Equitable Sex Page 4

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4.When there is a ‘sexual problem’, especially as relates to the ability to achieve orgasmic sexual release, to be solved between heterosexual partners, what has been your experience of there being a mutual desire to work that out? Has there been a willingness, by both partners, to work on sexual problems that both of them might have?

1. a.One of the major ‘stumbling blocks’ that I encounter sexually, with females, is this idea that if a woman has trouble experiencing orgasm in intercourse with a man (which is true for many women), then the problem is something they need to work on together, but if the man is having trouble experiencing orgasm via intercourse (which is true to some men, for reasons I note below), then the problem is something he needs to figure out and solve on his own.
2. b.In other words, if the problem is about her ability to experience orgasm, then the problem is socialized, but if the problem is about his ability to experience orgasm, then the problem is individualized. Many women expect men to take an active role, with their females partners, in coming up with methods to solve the problems associated with her orgasm (such as manual or oral stimulation outside of intercourse). And frankly, I have no problem with that viewpoint - I’m in fact in agreement with it. But, as an alternate strategy, when a man has difficulty achieving orgasm via intercourse, my experience has been that very few women consider that to be their ‘bailiwick’; in fact, they have very little expectation of themselves taking an active role in resolving his issue.
3. c.The ‘problem’ for men arises when a woman has birthed children, or has aged, and their vaginal walls aren’t as ‘tight’ as they were when the women either had not had children or were younger. For many males, the ability to achieve orgasm via intercourse requires a sufficient amount of ‘friction’ in contact with a female’s vaginal canal; if that canal is ‘not sufficiently tight’, then he can engage in sensuous and/or vigorous intercourse, even for extended periods of time, and still not be able to achieve orgasm. Yet, my experience has been that when I’ve noted this problem to my partners, they suddenly go ‘limp’ on the issue of mutual responsibility for mutual pleasure. They surely expect assistance with their inability to achieve orgasm via intercourse, but feel no corollary responsibility to provide that assistance to their male partners.
4. d.What women can do, if they were motivated to engage in mutual assistance, is either to engage in Kegel exercises, which could help in the strengthening of the tightness of their vaginal canal [thereby increasing the friction, for the male penis, during the sexual act], or help their male partners to achieve orgasm, outside of intercourse, via manual or oral stimulation (much as they expect that of their male partners). But my experience - and, anecdotally, that of many males with whom I spoken - is that very few women are willing to ‘take the time and effort’ to help their male partners achieve orgasm via masturbation, oral caress, or even extensive manual caresses of the partner’s penis and/or testicles. Again, it’s the double standard: it’s “your responsibility as a man to help me (the female) achieve orgasm outside of intercourse (for the majority of women who have that issue)”, but “it is not my responsibility to assist you (the male) with a similar issue”.
5.You keep using the term “responsibility” in reference to what would otherwise be considered sexual enjoyment. Why do you keep using that term? Shouldn’t people just engage in what they’re comfortable engaging in, and not be expected to be responsible for certain sexual behaviors?

1. a.First, I’m using that term because my experience has been that, if fact, females assume that I, as a male, have certain definite “responsibilities” vis-a-vis their sexual pleasure. In fact, almost every “sex manual” on the market stresses men’s responsibilities in helping women achieve sexual satisfaction and orgasm. Yet very few of them (per my reading) seem to talk about the same responsibility on the part of females for assisting males to achieve sexual satisfaction. It’s like it’s all one-way, or at least mostly so. So, if we’re going, as a culture, to stress that males should have specific behavioral responsibilities toward women on a sexual level, then I feel, for there to be equity in the sexual play, women need to have an equal amount of ‘responsibility’ for a man’s sexual pleasure, and that ‘pleasure’ should involve more than his ability to have an ejaculation.
2. b.While I would agree that people should engage in what is comfortable to them and not simply in what is demanded by their partners, my experience has been that females agree with this argument only to the extent that it factors in their limitations. They fully expect that their male partners will satisfy them sexually, in a full range of love-making behaviors, but rarely seem to accept that they should exhibit a synonymous set of behaviors toward their male partners. It’s like “it’s about personal comfort when it involves my (the female’s) comfort level, but about responsibility when it involves your (the male’s) comfort level - if you’re not comfortable with it, you ought to become so”.
3. c.Further, if heterosexual partners are to achieve equity and mutuality in their love-making, then they both need to engage in a similar level of pleasuring of their partners, to a more or less equal level of ‘work’. Because, as much as sex is play, it’s also a bit of work. In this culture, we don’t refer to men as having “performance anxiety” for no reason - we use that term because males are expected to “perform” sexually on their partners, to assist them in achieving sexual completion. If that isn’t at least to a distinct degree “work”, then one is minimizing the reality of the cultural expectation. We don’t, as a culture, often refer to females as having a synonymous “performance anxiety”. There are some distinct expectations of women - that they present themselves as sexually attractive and/or sexually available, that they achieve sufficient lubrication to allow sexual intercourse, and that, through those behaviors, assist their male partners to achieve ejaculatory release. But we rarely call that “performance anxiety” (though fixing oneself up, to be sexually attractive or available, is definitely a form of work, and needing to be sufficiently lubricated is stressful). But, my point here is that to achieve mutuality and equitable sexual play, both parties must equally be willing to engage in an extensive range of sexual pleasuring of - and with - their partners.