Photo by Flickr user kevkerkev. Used under a Creative Commons license.
In the course of farking the latest edition of the perennial "Why You're Not Married" schtick, Holly takes issue with this little tidbit from Tracey McMillan,
[Y]ou can be f**k-buddying with some dude who isn't even all that great and the next thing you know, you're totally strung out on him. And you have no idea how it happened. Oxytocin, that's how it happened. And since nature can't discriminate between marriage material and Charlie Sheen, you're going to have to start being way more selective than you are right now.
Source: The Wall St. Journal no wait, Dr. Phil Huffington Post
Holly replies
[Y]ou know what really gets me about this sort of thing? If it were true, you wouldn't have to be told about it. Falling in love after sex would be like getting thirsty on a hot day -- blatant and predictable. "Welp, now I'm in love with you" would be as everyday as "welp, now I want a nap." When someone tells you something about your own nature and it comes as a surprise, skepticism is in order.
I dunno if "nature" can distinguish between marriage material and Charlie Sheen, but I can. But wait... I'm made of nature!
Source: The Pervocracy
First of all, like men never get "strung out" on our partners, even very short-term partners...
...hey
...wait a minute!
I'm sure I was going to say something all intelligent and quirky and thoughtful-like but I've just been distracted by numerous recollections of first, second, and third-hand reality.
Quick survey time for any reader who's ever had a (biologically and/or self-identified-as) male partner:
Is it true, as McMillan implies, that only women form uncontrollably, dare I say uncomfortably deep attachments to short-term and even one-night-stand partners? Can it be that this never happens to men? Answer in comments, below.
And now quick survey time for any reader who's ever been a biologically and/or self-identified-as male:
Is it true, as McMillian implies that you've never become deeply, dare I say even goopily attached to a short term or even one-night-stand partner? Can it be this has never happened to you or another man you know? You can answer in comments as well but speaking for myself the answer is no, I've fallen embarrassingly hard for women I'd barely met.
Because, as the whole point of the oxytocin narrative is that women have it by the gallon and men only by the milliliter. And without oxytocin, why, you can barely form an attachment to your catcher's mitt let alone a full-sized, interesting-in-her-or-his-own-right human being.
And yet...
It seems to me...
That there's an awful lot of hurtin' cowboys out there. At least as many as there've been hurtin' cowgirls. And I'm pretty sure there always have been, and I'm guessing there always will.
Gee, if you can get the same thing when you've got lots of oxytocin and next to none then... maybe the oxytocin theory is a contrived piece of batshit cooked up by conservative, gender-essentialist fundamentalist cranks to explain why women shouldn't have sex except for reproduction.
Tags:
I'm VERY likely to be smitten
Submitted by Thaddeus Gregory Blanchette (not verified) on Sat, 2011-03-26 07:57.I'm VERY likely to be smitten after even one night stands. So big a problem has this been in my life that I've consciously had to distance myself from people I have had sex with if I feel I'm not ready for a relationship. If I were just to let "nature" take its course, I'd have a serious relationship with pretty much everyone I've ever slept with.
Not a good idea. Just because you have sex with someone doesn't mean you should marry them.
And I'm sure it's not just me. I'm surprised by the number of prostitutes' clients I interview who also report how "dangerous" it is to have sex with the same woman more than once "because you start to get hooked on her and thinking she's a girlfriend when she most certainly is not".
I wonder what McMillan would make of this very common male comment?
"I'm surprised by the number
Submitted by figleaf on Sat, 2011-03-26 08:44."I'm surprised by the number of prostitutes' clients I interview..."
I just don't think it's that surprising, either your own experience or the clients you've interviewed.
Instead I think it's a really great example of what they mean when they talk about "gender construction." Men know we're "supposed" to be indifferent so when we have feelings we take steps to avoid them, or cut them off, or redirect them, or whatever. And in terms of "gender narrative" when we find ourselves not meeting what we feel are social expectations we often literally *narrating* what we need to do to get "back on track." But the feelings are there! Feelings of getting too attached, which isn't supposed to be "manly." And feelings of being smothered or distracted, which isn't supposed to be "womanly." Stories about oxytocin exist not to explain our feelings but to help us conform to stereotypes -- to help men harden ourselves from and to help women succumb to *the exact same feelings.*
Thanks, Thaddeus.
fl
I guess I should rephrase
Submitted by Thaddeus Gregory Blanchette (not verified) on Sun, 2011-03-27 10:29.I guess I should rephrase that: I'm surprised by the number of male clients who are consciously aware that they are "in danger" of falling in love with a prostitute. I'm also surprised at the number of these guys who are actually SCARED of that sort of thing, as if it were the worst thing that could happen to them.
It certainly isn't the all-powerful, tighty-whitey patriarchical response to "objectified sexuality" that many people would have us believe these men are operating under. I'm surprised, basically, because at one point in time, I believed in that feminist "sexual objectification" theory which states that all prostitutes are objectified and that men turn them into sex machines. And yet, were this completely true, men wouldn't be so afraid of falling in love with pros and their wouldn't be so many pros marrying clients.
I can't claim any great
Submitted by DoctorJay (not verified) on Sat, 2011-03-26 11:53.I can't claim any great experience in the matter, having been mostly monogamous, but I'll attest to forming attachments quite easily. It didn't take full sex to do it, either. A little necking was sufficient for me.
This has led me to frame my own personal ethic, "don't sleep with someone you don't want to wake up with."
Logically, it makes sense
Submitted by Sungold (not verified) on Sat, 2011-03-26 22:25.Logically, it makes sense that if women's bodies are responsive to lower levels of testosterone than men's are (otherwise, if response was simply linear in both sexes, no woman would ever want sex!), then men might be more sensitive to oxytocin than women are. Studies have been suggestive of this, and I wrote a post in response to one that came out a couple of years ago.
Like the previous commenters, I've tended to fall hard for anyone who made skin-to-skin contact with me. More times than not, the guy reciprocated. I have a hard time believing that I, alone among women, have superpowers otherwise unknown to man. :-)
Of the four guys I've had
Submitted by ozymandias (not verified) on Sat, 2011-03-26 22:58.Of the four guys I've had causal sex with, one wanted a relationship and one was upset we'd only had "empty sex."
I have become very cautious
Submitted by Christina (not verified) on Sun, 2011-03-27 09:52.I have become very cautious about having casual sex because of the number of men who get obsessed afterwards.
Ah, good old oxytocin. You
Submitted by Pepper Lee Hales (not verified) on Sun, 2011-03-27 15:02.Ah, good old oxytocin.
You know, when I was a kid and we had purebred show dogs, we used oxytocin to induce labor or increase contractions in our dogs. That is what I knew it as for most of my life-- the birthing hormone.
We had this potent lurve drug at home! ZOMG! I had no idea we were working with such dangeroous substances. I should retroactively sue my parents for totally exposing me to hormones which ruined my ability to fall in love. They'd point out that I'm happily married, I'd point out that I can never be sure if I wouldn't be MORE married if they hadn't perpetrated this outrage on me, Mr. Lee Hales will laugh soda out through his nose, and the hurt feelings will NEVER end, all because of oxytocin.
Seriously though, I've yet to see any human oxytocin studies demonstrating a strong causal link between oxytocin and mating pair bonding. It shouldn't have to be said, but here it is anyhow:
VOLES ARE NOT PEOPLE, YO.
For so many, many reasons (I wish people whiskers were so cute, but alas!) not the least of which is that voles don't have complex culture.
The gender scripts about sex and love are ridiculous and untrue to so many people's lived experiences, including mine.
It's because of this that I think many het men for whom sex does create attachment are hurt when they find out that a het woman saying "NSA only," means exactly that. It's a straightjacket, because het men are pf course taught that they control the commitment, and that women are hungry for wedding rings at all times in all places, so it's just a mess for both het women and het men.
Feminism is what gave me the toolkit, in my pre-married casual sexing days, to set my boundaries firmly and make sure that my partners were actually really interested in NSA sex, and not really just substituting sex for affection/love/companionship, as part of a sexual ethic of not being a total horses ass.
And even with that, I still had a few partners out of many who were hurt or saddened that one night really meant one night, that fuck buddies really meant fuck buddies, and that I liked and respected them as people, but had no romantic feelings for them at all. Which is of course another example of how the patriarchy fucks us all over.
I've had a man get sticky on
Submitted by Rose (not verified) on Mon, 2011-03-28 05:46.I've had a man get sticky on me after a brief encounter, and get this - I'm in an open marriage, so he KNEW I wasn't available for more than friends-with-benefits. I'm careful to clearly state my prior commitment and expectations, but that's not always enough.
I'm a bi female and dating a
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue, 2011-03-29 15:10.I'm a bi female and dating a het guy long distance. We started getting to know each other about two months ago and about a week into getting to know each other, I came over to his house for a weekend and we fucked like bunnies. That weekend, he told me he loved me. I wasn't sure whether to believe him and honestly, didn't want to...I wasn't in love with him. I told him, slow down. Since then, we've been on the phone every day, and he's told me he loves me repeatedly. I believe him. I haven't said it back, because while I like him a lot both sexually and as a person, I don't want monogamy and am not planning out my entire future with him in mind. I just read your post from last year on the oxytocin subject and Amy the Spambot's responses, and one thing that struck me as really dumb was her contention that the only guys who want relationships are the low-testosterone ones, because this guy is sexually aggressive, hot-tempered, rough in bed, all those things associated with high testosterone. Must be an Unanswerable Riddle.
So, as a woman, I'll share my
Submitted by Shadow (not verified) on Thu, 2011-03-31 03:32.So, as a woman, I'll share my experiences.
My last boyfriend fell hard for me before we were even an 'item'. And he told me he loved me many times, when I wasn't sure I had quite that level of commitment. For me it was more a 'I really, really like you' thing. (Of course it didn't help I had feelings for somebody else at the same time).
Same thing with my first boyfriend, who would also tell me he loved me long before I felt ready to say those words.
I've even broken up with a guy once before we (read he) could form too much attachment, because I quickly realized we weren't meant to be and I didn't want him to get hurt feelings.
Hey, maybe we should make a new hypothesis; it's the lack of oxytoxin that make men fall so hard in love (while it shelters women from the same). ;)