Photo "Warm Embrace" by Flickr user Zach Slootsky. Used under a Creative Commons license.

While meditating on the notion of "ownership" in relationships (as in "my partner" or "be mine, valentine," or "one way / or another / I'm gonna getcha, getcha, getcha, getcha") Emily Nagoski says of the construction as it relates to heterosexuality in particular

...another predisposing factor, I think, is the nature of penetrative intercourse. Putting, say, your penis in someone else’s vagina… I mean, I can see how that’s like staking a claim, marking territory, like planting your flag on the moon. Add that to the nature of attachment and it doesn’t surprise me that our culture has generated a narrative of ownership in sex.

Source: Sex Nerd

I guess “staking your claim” works for penises and possession. Even though penises aren’t actual “stakes” at all. But “pocketing your prize” would work for vaginas and possession. Even though vaginas too are only “pockets” in the metaphorical sense.

So it’s funny how we easily we grasp the former but not the latter metaphor for sex.

Anyway, perhaps speaking only for myself, to the extent there's a moment of “possession” it has nothing to do with genitals.

It happens when I put my arms around a partner and pull her close… and she lets me. That can happen as easily on a ballroom floor as in the bedroom.

By the time we get to blending penises and vaginas, or even just lips and tongues, it’s no longer about the property it’s about the deed.

I strongly recommend looking at sex that way.  Particularly heterosexual intercourse.  We already tend to overload sex with so much other meaning.  Why load it down with ownership as well?!?!

Ok, so I feel really uncomfortable going here because it takes me back to when I was, like, a horny 17-year-old boy… and because it’s about fashion, which is always sort of a loaded issue but…

In a very cool post on body/mass indexes, working out vs. dieting, and standards of attraction Amanda Marcotte over at Pandagon said

“...a lot of women polled still found women like Alba attractive, but 41% said that muscles are never attractive on women. 72% said they don’t think men find muscles on women attractive, and 77% said that they don’t think women find them attractive.”

Read the rest of her excellent post here.

S’cuse me but… this is going to sound like male privilege out the wazoo or something (I promise it’s not) but… but… who gives a crap what women think other women should look like?!?

I ask because it’s certainly the case that women appear to care hugely more about how other women look than men do. And also appear to care hugely more about how other women think they look than how men think they look.

If I was an MRA or something I’d snuffle about how it’s so unfair that Teh Feminists blame men for forcing women into unhealthy diets, uncomfortable shoes, entire toxic waste dumps full of cosmetics and hair products and (worst of all in my opinion anyway) clothes without pockets that… cost two to five times as much to purchase as men’s and two to ten times as much to (dry!) clean. When, as this survey shows, women are full of the harsh towards other women.

Of course I’m not an MRA so I’ll go with stuff Hegel, or Naomi Wolfe, or Susie Orbach and say something about the feminine beauty trap which, like the corresponding masculine worthiness trap is a product of our self-criticism and self-policing in the face of our gendered expectations. And that is sure seems like there’s sort of the opposite of that stupid joke about bears and running shoes where we tell ourselves if we’re going to get the man/woman/whatever of our dreams we can’t just meet the typical non-gendered threshhold of attractiveness to the opposite gender and instead perceive that we have to beat everyone else who might also be interested in them. With the result that we’re more acutely attuned to the nuances of… whatever gender trap is assigned to us than members of the opposite sex are ever likely to be…

...with the result that, ironically, we’re likely to be more judgmental of, and have higher standards for, ourselves and our peers than the prospective partners we’re allegedly competing for. Which is why I think it’s an escalating trap. To the point that, say, women can wind up saying things like “don’t kiss me I just did my hair” and men say things like “I can’t come home now, I’m not earning enough to keep you happy” that are objectively dumb but subjectively make perfect sense to them.

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But what I really wanted to say was I think it’s weird that the report would gather statistics on whether other women think buff women are unattractive. Which goes back, I think, to me being gender, and probably cis- and all kinds of other privileged after all. Because when I hear “women are” attractive/unattractive/whatever I automatically append “to men.” As if that was the only criteria that matters. And I’m not sure it’s a good excuse that that really is supposed to be what the whole attractiveness industry is predicated on.

And now after saying that I’m going to add that I think 77% of women are out of their minds if they don’t think men think muscles on women are attractive. It’s as dumb as saying 77% of men think women aren’t interested in men who don’t have… I dunno… high-paying jobs or something. Because I’m pretty sure a heck of a lot fewer than 77% of men think buff women are unattractive. I mean, seriously, I don’t get it.

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One more thing: in comment #29 to Amanda’s post La Lubu said: “Women’s clothing—-outside of workout clothes—-doesn’t come in an ‘athletic’ cut the way men’s clothing does.” That part certainly is true. In the past I spent a lot of time doing pool aerobics with athletes recovering from knee, foot, and leg injuries and it’s certainly true that contemporary women’s clothes, ironically, don’t seem to “flatter” fit women’s bodies as well as they do women who aren’t as fit. Except, I guess, in the pool or at the beach.

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Things like this make you wonder who invented heterosexuality anyway? I mean, I like being heterosexual and all but wow, for something that’s supposed to be “how nature made us” we end up doing a lot of embarrassing things to ourselves and each other.

Lisa of Sociological Images, reviewing a YouTube-based ad for the Oslo Gay Festival takes a moment to rattle the stereotype that anal intercourse = gay sex.

How do gay men have sex?   Well, they must copy straight people as closely as possible.  Therefore, they must put the penis in an opening “down there.“  Ah ha!  I bet they all have anal sex all the time!  I’m sure some gay men do have anal sex, but some surely don’t, and lots of straight couples do!  I bet a lot of lesbian couples find a way to do it, too.

Read the quote in context here.

That sounds about right. Some percentage of the population, period, (don’t know how big or small but it’s some percentage) is sensorially responsive to enjoying anal stimulation. Some but, like any other random distribution, not all are gay men. But that’s not because gay men are supposed to like anal sex, it’s because gay men are part of the population. And while some of those randomly-distributed anally receptive people are gay men the rest are not. Which is where I rejoin Lisa to point out that the rest aren’t gay men. Bottom line: enjoying anal stimulation doesn’t make you gay.

Similarly some percentage of the population isn’t responsive to anal stimulation. And again I don’t know how big or small a percentage but it’s there. Some of those people are gay too. The rest aren’t. Bottom line: not enjoying anal stimulation does not make you straight.

And then there’s side B, where some percent of the population gets a kick out of playing with their partner. This too is randomly distributed. And this to does not distinguish one as gay or straight… or even male or female.

Aside: the classic illustration would be R. Mildred’s entry in the “Blowjob Wars” from a couple years ago, at the mostly-political Punkass Blog. Here’s the relevant part.

Look to the Heavens, Oh Yeh Of Little Faith, for anything that should, always, requires you sticking a digit or thumb up the guys butthole and stimulating his prostate for it be maximally pleasurable for the guy, is not supportive of the patriarchy.
...

The middle finger is the fellatio finger, never forget that, and we sex-positive, feminist, heterosexuals display it to show that we know it’s proper use.

The rest of the entry isn’t directly relevant to this post but you can read it here.

Which also introduces the third factor, one that might complicate things a bit: since potential for anal stimulation, and potential interest in stimulating, are randomly distributed some percentage of the population (I don’t know how large or small) are going to be ignorant of the possibility, and a possibly even larger percentage may be indoctrinated to believe, or may just believe due to Freudian-style memories of potty training, that it’s sick, wrong, inappropriate, painful, etc. to touch or be touched “back there.”

They might even grow up with the socially-instilled belief that this randomly distributed set of characteristics is “gay…”

With the result that gay men, operating under less social stigma and, indeed, influenced by stereotypes might be more inclined to find out if they enjoy anal stimulation and/or stimulating. But… if they’re part of the distribution then even though they might be more inclined to try it, they’re no more likely than anyone else to enjoy it. They’re just more likely to discover whether they do. Or don’t.

Point being that as with so much else about people and especially about people and sex, our stereotypes can enable inclinations or discourage them but in a way that tends to confine everybody.

Final note: Based on conversations and reading it sure sounds like gay men get that enjoyment is distributed pretty well. Straight men, for instance, are evidently far more likely to keep pushing a partner for anal sex after she’s declined. (Which, I might add, may have way more to do with men’s drive to get that all-important no-sex class-confirming “no” from his partner than with any objective difference in penile sensation.) Gay men, on the other hand, are more likely to have found out for themselves, or learned in ordinary conversation with other experienced men, that it’s great for some but not for everybody.

No wait, final final note: R. Mildred’s post also illustrates that enjoyment of anal sex isn’t only not confined to gay men, it’s also not confined to anal penetration with a penis.

Matthew Yglesias, discussing Lisa Belkin’s New York Times article on gendered task sharing, raises a perplexing issue

[T]he evidence from gay and lesbian couples does suggest that despite some specialization, you tend to get closer to 50-50 than heterosexuals do:

“Lesbian couples also have a more equal division of housework. Rothblum found that it is only heterosexual mothers who do the lion’s share of housework for the family each week — between 11 and 20 hours for her survey respondents. Lesbian parents, gay parents and heterosexual fathers all look the same on paper when it comes to cooking and cleaning — they all report doing between 6 and 10 hours a week.

Among other things, that result suggests a certain amount of “leveling down” in terms of housecleaning in gay couples with both partners acting more like a heterosexual man than like a straight woman.

Read the quote in context here.

I gotta say that’s been my first, second, and third-party experience as well. Anecdotally I’ve noticed a differential between the lesbian vs. straight moms at my children’s elementary school. I’ve also noticed that 6-10 hours a week estimate applies to non-romantic, non-parent male/male and female/female roommates too.

Point of reference though: even the difference between 6 hours and 10 hours is kind of huge. (Huge especially considering that just, say, just a one-plate difference in “time to do the dishes” tolerance means that the less tolerant person will wind up doing the dishes most of the time despite an on-paper fractional absolute “laziness” difference.)

If the number for partnered heterosexual women jumps from the same 6-10 to 11-20 hours per week while her partner’s doesn’t then unless someone’s really been drinking the “whistle while you work” cool-aid then conflict is going to seem inevitable.

So anyway, what’s going on that combined chores for same-sex parenting couples add up to 12-20 hours while opposite-sex couples run closer to 17-22? It can’t be as easy as “dads are deadbeats” because what would that make same-sex couples?

It could be as easy as “dads are patriarchal slave-drivers” who demand that their hetero spouses kick in an extra 5-10 hours a week more than they would for a same-sex spouse. It could be that same-sex partners tend to live in smaller houses, or condos or apartments and so there’s just less work overall. It could be that decades of indoctrination with Barbies and E.Z. Bake Ovens, plus maybe Martha Stewart’s “good things” mentality, holds hetero women to higher (possibly self-imposed) standards than their gay or lesbian counterparts. It could be that compared to gay men and lesbian women straight men start generating a lot more tasks that they then refuse to take responsibility for. It could be this or it could be that but while there’s no question that there’s something going on, I don’t know what it is, and even after years and years of discussion I still haven’t heard of a non-guess/non-theory explanation.

And by the way speculation like this doesn’t help either.

[O]ne parent — almost always the wife — has parenting or housekeeping standards that the other cannot (or will not) meet. Dad dresses the children wrong and diapers them wrong and sends inadequate thank-you notes and leaves the house a mess. This may look like a cranky power struggle, Deutsch [Francine M. Deutsch, a psychology professor at Mount Holyoke and the author of “Halving It All: How Equally Shared Parenting Works.” —fl] says, but the dynamic, which sociologists call “gatekeeping,” also reflects social pressures.

Women, she says, know that the world is watching and judging. If the toddler’s clothes don’t match, if the thank-you notes don’t get written, if the house is a shambles, it is seen as her fault, making her overly invested in the outcome. Many women will also admit to the frisson of superiority, of a particular form of gratification, when they are the more competent parent, the one who can better soothe the tears in the middle of the night.

Source: Belkin’s NYT article.

But that doesn’t particularly make sense given that you’d expect lesbian parents to both be affected if it was external judgment or a matter of one-upping each other, and if that was it you’d expect to see a bigger disparity between chores done in lesbian households compared to gay households.

So…?