacted men's expectations about women's looks. The young women I know feel massive pressures in general so I see their reaction to sex as a symptom of the loans, the rent, etc. or failure to distinguish real from fiction. The whole Carrie thing minus rent in NYC realities. The whole country has a reality issue with Trump's election a marker. Fake claiming to be real and real facts put forth as fake!
2
Sex is a powerful bonding experience. I think it's especially powerful for women, as they are taking the sexual energy in. I think we live in a time where people are trying to make casual something that by its very nature cannot be casual. It saddens me when an experience so lovely and connecting is not seen as sacred. Not that sex HAS to happen in commited relationships, but it is much nicer, I think, when it's with someone you know and know that you like (at the very least). If you have sex with someone that you do not know, it can be very confusing and sometimes very sad and empty. I wish young men and women understood that. I hope they eventually learn it, before the sex act has psychological wounding attached to it.
16
If you are afraid you will get beaten up or abandoned somewhere you can't get out of readily, or you don't want people to know what's going on, sex becomes a form of self preservation. However it happened, you accepted a ride you shouldn't have; you went up to see his etchings, and the situation escalated.
Young women esp. don't have the tools for self-protection often. Date rape. Self defense classes were about hitting strangers in the nose, poking fingers into eyes, breaking a headlock, finding garbage can lids or using a rolled newspaper to bash a predator with -- hah! Pepper spray should be legal. Or carry a cane for protection.
Has The Times reported on Steve Harvey's three month rule?... and even then watch Dr. Phil, people misjudge situations like mad.
2
If you can't have mace or pepper spray, suggest a can of dayglo paint. Aim for the eyes ...
(no, I've never done that, just seems an idea to mark the guy)
1
I think that the reason that women "go through with it" when inside our heads, all that we really want to do is go home and watch t.v., is because fundamentally, we don't know that the guy we're with is going to be cool with our changing our minds at the last minute. Will he get violent if we do? Will we get raped if we do? Will we get killed if we do? Do we have enough money to get home if we walk out the door? Are we sure that we know where we are if we walk out the door in the middle of the night? Is he the kind of guy who flips out unless we layer on the flattery and swear our undying love and devotion? Could he handle the truth, that he smells like cigarettes, garlic and sweat?
So we make this devil's bargain and hope for the best. Because we kind of know that probably the only reason he invited us to dinner and actually paid for it is because he wanted sex. If we give it to him, he might ask us out again, and if we keep going out with him and keep having sex with him, there's a chance he might get used to us or fall in love and want to keep us around. But if we change our mind about having sex, we know that we will probably never see him again. We might never see him again after we have sex with him, but you know what they say: "A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush."
136
Why would a woman be alone with a man about whom she has so many doubts and fears? Raped! Killed! Call 911, and run away screaming.
22
I'm shocked. Basically you are saying you knowingly hook up with a guy you fear, and ignore all the signals your good sense is telling you? Perhaps taking a moment to listen to your better self while you are in public and extract yourself at the slightest hint of control or dominance. Excuse yourself and leave. If you don't stand for something, you fall for everything, and will never know who you are.
40
Your comments are very revealing: "he smells of cigarettes garlic and sweat" " all we really want is to go home and watch tv". Perhaps for many the answer is in purchasing an AI love doll which stays erect for hours, smells however you like, looks attractive and best of all will watch tv with you
16
"What's love got to do with it," said Tina.
Practically all men were hard- wired to procreate, seems, only jail time will change that.
2
I have always thought that people are hard-wired to want sex, with procreation built in as a necessary side effect for the species. After all, all sorts of people desire sex without the ability to have it result in reproduction. A messy but effective design.
The present situation is the logical result and outcome of the women’s and feminist movement of the past. The internet is not needed. This is what you girls asked for. To be like men. You want freedom to have sex without getting pregnant? You have it enjoy it. Sex doesn’t need to mean anything, so it doesn’t. Frankly, I prefer the old fashioned girls.
A guy.
8
In “Cat Person,” Margot thinks it is absurd when Robert flips her around as though she is “a prop” for the porno “playing in his head.”
I expect there is a goodly percentage of non-fictional Roberts who who do this or that because:
1) it’s what they have seen and haven’t encountered anyone who has corrected their misconception.
2) they aren’t paying enough attention to realize.
3
According to Stormy Daniels' statement, she was hoping to get a role in an Apprentice show. Trump later called her back asserting that there were "developments". This all is reminiscent of that Weinstein and of the proverbial casting couch.
5
In our Trumpian internet world everything becomes transactional including sex. Trump is such a role model.
3
Nothing new under the sun here. Life becomes increasingly bleak for those with scant sexual values.
4
Some men worship women....the way they look, smell, feel and act....actually there are a lot of us out here. The women don't usually respond too well to being worshiped, either. If we act tough and distant, then we are arrogant jerks. We are being asked to be more than one thing at once, and we do both poorly. Your newest movement implies that men should sit quietly and wait for the female to make all the moves. Do you think that your movement would be satisfied if all men behaved that way? Do you think it would be good for society? Would that be what you call winning?
5
Whatever happened to obscenity laws? Let's bring them back.
1
Yep. It's why I'm alone, but not wanting to be.
5
I truly don't understand why women are afraid to say no to a man and walk out. After all it's your body and sex is the most intimate things that one can do.
And too many women are passive when they should be assertive. There's a herd mentality in there too with very little independent thought in these women. How can they expect men to value them if they don't value themselves?
104
Because of the fear of retribution? Do you think that guys in the heat of passion respect your wishes if you change your mind?
The woman in the Babe story described trying to leave, only for Ansari to chase her through his apartment and shove his hand in her throat--was she just not being independent enough? Too passive? Not valuing herself enough that Ansari would value her too?
Countless women get killed for merely rejecting advances from men who are still strangers. What do you think we'll expect from a date who's paid for our dinner and already taken his clothes off?
30
Maltese, see Jackie's post. And try a little empathy.
If you're a woman,lucky you for having ample self-
confidence. If you're a man, well, you've pretty much revealed your prevailing attitude toward
women and it's an old one--you don't value them until they refuse you.
27
There are always people like you that if you say a woman should value herself and be assertive that you try to turn their words against them and act if they're callous and mean. There's nothing callous about that. And no one owes anyone else sex. Just because you went out to dinner or had a few drinks? Give me a break. And if you're with a guy that will beat you up or rape you if you say no, what are you doing with him to being with? It's better to be assertive or even rude if you have to than be a doormat afraid to stand up for yourself.
2
It is incredible to me how people devalue themselves when it comes to sex, having it with almost anyone for almost any reason, and then wondering why they feel so empty afterwards. It's an intimate act. The most intimate act you can have with another human. Why would you treat it so cheaply? And once you've done that enough, why would you be surprised to discover that it doesn't hold the allure and warmth you hoped for when you're actually having it with someone you really care about? It cheats that person. And it cheats you.
14
I have a standard. If you wouldn't share a fork over dinner with someone, sex would be several degrees more icky.
4
My how times have changed since the late sixties. To wit young man introduces himself to young lady at a club; one says "Would you like to have sex." The other says "Your place or mine?" other replies "Well if you're going to argue about it forget it".
Ah things were so much classier then Chaucer would nay show a blush.
3
Females are sexual magnets. They control the parameters of sex, but they have traded their power in a rush to the bottom. And for what? They are getting neither sexual satisfaction nor emotional intimacy. They are selling themselves too cheaply.
They need to turn off the tap, and negotiate for sex that is mutually satisfying and respectful. Otherwise, they are better off saying, “No, thank you,” and pursuing their own alternatives.
15
Stormy Daniels has sex for work. Often, with men she has no real interest in, I would suppose. I found her explanation of her decision to have sex with Trump refreshingly honest: it was just another business deal.
The anonymous "Grace" who whined about Aziz Ansari is the flip side. Expecting sex with a stranger to be just picture perfect is not only unrealistic but dangerous. She's not entitled to say #MeToo. We need a new category. Maybe #MeStupid. Or if that's too harsh, how about #MeNaive.
18
When I was young and foolish, I thought of it as "pity" sex. This man is so pitiful I need to have sex with him so he won't leave this encounter with his confidence even more damaged than already is. Thinking about this attitude now, I realize that I am not responsible for a man's confidence. But I also recognize that I felt tremendous power when I thought granting a man the opportunity to have sex with me would change his life. "He needs this, and it is within my power to give it or withhold it." I think a lot of women are unwilling to acknowledge the power trip.
13
Umm , well - hate to say it but it was better ‘back in the day’. I’m talking about the early ‘70’s.
My male experience was fairly typical. You met a girl, if you both were attracted to each other you dated for a few months. - parties, movies, eventually family events. You fell in love with each other. It was a slow, gradual build up to sex - experimenting and exploring each other’s bodies. But, when the ‘act’ began it was sex but it was more about ‘making love’. Might sound cliche nowadays but is was wonderful and something that this younger generation has missed out on. One recommendation - now don’t freak out liberals - were not trying to ‘take away all of your guns’ - let’s try to figure out a way to limit access to pornography to our young people.
16
The highest rate of pornography usage is in the South where they are likely more conservatives than liberals. I really liked what you had to say until you threw in the obligatory liberal jab.
5
I appreciate this honest exploration of an important yet complex subject, especially the attention to ritualized social practices on college campuses.
Much attention is given to the judicial aspects of responding to inappropriate or illegal sexual behavior, as it should be.
But this discussion gets to something else, something more to do with identities and agency. And the persistent shaping force of patriarchy, which has young women 'competing' with porn.
71
What's morality got to do with it? Very little, apparently.
2
One of your very best. Tis a different world.
We may, some of us, long for the time when we could only write a letter to the editor but not post a comment like this instantly; to a time when the phone was on the wall, a time when hook-ups were about putting on clothing not taking off clothing.
That time is not coming back. There are parts of all this lately that are hard to reconcile, like the me too movement juxtaposed with very suggestive bra ads on television, especially on CNN and MSNBC of all places. Are the advertisers stupid? Or are we?
I'd like to read a column by Dowd on that sort of thing.
6
Many great comments! As in so many things nowadays people seem to miss that there are middle grounds to enjoy. The choices are not just no sex or drunk bad sex.
Try learning basic massage and sharing that level of intimacy before any sexual play. For that matter try injecting "play" into any kind of intimacy. Nothing is more boring or annoying as fast, numb, dumb sex. There are so many ways to slow it down and play with one another. Think of it as a gift.
3
"The fear is that dating and porn make women interchangeable." If that's the fear, how does making yourself interchangeable by participating in the hookup culture address that fear? If women aren't getting anything out of it, why do they persist? To me this is a real conundrum. Behaviorally, this culture should die out, for lack of female participation. When women were socially coerced into having unwanted sex for fear of not getting a boyfriend -- and thus being outside the social life on campus -- one could understand the incentive to go along. But in the hookup culture you don't get anything more lasting than a one-night stand, so where's the social reward? I'm afraid the question must be asked: Why don't college women just boycott ehe hookup culture?
8
A little paradigm called "the patriarchy" is a good place to start with thinking about this.
1
Growing up, I figured out that it was the girl who controlled the relationship, from its very beginnings, when you and she weren't sure if your earliest encounters were going to lead anywhere, to when it was definitely going somewhere but only she quite knew where.
Today's ridiculous apps have corrupted what was once supposed to be a joy discovered by chance, with phraseology that has turned into porn-talk and an expectation that our encounters will be faithful copies of the choreographed sex scenes we've seen and been taken in by hundreds of times.
No wonder it's a helpless bargain for the woman who has exposed her intension so quickly; and it's sad and depressing that the allure embodied in a Marilyn or Ceres or Salome is exchanged so cheaply and emptily, as if no other possibility exists anymore for modern relationships...
A plea to women: bring back mystery and an honest assessment of your men before you make your moves, lest we all turn into grade-C porn stars despondently trapped in low-budget love lives.
10
I also wonder whether the fact that women can "always have sex", no matter how off-putting or despicable their "partner" in the hook-up might be, whereas men can not plays a role. We've conditioned women to accept and tolerate undesirable, lust-less sex because they can (no doubt the pervasive male point of view) but men must be lustfully motivated - and so it's become the woman's responsibility to put up and shut up.
3
"It's so transactional now, it's bleak."
And there you have it. If you find sex to be bad unless attraction and attachment come with it, look for attachment and attraction first. When sober.
If hooker sex - basically a transaction - is what you seek, then the hook up culture is fine. But the second you paint a single additional layer on it - the minute you begin to get an inkling that the stranger might be your future soulmate, you have made a mistake, and should cut your losses. A soulmate would understand.
I don't know why this concept is politically incorrect right now. All women need to ask themselves is what they are really looking for, and acting on it. That is the definition of agency. They should not expect the person on the other end of the transaction to be in the same place, or have the same intent. That is adult. And they should take responsibility if they make a decision to stay if they are unhappy. That is equality.
8
In America today everything is “tran$actional”. It’s sold as “freedom”.
The bill is shortly arriving and it will be
too high to pay. But then someone will make money off the movie version of “The Late
Great America”. If ever there was a decadent
“culture” this is it.
2
News flash, there is nothing wrong about consensual intercourse for physical pleasure without the "love" and men and women alike are free to participate or not as they choose. It may not be for everyone, but those who don't like it shouldn't be preaching to those who do like it. Love is also a beautiful thing, but it is a rare gift and in the meantime while waiting for love a little bit of superficial sex can be fun if you get over your inhibitions.
70
It also seems like people who are "upfront" about recreational sex can be more forthright about what they like and don't like in bed. Ironic, or just a bonus of honesty?
4
Did you read the article? The gist is that most women in fact do NOT enjoy this type of sex.
31
Of course I read the article Sharon. The women (and men) who do not enjoy casual sex are perfectly free to opt out. But the article implies that there is something wrong with casual sex and the people who engage in it for whatever reason they have.
1
I'm a recent octogenarian, raised in a far distant generation where love really mattered before sex happened. Yes, many marriages didnt' last in my era, but many more did, and still last to this day. Sex with someone you love and are committed to is a bond that bears a reward to both. That bond is not bought these days, and as Ms. Dowd says:
“Good sex is a wonderful high”. “It’s what great novels and great music are about. And it’s free! But we’ve lost track of what a brilliant thing it is. It’s so transactional now, it’s bleak.” The real answer is that transactional doesn't do it. If you want brilliance, commit to one another. Marriage can really help, too. Brilliance often follows love. It never follows, "Will he love me in the morning?" She already knows the answer to that one. We need to move beyond #MeToo to #UsOne.
10
Well written dissertation Maureen, now let me dumb it down a bit and get to the bottom line imo.
Men and women can be equal opportunity dummies. They can have sex for all the wrong reasons. The list is endless.
They can also have sex for all the right reasons too, it almost always involves some sort of communication and/or compromise.
Society can play a role too. In the old days sex was frowned upon as a dirty deed and men and women abstained from it till they got married.
Today it is just the opposite ie if you don't have sex on the first date there is something wrong with you.
Better to go back to the way it was from app. 1945-1960 (with modern sexual harassment and equal rights laws included) were men were men and women
were women. not the extremes of other times.
2
Yup, Maureen, agreeing there's a very weird pattern in today's slightly nasty, lustless sexual encounters in Trump's hinge of history today. Pornish hookups with no attraction involved, antidepressants and booze making insensate women think they feel excitement, thrills, and being alive. Making too many bad decisions is the crux of the matter. Bad choices; no real intimacy. Not fun. Like the old-timey morning after's ashy-tasting mouth from too much likker, cigs and rolling over in de clover the night before. As the old boulevardier Maurice Chevalier sang in that 1958 Vincent Minelli "Ars Gratia Artis" MGM movie musical ("Gigi" with Leslie Caron) - h/t Lerner and Loewe - "I'm glad I'm not young anymore!".
2
Great piece. One of the missing ideas is that women are wanting to be "equals" to men, which drives them to be more accepting of emotionless sex. There is nothing wrong with women wanting more than that. If women really want to be "equals" to men, they should take responsibility for their behavior and stop being such pleasers. The many men who do not engage in emotionless sex are implicitly missing from this article. Not all guys are hooking up anonymously every weekend or burying themselves in porn. Women need to look inward and assert what they really want. Many will choose a different path than what this hookup/porn culture has created. Hookups and porn are not a sign of liberation, as is often mistakenly believed.
124
Boy -- If this is how dissociated from their feelings, and attached to alienated experience, young people are today, I imagine a future day when boys and girls will be literally "hanging out" during first days in restaurants, and having sex on the sidewalks.
3
My sense of the new hookup culture is that it is not all bad; i know young women in their 20s who enjoy their one nighters just fine. They like being in control, telling guys what to do and when to leave, etc. They like NOT being tied down in a relationship as they are way too busy with school and careers to want committed relationships.
As a 60- something year old woman i find it refreshing to hear such women talk about their sexual freedom to explore and get satisfaction with seemingly little worries. However the obvious pitfalls of one night stands are what we hear about the most in the media, from those women and men who are not prepared for the emotional fallout from having sex -without-love. This is not new. What is new is the online immediately available play by play of such encounters (such as the Aziz debacle). What is also new is women and men being so honest about said encounters.
Interesting times we live in. I am confident the young ones coming up will figure it all out. They are honest, forthright, smart. Women are stronger than ever and calling the shots with #metoo and #timesup. They are changing the world.
So proud of them all. I am hopeful for the next generation... they're stumbling in the dark like all young people do as they evolve in their virtual and real worlds.
79
Watch "Looking for Mr Goodbar". That's the problem with instant intimacy. You can die.
9
But this is about sex without attraction, forget love
11
Yes. So glad you mention this. Very high-risk. If women stop "hooking up" with men (for free!), maybe men will start treating women with respect and find their company far more complex and interesting and valuable than porn. Those who are aggressive and coercive have less chance to murder and harm.
This seems to imply that a woman shouldn't consider a man's feelings when deciding whether or not to have sex. I feel like there should be some guilt if you've led on the man. Not to say that you should feel forced, but it would be rude to continue to lead someone on only to continue rejecting them at the undressing stage
5
In a country with virtually no sexual education... what do you expect. My public school sexual education consisted of 2 hours in sixth grade which was segregated by anatomical sex. Boys were taught by a male teacher and girls were taught by a female teacher. It was all mechanics and technology. Every adolescent in this country should have access to comprehensive erotic education which is co-educational... otherwise how are males and females going to learn about each other's erotic reality. And how are they both going to understand what the options and rules are.
125
Good idea - maybe even with some reading assignments beyond the "mechanics and technology". Maybe more than a couple of hours, and maybe even with - gasp! - reverse roles...
2
"Many men don’t know how to interpret female behavior in bed unless it replicates a porno film."
Really? How "many" is that? Unsourced, pseudoscientific, gender-biased blathering.
11
Stop for a minute and think back on the course of your life At one time only "bad" girls had sex out of wedlock (oh even "good girls were having sex, but they were "bad" for engaging in it). Then came the sexual revolution where women could actually "come out of the closet" and initiate and openly enjoy sex. It wasn't just for men anymore. Now , I think, we are trying to find the sweet spot, so to speak. Where does sex fit into our lives? And I think it really comes down to figuring out how men and women "fit" in all aspects of society. Who leads corporations? Who gets elected? Who does the cooking? Who works and who "stays home with the kids"? Who wears "the pants" in the family? What kind of a friend are you? What kind of girl(boy) friend do you want to be? What does sex mean? It used to be "having" sex for a guy was just something that got checked off. Saying you did had little to do with how you felt about or viewed the woman. Did having sex "mean" anything in terms of your overall relationship? To some you were "in love". To others it was just another notch on the bedpost. And I think women are now going through a similar evolution. Eventually, I imagine, we will end up somewhere in the middle. I imagine in another 50 years the Maureen Dowd of 2068 will write a similar article wondering what it all means. To try and get us all, women and men, to do what we should have been doing all along. Thinking with our heads and not our genitals.
1
Women find a significantly smaller proportion of men attractive than men find women attractive (https://theblog.okcupid.com/your-looks-and-your-inbox-8715c0f1561e). So, unless the studs are getting all the action, women will less often initially reciprocate a man's lust.
Women can still enjoy such encounters, either through reveling in the man's lust (getting off on being desired), or when there is a deeper connection. Being hooked on the former vicarious passion is not though a good pattern for an independent life.
3
Cosmo's editor Joanna Coles shows how women can internalize and express the prevailing male dominating focus of sex. Only recently has the magazine started focusing on female pleasure. That's crazy when you think about it - a women's magazine spouting the male perspective for decades! That's successful propaganda at work.
One reason why patriarchal attitudes about sex (men first or only) persist is that many women have internalized them and reinforce them in literature, movies and their dating behaviors in Cat People and Stormy. Even Stormy as a powerful sexual woman gave it up to Trump (it's very hard to unimagine that).
#metoo is a good start but all of us (women as well as men) have a long long way to go to root out the deeply internalized male focused ideas of sex towards giving a fair share of pleasure to women.
55
And male entitlement to sex--which drives coercive sex, rape, unwanted pregnancies, and murder and which endangers the lives and futures of women.
3
Could it be this long era of free-market capitalism and free hook-up sex is turning out to be the very opposite of freedom-producing and spiritually elevating?
As a nation, we Americans appear to have worn ourselves down and out with our hollow, ultimately unsatisfying quest for money, dominance over others, and false notion that free sex is love.
The signs seem to be everywhere politically, economically, as well as socially that we the people are increasingly alienated from society, each other, and their own selves. Or is this merely what our films, literature, pop culture, media, businesses, advertisers, and politicians emphasize in order to sell their products? Our not-so dear leader and President is Exhibit A.
Here is a secret that I suspect most of us already know: Neither capitalism nor love relationships can work without personal responsibility, caring for others, and trust.
And in the present economic, political, and cultural climate, many of us are horrified that, for lots of reasons, this message is not getting through to a fair portion of our desperate citizenry. The problem is leadership. What passes for leadership today actively works against the most fundamental human and social values that bind us together in the struggle for survival.
Some writer said that the two biggest problems in human society are ignorance and indifference. How do we reverse the current trend?
3
I don’t know what I as a 57 year old man can tell twenty something women about sex. But I can say this to all men. If you don’t have female friends who you can talk and hang out with, I mean real friends who you respect and share your feelings and thoughts with, you’re no man. You’re a slave to other men’s version of masculinity.
I know a lot of men who seem to have trouble with women. They have no female buddies. I’ve always felt it was because of the way they viewed sex. The virtual world hasn’t made this problem, it’s just made it worse.
10
This really is a waste of space. The issue is about growing up, about being an adult, and about being able to make your own good decisions. If anyone, male or female, thinks they can't say "no", they are not enough of an adult to have sex. Sex is not for children.
11
I need someone to remind me, What was wrong with “sock hops and going steady?”
11
I'm sorry, but I simply don't believe "Sally" is a real person. She's a literary device, a composite caricature, a lie. When did young women attending small liberal arts colleges start getting wasted on Friday nites, hooking-up with Biff, then getting Plan B at the student health center on Sat. morning? I mean, is student health even open on Saturday? Seriously, liberal arts colleges in this country are women's studies indoctrination camps. They make feminist agitators out of every female freshman the moment she moves into the dorm! Besides which, HIV is still out there. Is Coles really expecting us to believe that educated young women aren't aware of that?
Most young men and women at our colleges and universities aren't out there getting drunk, high and 'hooking-up.' But the 20% that are, are getting 80% of the attention. If Sally is real, then her biggest problem is her alcoholism, not the heartbreak of bad sex with a troll.
11
White culture, and by implication general American culture, is filled with what is best called: Fallen Eros.
We possess, as a culture, no real understanding of those aspects of love connected to sensual and erotic experience.
Sure porn is ... just remember that erotic art has been with human beings for a long long time.
Further, aboriginal peoples (just because your material circumstances are primitive, does not mean that your understanding of life's mysteries is) all ancients generally understood that sexuality is already holy, just as are all other appetites.
The Redemption of Eros is probably the most crucial social/spiritual process needed by materially advanced cultures, such as in America. It is the deepest (and darkest in some regards) mystery of what it means to be human.
An example, I've written and done YouTube videos on this stuff): A man (in general, don't get hung up on absolutes) is best warmed up from the outside in - through the senses; while a woman is best warmed up from the inside out - through her heart and her emotions.
This is why is some Native American cultures there exists this idea: "dominion and surrender". Once the right situation is present (understood by both), the woman surrenders by giving dominion over her body to the man.
His art is to realize that the human organism is a musical instrument, and if he pays attention to women, they can teach him more than any boy to boy talk in locker rooms.
Sometimes being held (cuddled) is All
1
Friends of mine once had a plaque hanging over their basement bar: "Sex....The pleasure....Momentary; The position....Ridiculous; The cost....Damnable!" That was attributed to some old British lord or another. It's always been quite a risk to make ourselves this vulnerable, certainly far riskier for young women. Social media and small, powerful recording devices have intensified the risk. It will take some time to move from the traditional, patriarchal rules of sex into something fairer and more balanced. I think we'll get there, but not without learning to talk first and act later.
2
Has technology really changed things so much. "Cat Person" resonated with me so much my hands were shaking — and I'm 62 — because it flawlessly captured (many) situations I remember from my youth. That was decades before digital porn and hookup apps. Doesn't women's terror of saying "no" have more to do with gender roles than tech?
119
So women get to act callous, indecisive, rude, flity, distracted, inconsiderate of someones emotions and in the end this article and Miss Expert in the photo blame it on men labeling them all porn addicts with no real feelings anyway so just acquiesce and that's men's fault too . Sexist much?
As others point out the former Editor of Cosmo is in no position to ponder why women are so transfixed "on what men want" and have self esteem problems.
6
My guess is that the people who post comments to the Times 100 times a day aren't doing a lot of hooking up and hardly qualify as authorities on the subject.
5
I am now 70 years old, and came of age in the 1960's when the pill first became available, and "free love" was the meme of the day. It did not take women then all that long to realize that one night stands were not all they were cracked up to be; that the "freedom" to have sex whenever was sort of nice, but not really satisfying. Way back then, we learned -- and rather quickly -- that most of us needed and wanted some type of relationship -- it didn't need to be love, and it didn't need to be marriage, but the guy needed to know our last name and we needed to feel like we were at least friends. I am amazed that young women today do not seem to be learning that message. It really is not all that complicated.
12
There are two reasons women have sex with men they aren’t attracted to. First (gasp) for many women, sex isn’t that big a deal. Second girls/women are intensely socialized to protect the male ego. I can remember my mother insisting I not pay for myself when dating as a teenager because I would “hurt his ego”. I think we can agree that pretty much all that ails the world at the moment lies at the feet of the male ego.
9
"So, what you are saying is that ninety to ninety-five percent of the population is undateable?"
"Undateable!"
"Then how are all these people getting together?"
"Alcohol."
- Elaine and Jerry, in "The Wink"
Seriously, there will be a reaction to all this gross explicitness in the news about people's grossest encounters, the asexual revolution.
4
It's a way to keep hold of your own agency. If you say no, you risk being raped; if you say yes, you get to tell yourself you're the one who made the decision. If you get raped, you'll be blamed for having gone home with him. So it feels better at the time to say yes.
1
Whenever woman said "no" to me, there was never any risk that they would be raped. They also got to tell themselves that they were the ones who made the decision. Aside from that, how else do human beings behave in your universe?
9
Hmmm, after reading this article and just observation I feel sorry for guys today. The odds are more likely a guy will meet a real nightmare vs. a real girl in todays dating environment. Dating sites - for both genders -are clearly designed for those between desperate and or the mentally ill. The idea of “hooking up” is rife with all kinds of downside possibilities - charges (real or imagined) of rape, assault, pregnancy, STD’s and out right stupidity (on both sides), credit scores lower than IQ’s; leaves one with a sense of dread vs what use to be the wonders of life leading to adulthood. What a bummer.
3
Women are often predated upon, mostly by men.... but...
When a group of women walk into a bar and at exactly 10pm a buzzer goes off on their iPhones reminding them that it’s time to hookup, often with someone they’re not attracted to, it’s not the fault of men, not the fault of porn, and sadly not even the fault of Trump. These women, far more than almost all others in the world have extraordinary agency. They have the freedom to choose not to do that thing, and to refuse without coercion or consequences. In a world riddled with honor killings, genital mutilation and virtual imprisonment for women, the hookup women have champagne problems. Or maybe it’s martini problems.
4
In reading Ms. Dowd's account of loveless coupling and the reader commentary it inspired, I detect at least one of the elements that seems to have been lost in today's mating and dating rituals. Time.
It is ironic that, as human maturation and lifespan have increased, we have filled our lives with so much input that there's no time for anything but "wham bam thank you ma'am" sex, a paltry substitute for the slow, getting-to-know-you way we used to play the game.
70
I wonder if this is a straw man. Who doesn't behave differently when confronted with somebody genuinely promising? In all my youthful promiscuity, on ANY occasion when I met someone I felt was a relationship prospect that person went onto what I called "the slow boat." Sometimes the boat was too slow for that person and he went away. Oh well, c'est la vie.
4
Thanks for reminding us of the "good ole days" of romance and the spark igniting a relationship mixed with sexual chemistry. Courtship does serve a purpose.
5
PS- single ladies. Don’t let embarrassment stop you from saying “no.” One of the reasons I found my husband was because I just kept saying no until someone I knew I could marry came along. On my first date with my husband, we met for tea and took two separate cars. I told him sex was off the table and would be for a long time. He was the type every girl wanted because of his status. I was not impressed with it since I had my own money and status. I got to know him a long time before we even kissed. Turns out his “secret test” was to first find a great woman and then see if she said “No.” His first wife had left him out of the blue and she had rushed things. I was the opposite. I had a 6 figure income, various degrees, had traveled the world and still always said “No.” he said he knew I would never cheat because even though we were exclusive, it took a long time before I allowed him to kiss me and even longer for sexual intimacy. We are still married many years later and have two awesome kids. Ladies don’t sell yourself short. You are big girls and are responsible for saying “no” and leaving. I always did that and I did not care what a guy thought. It was my body and no meant no. Think of you, not the guy. The guy has a helping hand at the end of his arm anyway who will console him after you say “no” and remove yourself from the premises. Don’t allow yourself to be victimized. Please. Take care of your emotional health first. You are worth it. Sarah
6
A worthy column. But was “limerence” — perhaps the perfect word but one that I suspect few readers know — REALLY the best word for that lead paragraph to best enable understanding? Or is it just showing off?
3
It works both ways, but it's harder (?) for a guy to fake. There are many perfectly legitimate reasons to feign passion, one of the many white lies of real life...
1
We humans evolved fit in Africa 300,000 years ago. And we are biologically DNA genetically programmed to crave and seek fat, salt, sugar, water, habitat, kin and sex by any means necessary including conflict and cooperation.
And there are only two natural procreative human genders with differentially driven space and time sexual agendas. In lieu of some form of human sexual relations by and among and between men and women masturbation is natural. So is sex without procreation or love. Celibacy is not.
What doesn't lust aka biology have to do with it?
6
editrix?? Women have enough equality problems in the
workplace without snarky, demeaning references to
their occupations. Maureen, you can do better than that.
9
Didn't like it. Wondered why Maureen used it. I hope she'll tell us.
3
"Editrix"? C'mon, Maureen!
Editor, comedian, writer, spokesperson, chair, police officer, firefighter.
Despite the right's persistent belief that the 50's were the best of times, it's 2018, for cryin'out loud.
6
It’s probably just me, but am cracking up here- uh, sometimes sex is just, sex. And if I had to guess, I’d say more men end up having sex they are lukewarm about, just because they have their own stereotype to live up to; everready, ever knowledgeable, condom in the wallet....and if he says no, not ready....omg- he might be seen as gay, impotent, fill in your own stereotype. Does every date, every encounter have to be about finding mr./ms. Right?
56
"Does every date, every encounter have to be about finding mr./ms. Right?"
No. But I'd say it's about finding somebody interesting and companionable, with the added frisson of possibility. The alternative is our old model of conquest, scorekeeping, and boasting to friends.
4
Sex with love is the greatest thing, Sex without love isn't too bad either...
6
“Porn sex is designed to get men off in six to eight minutes. Many men don’t know how to interpret female behavior in bed unless it replicates a porno film.”
Six to eight minutes? What the heck is wrong with young men these days!
1
High risk behavior has been going for as humans have inhabited this earth. Nothing earth-shattering new, or even shocking.
But if a multi-bankrupted married man with 5 children from 3 different women, multiple affairs and admissions of forcing himself on women can still become president, and is still president while embroiled in a scandal of paying money to silence women just before election day, with a porn actress is holding all the cards, well, what has happened to presidential ethics at what is supposed to be an esteemed office of historic importance? Why is he still there? Senator Al Frankin was exiled for far less.
4
Young women are in a tough bind these days. Serious relationships, the kind that involve intimacy, interfere with career goals, and are perceived as old-fashioned. And yet, to maintain self-esteem in comparison to all their friends who are getting laid, women need to be getting laid themselves. And doesn't feminism tell women that free sex is their right? Lots of mothers nowadays take their 16-year-old daughters to get birth control pills, implying they should be having sex. The drunken hookup seems to be the only way to satisfy all these social expectations without committing emotionally or having a relationship. Not all women go this route but it appears that plenty do. On the other hand, the drunken hookup is defined on most college campuses nowadays as rape, since an incapacitated partner cannot consent. What a pickle.
3
One line struck me... this bit about Leaning In versus Walking Out.
I came of age in the 90’s and was dating, looking for a husband for 14 years before I found him.
Here is what is interesting. I was unapologetically a “Walk Out” girl. I have so many stories of men being aggressive and being in precarious situations. One example. I had a male friend who was like a brother. He drove us an hour away to go to a club as friends. This guy was also our foreign exchange student but he lived on the university campus. I made it clear we were hanging as friends. There had never been anything between us and he called me “host sister.” I don’t know why he thought we would hook up at the club. We he saw me dancing in from of several strangers he abandoned me at the club at 2am. Note. I was dancing, not kissing and not drinking. I told the main I guy I was dancing with I had been abandoned. He was nice enough to drive me an hour home. (Thank goodness). Another time a guy from Eastern Europe took me out for like a $15 dollar dinner. He drove. I thought he was driving me home and instead took me to a motel 6 and he had paid for a room. He said, “now it is time for sexy time.” This was around 1997. (When I saw the movie Borat I laughed so much I couldn’t breathe because Borat was just like that guy. Yes, real people like Borat do exist.) I went into the motel and told a friend to come get me. I was the queen of “No” when I was dating. I am married and had very FEW sexual partners
3
Good for you, Sarah Savvy - that’s the way it should be. Women - Don’t settle. Sex isn’t all that important anyway, especially if mechanical and without love. But, self-esteem, mutual respect and independence is everything.
2
I was bemused by Ms Dowd's use of the term "editrix" , a form that I have rarely seen since it was taught to me by a spinster teacher in elementary school, almost 70 years ago.
6
Limerence: Dowd, the thesaurus queen can't help herself. I suspect that wives consent to unwanted sex because it's easier than saying no and they believe men have to have it. There is nothing perfect including marriage. Everything worthwhile takes effort and planning.
2
At the end of the day, we need to teach our daughters that they matter. Their lives matter, their feelings matter, and their sexual health and pleasure matter. It follows, then, that we need to give our girls the confidence to speak up when they are uncomfortable and to not apologize for their discomfort. We all make compromises for the sake of healthy relationships, but if women are the only ones doing the compromising, that's subjugation, not empowerment.
I would also add that dating apps have not just cut to the chase, they've completely eliminated the chase. I won't infantilize women by suggesting they are not capable of having casual sex, nor do I believe casual sex is not OK among consenting adults. But what's not OK is not knowing yourself and your own needs. What's not OK is starting something you are unwilling to finish. If that means you end a date without sex, then speak up and say that's what is happening. Don't "go along to get along". If a guy dumps you for not sleeping with him after one or two dates, that's his problem. Why don't our daughters have the confidence to make their wishes clear, which has implications not just in dating life, but in working life, too? Men are not mind readers. And we, as parents, need to step up to make sure our girls know it's not only OK to say no, but to also say what they want clearly and decisively.
7
It has long been known only 10 percent of human communication is in words with 90 percent from body language, scent and tone. I met my wife on line and she wisely had a two email limit prior to face to face meetings. That way no false expectations were built up and no sense of obligation. We hit it off and got married 33 days later. Now with 18 years of marriage behind us we still are learning more about each other as we grow and change. Texting and email are not really for human communication, they are communication in only a limited fashion .
8
Dennis, that’s not what I hear from people who complain about online dating. The biggest disappointment they voice has to do with “false expectations” about looks, not words! Maybe maturity makes a difference (were you young when you met and married?) and perhaps things have changed in 18 years (um...yes, quite a lot). But what I hear (mostly older) online daters grousing about is the prevalence of misleading photos, showing younger and thinner prospects than the real deal. You can establish a rapport online, keeping this glossy image in your head. Then you meet up and your date might be a slightly podgy, more average looking, flesh and blood human. And for many people that is a let down. I think the problem is the visual fantasy, not the pre-meeting correspondence.
1
I’m not sure this issue is as simple as this column claims. Does porn make boys more aggressive? How were man behaving before the internet? My recent thought is that the availability of porn, which is clearly everywhere, may have made it less exciting. Too much porn may lead to a greater understanding that it’s irrelevant. Do violent movies make us more violent? Maybe, I don’t know. I’m starting to think porn is not the problem, but Disney is. The evil stepmother or witch is not the bad guy, it’s Prince Charming. For me, the really big issue in this article is the pivot from date rape. Women choosing to have bad sex is nothing new, and I can give you the names of several poor girls from the 80s, but we should not forget, for one instant, the danger these girls face due to alcohol and date rape. Those years in college are the most dangerous in their lives and the emotional consequences of rape are forever. Boys can’t figure out girls, we have our own issues, and girls shouldn’t rely on boys to do so. Girls need to be careful and that is what we need to focus on. Girls live in a very dangerous world and maybe we should stop brainwashing them into thinking every potential date could be Prince Charming.
6
I guess if it always has to be Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus, then there is a great case to be made for recreational homosexuality, where you get to stick with your own planet kind. Let's all pity the poor heterosexuals, who bear the burden of procreation, and an apparently bleak hookup culture with a lot of unmet needs.
4
People -- men AND women -- make stupid choices every Friday and Saturday night in every town in America. Now, increasingly, they seem to make "stupid" choices in search of a possible publishing opportunity. I am absolutely certain I am going to get a lot of grief for saying this, but it needs to be said: Do you have agency or not? Are you willing to accept your responsibility for your choices -- YOUR choices -- or are you going to frame your choices -- YOUR choices -- as some kind of feminist epiphany with you as "victim" [read: opportunist]?
Life is too short, folks. You live like and adult or you choose otherwise. And to the incipient haters: I have not ever, ever imposed myself sexually on another person. So you can leave that card in the deck.
13
The answer may be a bit more complicated than this. Agency is all well and good for adults, but as adolescence, coddled children, sheltered lives, and all that, stretch well into the mid twenties, the whole perception of 'you're adults, you should have agency' gets a little muddied. Couple that with peer pressure and alcohol, and you've got a recipe for a social disaster.
1
Maybe I'm old-fashioned but back during the "sexual revolution" and guys would ask if there was something wrong with me for saying no, thanks, I didn't feel pressured, I felt bored. No need for digital connections to feel a lack of connection, and therefore a lack of desire for that person. I am no prude, but once you introduce emotional quality control, you stay home a lot with a good book. Do we really have to reinvent the wheel?
It's all very well as long as the guy isn't accused a week later of 'forcing his will' on the woman.
4
6-8 minutes, please! more like 6-8 seconds.
6
It’s amazing to read about the misery with which women participate in sex.
He’s revolting, but: “It’s too much trouble to walk out. What if he doesn’t let me leave? Ugh, I can’t be bothered to get up. RED wine? Ok, fine.”
I know... it’s because they’ve been trained to please and they JUST CAN’T HELP IT!
It seems like women have become a gender of Chauncey Gardiners, letting the world happen to them, watching it unfold. At least Chauncey had the good manners not to blame the results of his passivity on others.
Are these entitled women-children really the heirs to Elizabeth Cady Stanton?
Even Ms Coles, who has thought about the issue and should know better, cluelessly states: “Sex is free.”
Not for men...
No money, no honey is one of the first lessons a young suitor learns. Dinner, drinks, car, movie tickets, oh, and make it look spontaneous and fun. Not free by a long shot. There is work involved.
You wonder how this attitude translates into other issues.
Equal pay is great and it’s free!
Actually, no. You need to negotiate (a challenge when you can’t get the color wine you want), sacrifice flexibility, relinquish childcare to your husband, etc. It ain’t free.
Feminism has gotten to a weird place where women seem to want all the goodies and none of the responsibility, all while appearing cool and free and blaming men when it doesn’t turn out exactly the way they want.
I’ll stick with European women. They are a bit more consistent.
18
So how is a man supposed to figure all this out if he thinks she has given him the high sign?
And why is it all on him if things go South?
14
Who says no one wants to go back to sock hops and going steady? You're wrong there. Many young women would gladly go back to THAT future and escape the dystopian world of hook up / Instagram glam-faux culture.
13
Thanks, Ms. Dowd, for a further explanation of why (how?) so many people voted for Donald Trump . . .
3
Sadly, women have no one to blame but themselves. Many men (maybe most) still consider women sex objects; woman as human being gets short shrift. And many women reinforce this attitude by behaving as they do. Again and again one sees women settling for mediocre or bad sex, and doing so without getting any emotional investment whatsoever from the man. Meeting people online is no substitute for getting to know them in the flesh. Again, men are the root problem, but women have got to stop enabling them. Have more self-respect, and make men earn your friendship and trust before you give them your body. Hookups are fine if all you want is sex, but then again, given that many men are indifferent lovers, don't expect to derive much satisfaction from them.
7
Porn may be part of the problem, but I think it's just another symptom of the increasingly broader trend in modern society for all relationships to be transactionalized - not just dating relationships. Why is this happening? I'll leave that research to better minds than mine. But the trend, across the board, from family, political, religious, and romantic relationships is pronounced.
1
See Erich Fromm on the effects of capitalism.
What has struck me about online dating is a universal trend that men fail to put in any effort. Women can exhaust themselves dealing with "likes" from men who post pictures of themselves in a sweaty t-shirt (often taken in a bathroom mirror.) Men presumably looking for a partner have no qualms about posting pictures of themselves with another woman, pictures of themselves from 20 years ago, of pictures seemingly taken in the dark. They don't fill out their profiles. If they email at all, it's "Hey! How are you?"
On Bumble I have had men, without warning, drop out of text conversations. Those who you do connect with will often tell you, after intense questioning, that they are in fact married.
Somewhere along the line, men think women haven't got standards. And if women don't behave as if they do have standards, they may indeed end up with someone they don't like and are not attracted to.
These apps, online sites, and general malaise, have devalued human beings. But it's mostly women getting the short end of the stick. We need to demand more and stick to our guns. And one other thing --- we need to socialize in person, rather than digitally.
80
KatheM,
My guess is that all the men to whom you refer are tall (6' 1" and up). Tall men know they don't have to do anything to get attention from women. I've seen a few profiles of men around 5' 7", and they are well-written and illustrated with numerous charming photos. If you look at men 5' 6" to 5' 9", you'll probably find all the good things you want: Good text, nice pictures, wit, education, style, success.
Posting photos with other women is a way to show that women like them even though they are short. From a man's POV, everything that men do online is done because of women's strong stated preference for tall men. Most men who post pics with women are doing it to say, "I am not tall, but women still like me and I'm taller than most women."
All men online under 6 feet tall feel like insects, like scum, like genetic rejects. Everything online that you don't like can be traced back to the fact that (online) women make men under 6 feet feel inferior and men over 6 feet feel invincible.
10
I honestly don't know what you're talking about. I think just once I got some guy's height -- and frankly, it doesn't matter to me.
Most women want an equal partner who will respect them. They want someone who will be honest, ethical, and put their best foot forward.
If you have issues with your own height, figure a way to resolve them before you look for a relationship. Women want someone who is totally present and emotionally available.
1
I hear what you're saying, and share some of these concerns, but I'm afraid I can't let the 'no effort' comment stand. On average, women receive LOADS more messages than men on dating apps. if a guy is messaging a women his own age, there is only a 4% chance he'll get a response, according to Business Insider and Snap Analytics: http://www.businessinsider.com/online-dating-message-statistics-2013-7
I've heard loads of stories of guys, who regularly send an average of 10 thoughtful, well-constructed messages a day, and not getting a single date for over a year. There isn't even an outcry, it's just the way it is.
Not trying to pit one side against the other, and we all have our challenges. All of my lady friends who online date go on 1 or more dates a week. The men I know who try all feel like they're going to die alone. And they're probably not wrong, sadly enough.
I like what you're saying about socializing in person, however, and think this is a way forward. Special interest groups are the best way to meet new folks that I've found, so far. Hope you find what you're looking for, also, and sorry for the jerks out there!
3
I had regretful sex with a guy I met on a dating site. He flew in half way around the country to take me out, stayed at a posh hotel close to my house. Although we had communicated a lot on the site and on the phone, I had never met him in person until that night. When I picked him up at his hotel and he walked to my car, my heart sank. He looked nothing like his picture and when he sat in my car I was repulsed. He, on the other hand, thought I looked prettier than my picture and was drooling with anticipation for our night. Now, this man was a very accomplished lawyer, even argued a case at the Supreme Court. How could I get out of this date? Well, I felt I couldn't since he paid for airfare and a hotel. So, I drove us to the restaurant. The conversation at restaurant reminded me more of our communication on the dating site and on the phone. He was very smart and I found the types of cases he represented important and fascinating. He was acting romantic towards me the entire evening and when I drove him back to his hotel he invited me in for an after dinner drink. Now, this is what I don't understand about myself. Why did I go? And then why did I end up in his hotel room? Obligation, I suppose. The sex was tolerable, but to him it was great. I left shortly afterwards and took a very long shower. I never spoke or communicated with him again. After that night I promised myself I would never put myself in this situation again. That was ten years ago and I haven't.
7
A perfect description of the difficulties of modern life. In my ancient history, I too made compromises when I felt I had contributed to creating the situation, and felt a bit dirty afterwards. It took a while for the lesson to sink in but like you I moved on. Making the choice for self respect is always a winner, and it opens a door that was shut as well. Cheap is dear ...
6
Anais,
It sounds like you liked him as a person, but were not attracted to him. Don't women sometimes hope that great sex will make a man more attractive? Was the sex not great because he wasn't handsome or because he wasn't good in the sack? My guess is that women are just as superficial as men are yet always hope that great sexual chemistry will overcome a lack of initial physical attraction. Men never think this. Men know the instant they look at a woman, if a relationship is possible. Women probably know this too, but perhaps hope it's not true.
I'm short (5' 7"), which is not a turn on for most women, but women say I'm amazing in bed and am endowed. Women I've dated seem MUCH more into me AFTER sex than before sex, like a desire switch gets flipped. Presumably, I'm not tall enough before sex for initial strong attraction, but the sex is so good that my height no longer matters. I can actually sense the increase in their attraction AFTER sex. It's like they literally see me differently AFTER sex. My guess is women often like a guy they are not super attracted to and hope the magic of great sex will make him look hotter. Maybe they hope some chemical reaction will kick in.
2
You asked a great question. Actually, I am attracted to men based more on who they are rather than how they look. I have several ex boyfriends to prove it. What turned me off about this guy was that 1) he was deceptive about his picture on the dating site. He looked nothing like his picture. 2) he turned out to be arrogant in person even though he was brilliant. 3) he was not a sensitive lover. He was mechanical and selfish in bed. Hope this better explains what was not expressed in my first post.
Don't MEN do that all the time? What's the issue?
Hey make up your minds already. ARE we equal and the same or ARE there differences between the sexes? Aren't women allowed to have sexual needs and urges or does a cloud of 'romance' always have to waft through the air?
3
The sexual revolution that began in the 1970's has mostly been to the benefit of men. Women have gotten the short end of the stick. This op-ed just adds to the long list of examples proving that point.
5
It sure was obvious to me back in the day, and I was no hippie chickie, baking the bread while the guys did all the cool stuff. No prude either, I never felt repressed and had nothing to prove.
1
Maureen's article concentrates on women and sex, but you can extrapolate to human interactions in general.
People of both sexes may find it easier to ‘just do it’ than tell their potential sexual partner that their flab/breath/ hairiness or whatever is repulsive and they’d rather be somewhere else. Who hasn’t been trapped by a bore in a social setting, where the choice is between a phony excuse to escape and politely trying not to yawn? Who hasn’t seen pictures, or worse, movies, of cats, grandchildren, vacations settings, awards ceremonies, or other stuff they have no interest in? Who hasn’t listened to long-winded individuals blather about their last golf game or quilting session?
We put up with a lot of stuff we hate because caring about the feelings of others is part of what makes us human. It’s unfortunate, but sometimes our sex lives fall prey to the same emotions.
7
What????? It must be low self-esteem, but I find it hard to believe because then I should be having a LOT more sex than I do. i'll keep your sex tips in mind from now on, so thanks.
1
Fascinating to me that we have this "elite" culture all about organic and natural food and remedies and entirely clueless to the fact that, without artificial means of contraception and without antibiotics to counter diseases, we would be in a world where young people expected that sex may lead to a multi year commitment to care for a kid together, or it could kill you/make you sterile if you chose poorly. This is the natural, organic expectation regarding sex. Very special very precious life giving activity. Not to be tossed around In a meaningless fashion. Women naturally and organically know this. Of course they drink alcohol and take antidepressants to deal with the crazy unnatural expectations our society has placed upon them to "hook up" in a meaningless fashion repeatedly.
2
I was born in 1941.
A lady at the supermarket who knows me 13 years told me the other day she thought I was 59 years old.
Regardless, not withstanding the complicated issue of "sex matters," the subject of M. Dowd's column, I tell babes every day: "Everything works. Maybe."
2
Astonishing that someone affiliated with Cosmo magazine is having second thoughts about the perils of promiscuity. Cosmo has probably done more to promote the idea that random sex is cool than almost any other media outlet, and never seemed to entertain the notion that any who opposed the idea of sexual license -- particularly if they were motivated by religious or moral strictures -- were anything other than just a bunch of prudes and scolds. Maybe those old prudes were actually right. Amazing.
7
Maureen, men have these exact same experiences. It is not just women who experience these. Men have sex with women they're not attracted to; men have sex because they feel socially pressured to have sex; men get drunk and have sex, and regret it in the morning; and women also pressure men into sex. It's called being human, not woman.
13
Best column of the year!
1
Male and female needs, at least the primary needs at play in hookup culture, are asymmetrical. ". . . people crave intimacy." No no no no no no no no no. Women crave intimacy. Men just want to get their rocks off. Then forget about it (her) and go do it again the next night, with a different woman. It's not right, it's not fair, it just is. I don't believe sexual orientation is a choice, but every time I hear another female celebrity is gay, or now gay, I think: Of course. Couldn't get what she wanted or needed from a man. If I was her, I'd be gay, too. And not just because, as a straight man, I prefer women. But rather, because I'd be getting what I wanted. No one wants eggs and biscuits, gets cold cereal and milk, and is satisfied. They might pretend to be.
4
One of my college roommates used to sleep with guys she met right away so that they would like her. They never did. It made me think that we women want to be cool and fit in, so we have sex with near strangers - but it isn't really the way women are made. That sounds old fashioned, but considering how unhappy a lot of casual sex makes women, I think it might be true. We should reserve sex for those we are close to and attracted to. You don't have to do anything you don't want to do. Don't do things to fit in.
9
I was in the waiting room at the dentist's office a few weeks ago and I picked up Men's Health magazine, thinking I'd read about health and fitness. Instead I'm treated to multiple articles telling me 'normal sex' is outdated and that everybody wants kinky stuff. What's a 'normal' person to do?
4
Stormy Daniels doesn't strike me as the immature and infantile women portrayed in this article. She knows exactly why she slept with Trump - money and status. Anybody think she would have gone up to Don the plumber's room?
14
Perhaps I have become too old and prudish, Ms Dowd, but the romantic encounters outlined in your column sound about as "romantic" as installing a snow tire on a rusted-out heap. I fool myself into thinking that as I grow older I understand more. Maybe so, but certainly not about everything.
6
How to write a NYT relationship "think" piece in five easy steps:
1. Find the necessary three examples it requires to declare something a disturbing trend (Donald Trump, Aziz Ansari, a fictional character).
2. Personalize, with sympathy, the female experience while painting men with a broad brush and without sympathy to their experiences.
3. Assume innocent, yearning intent by women and selfish, aggressive intent by men.
4. Quote "experts" who have no actual expertise on the subject.
5. Allow little to no rebuttal.
It couldn't be easier.
13
We no longer instruct gay people how to live their lives, nor do we put constraints of transgendered people. Men have always do what they like and older people could care less what other people think. But young women are fair game, apparently, for commentary and instruction from just about anybody, including columnists and commentators. We pretend to care about their long term emotional health or their marriage potential, but it’s really a smokescreen to bully an judge the last demographic that’s considered fair game. Maureen Dow’s would howl if somebody wrote a column on how she should conduct her sex life, but she loves to pile on younger, impressionable women.
3
It was never free and never will be for everything is life worth having that is relational or creative takes time and effort. Including great food, great art, great music, great friends and yes even great sex.
3
What a terribly depressing piece that was to read. As an older male with a daughter in her early 20s and coincidentally in London at present visiting friends... I am wondering how to broach a conversation with her on this circumstance.
3
Lust is really good. If you’re not feeling it, go home, pour a glass of wine and talk to your dog. How could that possibly be hard for anyone over the age of nine?
11
Maybe I am old fashioned, but simply asking the other person if they are interested in sex ( perhaps even more than once ) is the best course of action.
Sincerity and honesty are turn-ons.
5
Patriarchal tyranny has conditioned women to submit.
Until true equality emerges across not only American society, but the world too, women will remain props in the world they bore! If women don’t save us from toxic masculinity, who will?
1
Patriarchal tyranny is nothing more than a fiction designed to encourage victimhood. The last vestiges of patriarchy are long gone. Women dominate in today's world, but we haven't (yet) heard about Matriarchal tyranny. But, unfortunately, we will.
This is so exhausting. Another example of self-destructive behavior by a fairly large contingent of society.
There always have been fad followers (hence "fads"), those who cannot think for themselves and do or think what others tell them to, but this is getting ridiculous.
"This is a cool gadget." "Yeah, I must get one lest I am not in." "Women should behave sexually irresponsibly like men do." "Yeah, I should do that so I'm not out of step with modern society."
Why do so many people do so many things they don't want to? Jobs, relationships, recreation even. People just refuse to think for themselves.
Stormy Daniels states now she really didn't want to have sex with Trump but she thought, "Oh well." Say what? Stormy may or may not be accurately describing her feelings at the time, but that's an acceptable explanation for her having sex with him.
Life for so many people seems to be one "oh well" after another.
5
"She says something has gone badly wrong when 20 percent of young women are on antidepressants ... "
I say something is badly wrong when such questionable statistics are published as fact.
(If true please identify the primary producer of such pills and its stock exchange symbol.)
6
I agree that far too often questionable statistics are far too easily accepted as facts. We have a dumbed-down society that fails to critically analyze what we read, and accept everything we read as proven fact.
That said, I'm curious as to why you think knowing the stock exchange symbol for a drug manufacturer verifies the statistic. It would be far better to expect the author to cite some credible study rather than asking for a stock exchange symbol.
I wuz being facetious.
If the market for those pills is that enormous the manufacturer might be a worthy candidate for investment.
Wealth, power and intimidation are also significant factors in why women hook up with less than desirable men...Harvey Weinstein, Donald Trump, Charlie Rose, Matt Lauer and Bill Clinton are prime examples of this phenomenon.
In "Cat Person," is Robert a figure of wealth and power? Hardly. He's a lonely misfit. "Wealth and power" completely misses the point. The point is not women's fear. The point is women's need.
1
Or, as Brenda Lee sang so plaintively back in the '60's. "I wanna be wanted..." (Note to millennials: you have to hear her sing it.)
And an honest thank you, Ms. Dowd, for enriching our vocabularies by dropping the word "limerence" into this piece.
2
When I started to watch Lena Dunham's HBO series "Girls" I noticed something similarly strange: an abundance of really bad sex. And not only that, it was painfully obvious before the act that this romp was going to be very, very bad. And yet, they persisted.
I kept being puzzled by this and finally concluded that sex had lost its status as something significant with today's generation. Maybe it is now transactional, as Coles says, but to go back to "Girls," it was almost as if they used the sex act as merely another communication tool. Either way, it's disconcerting, especially when the end result is that women conclude that they can't say "no" anymore without feeling like a wuss. This doesn't sound very liberated to me. Sexual freedom isn't when you make out indiscriminately. It's when a woman knows when she ought to say "no" and then actually says it.
118
I think part of it is that even when there's uncertain/little/evaporated attraction, sex with a relative stranger can seem a small adventure, a small risk, a way to push your limits a little and learn a bit more about yourself and others (when it's not coerced). Occasionally it's also easier than the potential drama of forcing someone to leave and them becoming upset (and maybe dangerous). And these behaviors/mindsets run in all gender directions, I can tell you that.
5
Women are doing it to have a companion. To have companionship. To have a man to be intimate with, if they haven't found a man to love. To not have to go home alone.
Early feminism ridiculed the idea that women need male companionship. "A woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle." That was a lie. Women need a relationship with a man. That's why they are putting up with all these difficulties that Ms. Dowd so eloquently describes.
1
Great piece! Interesting, spot on, and free of snide comments about Hillary. I've wondered when the hook-up/drunken frat house cultures might start to look like a raw deal.
2
Good sex involves thought, investment of emotions and effort, risk of rejection and patience and openness. Porn is like fast food: Easy but ultimately unsatisfying. I agree with the tenet of the article that way too many people have bad sex. I don’t know if that’s as much driven by (straight) men, or any gender as the article implies — we are talking consenting adults here. I’d also be interested in what percentage of said straight men really are as superficial, emotionless, porn-replicating as the author suggests. Is there any data beyond anecdotal?
1
Why would a woman go home with a man, decide she’s not attracted to him but have sex with him anyway? Um... becasue it feels good? One of the many scary aspects of this topic is that we are talking about an activity in which, with a few turns and misunderstood intentions, guys can be tossed in jail, and worse. And women can be traumatized for life, and worse. But hey -- don't say No!
1
The first thing you have to understand is that the views expressed in this article are the opinion of one or two women -- and women are extremely different (perhaps evolutionarily so, some scientists argue). A tremendous number are all about casual sex with no strings attached! No emotions, just physicality! Many men are more emotional than women. Second, don't believe the idea that they weren't attracted to these men, it's sort of smoke and mirrors, they were attracted to an extent.
6
Sincere love and commitment to a wife is the greatest motivator and inspiration for sex. Beats vodka 100 to 1
3
This column misses the point, I feel. The problem is that women are associating social or personal acceptance with sex, instead of drawing a clear line between intimacy as a requirement for sex. Are they really victims, as the column seems to imply, or are they responsible adults who understand the issues of sex before partaking in it?
1
So glad I came of age in the '70s..the age of Feminism. Men reading tons of books on how to sexually please women. Glorious.
4
I think it can't be overstated that the hookups, the porn, the belief in no strings attached/friends with benefits culture is male-centric. So many young women seem to see sexual-empowerment in meeting male desire solely on it's own terms, instead of forcing men to cope with a redefinition of desire based in their needs and bodies.
2
Is this all young life has come down to? Heavy breathing and faux climaxes.
The digital age has exposed society to an unlimited source of uncontrolled misdirection and the results have led us to #metoo and careers set on their heels. Face Book and Zuckerman should take note.
So much is taking place in our society that it has become difficult to know which way to turn. Even starting points are hard to find. It is very disappointing.
2
I wonder how the porn culture has warped young people's concept of sexuality, per the comment that "porn sex is meant to get men off in 6 to 8 minutes", and that it can relay violent or abusive scenario's. Does repeated exposure to porn videos subvert men's expectations about the female sexual response, and promote a misunderstanding of female sexuality, as if it didn't matter. Women lie there and moan as their bodies are man-handled with aggressive sex. Has it influenced the "rape culture" we have recently seen on college campuses? The cultural impact seems to have downgraded sex to the lowest common denominator as a commodity, or a transaction. This is inconsistent with the human need for intimacy, and the female experience of heightened sexual pleasure in an emotional relationship. Why are young women not so educated about their psychological well-being, and emotional understanding of their own needs? This was the feminist message in the 80's and 90's, "Our Bodies, Ourselves."
1
Three words sum up the characters in this story: Low Self-Esteem.
3
Women don't want to have sex..."but they have sex anyway." How do Dowd and Coles work their way out of this contradiction? Saying no is "impossible" because "it would require an amount of tact and gentleness that she (feels is) impossible to summon."
Even when a woman is being violated (by engaging in a mutually chosen encounter) the invisible patriarchal boot forces her to be tactful and gentle towards her overlord.
And so follows the rest of this column. Women (but not men?) take anti-depressants...because of men. Women fear that dating sites have made "women interchangeable." (How? And what about men on dating sites?)
No one in 21st Century, Western society is obligated to become physically involved with someone they do not wish to be.
3
And vice versa.
1
I am a man in his mid 50's and am feeling incredibly old. Why would a woman voluntarily have sex with a man she does not find, at a minimum, interesting and attractive? I read the column and Ms. Coles' comments, which try to explain why the cultural influence she believes porn has had on how young men approach sex. But why do women willingly go along with this? Why voluntarily go alone to the apartment of a man you don't particularly like? And if you did go and decide not to have sex, why not just politely decline his overtures and leave?
I have no data or other information to debate the statements made about young men, but unless they are committing sexual assault it seems to me the women are putting themselves into this position willingly. Have some self respect and don't do things you don't want to do.
6
Wanting sex is healthy. Medical advances made having consequence-free sex possible for both boys and girls. However, feelings of joy or regret after sex haven’t changed. Parents have not stepped up to these sexual realities and prepared their sons and daughters.
In all families, young sons AND daughters should be encouraged with, if you are going to watch porn, watch those productions where all participants - ALL - have fun. Avoid subjugation and bondage porn. Because sex IS fun, the act should be fun, agreed to, and respectful for you and the other party - which means it should never be done with either person drunk. Boys and girls should be taught to realize that just because you “can” have sex, doesn’t mean your feelings are ready for it. Stop teaching girls that hook-up sex makes them guilty or dirty. Stop teaching boys that meaningless engagements with naked women, including that old saw of having bachelor parties with strippers, are ok at all, let alone ok to their bride-to-be. Beg your children to avoid practicing “feeling-less sex” - it doesn’t exist!!!! Warn them they may live a lifetime of numbing indifference and find it impossible to create an intense relationship of connection that turns “life” into a “good life”.
1
Liberated women are now finding out what gay men have known for a long time. Some men live for the six-to-eight minute high, and then they move on to the next. Places like PornHub turn fantasy into reality for some guys.
Men are wired differently than women, and too many men are too self selfish or too A.D.D.'d to figure it all out. Porn and "easy" girls makes it super easy for a guy to get off and move on to the next orgasm experience.
Casual sex and building a serious relationship are two completely different animals. You have to know which one you want. Can you build a substantial relationship that began as a casual sex encounter? I suppose. But I don't think that's the norm, and people need to fail a lot of times and endure depression to discover what doesn't work.
Building meaningful relationships takes time and commitment, and that tends to work against a man's need to get one off. It's just not easy to find a sensitive, nurturing male these days, one who truly cares about the needs of a woman.
An "easy" woman rarely gets the prize. A smart woman learns how to say no, and she instantly becomes more alluring and desirable.
1
Finally a women telling the truth about their own responsibility for their sexual encounters. Having sex is a personal choice and if it's not a choice its a crime called rape. If women feel they are a victim of rape they need to go to law enforcement, otherwise just accept it as a choice bad or good. People, including women make bad choices all the time, but they are choices all the same. I am no fan of Donald Trump, but compared to Stormy and her lawyer he's a saint. Her lawyer wants fame and she wants more money than she was originally offered when she and no one else thought Trump could possibly be elected. She signed a civil contract that she has to honor, regardless of the legal implications as to whether the lawyer who paid her is in violation of federal campaign finance laws.
I just read yesterday that this new "Generation" of young couples who are having children are naming their children after IKEA furniture. One of the most pathetic stories I have recently read. Of course there are worse things in life but this seems to be quite connected to your story about "Lust". Women want to please and men want to be pleased but there is an unbelievable amount of severe emptiness to the way young people these days are going about it. At least in the past there was something that the two people who were involved in the SEX had to believe in, even if it was loneliness. People are lonely today too but now they can get right on their I Phones or computers and have a "discussion" with someone...anyone and talk about what they just did. Unlike us "Baby Boomers" who had to either stew around with the experience over and over in our heads, try to forget about it or actually have a friend to sit down with face to face and discuss it.
This Super Instant Gratification Society we seem to have these day's is ruining Life. Could it be because the people these days seem to be more like Zombies than Humans?
Great piece! I have always felt this, sex for sex's sake is a setup for regret and emotional harm. Only, I would add, the harm happens to men as well as women. Men are just better at and have more years of experience at shutting off that emotional side to them, that need for intimacy, as much, if not more so than sexual gratification. Women, even young women seem to not have yet learned, after 60 years of literature and changes to our society, that they do not exist solely for the purpose of satisfying the needs of everyone but themselves, male needs being the priority. In fact, many seem to be worse than women of my generation in that respect. It sounds trite and grandmother-ish but some of these time-honored beliefs are time-honored because they are true: Sex is so much better with someone you love or at least care about, than the quintessential, "wham-bam...."
Good piece about taking responsibility instead of blaming men! I NEVER was interested in promiscuous women anyway and as we grow older I thing most men are not.
1
Ms.
In cycles of converging time
She whirls into engrossing toil,
And does a fox-trot to the rhyme
Of filtered smoke-puffs in turmoil.
COFFEE, BLACK PLEASE.
In keeping with a certain grace
She spurns the homely conventions,
And sustains her compelling pace
With the latest medications.
MORE COFFEE? YES, THANK YOU.
In answer to the distant bells
She rails against passivity,
And in pursuit of hollow shells
Eludes the fate of community.
It's not just women—
https://www.nyu.edu/about/news-publications/news/2017/november/why-do-me...
In my younger years I found myself more than once in Cat Person's situation, ending up in bed with a guy I wasn't attracted to and not knowing how to extricate myself. The sex was technically consensual since I hadn't explicitly said no, but only because I didn't feel confident enough that I had a right to say NO! It's easier than you think to get in a pickle like this, and harder than you might expect, if you're a guy, to extricate yourself.
Love your work. Great column. Keep it up.
The animal need for sex and companionship yields some pretty unpredictable results. The random coupling defies rational explaining. A friend described giving his teenage daughter the car for the first time as, "sending her into the wild". An apt description.
I have fond memories of women I went out with who shared mutual urgent and fiery attraction. When we arrived at one of our homes after whatever date activity we had great uninhibited sex. I am sure that the women enjoyed themselves as much as I did. The relationships often did not work out but the sex was meaningful and great. This was before online dating but I can’t say we knew each other that well. Does that still happen or is it all as dreary as this article describes
1
The joys from love are still and always will be a reflection of love for one's self. You do attract those who share a belief in self-worth mirroring your own. Instant gratification leaves normal people empty and often guilt-ridden. Stop and smell the roses. Enjoy a wonderful dinner, a great play, a baseball game and you might find there's more to the companion than quick sex. He or she may not become your life partner, but isn't friendship a nice reward?
1
This is a depressing article all right. But then our society has been sick for a long, long time. This sickness has been chronicled by John Cheever (his 1954 short story "The Country Husband" is a classic), James Baldwin (his essays from the 1950s and 1960s still resonate), and numerous other writers who have pointed out our general misery, our fears, and our insecurities despite our great capitalistic wealth. And today we're even sicker. Too many of us are lost and desperate and drug-dependent. That great capitalistic wealth accumulated after World War Two has been funneled into fewer and fewer pockets. Finally, the election of somebody like Donald Trump to the presidency illustrates just how critically ill we've become.
3
"My friends and I all go out on Friday nights, get drunk and hook up. And on Saturday morning, we go down to the health center together to get Plan B.”
I am trying not to be judgmental, my friends and I had similar habits in the eighties and I have no regrets. BUT, we were all on the pill; what gives with Plan B?
5
You must understand though the swipe of your thumb...
Makes my phone react...
That it's only the thrill of yang meeting yin...
Opposites attract...
It's sexual...
Only logical - you must try to ignore that it sadly will bore in the aftermath...
What's lust, but a seconds-long commotion...
Who needs the lies when the lies cause corrosion...
Guys, if you seek active consent and find out what women like, not just what porn says they like, they'll enjoy sex just as much as you and want to repeat the experience.
An LTR makes everything better, but some women want good sex simply for itself just as much as the guys do. The problem is communicating what that is between two people.
Women, speak up if the sex isn't what you want, unless you feel in danger. Most guys really do want you to enjoy yourself too. Value your own pleasure as much as you value the guy's pleasure. It will benefit you both in the end.
1
Sex is fun and in my view at least half the fun of
life. Canadian and European women seem to focus most on the fun aspect of sex.
American women seem to see sex as a prelude to some kind of relationship; and the fun aspect of sex is not fully appreciated. American women who focus on the fun aspect of sex seem to be the most joyous and full of life.
Having said the above, there is nothing so nice and thrilling as holding a naked woman you love after all the sexual energy is spent.
1
After reading this I see the benefits of sexual abstinence and arranged marriages. Young people just don't seem to have the experience and maturity to handle sex on their own. In the old days young girls were protected by their mothers. Now they're on their own and unable to handle the pressures.
1
I had believed women were becoming liberated from the old past bondage with men, but now I learn they're acting like the old women in their new lives as "liberated". They're choosing to try to please their men. The more things change, the more they remain the same.
5
Once upon a time we talked to people. Now we talk to phones.
1
(Please note-- I am writing only about the experiences of young men.)
Perhaps I'm an old sap, but I don't buy the common characterization of young men as callous gluttons for insensitive, meaningless sex.
My days of promiscuous sex were back in the 1980s when we had 'one-night stands.' I was far from a great seducer of women, but it wasn't that uncommon for me to wind up having sex with a woman I'd just met. Honestly, virtually every one of those one-night stands was genuinely meaningful to me. Beyond sex, they offered the opportunity to quietly hold someone in the dark.
Intimacy, even if it is fleeting and shallow, in my experience is almost always meaningful and nice. I think humans are built to feel that way. It surprises me to hear otherwise-- even if I'm hearing it again and again.
1
And, now, the woman's perspective on those same encounters. You might find it to be different.
3
The updated "dozen roses" box now includes condom, alcohol, a recreational drug and app of choice, blank consent and NDA legal forms. Morning after contact info for follow up dates or ghosting is optional.
3
To me, one on the most distressing parts of the Stormy Daniels interview was when she made her comment about going through with sex because she had come up to Trump's hotel room and therefore created the expectation, and Anderson Cooper pushing back and asking her why she felt that way, and whether she was saying that women in general should feel that way. I get her insistence about not being a "victim" and feeling that she made her own decisions, but to not have this narrative challenged is part of what perpetuates this level of expectation, even in the MeToo era. Would a female reporter have asked the follow-up question? I hope so, but fear not.
2
The irony is that the "patriarchy" was more respectful of the reality of women's sexuality than the so-called "sexual revolution" which insisted that free sex was fun (and if you weren't having fun then something was wrong with you). The "patriarchy" was a system in which dating would lead to a monogamous relationship (a.k.a. "marriage") or dissolve. Now who knows where any meeting between the sexes is going, or what is its purpose? In other words, we're in chaos -- and the sexual revolution is to blame. To put this mess on men is cherry picking at best. Women made this mess. Now women are trying to clean it up -- by putting the onus on men -- which will bode even worse for us. Men are not the enemy. Our imaginations are.
5
A touchy issue, the sex appeal we crave and submit to when all seems right, and of mutual attraction, not necessarily a deep commitment but just for fun and joy of sharing an intimate experience worth remembering. And safe. And non-dominant by either one. The easy one to explain is the professional, man (gigolo) or woman (prostitute) than entertains the partner's wishes for the pay ( and freely, mutually agreed upon, non-coercive so to speak, even though some consider it a form of exploitation). The other that may be legal, even moral, is the one that two persons agree upon...without being crazy about the virtues (or lack thereof) of the partner, to escape loneliness. And there ought to be no quarrel for two (or more?) who really like each other, and are willing to become exposed to potential harm, 'knowing' the other person has her/his best interests in mind. This latter situation may lead to a happy outcome of sharing a life together, even having children, in a loving environment. What you described, specifically about Trump, and the Weinberg's, is an abusive behavior that objectivizes women, even rape, when a woman feels cornered by dubious maneuvers (especially insidious and even 'criminal' when alcohol and drugs are involved). Now, we are sexual, and social beings, and crave to feel part of others, and for which we may feel ill at ease, and ending sometimes in a stupid move, of untoward consequences, sometimes for life. Thus far, clear as mud, right? You are welcome.
So, in the Trump era, like everything else, it's a zero-sum game.
A lot of it comes, as always, back to "competitive living": it's keeping up with the Joneses for the Facebook era. You're expected to have X number of drunken selfies on Insta, or you're not having fun; you must be having as good of sex as everyone else claims to be, or your love life's a failure.
Note how these girls do it in groups. They are competing among themselves in a social hierarchy. I recognize the behavior instantly, because it's been the status quo, as a male, since I could discern person from teddy bear. People aren't just building narratives to each other to get the hook up. It's a means to an end, and the end is the ceaseless curation of every facet of your life.
Gotta make sure all 900 of your friends know that your "story" is every bit as great and successful and idyllic as theirs.
4
Regret and insecurity is unfortunate, but fine. What is not fine is then accusing the other person of sexual assault.
I have been out of dating for many years, but like most modern transactions, the cost of sexual transactions has gone down. Hookups seem like finding a partner with a click.
But like a vendor on eBay, Airbnb or Uber, reputations have value and need to be built and maintained.
This is still true in the dating world.
Never did, and never would have sex for the sake of having sex and would be unable to perform with a partner I am not attracted to.
Maybe too many see sex as just another bodily function that has to be performed with regularity.
2
It works this way for men too. Maybe and obviously not as much but it still does.
1
From Robert George:
I have a radical idea–a kind of dream.
Let’s re-re-define marriage as the conjugal union of husband and wife–the unique form of relationship that is ordered to and would naturally be fulfilled by the coming to be and rearing of children together. Let’s regard the social role of marriage as uniting a man and woman as husband and wife to be father and mother to any children born of their union, thus conferring upon those children the inestimable blessing of being brought up in the committed love of the two people whose becoming one in an act of marital communion gave them the gift of life, and further providing those children with the benefit of both paternal and maternal examples, influences, and care.
Now here comes the really radical part. Let’s view sex as having its meaning and significance in expressing in the most intimate and profound way the conjugal love and commitment of the spouses. Let’s understand it as uniting them as one-flesh in a uniquely comprehensive sharing of life–a sharing at all levels of their being as human persons, the biological, the affective, the rational-volitional and spiritual. Let’s regard marital love and commitment as the very principle of sexual morality, the normative basis for distinguishing upright from unworthy sexual conduct. Let’s embrace a set of virtues that guard us against objectifying others (and indeed ourselves) and treating human beings (others or ourselves) as mere means of gratification.
2
Dating apps are a poor alternate to the live hustle. I have friends who make several dates off dating apps and everyone of their contacts are a wash. The idea of meeting a live person to get to know when the opportunity presents itself is very enticing. Dating apps are not. Oh, by the way. If you need to over drink to get your courage ladies, I am not your guy.
1
She lost me at the quote about it being "politically incorrect" to discuss respecting limits on drinking.
if this person thinks of and refers to that as "politically incorrect", I have absolutely no desire to know what this person thinks of and labels as, politically or not, correct.
Ironic that this problem is hardly new. It is, in fact, the centerpiece of T.S. Eliot's nearly century-old, still greatest of all modern poems, "The Waste Land." "At the violet hour," the typist lets the man in, has undesired, unemotional sex with him, thinks, "I'm glad that's over," and "puts a record on the gramophone." This spiritual nadir of human experience is witnessed by the narrator Teiresias, who, having been both sexes, is pretty much the only character in the poem capable of empathy. What's old is all too new.
Good for Dowd and Coles! They speak mighty truths and put words to some increasingly common aspects of dating culture that trouble me -- often to the point of despair.
1
I have called a halt to the proceedings on several occasions during my dating years. Yes it's awkward, but the prospect of attempted/bad sex, followed by uncomfortable or embarrassing goodbyes, is even worse.
Something this man did not care to repeat. You can say something like, "I'm just not feeling this, right now." This situation goes both ways. Either partner can be revved up, only to have the engine switched off by the other.
Women should not "go through" with something they don't want. As a culture we should raise children, and adults, to understand what "good sex" is and that should make it easier for two people to stop when it's not.
1
Sorry to let you know young ladies but your sexual stress is due in part to your success. Success in college, success in business, success in establishing profession careers ... For example at my local state college 60% of the students are women. Life is more of a zero sum game than you'd like to believe. When you win it may very well be that a male is displaced ... he loses. He's hurt and angry and can get revenge by denying you what you want more than him ... commitment. Is that fair given that women have been denied advantages for generations - of course not! Welcome to our world.
2
Apparently I was hoping in vain to an answer to a question that has stymied men for decades; "What do women want?"
I'm sad to see they still don't know.
3
I admit that sometimes Dowd's columns rub me the wrong way, but I think this piece is so timely and spot-on. Women, and men too if they are brave enough to admit it, are in a quandary about dating, sex and relationships and the negative impact of technology (wide distribution of digital pornography, online dating, virtual relationships). I'm interested in Cole's book although I will say that rags like Cosmo and Marie Claire add their own distorted, self-serving agenda to the conversation, so I wouldn't say an author with that provenance really has a clear conscience. Cosmo is a complete nonsense publication that mostly makes a mockery of women's issues.
That said, what Cole's says here would be helpful for young women to hear and discuss. It might provide a foundation for self-knowledge and self-respect that helps young women engage in sexual experiences that are more satisfying and have a fortitude and self-esteem to comfortably beg-off ones that are not.
3
There's an underlying tone here. It makes me squirm, as Maureen fires the first salvo at her latest move in excusing Trump for his countless affairs. It's as though she's saying, "It's okay, Donald. Not your fault. All those ladies were in control. They volunteered. You were just there, that's all. It could have been any man - or woman, including Hillary."
That's the undertone I'm reading. And it makes me squirm.
2
I often wonder what impact -- if any -- young women had when Bill Clinton's forays led to his impeachment, and today, with Trump's dalliances revealed for everyone's reactions. My 20-year-old daughter says she is appalled by Trump, but in her own life, boys, young men, really, try to hit on her all the time, as if a physical encounter was a natural and insignificant as brushing one's teeth.
I suppose you could conclude from this that morality (or, perhaps, privacy) has disappeared from society. Resist or succumb does seem to be a zero sum game, with mostly losers.
Bill Clinton set the tone, but Trump is the undeniable authority figure by which we are judging our own actions towards other. Relationships have become merely transactional: I want your body, give it to me now, or . . .
I think about my daughter every day, and wish I could stand guard for her.
2
Lust is very easy to remedy but a true connection is the essence of living a full life. If I have an itch, it's a simple task to scratch it (safely) without apology but make no mistake, I take full ownership of scratching that itch if I want to do this. This is my experience as a modern woman who is adult enough to recognize that satisfaction of lust is not a relationship and should not be mistaken for a relationship just satisfaction of the momentary. This is not a "one night stand" but a "one time only" and nothing more. We part with mutual understanding beforehand.
3
Ms. Dowd, you had me at limerence.
I hope your column leads to a deep infatuation with a balanced perspective on an increasingly troubling development: lack of intimacy, loneliness, and, yes, lack of good sex.
Have we, post-modern humans, become “victims” of our success? It seems the more affluent we became the least satisfied lives we live (relatively speaking). The more technology promises to connect us, the least interpersonal relationships we have. The longer we live the more isolated we seem to grow. But it doesn’t have to be this way. In less technologically advanced and less affluent societies the human connections endure.
1
A conversation I will soon have with my teenage son. Thousands of sellers are telling you that what you want is sex, sex, sex, and if only you buy what they are selling, that glorious sex will be yours. They want you to believe that relationships are nothing more than simple, brief transactions. These are lies with the sole object of taking your money from you. What you really want is connection, friendship, support, and, when you are old enough, romance and love. (Sex is entirely secondary. Don't believe the hype.) Friendships and romance require courage, both to ask and to decline. And you need time and experience to navigate these relationships capably. There is no rushing. So begin building up your courage by making and keeping good friends. Learn what it means to care for them through good times and bad and to accept their care too. Then you will have some idea of how to navigate romance. And it will not involve any "liquid courage."
4
Like the article, thought provoking. And one line sticks out, but in a different context. Being complicit, or 'lay back and enjoy it' when being violated, can apply to many situations. The one which diminishes me, makes me very sad, is political.
The quote "...it builds up a false sense of who the person is. There’s a tendency to fill in the blanks with positive information.” How many who went to bed, politically speaking, with our current president must feel the same way. Taking what you wanted, expected, and longed for and filling in the blanks or papering over the distasteful parts with imagined acceptance. Well, America, can we abort the current regime?
After the glee of voting maga, the resulting hangover and shame must eventually prod you into changing your behaviour. But please clean up your mess and remove the offensive stain on our bed sheets. If not you, who?
1
Life is so much easier when you seek out a good friend, build the relationship, discuss what you want from one another, discuss shared values, check to make sure they are not already married, etc. and then decide to have sex.
I felt sorry for Stormy Daniels. She must have known that going to Donald Trump's hotel room and flirting with him (spanking him with a magazine) was going to lead to him wanting sex. If she didnt want to go down that road why did she go down that road, I wondered. My guess is that she too saw her greatest and only value as a sexual object and did not have the confidence to sell herself (as a candidate for The Apprentice) on any basis that did not involve advertising her sexual availability. The "heroine" in Cat Person lacked the know-how to extricate herself from a socially awkward situation with a guy she perceived as vulnerable, marginal and harmless. Ms. Daniels's lack of confidence was not situational in the same way (betcha she can say no when necessary). She lacked confidence in herself.
1
I'm really tired of all the moralizing and generalization based on gender. As a woman in my 50s who enjoys casual sex I can assure you that there are many of us out there. There are also many men who don't enjoy casual sex. Same goes for porn. It's incorrect and harmful to generalize. It's completely incomprehensible to me that young women would go forward with sexual encounters when they are not interested or fail to stop encounters when they realize they are no longer interested. Personally I don't think it's about being "nice." I think it about wanting something more from their sexual partner -attention, affection, a job- and using sex as a way to get it, which is not "nice" at all, it's manipulative.
3
I recognize the "nice" impulse completely. It disturbs & baffles me, but it's part of me. It's a deep sense of not feeling I have a right. It's a default setting that takes a conscious effort to override.
We live in a culture of instant gratification We want instant gratification. We even believe it's possible. Men want instant sexual intimacy and women want instant acceptance, and each believes the hookup will give it. The idea that we have to nuture the experience is passe.
1
Just so the ladies know, men often feel the same way. An obligation to do the deed with someone to whom your not really attracted. Men just don’t fret about it as much.
3
Unsophisticated as I am, I always thought that after the heat of physical desire burned off, one soberly assessed the other person: did they have real character, did they have any admirable qualities of honesty, compassion, intellect, charm? Is this a person worth keeping close in one's life? If so, that was when the real relationship began.
Sex simply does not mean the same thing for everyone. For some it is recreation and nothing more. For others it is intimacy and trust. For others it is proof of sexual value in the marketplace of lust.
It helps to find out sooner than later the intentions of the other person, and even more valuable to figure one's own intentions. Honesty is still the best policy.
3
Who's the "we" that's "lost track"? Is this a cross-cultural phenomenon, or just something middle and upper class white women experience? And, incidentally, two questions that Cooper failed to ask Stormy were, well, was it "good sex," and was she "high" during the encounter? Enquiring minds want to know.
Somehow I don't think that my mother insisting a should write a thank you note for a gift when I was 10 would lead me to a drunken bad sex hookup at 25. Can't we PLEASE be responsible for our actions without blaming someone ?
1
Isn’t the media including magazines like Cosmopolitan and GQ, as well as the proliferation of pornography online a major part of the problem? Just as men and women are starting to seriously address the issues of gun control, they are going to have to address the issues of predatory sexual behavior both in themselves and in others. This is part of the #MeToo movement. If predatory behavior is encouraged in college and in the workplace, why should we be surprised by the levels of loneliness and depression in our societies?
What happened to men and women engaging with one another intelligently on a college campus? I thought they were paying lots of money to learn and to grow intellectually and emotionally. Is that now passé?!
Maybe if people spent more time improving their thinking skills they wouldn’t be compelled to dull their best minds with liquor in exchange for degrading sex!!
Am I the only woman out there who got drunk, had bad sex, and didn't feel guilty the next day? Or felt coerced, manipulated, or forced to engage? Alcohol reduces inhibition and raises the libido of both men and women. Putting all the blame on men is ludicrous.
7
I've heartily agreed with a recent David Brooks column and now this Maureen Dowd column. This is disturbing.
However, the behavior described here is more disturbing. We already knew that most young men are not thinking long-term, much of the time when they have sex. But at least they are having sex because they *want* to have sex. How sad/crazy is it that women of college age and even older are voluntarily having sex, which they don't want to have, with men whom they also don't want to be involved with?
Please learn to not go on these dates or, if you do go, please learn to say, "I'm going to go home now. Goodnight," and then leave. Trust me. Other than possibly our president, every man knows that not ever woman wants to sleep with him.
2
Sock hops and going steady? Try it , you might like it.
3
I don't think physical attraction was the key motivator for me to have sex with a man following my divorce about 15 years ago when I was in my early 40's. It was, in most instances, curiosity and a connection based on intellect, humour, and agreement after a frank discussion of intent. I had sex with men that would shock my friends by their appearance or weight or interest in ice cubes, tickling or light bondage... Luck was with me, as I listened to my gut and was safe. What this period taught me was so much about myself. I had been married to a sexually incompatible (I see now) and abusive spouse. This period of time, while I rarely discuss it with friends, was one of the richest in my life.
I write this to say there are more sides to the issue of sexual relations than the writer covers.
81
Perhaps you should write a memoir.
5
I'm considering it! ;)
"Editrix"? Might as well call her a "female editor." Odd word choice, especially for this particular piece, which asks, "Why would a woman go home with a man, decide she’s not attracted to him but have sex with him anyway?"
3
Why would a man go home with a woman,decide he’s not attracted to her but have sex with her anyway?
1
Maureen makes a good argument for the banning of porn for the good of society. If there is anything that should be politically incorrect it is porn. It is a moral, spiritual, and psychological plague on both men and women.
98
It's not just young men having porn sex. My last boyfriend, before I came to my senses, in retrospect was clearly taking all his cues from porn while having sex in his late 40s. This Harvard graduate had been reared an evangelical Christian and still bore all the holier-than-thou attitudes while he porned away (and drank himself silly every night).
1
Basic rule for a good life: when something isn't working, stop doing it! Insanity is defined as doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. If today's young women are unhappy letting themselves being used as a prop in a porn fantasy, they need to stop. If wisdom is the understanding of consequences, then maturity is the ability to call a halt. Grow up
5
Years ago when I was living the life that many single women were exploring it occurred to me that being sexually active entitled me to enjoy it.
That said, I keyed in on a few things: I had to get something out of it and I wasn't going to go for it if there was no chemistry. I took a few guys home with me but not intending sex. We talked, I gave them a chance and then sent them home with either a plan for a next encounter or just sent them back into the wild.
There was never a promise of anything and I let them down easy with a kind sendoff.
We all want wild and crazy sex at times but the partner has to possess what engenders that.
Sex is easy and enjoyable when there's an attraction but it is excruciating without it. Women have to look out for their own interests and saying no is empowering just as multiple orgasms are too.
6
"Why Women Pursue Bad Sex" This is the kind of article only a woman could write. If a man were to lament the decline of the male sexual psyche women would be up in arms if not saying "serves you right."
The bottom line is this: women deserve to be treated equally and fairly by society, both at the home and the workplace. But at the end of the day the problem of intimacy is that our partner-partner mindset has drifted toward "me against you" not "us" and even though we are genetically wired to seek the latter.
You're the New York Times!!! Please put articles like this where they belong....back in Cosmo.
3
This is a piece that was needed to be written. Thanks Mo.
(You’re so hot.)
Impulse control is centered in the prefrontal cortex of the brain - an area of the brain we recently discovered doesn't fully form until our mid-20s. Yet our bodies' hormone engines are at peak production well before that time.
Historically, puritanical religious and other cultural values have acted as a makeshift back-stop to low impulse control, which allowed our teenagers and young adults to live in a kind of sexual gated-community.
That's all changed - and a good question might be, what, if anything, is to be a replacement countervailing cultural force.
At the same time women's magazines and media still put an emphasis on outward looks - seemingly above all else. Even our language still conspires to tell women (of all ages) that looks are the most important thing. Do a Google search on "beauty" magazine and note the number of titles - and the content of the advertisements. This list certainly includes Cosmopolitan, the magazine that article contributor Joanna Coles chief edited.
We need strong, independently minded self-determined women - who feel all the confidence in the world to engage with men on their own terms. But we haven't done even a passable job of preparing our young women for that perspective.
1
"We need strong, independently minded self-determined women - who feel all the confidence in the world to engage with men on their own terms." Maybe that's what you need but I prefer a woman who is a good friend who I respect and we both want to share our lives but at the same time allow each other to pursue our own interest.
2
"“Online dating is very crowded,” Aiken said. “There are four people in it: two real, normal selves, and two virtual selves.”
Insightful, but multiply that by several dozen?
The Cloud, the NSA, FB, Guccifer, Google, Analytica.
50
Here's a secret: men too have sex with women we don't find attractive, but we do it anyway, and feel anxious/bad about it during and after.
The difference is, women do it out of empathy, men do it out of pressure to perform, men too have to compete with Pornhub, we know we don't have the body of that Pornhub actor, we know we can't maintain that 20 minute Pornhub erection, but we also know we cannot not perform either. Maybe it's over in 6 minutes because Thank God it's over.
Stop dividing the experiences of men and women and blaming it on men (who knew even cyberspace was Man Space?), we are not from Mars and you are not from Venus, we both come from the same place.
192
What an odd comment. Why would you have sex with someone you weren't attracted to? Why do you think you have to compete with Pornhub? And if you can't maintain an erection for 20 minutes under any circumstances, see a urologist or a psychiatrist (or both).
11
I think the point was that men and women can and often do have similar problems. It is a good point.
1
Really? The former editor of Cosmo opining on mindful sexuality after planting superficial thoughts in readers young and old for how many year?
4
Back in the heyday of the 70's when wild and unprotected sex with strangers was the "in" thing, many woman would pop half a quaalude just prior to having sex. Several women told me this, many years later; they said quaaludes would relax them and make the experience more pleasurable. Why alcohol is still thought of as the drug of choice to initiate a sexual escapde is beyond me. I thought the idea of having sex is to totally enjoy, melt away, and lose one's self with another person? Bliss in arms of another. Alcohol and other drugs do the exact opposite. Maybe, it's some sort of social ritual these kids need to particpate in- sex without any feelings at all. How shallow has this generation become?
28
Knock me over with a feather! The older I get the more I don't know. I was a young woman college student in the 60s-70s, (now I'm just in my 70s) and I never knew anyone who took quaaludes for any reason, mush less to have sex, not one, and I knew a lot of young women. A lot! Than was when women were meeting other women in "consciousness raising groups." It was when women artists (I was one) formed women's groups and organizations like NOW and the Women's House. We had a lot sex, but only with men we knew well, trusted and were, at the least, good friends. Never once did I meet a woman who was like the "Cat Person" in the story, or the several women who told you their quaalude stories. I begin to see what a little sheltered privileged bubble I lived it, even at a university with 27,000 students. It was still college and we were serious about our careers. We supported each other. We smoked pot. We had good sex. Loved jazz and poetry. But not much alcohol and no pills. I know of one attempt at rape but the man, who sustained serious injuries, did not press charges.
10
Marijuana and not alcohol is the drug of choice. Alcohol, beyond maybe one drink, is used by people who are super-inhibited, scared of intimacy, or who lack sexual experience.
@mary- where you lived mattered at that time. This was the scene from NYC during the 1970's -early 80's, pre- HIV era. The social circles one roamed was also a factor but not too important. If you lived in some smaller city or town, well, Quaaludes weren't that available or used, NYC was a whole different ballgame. There weren't any Studio 54's or Plato's Retreats in Tacoma Washington as far as I know.
This is key: “Porn sex is designed to get men off in six to eight minutes. Many men don’t know how to interpret female behavior in bed unless it replicates a porno film.”
2
Why does Maureen Dowd use "editrix" instead of editor?
Seems very Victorian.
3
Pseudo-intellectual sexism ... in an article about well, sex.
Wondered that myself.
3
So does "limerence," whatever that may mean.
2
I am a male and I also have "given in" to sex out of "obligation". Now and then brain really is not into it (the sex or the partner) but just cannot summon the emotional wherewithal to say "no thanks" and leave. Part of you thinks you are being nice - not hurting anyone's feelings. If you say "no", you owe the person a complicated emotional discussion and still will hurt their feelings. If you just comply it is over in a few minutes.
Lastly:
"[T]o attempt to separate emotions from sex is... illogical, given that emotion intensely augments pleasure, but also impossible for almost all women."
This is a false statement that gets a pass because it sounds so warm and fuzzy. Many women are capable of enjoying sex without emotional entanglements.
96
Thanks for breaking out the the box pop media culture would like to keep us in.
5
Bad enough, before digital kulchur and neo-liberalism--but today , America's sexual mores now all the more need to shift out of trainer wheels, first gear, and frat boy games into something approaching adult mind-sets. Going off-screen, below the radar, or variously downhill from the rat-race just might be the ticket.
3
FYI: neo-liberalism is an economic term that advocates for the privatization of public assets and is supported by Libertarian ideology.
2
I hate to say it, Maureen, but you've tapped an important topic.
I remember, back in the '70's, a young woman who I was quite taken with telling me, "Oh, I'm sorry _____, I really like you, but I've become a 'political' lesbian to protest all the male pigs out there and can't go out with you."
The @me.too movement is protesting a real, long term, serious societal problem. However, and with all due respect, some of the statements by its most radical supporters lack, shall we say, life experience nuance?
Like it or not, we're all in this together; straight, gay, bi, trans, or whatever. We have our dreams, our desires, and the cultural/familial expectations we either accept or reject.
But Ben Franklin was right. We either hang together, or we'll hang separately. "Accepted norms," whether cultural, traditional, or just plain old bigotry, will destroy us if we don't realize that we're all one species and all deserve as safe and empowering existence as it is in the power of the people of our world to give us.
Unfortunately, that probably won't make the current occupant of the White House happy. Isn't that just too bad?
4
Uh, it was always transactional, though there are now six people involved maybe.
Points taken otherwise, Coles's especially. But it sure seems sexist (for anyone) not to take women's agency and responsibility seriously; see the wack KKlein piece in WaPo. And the famous NewYorker story, eesh, what a wuss.
Man up, everyone.
4
It may be shock to many... but men crave intimacy beyond sex as well. On the other hand, there are troglodytes out there which dehumanize all relations between men and women. And there ARE women who are only interested in a sexual 'hook up'. We need a better filtering system to separate those that seek true intimacy with those that do not. Given our culture, the issue is not symmetric as some men do take advantage of the emotional extortion of 'sex or forget the whole thing'. And there are options. Tinder is not the place to seek intimacy - and both sexes know that. Other sites to allow for some filtering before the first date. However, when duplicity is discovered on that first date - we are back to the thorny issue of retreat. There should ALWAYs be an option for retreat.
6
Not sure what is meant by men expecting women to perform "porn sex". Speaking to my own preference, however, I do expect that anyone who sleeps with me would want to do so, and enjoy doing it.
2
In college, I made out with lots of men, got drunk, but at 5'11 and a former equestirenne, I knew my limits, had good instincts, fast reflexes and also knew how to handle a runaway horse. I didn't want to get felt up or sleep with just anyone. And while almost all of them tried, none succeeded. I didn't get abused or assaulted. My feelings were hurt they didn't like me better. But I guess being successfully arm-wrestled by a tall blonde wasn't quite what they were seeking in a girlfriend.
Things are more ominous today. I doubt I’d get away with my making out and leaving the premises as I once did. There is an implication that what you start, you should finish.
I know quite a few women who are internet dating. The rule of thumb, they lament, is that men expect you to sleep with them by the second date," or they won't call you back. Quite a few are just out of long marriages in which sex disappeared entirely. But others just like the girl buffet.
As my sister reminded me, that kind of sex is like cafeteria food. There’s always plenty of it, but it’s never any good.
I don't know what the solution is, other than to know what you deserve. I was fortunate to have dated a number of men who treated me really well, so I know what good treatment is. Many women do not. To them, I say: get a horse. You will develop good reflexes, and as a bonus, they generally stop when you tug on the reins. Saying "whoa" also does the trick.
167
There is plenty of making out without sex following it going on today. Talk to anyone in college.
5
Please write a book about this!! The dry humor, the descriptor of "the girl buffet", you have got the chops to do this! Horse girl takes on porn world expectations. I will look for your review in the NYT!
20
Great advice. I always had at least one horse and no big problem with dating behavior. It's also nice to really love your husband and in a perfect world, he has a horse too.
6
I am glad my adult daughters are past college age and the present "hook-up" culture aided and abetted by online porn. The line when I was in college was, "If it feels good, do it." Clearly, what these young girls are doing doesn't feel good, so why are they doing it?
74
My daughter is only two, but I've already compiled a list of things to say during the "sex" talk. Her mother will take care of the biology and anatomy. I think its very important for an adolescent girl to hear from a man what she's about to encounter. I also think building sexual confidence starts at an early age.
1. Never confuse attention with respect. Your male classmates may "adore" your promiscuous female classmates, but they don't respect them. Strive for the latter even though the former is seductive.
2. From the age of 12 to about...40, men will, and do think singularly with their genitalia. Don't even judge them for it, it's biologically encoded. Does this mean that men are not capable of being in, or even desiring fulfilling relationships beyond sex? Of course not, but try as you might, you'll never get a guy to like you by sexually pleasing him. A budding relationship can be enhanced by sexual chemistry, but it will never be built on it.
3. Know that why you may experience feelings of lust, they are very unlikely to be detached from emotion the way men's are (see #2). If you can recognize that, you will not fool yourself into believing that all you really wanted from your casual hook up and thus are ok with, solely physical gratification.
4. Regarding the last sentence in #3, realize that your experiences should be mutual and not exist for the enjoyment of only one party.
9
Maybe this is why my college student son and his friends study, go to the movies, and play video games instead of hooking up. After all "getting naked and having sex with strangers is hard," to say nothing of depressing, and dangerous.
10
Great column.
If you talk to college women, some will tell you about hook-up culture, which is, like all sex at college, less prevalent than it sounds. In my college days, I knew women who intentionally drank so that they could shed their inhibitions and quiet doubt in their minds...and they were very open about it. "I only swallow after four beers, so make sure your fridge is full," one male friend was told by a girl before a date that night. She was cold sober when she said it.
Cole says, "porn sex is not pleasurable to" women. Alas, to some, it is. I've known guys who have complained of backaches from women who want it faster, harder, longer, not exactly rough sex, but with a ferocity that these men describe as surprisingly like that unrealistic porn.
I've also known men who meet a woman off of Tinder, and it is clear from minutes after they meet that the woman wants sex and then to never see the guy again. Men are trained to say yes to sex, trained to understand that women view sex as a precious gift that they share, and that it would be devastating to shame them for offering intimacy.
We all need to do better, and especially to teach our children to respect themselves and their partners.
80
How odd. In Dowd's piece woman figure they owe sex for bad choices. In Douthat's column you have a couple of guys who think a woman should be hung for having an abortion.
Disconnect?
8
Interesting how, even in a piece such as this--which at first seems to be bravely examining something foolish and wrongheaded that women do--Dowd ultimately explains to us that the women are driven to their stupid behavior out of too much sensitivity, trying too hard to please men.... i.e. because they are inherently oppressed by our patriarchal society.
In the Times, all roads lead to the same drearily predictable conclusions.
2
But there are only 24 hours in a day. Who has time to get to know someone? Those 6-8 minutes I'm spending having "porn sex" means several missed checks of the cell phone.
There's just has to be something on one of those bondage supply websites where you can put the phone in the harness so it's available to you for those 6-8 minutes.
Otherwise, we're going to need a way to get this hook up down to 3-4 minutes.
"What did Tim Cook say about Zuckerberg?"
"A new cat hat app?"
See what you miss when you try to have a mature physical relationship?
“But the thought of what it would take to stop what she had set in motion was overwhelming; it would require an amount of tact and gentleness that she felt was impossible to summon.”
Remember that Margot was very much afraid of what Robert would do.
It's not just about pleasing and playing nice, but about real fear.
Porn is certainly a major problem, but fear of being hit or worse, supercedes horrible sex.
1
There is no money to be made from the woman who has realized that no one cares about her orgasm. She does not spend any time or money on her physical appearance, does not go on dates, does not fall for any of the silly advertising that says having sex is WONDERFUL and A PART of NORMAL life because in the end it simply pleases men.
Being a sexy object is very tiresome. Young women's shouldn't bother. Oh wait, but they are insecure and conflate pleasing others with pleasing themselves.
2
This is why, even though I am liberal on most political issues, that I continue to read and admire David Brooks. These views--that sex should be connected to intimacy--are conservative ideas. The irony is that the rights of gay people to marry is also conservative: sex is best when it is connected to loving. I know younger people who have open marriages, and I have get to see that work, even though they themselves are very idealistic about the inability of one person to meet all one's needs and their intention to be honest with each other, agree about it, and always put the "primary" relationship first. Monogamy is hard sometimes because of course we will be attracted to other people and also because it's so much easier sometimes to fantasize about the perfect partner rather than suffer discomfort with the one we have as we work through disagreements. But there is no such thing as "safe sex" unless there is a condom big enough to fit a heart. Sex is good precisely because it's dangerous in the best way possible: we are open and vulnerable to another human, and unless it's transaction, we have no way to completely control the direction in which it will go. Nothing lonelier than sex with trust and warmth and affection--maybe even love.
5
There are very difficult life questions to be navigated here. In the meantime, how about looking at the role of alcohol in the college and post-college cultures being discussed here? Young people (or anyone) who can learn to be analytical and intentional about their alcohol use will be in a good position to address how they want to manage their sex lives.
The U.K.'s Drinkaware site is a good place to start, especially for those who don't want to take an "all or nothing" approach to drinking. https://www.drinkaware.co.uk/
Way back when, we were cautioned not to put ourselves in a position that would be challenging to get out of in the first place, no matter who the person was.
Most of us had fantasies of being swept off our feet by Mr. Right.
We read those love novels and magazines instead of the stuff on movies and TV.
Sex can be complicated.
Relationships are complicated.
And yes, most of us find that sex can be a way to either break in or out of a relationship and I think most of us in our lives have experienced that.
In the meantime, the only thing we can tell our children is the only common sense thing our own parents taught us, 'don't put yourself in that position in the first place'.
But on the outside chance you do, protect yourself.
2
As a father now helping his bright and highly accomplished 17-year old son and daughter decide before May 1st which of their college acceptances is their best fit, this OpEd is published at an opportune time. Maureen hits the nail on the head at so many places in her article. I think this is one I will print out and share with son and daughter (in a low key way and separately to not embarrass either of them). Boys want to be higher status and when they arrive on campus for the first time, they won't know how to deal with their new freedoms, pressures and environment. The same for girls except that on campus, it is often customary for some more predatory-inclined already enrolled students to "scout" the new freshman class arrivals (and in some cruder frat cultures, to "target" the more attractive new-arrivals) for short-term affairs.
Whether the behaviors of college boys and girls is driven by hormones or not, I want my son and daughter to realize that their new college life could be made much more confusing and painful by accepting the hunter / hunted sex culture they might be exposed to, or by blindly falling victim to it. And I hope they will adopt a wise and discerning approach to their own (and others') values, morals, instincts and behaviors.
5
There's no emotional investment in these physical encounters.
No wonder there's little return....
8
This is not a new phenomenon -- it's not an issue with Kids These Days.
Consider this bewildering interpersonal interaction T.S. Eliot writes about in "The Waste Land" between
a typist and "the young man carbuncular" at her house:
"The time is now propitious, as he guesses, / The meal is ended, she is bored and tired, / Endeavours to engage her in caresses / Which still are unreproved, if undesired. / Flushed and decided, he assaults at once; / Exploring hands encounter no defence; / His vanity requires no response, / And makes a welcome of indifference. / Bestows one final patronising kiss, / And gropes his way, finding the stairs unlit . . . / She turns and looks a moment in the glass, / Hardly aware of her departed lover; / Her brain allows one half-formed thought to pass: / “Well now that’s done: and I’m glad it’s over.”"
For whatever reason, this 1922 poem (including this area of murky consent) drew praise while "Cat Person" drew derision.
But the underlying concept is not new to "hook up culture" or the 21st century or online dating or pornography use -- it has been with us for a long time.
Sometimes people make romantic decisions where they don't like the outcome and where it's not entirely clear they could say "no" even if they wanted to (but anyway they didn't). Why does it happen? What kind of culture would we have to have in order for it to happen less?
We have been asking this for a hundred years or more and I'm still not sure we know.
19
Comment of the day for including "The Waste Land." Well done, sir.
1
Woodstock.
1
Thank God I came along before the digital age. There's a great deal to be said for not being young.
16
As the father of 3 daughters and a son in their 20's this op-ed really sadden's me. My wife and I have always taught the kids that all great relationships are built on mutual respect and the ability to trust one another. We are very active in their lives and can see they model the same behavior. They treat people with respect and expect the same in return. Where are the real role models for all the young people caught up in the hook up culture. The author mentioned states that we don't want to go back -to "sock hops and going steady". While I can't speak to sock hops, "going steady", or maybe just call it going on several dates while getting to really know someone, is highly underrated. If the hookup culture is shallow and meaningless, I don't understand what draws younger people to it? Maybe a little old school relationship building isn't so bad.
14
"...not making people angry, taking responsibility for other people’s emotions, working extremely hard to keep everyone around them happy."
I was taught to be a "good little girl" from infancy. Parents, school, friends and the media have imprinted instructions on women and women's behavior that turns far too many of us into docile, pliable creatures desperate to please those who have power over us.
Men have a long list of derogatory names for women who don't cooperate with our culture's standards for "acceptable" female behavior. The only exempt cohort are older women past childbearing age -- lines, wrinkles, sags and bags have finally empowered us to say and do exactly as we wish.
Thank you, Ms. Dowd, for calling out yet another abuser. #metoo is opening a lot of eyes in and out of the workplace.
13
“'Online dating is very crowded,' Aiken said. 'There are four people in it: two real, normal selves, and two virtual selves.'”
This is one reason why I don't use dating websites or apps. Attending social events in the community and gathering with friends do seem inefficient compared to technology. Direct social interaction, however, goes a long way toward eliminating the "virtual self" that can start a steady stream of text messages but is likely to disappoint or just flop at the first direct encounter.
I've also found it important to consider expectations and goals carefully. The hookup culture I first encountered in college - physical intimacy without an emotional connection - never appealed to me. Much better to let relationships evolve naturally, remaining patient and tolerant.
Lastly, sometimes the best move is the one you don't make. A healthy relationship can improve our lives tremendously, but we have to be capable of going through life without a partner.
29
Let's celebrate the old-fashioned process of "dating," in which you don't express physical affection until the third date. This allows 2 people to make an investment of time in each other, get to know each other, allow love to grow. I feel sorry for the women of today who have no exclusive, committed, romantic partner to meet their needs for intimacy. They risk pregnancy, STDs, insecurity, for an hour or two with a man who cares nothing about them. Not my idea of a good time.
190
The third date? How about the 12th? or find truer ways of gettingto know each other than shallow dating rituals.
15
Nobody will celebrate that.
Great article and fascinating comments from readers. As the mom of a college freshman and a high school senior (girl then boy) the only thing I know right now is that I am getting a copy of Ms. Coles' book and reading it today.
8
If all you get is Plan B and a bad hangover the next morning, what is the point?
Is this supposed to be fun?
41
Thank you, Mr. Marcus, for your unbelievably insightful and eloquent commentary AS A MAN! We need more men like you in this world to speak out! I am 45 and have grown up LEARNING to be a Feminist of my own accord. I taught high school English for 16 years, and was horrified by what my female students shared with me about their sex lives....(how they felt pressured to do what the boys wanted, regardless of how they really felt....) Dowd's article speaks to all of these elements. As a "late bloomer" myself, (I waited until age 20 to be intimate for the first time, with the criteria that I had to be in love in order to "cross the proverbial Rubicon"), I will admit that I, too, later in life, have succumbed to being intimate when I didn't want to--simply to please the fellow I was with, and I regret that decision to this day. Growing up in a patriarchal society that places male desires first really does a number on a girl's--and woman's psychology. I am now raising a 3 year old girl and a 4 year old boy, and I cringe at the prospect of their having to negotiate their personhood in a sexual landscape that is all about objectification, (versus love, connection, and kindness.) How do I stave off the tide of misogyny that has become so rampant in our society? What can we do as a culture to reverse this incredibly toxic problem? I only hope our culture starts to un-learn the misogyny that is so endemic....We must have thoughtful conversations about these topics with our kids....
18
I am horrified that a high school girl would share her sexual escapades with her English teacher. In my day, most female high schoolers has no escapades to share with their teachers. We were more interested in speculating about Miss Marne’s possible relationship with a Greek guy she met on a cruise. We need to resurrect the unspoken rule that teachers have no knowledge of their female students’s antics and vice versa.
1
I think Ms. Dowd has zeroed in on the real issue: not men vs. women, but women's autonomy vs. an attractive but ultimately counter-productive idea of women's virtue, of women's need to please others and not themselves. Civil rights leaders used to say that half their struggle was to convince their own people to fight back. This is the same.
38
Maureen, thank you for writing this...it's so hard to talk about, and it's hard to nail down exactly what's wrong here without making it sound like it's all on the woman. But women do need to wake up, and take charge. They do need to take responsibility, but mainly for themselves and their own safety and happiness. It is absolutely exhausting to live any other way and it does nothing for all the relationships in your life not to face up to this.
22
I, with my wife of 33 years, watched a wonderful Canadian movie yesterday called "Maudie." My one word movie review of this film is "commitment." If you are unfamiliar with the term, trying watching this beautiful true story of earned love, hardship and the sanctity of art. If you remain unmoved, then unfortunately you may have yet to discover the value of commitment in your own life.
19
Our society has made emotionless sex some kind of marker for "freedom." Young somen who want a relationship have to pretend they want meaningless sex, even if they don't, to get a guy's interest. Because if they won't hook up, someone else will.
And in truth, there is societal pressure to have hookups. The media call it "fun"--even if the young woman has to get hammered to do it. Older feminists talk about the "freedom" to have sex "like a man" as if wanting a relationship makes you a loser.
Even many parents promote hookups, wanting their daughters to avoid significant relationships in college.
Everyone is playing out their agendas through the sex lives of young women except the young women. No wonder they get drunk.
49
I hope that college student's experience isn't representative; it sounds awful. I doubt many of the guys are enjoying it either. I'm 50 but the few guys and girls that actually lived like that when we were young were considered sad. They have lived hard lives too.
The slow musical built of true intimacy is the best (and hottest) thing in life, kids. Long talks and walks, crazy eye contact, favorite stories, easy laughs like there's no one else on earth. Can't be done quickly nor with phone on.
61
So very true!!42 years later.....exactly what I remember...long talks and walks filled with laughter while sharing our lives....It is still a magical time to remember....
1
Dating and sex have always been confusing and impossible to understand and I don't care how many studies are conducted in this area. The predicament for women today in my opinion is technology. I saw this coming with advent of the cell phone. Young women approaching the age wherein they feel it's time to become sexually active used to give their number to a guy and have to wait, at home, until that guy called. Women didn't simply didn't give their numbers to young men or boys they weren't already attracted to. When the guy called, it became a beautiful event. He'd have to come to her home and meet her parents before the date could take place. Things moved slow, but that process injected respect into the equation. It also in it's own way provided emotional support for the young woman. When both parties felt the butterflies in their stomachs it was a signal that the next step was imminent. It was wonderful. The dating process was a conduit to comfort, actually knowing that the sexual encounter was going to be with someone you cared for and wanted to please. In the worst way, at least from a guy's perspective. Of course a young man at that age could think of nothing but sex, but he also knew he had to work for it. When it happened it was usually wonderful. I'm old now but remember those experiences like they happened yesterday. I can't imagine "hooking up" as it's absent of the caring an intimate encounter requires to make it memorable. The good old days.
35
This article makes me sad. For the young woman who, as a result of a whole slew of societal forces, subjects herself to this emptiness, and for the boy whose capacity for love has been so terribly desensitized by the stuff he watches on the internet. I’m 65. Growing up with three sisters, I learned early on to recognize the special pressures that affected them as young women, but was too young to understand what that meant. I raised two daughters, recognizing the same special pressures coming from school, television and the nascent internet, but even though I understood what all that meant, was, generally speaking, unable to protect them. Now, I have three lovely granddaughters and the world they live in scares the hell out of me. Am I the only one who wants to grab these boys by the neck, and tell them what it means to be a man and what it means to love?
84
It is dangerous to assume that a person who simply wants sex also wants to love and be loved.
2
I'm old enough to have grown up gay without porn. I know a lot of people are saying that porn is screwing up sex. I understand their point. But, take this as a message from a different time and place; sex without porn wasn't wonderful either. The quickie wasn't invented yesterday. As they say, the grass is always greener over the septic tank.
27
I’ve been reading these comments and am struck by the fact that no one has mentioned the f word..friendship. I am old and have learned (I think) that being a friend...you know getting to know each other, valuing each other, is the best foreplay there is.
86
I did but it hasn't been posted yet. Hold on! It's coming! And, I expect at least one Like off of you! :D
1
A musician friend told me a story of two bandmates who took ladies back to their shared hotel room. The ladies were friends and one bandmate was acting as wingman. The wingman ended up pissed at his friend because the friend kept waking up to have more sex with his date and wingman felt obligated to perform again with his partner when he really preferred in bed, asleep, alone. Men and women have sex sometimes without really wanting to but it doesn’t mean something sinister is happening.
6
Maybe not sinister, but sure sounds unlovely.
15
I think that is actually one of the definitions of sinister.
2
The virtual world does little for our corporeal bodies and minds; approximately two-fifths of our senses are engaged.
We are creating spectrum disorder in people without it and exacerbating it in those who do.
18
This is quite a remarkable discussion. I knew at the outset it would lead to Trump.
It’s an abundant area for research by social psychologists but, unfortunately, those best qualified to study it (young women) may already be subjective participants.
A youthful Margret Mead was nearly drummed out of the profession by male psychologists for studying the sexual mores of young girls in Samoa by living with them.
Ms. Dowd is describing the “unintended secondary social consequences of advanced technology”—social media sexuality. Can we say “social sex?”
It’s like social media—people engage in very serious, sometimes intimate thoughts with total strangers.
However, actual physical presence with total strangers leads to intimate conversations that don’t seem possible to end with a specific number of words or signed off by a hash-tag.
Of course, the thoughts lead directly to Trump, the 3rd most powerful man in the world ending careers and threatening nuclear disaster with tweets to strangers.
How do you know when one of those casual cataclysmic tweets aren’t just enough to motivate an already delicately balanced soul over the brink to shoot up a school?
At some point, one of these issues of “social sex” may lead to the loss of a life of a resistant female or bring down a government.
9
Our culture has become so impoverished that about 4 ideas will cover any situation. So here is the appropriate idea for the hookup situation.
it is merely another manifestation of consumer culture. We are conditioned to believe that life is a series of choices of the appropriate product to consume at any given time. Due to our obsession with the material we tend to focus on externals to the extent that we forgot we have an inner life. Our goal in life is to assemble a persona that pleases us by assembling an appropriate set of objects to consume. In making human relationships we look for someone with a persona that bolsters our persona. We then pursue an appropriate activity for intimate relationships which is likely to be sexual. In the course of our activity it might occur that negative feelings come up about the object of our relationship activity, but the occurrence of actual emotions is so out of context that we don't know what to make of it. Given time to think about it we may recognize that it was inappropriate to have sex with a person that actually turns us off. Many of us, being unwilling to damage our persona by acknowledging that we made a mistake, will instead decide that we were mistreated, and are likely to complain.
22
Ah....I would like to remind folks that finding someone similar to you in values, thoughts, perspective, background, family, economics leads to acquiring a good companion. And, having acquired a good companion, a friend you can count on, that person will, with a little effort and patience, become a fantastic lover. I met my wife of 32 years at church. I highly recommend young folks return to their church, and, find quality young people to build a life with. The quality of physical intimacy is not about what someone looks like while undressing. Your best friend, closest ally, mother of your children always looks beautiful. dressed, half dressed, or undressed.
82
Absolutely agree. It doesn't have to be church, but a forum in which people share interests and values --hiking, volunteering, doing anything interesting and constructive -- gives rise to relationships of shared interests and trust. If you go to a bar looking to hook up, is it any surprise that the result is primarily a product of alcohol and sexuality disconnected from anything else?
1
Lovely comment and my husband totally agrees with you.
1
Very cute reply, No pics plz! of Houston.
I don't think it's just the youth. it's actually many people in this world that can't grasp what love is. what do you think love means compare to what love is to me may be completely different. Love was a term when men can provide a woman a roof on top of their head and food on the table. Now, love is just like someone's personality, there is no standard, it is just perspective and even with survey with a million people. it wouldn't provide a just answer of what is love to a person.
6
Once upon a time feminism was understood to include an emphasis on female assertiveness. Where did that piece go?
Seems there is plenty of assertiveness in academia, politics and the workspace, and not so much where emotional health is needed most, in intimate relationships. Yet so much energy and attention are devoted obsessively on the superficial attraction arena - to hair, face, clothes and shoes, much of which straight men could really care less about but seems critical these days to the comparison competition with other women that women seem desperately compulsive about (as well as obedient shoppers). A significant part of this seems to lie in the health of women's relationships with women. They seem to enable each other in dysfunction and regret. Back to the drawing boards, and a steering of empowerment to the real world of relationships, all kinds, as much as to the workaday, theoretical and intellectual worlds. Intellectual feminism is missing something.
42
Women and men are two separate, different tribes, each with our own culture, i.e. customs and rituals. I can't speak with any knowledge about men's culture (more and more they are a mystery to me), but women do compete with each other on the basis of looks, with attention to wardrobe and grooming. And yes, men hardly care about that, but we don't do it for the men. It's just what we do in our culture. It's what we do, and it pleases us as often as it makes us worried and uncomfortable.
10
i agree - what ever happened to NO?
3
I believe there has been a war against feminism since the 70's. Assertive women are called names that can't be printed here and young women have taken to heart that feminist hate men. I have hope for the #metoo movement but only time will tell.
2
Most young people do not know what a relationship is. Their entire worlds are transactional; from buying apps, using the apps for almost everything and, up to and including, human interactions, both online and in person. They are lonely and do not know why and do not know how to resolve a problem of any kind without an app. Technology is not their friend. Both genders live
33
Stereotyping much?! Sweeping hyperbole going unrecognized?!
Any empirical, large-scale research that indicates that?!
1
"L.O.V.E is just a four letter word."
All relationships are transactional to some degree. Even the ones in the bad old days.
1
30s, and married before I grew interested (or desperate?) enough for dating apps. So I feel as though I’ve experienced some of the last of the ‘old’ — many of the men I was with in my early 20s were Gen Xers, and there was a difference in how we did things — and stepped off before the ‘new’ took complete hold over the culture of dating/hooking up at large. It’s a weird place to be.
Friends (also 5-10 years older than I) look upon this with fascination, but those we know who must wade through it in hopes of discovering something worthwhile can only tell how exhausting it is.
Maybe I was lucky or it’s representative of who I am and how I chose, but I look upon my dating years fondly. Whether it was sex and hanging out, just sex, or just watching movies and making dinner together, being aligned in intent and purpose was important. I sense that now, as young adults grow dependent on handheld tech and communications, they lose the ability to cultivate emotional intelligence and interpersonal skills. The senses required to find a foothold for connection with a stranger beyond a first look, and navigating the rest honestly.
Also- emergency contraceptive a ritual occurrence? Good grief! I had to take the stuff twice in three months one year, and I was dealing with symptoms from ensuing hormonal chaos for at least half a year after.
28
I agree with the overall sentiment and the message of the Op-Ed. I would add that the "hookup" degrades and damages both parties, the man and the woman, equally. It is disingenuous to insinuate, as is done here, that one side is the victim of the insidious manipulation of the other side. It is not.
64
Casual sex doesn't have to degrade anyone. If you take charge and responsibility of your choices, then there is no victimhood or degradation. There is simply nothing to be ashamed of in consensual sex, rather it is the shamers who are shameful for shaming fine respectable people. And the same goes for shaming prostitution. It is only the shamers who want to make it shameful. Get over your inhibitions people and set yourselves free!
5
After reading this, I remember what my young co-worker said when I joined the workforce long time ago. He said, "A bad girlfriend is better than no girlfriend." Really? I thought no boyfriend was better than a bad boyfriend for me.
Why can't we stand alone, if things are not desirable? I am old, but hope young women develop the strength to stand alone and quietly reflect the moment.
218
Holly Near had a lyric: "Someday one will do." As usual, she was honestly saying what she was not seeing, what with everybody pairing off.
1
I agree totally. Why are people so terrified of being alone?
6
Everybody seems to be in panic mode; hook up or fail!
1
I would say that much of what is described, valid as it is--the various forms of unsatisfactory "hook-ups"---has similar side permutations for a lot of men, that has not been adequately expounded(?).
38
As a gay teenager growing up in the south in the early 70s, I started having sex with other guys late at night near the downtown library and bus station. There was never a time when I had sex with a guy I did not want to have sex with because I was always in my car and saw what I was getting before we went to bed or the back seat. I never had sex with a guy from my high school because I had no idea how to date another guy. The same held true for my college years, guys did not date, at least not yet. I don't know exactly what this says about women and men and sex and your column, Ms. Dowd, except for the possibility that sex is sex and love is love and when the two erupt at the same time, it's miraculous - I know because I met my husband when I was 28 in a bath house. While we were having sex, we fell in love. We've been together for 35 years... I have no advice to give because if I did I would give it to my young women friends who meet guys online and hike or bike all day on a date. I never ask about the sex unless I'm told but in a few weeks, they tell me they have met another guy online and they are going on another date, moving on.
33
I'm a 64-year-old gay man with experiences similar to yours, I imagine. I learned early on that, indeed, "sex is sex and love is love". In pre-AIDS times, sex was to be had for the sheer enjoyment of it and for the thrill of being liberated from societal norms. As I grew older and online dating became the norm, there were many, MANY encounters which ended in "You're not my type" either stated explicitly or subtly implied, and thus the time shared over a cup of coffee or a Sunday afternoon lunch (dinner was an option ONLY IF there was a really strong mutual interest) would come to a politely abrupt end.
Like you, I have no advice for a young woman (or for a young gay man, for that matter) except to caution that illiberal amounts of alcohol will skew one's perceptions of The Other as well as lower one's resistance to untoward advances.
11
"Sex is sex and love is love and when the two erupt at the same time, it's miraculous". Absolutely DHC, you couldn't have put it better. I'm a straight woman but I couldn't recognize myself in this article. I've had plenty of brief hook-ups that have been great fun, and some where I've wanted to pull out but didn't because hey, I had a few drinks and went home with the guy and took my clothes off and... But really, the idea that sex has to have some deep emotional context is not something that I subscribe to and I don't think that's done me any harm in my 50-odd years.
4
Men need to become sensitive and more aware of women's feelings. But women must take responsibility for their own actions, too. If a woman doesn't say stop, if she doesn't say "I don't want to," if she doesn't keep her clothes on, then it's really not the guy's fault if he doesn't read her mind. "I don't want to upset him" or "I don't want to hurt his feelings" are choices.
131
Sure, it would be ideal if women could more easily and readily communicate their needs but I don't particularly find these to be easy choices in a society that is so coercive and demanding of how women should be in the world. I find that sentiment pretty dismissive. These different forces are described in the article, which doesn't speak so much of the ability but the conditions in which women are able to voice themselves and what's preventing/shaping that. How do women respond to an innately irrational dehumanization of themselves in common sexual or romantic interactions in a rational way? I find your comment reflects this unreasonable demand and is not simply a questioning but undermining of their real struggle.
2
But many women now expect evolved men to know when "Yes" actually means "No."
5
I think that depends on the guy. There are rapists and other sexual predators who won’t take no for an answer, and it’s not always possible to know who those people are when you first meet them.
It’s important that women understand that if you don’t want to be forced to have sex with predators or if you just don’t want to have sex with someone you don’t really care for, you should not make yourself vulnerable by drinking too much or being stoned on drugs around people you don’t know well, and when you are out socially you should have a solid agreement with a girlfriend to keep an eye on each other and to leave together at the end of the evening.
Real, meaningful intimacy is grounded in friendship. Cellphones and the internet appear to be a poor substitute to the real human connections that make relationships profound and lasting. Holding someone you know and love deeply is one of the greatest joys in life. But this joy does not come at the click of a button.
88
I think the primary purpose of sex it is to pro-create. There is a secondary purpose too which is best understood as a gift shared between two intimate adults expressing their unity of mind, body and soul through the phisical act of intimacy.
Sex is to be approached patiently and respectfully. It is not designed to be a quick fix.
58
Right...
Did u actually talk with the entity that designed us to reach your conclusion?
Humans have embellished procreation just like every where else they have messed with nature.We are not biologically different than any other species on earth.
1
I'm glad that when I was so lacking in judgment as to get to a point of seeming no return with a man (the 80s) and I suddenly decided I didn't want to proceed (despite the fact that we were naked) and told him so - I think I blamed it on not feeling well from the evening - he respected my wishes and didn't make a big deal of it. I remember respecting him for it and thinking that he had been well-raised. And that I would never put myself in that position again.
108
Dear Rae, I appreciate your Comment, and I can understand that your experience and viewpoint and perspective all have merit. Unfortunately, or fortunately, in the course of this inter-sectional behavior between the genders, "the 80s" argument has merit as well.
Some of us/we participants in those 80s, did not lack judgement and used and discussed a more than significant amount of it in pursuing "point of no return" behavior. In addition to any other considerations of attractiveness or "being well raised," there are, often, simply the chemical matters of hormones, genes, DNA, and the psychological imperative of sheer curiosity. Many of us who were very well raised considered a mixture of the ramifications of our decisions and subsequent actions. These were and are serious matters with life-changing consequences.
Many people spun wheels of Lazy Susans in pursuing the choices that they made and in full knowledge of the excitement and flavourful variety of the menu. Sometimes we were victims of food poisoning; should it have been a caution. Even the big possible pregnancy can be a caution, but human urges of ego, id and super ego transcend "what if " moments and go on to become "damn the torpedoes" moments.
Ms. Dowd's column points out that among the differences between 80s life and the 2018 life, the matter of definition(s) & reflection(s) held a higher priority. The ability to group-march to a contraceptive venue on the morning after is now 1 of the options.
1
That guy who responded to your pre-penetration NO with such class seems like marriage material!
3
@Father of Two, sadly I've had the same thought over the years - if only we could go back in time
It may be bleak, even very bleak, but as one gets older there is real joy, satisfaction and thanks. I'm old and still like all the women I've known for over sixty years, one especially.
45
Lovely
I'm so glad when I was dating the question was whether to kiss goodnight on first date. By the late 60's I was feeling a little jealous I had missed out. But really, this is just a crazy way to go about finding a life partner. It doesn't seem to be that way here, at least with my grandchildren, I'm happy to say.
26
Like your grands are telling you all that they do...ha!
This article is very upsetting. We have one daughter — our oldest — and three sons.
Among many other lessons, we raised our daughter to maintain control of her circumstances. To do what she wants to do and not to succumb to pressure. To take responsibility for her decisions and actions.
We raised our boys to respect women, equality and to be gentlemen. And that NO means NO. No matter what.
This article suggests we need to teach our sons even more. We need to teach them to read minds. To realize that a woman quietly drinking ‘to bludgeon her resistance into submission” without saying NO means NO.
We don’t know how to do that.
201
Teach your sons to seek enthusiastic consent. It may seem weird and mood-breaking, but after some practice, I've figured out how to make it sexy.
5
You're doing the right thing.
2
You could teach them that it is NEVER OK to go to bed with someone who has been drinking unless you are already in an intimate relationship with that person and have a caring friendship with them. No mind reading required, just a few simple, sensible rules.
2
For those who find their definition externally, this will continue.
60
somewhere along the way today, I read a quote that seems apt: "the opposite of love isn't hate, it is indifference".Maybe that is the problem with women who " decide she’s not attracted to him but have sex with him anyway."
Some years ago I met a girl at a party, took her to the county fair a couple of days later, she had lust, we have been together 31 years now, married 26 of them. lust had a lot to do with it.
75
I once worked with a smart, gorgeous young man who came into the office every Monday morning looking like he'd spent the weekend with a pack of alcoholic wolves. It was girls he said.
What's her name this week? we'd ask, knowing the phone would be ringing with another new girl looking for him.
A few months later we all were out on a Friday after work and he was complaining again about girls and why they act the way they do. If he ever had a daughter, he would .......
What do you want? Somebody asked.
Somebody who will say no, he said.
149
Maybe HE could say no.
7
So why did he keep asking ?
6
Sheesh. Why didn’t he say no? Why didn’t he stop looking?
4
Am 66. Live alone. My romantic life has never been better. I control the horizontal and I control the vertigo, because I live aggressively alone. Every relationship I have had ends up with the male taking advantage of my talents, intellect, and skills and gaslighting me to do it. Have lived alone since 2011. So far, so good. Yeah, baby.
112
Or not; who knows.
2
Me too
1
Well, that "What's Lust Got To Do With It" was certainly depressing!
Didn't see any lust at all in the descriptions of women's experiences. The high point seemed to be resignation and "let's get it over with."
Stay home. Read a good book. Pet a pet. Go bowling. Do something fun. Look for a growth experience. Join a political club or a civic cause. March. Have days with moments of everyday enjoyment.
There are a lot of things a woman can do that she will remember with pleasure or contentment.
This lust you speak of is definitely not one of those things.
274
Excellent advice, also for guys.
54
Hmmm.... The author’s very point is that lust *isn’t* involved in these hook-ups.
2
...and doing some of those things with others is a way to meet real people, some of whom are your preferred sex and are single! Most relationships I've had came from meeting men that way.
The big problem today is that everything is so impersonal. In the old days, in small towns or neighborhoods in cities, everyone know everyone else. Parents know the parents of the boys or girls went out with. That didn't mean that every relationship ended up well. Of course not. But today, it's a dice game. There is no good way for young people to meet except perhaps at work, and there people can put on false personalities. Outright despicable people can appear nice, attractive, real catches. I'd say that there is a very slight chance that a young man or women will meet the ideal mate.
37
Church, volunteer organizations, clubs don't work? Poppycock. Of course, for those subscribing to the ennui of today's modern culture, maybe that's true...and they wonder why they're unhappy.
1
As a man, far removed from the days of my youth, I can recall situations in which the game of cat and mouse went too far for my tastes. On multiple occasions, being an insecure youth, I wanted the girl to want me, and worked feverishly towards that goal, however, that didn't mean that I wanted to have sex with her.
One particular encounter has stayed with me to this day. My college roommate and I were hosting a party in our trailer. Earlier in the day I was introduced to a young woman who my roommate knew. On a dare, I told my roommate that I would get the young woman to spend the night with me.
Being insecure, alcohol increased my bravado, and seemingly, my attractiveness. The girl and I made-out on my bed before the alcohol made us both pass-out into sleep. Upon awakening the girl was ready for the promised sex.
Who knows if it was virtue, fear or the fact that I don't like being ordered to perform, but I begged out, as diplomatically as I could, claiming the whiskey had effected the machinery.
These memories make me very empathetic to the situations faced by women regularly. It's buyer's remorse, in real time.
85
Reluctant sex and regrets thereafter is hardly a phenomenon limited to women. One night stands, where neither party want to inflict the other on themselves for a future encounter, is hardly unknown. This piece seems to suggest, by its emphasis on women that the regrets are almost always imputed to women participants. Hardly case, Maureen.
80
Even when we were younger, my wife and I found that more than a glass of wine was more conducive to sleep than sex.
45
I am so lucky in having come of age before smart phones and social media.
A teeny 5'x6' galley kitchen to cook a dinner for two in a 400sf apt with a balcony. Rent was a week and a half's take home.
If you could cook a good dinner, simple dessert, inexpensive wine, and provide conversation, you might be be cooking them breakfast.
And if not it was still a lovely evening.
68
The much talked about Aziz Ansari’s hook up was talked about by a woman who rather conveniently stayed anonymous in Bebe. I thought that was no fair to Mr. Ansari who being single was trying to find a partner.
I am glad to be married way back when when the first date did not lead to a bedroom but perhaps a dinner date when all the senses remained open .
95
Online porn and its easy access is what's causing a lot of deep problems in traditional and women-repressive cultures everywhere. Men want to replicate 'porn lives' they view online and foist them on unwilling women, ending usually in deviant sex that leads to violence, suicides, etc.
39
I think what makes young people deeply unhappy is the sense that they should be having fun. Mating rituals bring people together with nothing much in common except for their wish to participate in mating rituals. Disappointment is a far more common outcome than mutual satisfaction, and yet we persist despite our better judgment.
33
The term "ritual" implies to me a sort of agreed/learned/ social response to a situation, where one behaves as it is believed will be socially acceptable within a normal range of behaviours to one's peers.
Such behaviours are likely to be, almost inspired by the commercial values of the mass media, that has the aim of getting us to spend to be part of the "in crowd".
Despite such learned rituals, we are also animals, with all the natural urges to procreate and consequentially engage in sexual acts.
I suspect that too often we ignore the power of socialisation on the one hand and our animal instincts on the other hand, and mistakenly believe that our actions mostly involve rational choices and decisions.
13
"they should be having fun" That's the problem. Real life isn't like the commercials, isn't like the fantasy world of face book. Comparing reality to the unreal virtual world, well, we know which one tends to win. If you think that something works for everybody else, but not for you, you tend to get desperate.
2
Why I am not surprised? We all do all kinds of things that we have no desire to do; but we do it anyways. I believe the seed of this problem is sowed primarily in our childhood.
Remember when you were a child and the adults in your life (parents, teachers, etc.) were repeatedly telling you to be kind, or not to be rude, to others, and not to hurt other people's feelings? That is when you were conditioned to accept things that you did not like to do or to see. The fact is, that advice is incomplete. The child has to be also advised that there is a limit to everything. And once that limit is exceeded, it is legitimate to be rude or hurt the other person's feeling.
151
This isn’t a significant difference between men and women. It’s a common human difficulty with resisting fake (purely sexual) intimacy to preserve the hope of deeper emotional (and sexual) intimacy in the future in a more thoroughly committed relationship. Attachment research has a LOT to say about people who freely engage in casual sex.
Women aren’t giving sex to “fit in” any more than men are. We all seek intimacy, and when the best kind is hard to find, the shallow kind sometimes substitutes. It is a mathematical imperative that men and women are having casual sex at the same rate. The sadly persistent but false narrative that casual sex is what men “want” only serves to preserve that false narrative. When we accept that ALL people crave (and need) emotional intimacy, perhaps we’ll begin to understand why men, too, allow casual sex to substitute for the emotional depth they (also) need.
98
people - listen to this person
1
I’ll add—if you think women are substantially different from men in their attitude toward casual sex, you haven’t seen enough Tinder profiles. The emotional disfunction of reliance on casual sex is cross-gender. What’s gender-different is the propensity to view women’s casual sex as “victimhood” and men’s casual sex as “predatory.”
4
Finally, the first person to acknowledge what each of us human animals wants, that is, emotional intimacy. I am so tired of reading articles about "wanting intimacy" when that intimacy has always been identified only as sexual intimacy! Yes, sex is intimate, as, for a woman, having someone else's body part inserted into a bodily part of you that you hardly know anything about, could not be anything else but intimate! As a single woman I had sex with men, because I thought that that might be the best way for me to find emotional intimacy. For sure those women's magazines that told me how to pleasure a man, had something to do with my MO! No wonder alcohol is used by people who would prefer not to have to be sexually intimate when looking for emotional intimacy. And I can assure you that many men would and are sexually intimate as often as they see an opportunity to be so: that is a biological imperative that they do not understand and therefore, more often that not, fail to control. It's really time that men were educated (note I don't say" better") to understand their biological imperatives; that would make them happier and better human beings. It would also be better if both women and men were educated about their own biological imperatives; obviously, they are different, as reproduction is the first biological imperative of every creature on our plane. Think about what fruits we eat do to protect their seeds! It's astonishing.
2
I'm 58, divorced 4 years. My daughter pushed me to join a dating website three years ago. Over the last three years I have met at least 200 women. Four of these women pressured me into having sex with them; I knew it was premature but decided to try anyway. I could not get aroused, and of course they lost interest, because they did not care about me... and I knew it. Which is why I could not get aroused in the first place.
Emotion, trust, feeling like I am loved -- all are important to me as I get older. I was a stallion in my 20s. No more.
I was about to give up when I recently received a message from a 54 year old who lives about an hour away. We met, the chemistry was wonderful. Lots of things in common, mutually interested in one another's lives. We had our second date last night, she took my arm as we walked, we hugged and gently kissed one another good night. Nothing sexual, just the expression of comfort and intimacy. It was divine, there is no other word for it.
I am not thinking about sex; we will get to know one another and the discovery will be beautiful. I know now that when we consummate the relationship, it will feel like the most natural thing in the world.
I feel like I have my second chance at love and happiness. It does not involve sex. Because sex is not necessary -- rather it will be something we choose because we trust and care for one another.
983
Just lovely. And best wishes.
120
Frank,
You're a gem. It's amazing how many men in their late 50's only want to date women who are young enough to be their biological daughters and how (if they haven't had intercourse in a while) want it on the first date. Plus (because of the odds at their age) they have an overinflated view of themselves.
Because you were interested in seeing a woman in your age range and you weren't in a rush for physical intimacy, when (if?) it happens, it will be far more enjoyable than the one night stand stuff that too much of online dating encourages.
Enjoy wherever this beginning of friendship takes you two.
26
This brought tears to my eyes. Nice tears.
14
It's weird. It's almost as if physical intimacy has different meanings and values for men and women, just as traditionalists in all cultures have pointed out. Fascinating.
30
I wonder how much this "difference" is forced, though. Boys and girls and men and women are bombarded with messages about what they're "supposed" to do and what is "supposed" to be attractive or stimulating, etc. And then they see their partners acting as they expect them to and it reinforces the game. What would happen if everyone were just a little more honest?
33
Honesty's a poor practice on the first date.
don't know if you can view it in the US, but I enjoyed this episode of an Australian TV talkshow - https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/video/866873411663/insight-singles - where both young and old singles said using Tinder was both easy and enjoyable - so much variety ! Not even necessarily about sex.
As an old guy researching my family history, I'm struck by how many of my ancestors had 6-8-10 children - many died in infancy, many wives died in childbirth including my grandmother - the idea of 'satisfaction' from sex was not an obvious discussion in times of famine and struggle, where early settlers lived in tents before they could build their own slab hut and clear the forest to grow food. Many died from sheer exhaustion.
My father grew up on a farm - previous generations were farm laborers escaping poverty and life-threatening disease. Sex as fun was not something I read about back then.
26
Bummer, "currently not available outside Australia" so says the screen when I found the episode
3
You can find it on youtube. Just put Insight Australia Singles in the search bar.
I'm a woman, who is annoyed with my fellow women.
No one is making you have sex, just don't put yourself in compromising situations.
This is not the same thing as being sexually assaulted. I get that.
There are women who will get mad at this thought, but we give off signs all the time. Men are built differently than women. They experience sex differently than women. Their arousal is different than women.
When I go out on a date with a man and he asks me to come back to his place, I make the calculation beforehand of where I want this to go. If I'm not interested, I tell him, nicely, that I'm going home.
There's nothing inherently bad about not sleeping around.
You'll get a better night's sleep. And, you'll feel better about yourself in the morning.
Maybe we should all go back to wooing one another.
777
Someone can be "interesting" right up until the time you get in bed with them. It can be a surprise when someone you are otherwise really attracted to, is not, for whatever reason, someone you find you actually enjoy physical intimacy with. Personally I don't have a way to detect this in advance.
17
Agreed V, read my post, bring back the 1945-1960 period with sexual harassment and equal rights laws included.
1
The only sensible voice.
1
"Women decide they’re not attracted to a guy they’re nestling with. Limerence is not in the cards. But they go ahead and have sex anyhow."
Many men do the exact same thing. It has names, like "going ugly" and the advice "go ugly early."
They just don't want to be alone. They just want something like sex.
Men and women are not all that different sometimes. They just get lonely or needy, and go with what is there.
53
Yet another example of technology making our lives more "convenient," but certainly not improving the actual experience of living.
58
Many years ago it dawn on me that you must like the person you are with.
While opposites may attract, likes stay together for the long term.
When the lights come on and the days stretch into years, talking, agreeing, arguing with you partner are the basis of a lasting relationship.
And beneath it all is a mutual respect.
Without respect, there can be no real love.
169
Things haven't changed that much when I was a young man. Back in the 70's, it was considered cool to be hot, regardless of the circumstances. Reality bit back in many forms, including visits to the doctor, awkward phone calls the next day, and an indefinable sense of emptiness and shame that had nothing to do with prudishness.
In Los Angeles, sex was generally expected on the second or third date. The trap was sprung for both parties, and there was predation on both sides.
We are not going back to virginity and marriage contracts as guidelines, but a common sense rule should be employed: be pretty sure that you connect with and at least sort of love the other person before taking off all of your clothes.
Then, as now, the impetus came from both sexes, not just the remorseful women you describe in this column. We all need to respect honest emotional rules of the road.
109
If you are over 30, your posts on this thread should automatically delete.
Damn...didn’t work.
33
We have commoditized each other and in this race to the bottom, no one wins. Women are fooling themselves if they do not realize it is their job to set their own value no matter how difficult that is. This is not just an issue for the young: Viagra and online dating are distorting older people's relationships too. It used to take work to meet someone and there were not other people virtually knocking on the bedroom door with seemingly better offers. Relationships have never easy but the striving for deep emotional attachment, the romantic ideal, create some sense of balance.
111
To your point the women's magazine covers and headlines are largely the same today as they were in the 1970s; pitched on objectification, striving for beauty, and getting a man. This teaches young girls on up to devalue themselves and to take in an externalized objectification that places worth on shallow things like how they look. Hookup culture is about pleasing guys and somewhere girls got the message that having sex on a guys terms could work for them. So tragic.
17
Congratulations, Ms Dowd, you have written an interesting Rorschach piece to tease your "loyal following!"
I am no expert in the hook-up culture. Heck, I don't even understand why kids swallowing tide-pods or snorting rubbers simply because they saw the acts on YouTube.
It is fascinating to read the responses though. Some have the one-track mind to attack Trump while others choose to advance their own morality and/or universal theory of life, sexual and otherwise.
Maybe it is just another case of "human, all too human." Perhaps there are many reasons - or lack thereof - for having sex with an unattractive guy. Just as guys (and gals) watching porn.
Is the hook-up culture really new? Or it is more talk about? Leaving gender aside, the late German Director Fassbinder had some provocative movies about gay hookup culture.
Then, there were other incidents. They are strange to me, like Pee-Wee Herman and the late George Michael. And Jimmy Swaggart hiring a prostitute to seduce him. They are all very bizarre.
Personally, if they are not hurting anyone, let them do what they please. If they need help, help them! It is far better than deluded individuals shooting up YouTube HQ and high schools.
One thing for sure, praying to God will not work for all individuals and society should provide appropriate medicine as needed and not prescribing morality. By the same token, if people want to be superficial, let them be. It's their life after all
20
Sex without lust isn't a new thing. Trophy wives. Boy toys. Beer goggles. Anyone who can describe any Trump genitalia and hoped for a life of ease or a gig on the Apprentice. Et cetera ad infinitum....
26
"Good sex is a wonderful high,” Coles says. “It’s what great novels and great music are about. And it’s free! But we’ve lost track of what a brilliant thing it is. It’s so transactional now, it’s bleak.”
Boy do we all need to grow up. Beautiful sex is a wonderful thing, but when has it ever not been transactional?
Almost never mentioned in these discussions is the happily ever marriage bed wherein many women find themselves having bad sex with someone who doesn't appeal to them anymore, but because of the contract to acquiesce, hammered into us for millennia, can't find the agency to extricate themselves.
It's not that much different from the implicit contract single women enter into when they follow their bliss on promising date into bed and end up having to follow his urges instead. Some of us demur and exit the scene, but far too many shrug, go with the flow, and hopefully don't go back for seconds.
Transactions are important, and they needn't be bleak. Maybe we need to find a way to make them part of our foreplay. People with a kink already know this. They have to be upfront about their desires.
Yes, sometimes words get in the way of a beautiful moment and sometimes its words that sweep you off your feet. Whatever happened to pillow talk? It's not just for after.
83
I have been wondering , in this "me too" discussion, when someone would speak about the married woman who feels a need to "perform" "give him some" "do her marital duty" etc etc long after her own mind/body stopped "encouraging her" to do so.
23
Memi,
Perhaps some do it because they think it’s “easer than getting a day job”!
4
More useless, unnecessary, and unwanted advice for whomever -
Do whatever you want as you see fit, make your own choices and your own mistakes and learn your own lessons. Follow no advice or guidance, including this bit. What a desperately boring world it would be if we were all the same.
31
you're really saying that one can't learn from the mistakes of others???...and not listen to any advice (not to blindly follow it, but to consider it)???
3
The hypocrisy of Joanna Coles is truly breathtaking. The former editor of Cosmopolitan laments that young women are “sublimating their own needs to try and please the guy.” One would think that she hasn’t seen any of the covers of Cosmo in the last 20 years.
1370
And she's misuses "sublimating."
3
There might be a simple explanation for why young women are having sex with men they don't find attractive: control. In a world where they are expected to "not making people angry, taking responsibility for other people’s emotions, working extremely hard to keep everyone around them happy", having sex with a man they are not attracted to gives them a modicum of control in their lives. Generally speaking, the only time men play nice to women and try to win their approval is when they want to have sex.
60
Maybe we should teach our daughters to create wealth, aspire to power, and not worry about who plays nice with whom.
181
This is very troubling on multiple levels.
It sounds like peer pressure is driving females not simply into having sex, but into having casual encounters with men they aren't even attracted to, simply because some outside forces except it of them. Physical intimacy is one of the most personal acts in life, and entering into it should be a personal decision, not made with public consumption in mind.
Unprotected sex is alarming. Figuring that one can just pick up "Plan B" later is totally flippant about the risks of STDs, including HIV. And how confident can anyone be about what a virtual stranger will transmit?
And it is also disturbing how many women use alcohol as a crutch for unwanted encounters. Inebriation is unhealthy, as are behaviors under the influence. If someone can't get through an act while sober, they would be better off not doing it at all.
Disconcerting as these profiles are, they are probably the best solution to stopping a phenomenon of unwanted sex. Honest accounts are a powerful countet-narrative to that of casual sex as sophisticated and fun. If more people can come forward with descriptions of repulsion, fewer women will perceive that they should be part of the hookup culture.
62
Observations from a bartender:
After 10pm, the groups of women sort out who they're going home with, then very quickly they pair up and leave.
Thursday nights, it's usually pairs of women and the decision time moves up to 9pm
2 days before family holidays, the women are very much prowling.
Initiation and responsibility is very much taken by women; thank you for writing about it.
179
Last call is also called last chance, the time of lowered expectations.
6
And, if I were living in Portland, where would I find this bar?
7
John's Landing
Perhaps Martin Luther King summed it up long ago:
"If you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything."
Or maybe it was Thelma (of Thelma and Louise), who told her friend
"You get what you settle for."
Young women should not settle cheaply. Maybe they need to go on strike, like the Greek women in "Lysistrada."
109
This is what happens to feminism when it trades the concept of 'equity among differences' of the 2nd wave with the tribal narcissism, and ultimately victim culture, of intersectional academia. No room for evolution of all gender.. just complaint and blame of others for one's own unenlightened choices.
Not pro-censorship but consider the dating culture promoted by publications like Cosmopolitan and Marie Claire.. as much fantasy as anything on pornhub and just as oppressive, dangerous and stuck in tired gender stereotypes.
162
Why would you bring up an embarrassing moment for Aziz Ansari. The woman who decided to publish a private encounter for her own self satisfaction is symptomatic of the disfunction of our society and civil boundaries of privacy. She pursued him... Stormy I’m sure was just an innocent st flower ready to be plucked.. this is a disappointing article.
87
The hook-up culture is likely just one more symptom of the generalized despair sweeping this country. Having sex with an unappealing stranger might feel better than sitting alone in your room. It's the Weimar ethos all over again. Life is a cabaret, old chum, so you might as well get yours as fascism rears its ugly head and we're assailed by constant images of the hair literally raising itself off our alleged president's empty head every time the wind blows.
It's no surprise that booze and drugs are necessary accompaniments to these casual sex sessions. Also, there's the research showing that a third of all teenagers report feeling depressed, and the inconvenient truth that the suicide rate of 13-18 year-old increased by about a third between 2010 and 2015.
Couple that with college grads saddled with a mountain of onerous student debt with the only available jobs being nannying and Uber-driving and you understand why casual sex might offer a minute of forgetfulness. Especially since the only friend they feel they have is their smartphone.
Meanwhile, the lonely and desperate are chirpily urged to "empower" themselves and become the entrepreneurs of their own lives.
American society is sick; it is literally killing people, and the current depraved power structure in Washington is killing people absolutely.
We need a new New Deal to have even a smidgen of hope for a return to health and a chance at happiness, not to mention our basic survival as a species.
848
Karen Garcia, please accept my thanks and admiration for yet another insightful (if painful) view of the state of things in our sad society of today. We need sunlight and visibility to the horror that is the current administration, and thoughts like yours to remind and energize all of us that we can be (and have been) better. Again, thank you.
32
Karen, I really appreciate your comment and agree with it. A further element which I have noticed is the confluence of the ethos of empowering oneself and becoming one's own entrepreneur you mention, and the hook-up culture. Young people, and especially young people are saddled with insanely high expectations for success by family, friends, and culture, which can only be met by dedicating massive amounts of time and energy into career. This leaves no time for serious dating (partner seeking), and so most of these young people come to participate in the hook-up culture because it is the only way to attain their basic need of physical intimacy while still meeting the "entrepreneurial" demands imposed on them.
17
Karen Garcia - Yes, we need a New Deal for sure, not the tepid tea the DNC is offering...a "Better Deal"...sadly, both parties, or The Duopoly, have been bought by corporations and no longer consider the saddened/disheartened/impoverished people here in our diminished country. Sorry to be so bleak about it today.
15
Because we are still so private about our sex lives it is impossible to know how the experience is changing, and certainly the analysis in this column is not supported or disputed by any particular research.
Sex has always been a source of our greatest pleasure and misery, once our basic needs are met, but not necessarily the source of happiness- happiness comes from sharing many things , including sex, but it is derived more from providing than receiving pleasure.
Sex education should include a lesson on the difference between serotonin and dopamine. Serotonin is the love hormone- dopamine is derived from the fulfillment of selfish lust.
Recent research suggests that the two hormones are sometimes in conflict and an addiction to dopamine destroys the functioning of serotonin. Infatuation releases both, but it is the dopamine that is addictive and potentially destructive of happiness.
Sex, lust, infatuation and love have always been complicated and confusing. Speculation is always entertaining but actual knowledge is gradually being revealed as windows open in how our brains work.
25
The answer is: She was drinking too much. Her inhibitions were lowered and her defenses were down. It's really ok to just walk away from the bad date. I've done it and lived to tell about it while coming up with plausible excuses like having to get up early or even saying my kitten can't be alone too long. But you have to be sober to have the energy to walk away. Use the Lyft app for a fast get away. If a man wasn't having fun or was bored with the woman he would figure out a way to cut the evening short. It is still a free country.
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"It is still a free country."
Not the way things are going.
The liberals want to ban this and ban that
just because something it feels or doesn't feel good to them. They'll soon have sex regulated, mark my words.
Conservatives have made government small enough to fit in the average bedroom.
It's the new sad version of free love.
69
Don't kid yourself. The old version wasn't so great, either.
2
Absolutely. As an older person who lived through the first” free love” era and did not participate, this whole scenario sounds sordid and sad. I actually thought we as a society had gotten beyond that. Apparently not. These young women need to search their own psyche to find something more valuable than drunken sex.
1
And to think that "Lady Chatterley's Lover" was once banned as pornography. It's all about how a man teaches a woman how to have great sex, and she then teaches him how to have great love (starting with self-love). Maybe instead of banning or forgetting it, it should be mandatory reading. We all want and need to be loved for whom we are and not be treated or treat others as some sexual object. The latter is the ultimate in loneliness and self-degradation.
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I still belong to the category of men who look to women for support rather than leadership and don’t feel apologetic for doing so. I prefer women in dresses rather than pants, women who stay home with the kids when it is an option, women who, as a matter of preference, speak softly rather than loudly and work behind the scenes as opposed to in front of them.
The last 50 years in this country has been a time of profound changes. Today it is the women who are the doctors and lawyers and college graduates and primary wage earners in millions of families. American men in large numbers have been made to feel superseded and irrelevant. The traditional supportive role of women in American society is now largely regarded as something akin to a crime against them.
Trump, by his boorish and ugly behavior, is taking full advantage of the backlash and resentment to this that is prevalent among millions of Americans of both genders who long for the good old days when men were men and women were women and rarely the twain did meet.
I voted happily for Mrs. Clinton in November and would gladly do so again, but not without a feeling that something important was going away.
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Who is making "American men in large numbers ... feel superseded and irrelevant"?
Is your point that women should not *want* to be "doctors and lawyers and college graduates" or that, for the good of society, they should just not *be* "doctors and lawyers and college graduates"?
All because men have such fragile egos that the mere success of women is enough to make the men feel irrelevant?
Do you have any idea how denigrating this perspective is to anyone, male or female, doing the "behind the scenes" work? If you insist that this type of work is women's work and therefore emasculating if a man does it, how can you think that you are not devaluing that work?
And while I am at it, Trump's poor behavior to his wives and mistresses was as common when men were men and women were women as it is today. The only difference is that fifty years ago he could have done it with impunity, even as president. Today, he is getting called on it, and for that I am grateful.
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I didn't vote for Mrs. Clinton in November (nor Mr. Trump), and i would gladly vote the same again. I do feel that something important would be going away for good if she won, but it was gone already. None of the above had anything whatsoever to do with the gender of any of the participants. (It had to do with inequality and the plight of the working classes. It had to do with healthcare. Jobs and wages. Stuff like that.)
13
Believe it or not, women find the world engaging. They want to do things. They want to be things. They want more for themselves than caring for their husbands and their children. Husbands get to care about their wives and children, but they also get to focus on their careers. Why do you deny us the same?
It bothers me when men think women are pushing them aside. We are not. We are just doing what we want to do. And, plenty of women are still stay at home moms, because, well, that's what they want to do.
I worked for many years as an engineer. I made an effort to promote a collegiality and camaraderie that allowed us all to enjoy working together no matter who was in charge. It was always about the work, not about my being the boss or loud or wearing pants.
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I know this is an old story and times have changed (maybe not so much but how we get our information) and this happened in 1983. A young attractive 25 female wanted to go from daily contact lenses to extended wear lenses. Examined, fit, evaluated, and rechecked 24 hours later. All was good and she was happy. A 4 day check was established (a Saturday appointment). She came in, looking a bit tired. Asked how things were with the contact lenses, she replied she wanted to go back to the daily wear ones. Asked why, her answer was "I did not realize how poor my taste in men was late at night". So many comments went through my mind on how to handle her problem in other ways but said ok. I heard a similar comment 5 years before from a girlfriend's roommate. We were having breakfast when she came out and gave her roommate a look. My girlfriend replied to the look, bad choice? Her response was poor fitting beer goggles.
As to the contact lens wearer, I have thought about her over the years. Shortly after examining her, AIDs broke out into the news and I wondered if she developed better choices or more care.
Reading this article I see things do not change and I am glad to be alive and healthy
19
I guess I fail to see the big mystery here. Is it inconceivable to Maureen Dowd that sometimes women and men have sex because they enjoy it -- even if the partner isn't someone they especially like? Sex is certainly wonderful in the context of a committed long term relationship, but if you don't have that, I would think sex could be enjoyable just by itself -- is this column suggesting that's impossible or something to feel guilty about? Just seems like there is some Catholic guilt lurking in this grab bag of negativity.
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That kind of sex should be paid for. If you don't like each other, that might be fine for you, it's your choice. But degrading somebody else and ignoring attendant risks (VD, pregnancy) is probably selfish and certainly unwise.
A female who exposes herself to somebody callous or arrogant enough to think physical stimulation is worth the price is all too likely to end up humiliated and hurt, both emotionally and physically.
You may think it's mutual, but if you don't know or care about the other person, you are all too likely mistaken. Being blind to possibly hurting another human being in their most intimate places doesn't seem like a good idea to me.
75
Susan: This is not about me and it's very rude of you to make assumptions. I am blissfully married 30 years. I am incredibly lucky. But what about people who do not have love right now, or ever?
You're saying that for them, paying for sex is okay, but two people having sex for free, simply because they enjoy it, is not okay? You're saying that enjoying sex for its own sake is by definition a man "degrading" a woman and/or a woman foolishly setting herself up for humiliation? Is this 1865?
Surely the fight against sexual assault isn't being fought so that we can return to Victorian notions about love and sex.
6
You are entitled to your beliefs, but they don't apply to everyone.
Women (and girls) would hopefully love/like/appreciate themselves before they give themselves away. The idea of mutual giving is largely absent from media-driven sexuality. As wholly owned subsidiaries of marketing - which lacks a third dimension and is driven by hair and makeup and manipulation - we strive for the impossible and miss the wonder and difficulty of reaching for real value in the touchable breatheable smellable world (both positive and sometimes negative).
I know there are some who would sneer at this, but how's about getting to know each other and finding out if you like each other before you get naked and indulge in the vast and varied pleasures of intimacy? It's both safer and more fun.
Thanks to Maureen Dowd for bringing up internet porn. The idea that a girl or woman should strive to satisfy a man who thinks a woman is an object to give him his ya-yas and doesn't want to get to know her and find out what gives her pleasure is deeply wrong. He's missing out on a whole world of fun.
There's wonder and adventure in them thar hills, and porn is an excellent way to shut and lock the gate.
Women/girls, if you wish to empower yourself, learn to say no, and don't put yourself in ambiguous situations. And if you have to drink to enjoy yourself, think about that. What is the point? It's dangerous and degrading to let that drive you. Put yourself in charge of your body and damn the critics!
373
Excellent points. An infant and child's natural boundaries should be respected. And parents should take care not to force a child to accept another adult's touch, holding or kisses. This way their outer world reinforces their internal sense of what feels good and what doesn't and is uncomfortable. People who know this as adults won't sacrifice and abandon themselves to alcohol and a bid for instant intimacy. They are more attuned to when they don't feel comfortable and have learned to honor that.
11
Susan,
One word, “Chappaquiddick” not much has changed in fifty years no matter what you say!
5
Maureen, I hate to break the news to you, but once you reach a certain age, you're increasingly unlikely to physically connect with a person who you're sexually attracted to (unless you're apparently a millionaire or billionaire). The aging process has that impact - at least in my experience. Luckily there are other reason for people opt for sexual intimacy.
As to why young women are settling for hooking up with men, it's a mystery to me - but I've always been the type who puts emotional connection ahead of physical connection (which I acknowledge is unusual for a man). And emotional connection takes time, effort, carries risks, and can lead to rejection.
I agree that it's problematic for women to today be mirroring men's' characteristic casualness towards sex. Sex, at its best, can be so much more than a race to hormonal exhaustion - namely, the glue that binds two psyches together, for better or for worse, as the phrase goes.
Lust is there to insure the continuation of the species; but in my experience, when you put the cart before the horse, you can easily end up becoming a horse's backside.
Maureen, I would argue that this is one of those areas where our entertainment-centric culture is failing us. We've banished all the all old authorities and have young people instead learning life lessons from movies and films - whose goal is make a buck, by any means necessary, not initiate the next generations into adulthood.
Perhaps we need authorities?
80
Obviously, in my next to last paragraph, I should have typed "we have young people instead learning life lessons from television and films".
Also, in my concluding line, I mean to type:
"Perhaps we need new authorities?"
Someday my edit button will come...
53
What a depressing article. What it tells me is that that female sexual self-esteem is as elusive now as it ever was.
In fact, maybe even more so. When even Stormy Daniels, a professional, feels she has to have sex because it was her fault for going to Trump's room in the first place, how are adolescents supposed to cope?
What's gone missing is the old fashioned art of getting to know someone before jumping in the sack.
At the very least, it might give you a chance to see if you like someone enough to see him again, let alone have sex with him.
And unless racking up scalps is your thing, online dating apps don't seem to have improved intimacy much. I don't care how evolved we are, biology still plays a huge role in how men and women interpret their connections.
Coles gets it right: when so little time and thought go into hooking up and sex becomes transactional (paid or not), it's "dreary."
320
So well summarized. Agree with all your points, except that Stormy was 27 at the time of her encounter with Trump, a 60 year-old powerful billionaire who is rumored (if the "Fire and Fury" anecdote is true) to have had paid for sex with hundreds of women. She was put in a difficult situation with the possibility of a chance to be on TV (a career booster) dangled over her head. There's also the fact that Trump was insisting on having unprotected sex--which could have put his wife and new-born son at risk of getting STDs.
28
Ann
Perhaps Stormy was at more risk of getting STD’s from Trump. My understandings is the porn industry has certain standards to uphold. Trump, apparently not.
1
it's pretty clear that the woman who performs as Stormy Daniels went to a publicity event looking for opportunity, and subsequently went to the hotel room of a rich man who was star and producer of a tawdry but successful TV program, simply in order to get a part on that program... or what used to be called the casting couch.
"Daniels" did not need to be physically attracted to Mr. Trump to have sex with him; she was attracted to what she hoped he would do for her professionally. and she had already made a career of using her body to make money.
they deserve each other!
9
Online dating apps reduce people to pixels that can be viewed and swiped away in a matter of seconds. The hookup culture it has spawned also makes actual encounters ephemeral, and real intimacy very unlikely. And while social media and texting have made instant communication easy, they have reduced people’s attention spans and made face-to-face interaction more difficult. My two cents: Turn off your smart phone, pursue things that interest you, and spend time out in the real world. You never know who you might meet along the way...
187
“Why would a woman go home with a man, decide she’s not attracted to him but have sex with him anyway?”
A) She’s about as smart as a bag of hammers;
B) He has a LOT of money;
C) He has something to offer besides money;
D) She’s doesn’t regard sex as all that important, so the mistake doesn’t strike her as life-ending; or
E) Who cares?
Maureen is one of the more sophisticated among pundits liberati OR illuminati that I read: SURELY she doesn’t take seriously Stormy’s assertion that she didn’t know why she had sex with Trump, a man whom she didn’t find attractive and who asked to be spanked besides. The truth is plain: B) and C). Our Stormy NEVER loses sight of who and what she is, where she is and why she’s there.
“I had it coming for making a bad decision for going to someone’s room alone.” Hahahahahaha! How ELSE does Stormy meet men?
Could there be anything more appropriate to a nation whose CONSERVATIVES appear emotionally whipped and whose liberals (Labourites, actually) are flirting with PUBLIC anti-Semitism than a “loneliness minister”? The British Parliament is becoming more an Eddie Izzard institution than the U.S. Congress.
This column implies that single women, at least those not hiding under a chador, need to consider slitting their wrists. For those who ARE hiding under chadors, move to an English-speaking country and learn to live the dream. THEN slit your wrists.
And, heavens, when was great sex ever “free”?
Consider growing up and becoming real humans.
40
Your cynical dismissal of the possibility of life-enhancing interactions between the sexes says more about you than about the subject of this article. You've used this to misrepresent several other issues that are not germane as well.
For an honest review of the attacks on Corbyn and the state of the UK, try this. As the author says, anti-Semitism gets worse the further right you go. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/06/opinion/anti-semitism-britain-labour-...
Stormy Daniels is a professional, and she seems remarkably free of complexity. Her life outside of that appears to be admirable. Since nice women that Trump bullies seem unable to fight back, I'm glad she's able to tackle his vileness.
Chadors? Really? Check out local hospitals and nursing homes where you will find many muslims caring for us all. All the Abrahamic religious texts have nasty stuff in them if you look hard enough. Certainly there appears not to be a single public follower of Christ, as described by the Gospels, on the Republican side of Congress. Trump sure ain't one.
I'm sorry you've never experienced intimate and fulfilling love. Try it, you'd like it!
130
The British certainly have their problems but better an Eddie Izzard institution than a U.S. Congress inhabited by misogynists and sexual assailants, particularly on the Republican side of the aisle- and that's not even considering America's kitty-grabber in chief.
42
Thank you for getting through that Susan - RL's comments tend to put me to sleep.
"“They’re sublimating their own needs to try and please the guy. Then they realize their needs weren’t being met at all."
This reminds me of a woman's lament from the 1950s.
211
Give it to her, Mary Ann. This thing read like a cri de coeur to re-animate Sir Walter Scott -- forget about the 1950s. Thank heaven that the single women I know are a HELL of a lot sturdier than those portrayed here.
22
Richard ~ What I meant to imply was that all these decades later, women are often shortchanging themselves, not getting their needs met. We "may have come a long way" but we don't seem to have progressed far enough.
1
Richard ~ What I meant to imply was that all these decades later, many women are often still not getting what they need emotionally and/or physically. We may "have come a long way" but there is still a ways to go.
36
Dear diary,
I’ve never told anyone this. But I went to bed alone on November 8, 2016 and woke up ritually joined to a fat, orange-haired doofus. It was like a nightmare, but it turned out to be real.
I was horrified. I played no part in this sham of a ritual. It turns out that I was set up by some deplorable people who live out in the boondocks. I now find that I’m in a long-term relationship that will last at least four years. I was disgusted beyond words. But the contract had been sealed, and there was nothing I could do about it.
Since then, he’s had his way with me repeatedly. He tried to cancel my health care. When I complained he said it was for my own good, but he couldn’t tell me how that made sense.
My Hispanic friends don’t come around anymore, especially since he put a huge fence around the house. But somehow seedy looking guys with swastika tattoos find their way in. He picks fights with the neighbors. Some of them are scary people with scary weapons, but that doesn’t stop him. He provokes them just the same.
I try to talk to him, but he doesn’t hear me. He just talks about himself.
I should say that it’s not a physical relationship, which is fine with me, since I’m a guy in my late 60s. That doesn’t matter to him. It turns out that there’s a big difference between having sex and getting screwed over.
1879
Gemli, 5 stars and a gold rating.
505
Wicked good parable!
219
Wicked BAD parable!
81
A dull and insensate guy I,
No encounters easy as Pie,
One Wife I adored
With whom never bored
Our lives not awry from a lie.
Sexual encounters sans love
Like handholding, each with a glove,
Passion is in fashion
While, lovelessly trashin',
Such encounters merit a shove.
408
Love you Larry! You're the best and reading your poems makes my evening!
23
Beautiful. Thanks.
6