One, Two, Three Strikes You're Out...
Photo by Flickr user TipsterHog. Used under a Creative Commons license.
After two spurts of intercourse lasting a) 10 seconds and, 20 minutes later, b) 15 seconds with a new partner, Hedonistic Pleasureseeker proposes a much more immediate, pragmatic, and entirely non-millions-of-years-of-behavioral-evolution reason why women are less enamored inclined of totally random sex. One likely to persist even after all but the most radical, authentically *sex positive* realignments.
...the reason why Samantha on Sex and the City was such an obviously fake character: No woman with the turbocharged sex drive of a Samantha would even put up with, let alone enjoy, a series of first time sexual encounters with a string of strange men. I don’t care how good looking they are.Why? because 99% of the time with a woman a first time sexual encounter is a complete throwaway.
Relatively speaking when it comes to orgasms men come too quickly and women come too slowly. Whole societies have emerged from this one simple difference between men and women. Women make men jump through hoops for sex for a very good reason: We want to make sure a man is going to stick around long enough to make us happy, in bed and out. We also want to be sure that we still feel like letting him try.
I'll say! In my younger days I was fairly long-term partners with a woman who with pretty severe "premature ejaculation" problems -- she initiated sex as often as I would but she'd come sometimes only seconds of genital contact. And then lose all interest, falling asleep almost immediately if it was late or leaping up with renewed energy for the rest of the day if it wasn't. And no, she wasn't always like that, but she was often enough that I can totally, totally get HPS's point. Yes, it's totally cool to share that kind of headlong enthusiasm in someone else's pleasure -- seriously, it is, and I think that's often overlooked when non-heteronormatives (or extreme ones) wonder why women bother. But over time (and, I imagine, with partner after partner) it gets a little, um, one-sided.
So yeah, I can see how if the first time's virtually always a wash that you'd pretty quickly lose any enthusiasm you had for one-time-only encounters... with no further need whatsoever for post-hoc sociobiological, evolutionary psychological justifications of the status quo.
In fact, given that humans are culturally highly flexible it's more likely that biology influences culture than culture influences biology. Which is one reason I particularly liked the line "Whole societies have emerged from this one simple difference between men and women." To argue instead that the difference has been directly selected for (for instance, to somehow genetically "punish" women while simultaneously rewarding men who sleep around) seems insufficient.
In a slightly different context I've been thinking a lot about the idea of whole societies emerging from "this one simple difference" lately, particularly in terms of the extraordinary voluntary and involuntary social cooperation needed to maintain the distinction of male "prowess" but that's for another post. Instead I'll say cool post.
(Oh, you really should go read it: in the same post she's got a great rejoinder to the old line "If a man turned into a woman he'd spend all day..." It also nicely carries her argument forward.)
Only if you play by the rule that the man's ejaculation ends everything. If I'm not done, we're not done and that's why God gave you hands.
Besides, the proportion of men with premature ejaculation isn't exactly 99%.
Anyway, I'm a woman, I have had random sex a double-digit number of times, and I've rarely been disappointed. In my experience most men (especially the ones who are promiscuous/experienced themselves) are at least competent in bed. I think the reason female promiscuity is discouraged really is cultural--it's based in the desire to be certain of paternity. I think it's more likely that societies would be based on guaranteeing patrilineal inheritance than on female (or anyone's) sexual pleasure.
To be honest HPS's post comes off awfully condescending to me. For a woman, step two after the throwaway first time encounter is to 1) decide whether or not a man is trainable; and 2) if she even wants to bother. "Trainable?" Really? Unless you're doing virgins or men who've only done doormats before you, most men don't require "training."
If we ladies used “skill in bed” as the yardstick by which we measured a man’s potential, most men would never get a second chance!
Maybe her body is hard to please, but jeez, this is way too harsh. It's not my experience at all.
[Dang it all, Holly, I knew I should have added caveats besides the quick aside about a sex-positive realignment! I'm still reeling from that Cosmocking video about "1,250,444 Was to Please Your Man" from the Onion, which is the same context I think HPS's admitted-in-her-title cynicism comes from. --fl]
I think the problem is that the first time with a new partner is likely to be a "throwaway" if they're operating under the notion of "default sex" being a minimum of "foreplay," then PIV, then party's over. And honestly, his increased likelihood of an orgasm aside, it sounds like it's probably a "throwaway" for all partners.
Relatively speaking when it comes to orgasms men come too quickly and women come too slowly.
Seriously? As in, that happens enough to posit it as a general rule, rather than something that happens occasionally or if the people involved are actually trying for it? Because that hasn't been my (admittedly limited) experience at all. (And I hate that social constructions make that sound like puffery.)
I don't know much about that. They few times I had sex were all non-simultaneous oral things, so the issue never came up.
It seems to me that the upshot of your anecdote plus the linked post, is actually that human beings are sufficiently varied as to make generalisations like this impossible: some women orgasm pretty quickly (especially if they're already psyched up/excited about the idea of sex) and some don't. Some men last only a short time, while others just naturally take a while.
My own example, I take quite a long time (especially with the meds I'm currently on, but I did anyway). But when I was in my teens I was afraid that I'd be "too quick" whenever I finally got to have sex, because I was told that "men are always too quick". Being the considerate sort, I decided I could use my hands as back-up to make sure it was mutually pleasurable (as Holly points out, it's why God gave us hands!)
Is it possible that the artificial sex-scarcity of the "no-sex class" dominant paradigm, is at least partially responsible for men's tendency to clock in-and-out so quickly?
This started out as a response to JFP but it seems general enough to make it, well, a general comment. :-) I've never questioned that I have the sexiest, most thoughtful readers in the world and everyone's reactions to this post are just more proof. Also who says there's no such thing as progress? Because when I was more sexually active it wasn't considered a sure thing at all. But... let's just say that for an awful lot of people worldwide (men *and* women) the idea of *foreplay* is still fairly radical. But as you, and Holly, and SnowdropExplodes, and Nightfall make clear that world view isn't inevitable. I suppose I'd better bump up writing that post about maintaining prowess before it becomes too late too. :-) Thanks all.
I agree with Holly's excellent point. And in addition to the fact that once a man's orgasmed it doesn't mean the night is over, the author neglects to mention that it's possible to enjoy sex and want a repeat without coming at all. I've had more positive than negative random encounters-- often I came from intercourse; sometimes I didn't but had fun anyway; occasionally it simply wasn't as fun as I'd hoped. Sometimes the excitement of the situation's novelty makes first-time sex, dare I say it, better than any future sex with the same person.
[I think the tricky word here is "possible." I agree it doesn't *have* to be that way, and I strongly feel it *shouldn't* be. But for an *awful* lot of people (and not just in high FGM areas) for an awfully long time it's not been that way at all. Glad to hear if it's becoming unheard of. Thanks, Sabina. --fl]
"Relatively speaking when it comes to orgasms men come too quickly and women come too slowly."
It's still a shock to see how many people don't know the difference between orgasm and ejaculation in a man. I ejaculate every time sometimes multiple times with intercourse. Orgasm however only happens maybe once in five encounters. Even less common is for both too happen in the same encounter. Orgasm takes a lot of work and time for me.
Sounds like another case of pot and kettle, who's blacker?
[Cool personal history, Edward. Seriously. And I definitely agree on the difference between ejaculation and orgasm in men. But OEN's complaint isn't that her partner ejaculated vs. had an orgasm, it's that he did so very rapidly, twice, without (evidently) spending a lot of time attending to *her* satisfaction, as *she* defines that, in the time between. --fl]