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An idea my wife had
If this is the wrong subreddit for this just let me know.
At dinner tonight I told my wife I had ordered "The End of Gender." She (jokingly?) said that when I was done reading it I should put it in the "Little Free Library" down the street.
I think the Little Free Libraries are pretty much everywhere now, right? Definitely in my little liberal town. My wife suggested, "What if everyone on Ovarit went out and bought a copy of "Irreversible Damage" and put them in Little Free Libraries across the country."
I don't know how feasible this is, but for anyone wanting some sneaky, passive activism - I think its a good idea! I don't think 95% of people - working mothers especially - are tuned into this stuff on twitter and social media. Might not be a bad idea to plant some seeds of doubt in all these little libraries.
Edit: I just ordered three copies of Irreversible Damage. 😇
I learned recently, here on Ovarit, that the word "prude" is derived from "prudence" meaning wisdom.
I think prudence is a perfectly good default approach to dating and living in general
Especially given that medically and psychologically, having sex with many different partners, especially partners not well-known to you, is called risky.
Yes, and it's called risky for a reason, especially for women. Just listing the most obvious risks, it puts you at high risk of rape (being forced or coerced into doing sex acts other than the ones you wanted to do), physical abuse, pregnancy, STDs, infertility (STDs can cause infertility). Oh, and murder.
"Prude" or "moral prude" was originally a moniker for those who practiced any of the trad Christian virtues of prudence, temperance or chastity (in the old-fashioned sense, where 'chastity', rather than just being a synonym for celibacy as it's often used now, was something that could be practiced in a sexually active marriage) 'to excess' according to whoever bestowed the label—not unlike "goody two shoes" today.
Also like "goody two shoes", "moral prude" was regularly thrown far beyond the ambit of those three Gawdly virtues, used to tar 'excessively upstanding' peeps as diverse as those who refused to cheat (or, more typically, to abet the cheating of others) on school exams.
Prude didn't take on a primarily sexual significance in the States until the sexual revolution of the 1960s. In the early decades of the XX century it was more likely to be used for non-drinkers, with special emphasis on young adults who weren't willing to partake of bootleg hooch during Prohibition.
I am prude too lol so many men call me "kid" but whatever I am not performing for you
I think there's a ton of people out there with unresolved sexual trauma. Hypersexuality can be a trauma response, after all.
Oh god, yes. And now the narrative of indulging further in the sexual trauma as some sort of "reclamation" or "exposure therapy" seems to be putting a lot of people's recovery in a tragic loop.
It's so clear that the only option for sex given to women is exclusively patriarchal, degrading sex, and you either learn to "reclaim it" to the thunderous applause of men's misogynistic dicks, or you have no sex at all.
Don't rely on just the options given to you by men. Women and men can both influence each other but if only one side's trying to do that, of course it skews in their favor.
Sadly women do not have the power that men do, so men don't care what they want. Men will turn to other men for advice on how to manipulate women, and throw mantrums and scream about misandry and oppression when women avoid having sex with them, instead of changing their behaviour. Meanwhile women are engulfed all their lives in an androcentric patriarchal society and are forced to adapt to men's sexuality or essentially be called selfish or asexual.
Every time I read that on reddit, it makes me want to scream
"Hey Reddit, my husband is great, but he's also an alcoholic momma's boy who never changes his underwear (minor details, just for context. Our relationship is great otherwise!).
I'm no longer interested in sex with him, what can I do to fix my libido"
"HaVe yOu cOnSiDeReD yOu MiGhT bE aSeXuAl?!?!?!?!one111!?"
Oh god, me too. I actually had an "asexual" phase because of that. The amount of societal shame and pressure women have to endure, the pestering to "look pretty" and be objectified or else shamed for being selfish and sexually neglecting the man while the man does absolutely nothing to make himself pretty and sexy, the pressure to be sexually submissive, to have every inch of your body sexualised, to perform men's shitty supremacist sexuality, porn and fetishes for them and pretend to like it so the man wouldn't feel bad and "shamed" :,( ...
Also noticing how many men were just MeMeMe on any subject of dead bedrooms. "How do I talk my wife into sex again?" "How do I manipulate her into sex?" "She says she's tired and drained, how do I continue to pester her without her going hysterical?" "How do I get blowjobs/anal/some fetish from her again?" "She used to pander to me so much and she got tired of it, and I have no idea what's wrong REDDIT HALP!!!" Zero attempts to actually figure out why the woman's libido "mysteriously" dropped or, heaven forbid, actual interest in helping her to regain it, make her comfortable, make her feel attractive, work on himself and his attractiveness etc. Nah, clearly she should just buy more lingerie and doll herself up to keep his dick hard. Gee, I wonder why straight women have so many sexual issues and the worst orgasm rates.
The worst is when the woman is pregnant /post partum. The hormonal changes alone make many women not interested in sex at all, no matter what the relationship is. Now add taking care of a baby/toddler and it's obvious why she doesn't want sex. But some of those men act entitled to it. Even a highly sexual woman in the world great relationship can lose her libido during that time and it's completely normal! But reddit acts like men will die without sex for a while
There's some stupid pseudo medical nonsense going around Instagram now called "sperm cramps" New code for blue balls. Like dumbass even if men felt pain from not Nutting for for more than 3 days or whatever you have a fucking hand. Use it instead of trying to guilt women into sex
Right, the man for sure needs to accept that the woman will be drained or go through rough spells sometimes and have other things on her mind. Which is another thing where actually prioritising helping their partner would be effective. But some of it for sure is avoidable. Sex should be fun and enjoyable for both parties, and it can be a great way to de-stress. Women just don't get to enjoy most of it due to societal dynamics.
Women just don't get to enjoy most of it due to societal dynamics.
And sometimes due to things like hormones!
Nothing to add, other than I feel you 100%. That is exactly what it's like, and it's as exhausting to read as it is to live it every day.
Avoiding sex won't lead to better sex. Especially as a way to get men to change, all it does in his eyes is confirm sex is about him, something you provide him, when you should want it the other way around.
It's not like the majority of selfish men are adamantly refusing to change no matter what. They were also engulfed all their lives in that same society, so they're acting how they think they're supposed to, and it's reinforced by enough women who either think the same or put up with it. This isn't defending anything, the point's just that there's more potential than you might think.
Still though, if you want sex to be more about you, you'll have to MAKE it about you. It's fine if he doesn't care initially: Power only comes from controlling what others desire/fear.
And even for redpill stuff or anything about what women "really" want, with most men you could dispel any of it in the blink of an eye because whatever he's talked about with other men, it's all just theory. You, standing in front of him, are reality.
Absolutely. Seems like the BDSM community is 100% comprised of these folks.
Can we get men bending over backwards to make women comfortable in sex for a change considering the extent of patriarchal trauma that they cause, instead of every other fucking woman thinking it's subversive and galaxy-brained to be into re-enacting rape, degradation, maledom and physical abuse because "it helps her cope" and "it's how she processes trauma" 🙄
There is a small sub-group of men who deeply pride themselves and brag about how good they are at giving oral to women. It's the only time I've seen a movement to please women and get brownie points for it. It's usually rappers I hear talking about it. It's a small victory.
It seems to be a surprising, unintended evolution from men priding themselves on being penetrators and impregnating women, to (after birth control came onto the scene) men priding themselves on giving women 30 orgasms with their mighty, perfect supermasculine jackhammering dicks doing sex the way REAL MEN do it, to men like...focusing on the "sexually satisfying women" part and actually priding themselves on that, independently of enforcing the proper manly patriarchal way of doing it. Huh. A very rare, unusual case of patriarchal pride evolving into accidentally giving a shit about what women like.
for some of these it really is "patriarchal pride" as you say. I've heard some of these men boast stuff like they are a sexual master and can get any woman off. But I think it is getting more accepted as a required skill needed to handle their side of it so that's good yes.
If I ever meet a woman in real life who tells me she does Rape-play, I will hold an intervention then and there. Even if I don't know her.
They've been told this can heal them.
See? You don't have to deny men their objecrifying, rapey desires! In fact, they will make you heal from the trauma! Just like how hitting yourself more with a hammer will make you heal from a concussion! Being mistreated is unavodiable for women anyways so the best you can do is either Stockholm-syndrome yourself into liking it, or make money from suffering through it for male amusement.
Can we get men bending over backwards to make women comfortable in sex for a change
Something I plan to do when I get the energy to start dating lol.
I'm not clued up on the latest research but I did vaguely hear a lot of female porn workers come from sexually abusive backgrounds.
There was some article on that in, I want to say, Harper's or maybe the Atlantic a long time ago - 20 years? A man went into the journalistic process planning to write a cool portrait of porn performers but he discovered during the interviews how nearly all of them were child sex abuse victims, which changed his perspective hella quick.
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Yes, this is very common and it's mainly advertised as some kind of sexual empowerment, especially in rap music.
Think about Sexxy Red or Bhad Bhabie (if you're familiar with Gen Z pop culture) both women were sexually abused and their overly sexual image is rooted in trauma. There is actually a video that popped up on my recommendation that talks about this (it talks about the black community and black women's sexual trauma in the rap game)
The Jezebel Stereotype: Monetizing Trauma, Brick City, Colorism & The Blind Leading the Blind: https://youtu.be/dlHMwbKX8Z8?si=yxn1QZ5weHm29eKP
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I'm around Bhad Bhabie's age
I’m the same age as her and even seeing her on Dr.Phil as a 13 year old, even I knew she had some deep issues going on. People just look at traumatised girls and think “she’s just rude and disrespectful”
She clearly had trauma, same with all these other girls like Malu Trevejo who literally made a OF the second she turned 18 like Bhad Bhabie.
I’ll never forget seeing that comment of a man saying “I’ve waited for 5 years” after Bhad Bhabie’s OF was announced less than a week after her 18th bday. This man had kids too, I clicked on his profile. 🤢🤢🤢
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I had a real dark period when I was younger that involved some really bad sexual decisions. I can look back at that girl and know exactly why she acted that way. And I know I won't ever go back to that dark place. I've emerged from my chrysalis into a pure prude and I'm happy for it. I know what safe healthy sex is and no dirty male or well meaning libfem can change that.
I had a dark period too, I’m now the biggest prude of all and I will mercilessly kink shame every degenerate on this globe
Same here. It’s hard because I felt guilty for doing it to myself, then. For excusing it to myself.
I’m sorry you went through this.
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Count me in as another of the tribe one wishes one didn't belong to. I was sexually abused by my father, who was also physically violent and sexually controlling with my mother (the latter with me, too, but not as badly), so my relationship to men suffered from that past. I consider it, in fact, a large factor in why I stayed as long as I did after my then husband declared he was "a woman in a man's body." I'm out of that now, and in a much better place. But I'm an older woman, and it's been a lifelong project to heal.
Do we really need to replay the 70s and the mixup between liberated and hypersexuality/ doing whatever men want women to do? So many people are mixing up "sex positivity" as saying yes to anything sexual with the alternative being you're backward. There's even an another attempt to revive pedophilia as an acceptable sexuality.. I think a lot of people into kink and porn actually have a problem with genuine emotional connection in sex.
Yes, yes, and yes. I came of sexual age in the 70s, in the early days of the pill, and although then "liberated" meant "having sex with men when they asked," which was bad enough, at least it didn't include the violent sexual behaviors and kinks now being peddled as "liberated."
Oh I totally hear you on that one. I think we are just starting to see the implications of a generation raised on perverted misogynistic sex on tap from the internet within their homes. What this does to developing brains I wonder. No doubt it has played some part in the surge of TIFs that's happened.
Prudence means being careful about your choices, stopping and thinking before acting. It is a strength of restraint. Being prudent is a good thing. But depraved men and their handmaidens have convinced women it's a bad thing.
Gaslighting women into thinking being a prude and/or a nag were the worst things you could be resulted in the rise of the cool girl.
All I can say is that fulfilling sex that I have had has always been with a partner I have known very well, I have never wanted to have sex on the first, second, third or fourth date. I really have to know someone well for sex. I would think many heterosexual women are the same.
I am glad I grew up Gen X before all this sex positivity bullshit started. It only benefits men who apparently will have sex with someone they hate, a dead person, a sock, an animal or a hole in the ground.
The sex positivity movement was useful to make women feel normal for having sexual desires and having joyful sex with their boyfriend/husband.
Remember that we come from a culture that used to tell women that their purity would be compromised with sex. Some older women have a difficult sex life because they feel gross and impure to have sex with their own husband.
So, sexual positivity is good. Too bad that it became highjacked by creepy men who twisted it into having sex with whoever and being "consensually" raped.
Sex is beautiful and pleasurable and fun and has been twisted into something so dark and sinister
Yeah. Ive been gaslit by a friend who insisted I was prudish because I wasn't hypersexual and engaging in hook ups like her. (Turns out she was hypersexual because of mental illnesses). No thank you. I want to have sex with a person, I want to know them and I want them to know me and have care and concern for each other before I jump into the sack. I have no interest in some transactional experience based on some pornified fantasy- it just isnt worth my time.
Or MaYbE uR dEmIsExUaL🤡
I'm not even joking. Same friend suggested I put demisexual on my dating app profile so I wont get as many men pressuring me into having sex with them. Like it needs a label or an "identity" for people to simply behave decently and see each other as human.
They'll just see it as a challenge.
Yeah. Also I'd rather not have my sexuality/ sexual behavior- which is about the most common one- straight woman- be the defining part of my identity. Theres just so many other things that are more interesting about humans, why would anyone create an identity around so flimsy a concept as demisexuality.
"demisexuality" is just a part of women. Why would we have to specify it?(Oh wait we live in a world where we have to specify a woman is cis or has a bonus hole) Cuz it's from a male pov. Men can fck a garbage bin like an automaton. Liking what their fcking is extra.
Honestly I wouldn't mind sex with no strings attached, but I literally can't imagine doing that with men without being pestered into acting "pretty" and feminine for him, having to pander to him, be oogled and objectified, having my clit completely ignored, and everything revolving around his dick etc. And that's not even getting into porn.
Same, if men could make casual sex worth my time, I'd have them lining up around the block. But all they bring is sad pp and disrespect
This is what annoys me about the current claim that women can be empowered by casual sex. Men don’t want casual sex, they want to get one over on someone. It’s not a fun dalliance, it’s a conquest. The mindset is totally different. Telling women it’s empowering like the newfangled ‘fauxminism’ does just excuses the fact that men are laughing at the women who do it.
Exactly. For casual sex to become anything more than a massive source of pain and regret, men would need to completely change their outlook and learn to prioritise women for a change (and no, learning how to manipulate women into bed is not prioritising their desires). Instead, women are portrayed as prudes, asexuals and misandrists for not wanting to have degrading, objectifying, androcentric sex for male benefit.
This is the one. They had the lie of no strings attached but there's always strings, and it's always from them. They want to hurt women it's never casual. It's always some sick power play, mind game, abuse etc. They're pathetic, empty, soulless creatures.
"hookup culture" - women really seemed to try to embrace it. Some have been brave enough to admit that it just didn't work and go against the sex poz mainstream orthodoxy.
Correct, they want a quick lay and they'll toy with your mind and emotions to get it. And a lot of them also openly admit to not being interested in pleasuring a casual partner.
So, what's in it for us 😂
I mean, you do you I guess. But even when its been with men who were taking their time with me and making sure I was turned on- the lack of emotional intimacy always made me regretful later. I just want sex with people now- not organs.
The implication of calling someone a prude is that they think sexuality is shameful and taboo. I think most of us here believe that healthy sexuality is not shameful or taboo, but hypersexuality and kink are not healthy sexuality, and that sexual encounters are much more risky for women than for men. So, while it's much better to be a "prude" than to be someone who sexualizes everything and promotes hypersexuality, being critical of hypersexuality and kink culture shouldn't be reduced to prudishness.
My cousin's baby dad cheated on his wife with her and he didn't even tell my cousin he was married until she told him she was pregnant. Not to mention this man has at least 6-8 other baby mothers (one being in a different country and he hasn't met the child from that woman yet... it's been 22 years). Think about Nick Canon, there's many men like him, who aren't even millionaires, but they are having loads of kids. I also had a friend who was raped by her porn-addicted bf. He would perform all the messed up things in the videos on my friend which left her bruised physically. Another guy I know is only a year younger than me and he loves to boast about the girls he's abused and had sex with (like bro, that's not a flex.).
There are way too many hypersexual-manwh0r3rs in today's society. I don't get why we don't normalise slvt shaming men into sexual discipline because wtf? Males need to start thinking with their brain, not their dick. It's not attractive that you're being dragged along by your dick like some kind of brainless dog on a leash.
I don't get why we don't normalise slvt shaming men into sexual discipline because wtf?
Right? The vast majority of shit and double standards women get saddled with under patriarchy is what men need. It's all just projection. Women are slut-shamed because men don't want to be the ones controlling their own urges, so women get blamed if they don't do it for them.
Gay dating is a good example of what happens when men have unlimited, willing, equally-irresponsible partners in crime: loads and loads of STDs, borderline public sex, condoms being treated as a bonus or "personal preference", pornsickness, drug use, mass loneliness and psychological issues because it turns out your fuckbuddies don't give a shit about you as a person.
I loudly slut shame men. My husband has a cousin who is a pLaYa and hooks up with a lot of women (he's actually very kind and charming) and I regularly suggest he get tested and act disgusted at him. I don't actually care and it's kind of playful but he does get embarrassed/ashamed and men do it to women all the time so whatever
It sucks too, because it seemed to have started off with the best of intentions. Releasing women from this feeling of "wrongdoing" for having a HEALTHY sex life. But my mom always said society runs on a pendulum, and can't ever seem to just find a happy medium.
Growing up as a small girl in Texas, hearing that women wouldn't die if they had sex for fun was a revelation. Maybe others didn't need "permission to be themselves" or whatever, but I did. Of course, then that goddamn ball kept swinging.
Pendula (plural): Balls. Sorry just having some fun. "Society runs on pendula."
There has only been one person I dated where the first time we had sex was the best (though still not great) and then gradually got worse, and it was with someone who regularly watched porn. It wires people's brains for novelty and objectification, so pretty much guarantees they will be terrible sexual partners.
I also am a prude by today's standards and PROUD to be. Not being a prude today means supporting all sorts of (often dangerous) depravities and perversions.
Just curious but does anyone know when "vanilla sex" being used as a pejorative term came to be? My first thought is late 80s/90s, but could be off.
I believe the term started in the 70s to differentiate between kinky sex and non-kinky sex but I don't think it started to become the put down/insult that it is now until the 90s.
I once heard on a podcast that studies have shown that married people who had fewer sexual partners before marriage actually report a better and happier sex life than those people who had many sex partners. I can't remember where I heard this but have always wondered if it is true. Does anyone have any links to research on this?
Furthermore, despite the hilaaaaaaaarious jokes about marriage being the end of sex, married couples have much, much, much more sex than any other group. Which should be a “well, duh”, really.
I had a lot of partners before my husband. I went through some traumatic things as a young woman and had low self esteem, I had a hard time saying no to men I didnt really like too.
The kinksters think their sex lives are so much better. Even though they cannot get aroused or achieve orgasm without watching depraved porn or doing weird kinky shit like strangling their partners or shoving their foot in a toaster or whatever
"shoving their foot in a toaster."
looney tunes sex
😂😂😂😂 omg now I'll never see Sylvester or Yosemite Sam the same way ever again
my safeword is poody cat
Got a real good laugh out of that at seven in the morning! LOL
Toester toasters!