How to stop the double standard

[lindahotstuff]

What is it about both guys and women with a double standard? A guy who goes out and fucks around with anyone is considered a stud. A woman who does the same thing is considered a whore.
Humans are sexual animals, and sex is about love but it is also about deep and satisfying physical pleasure. It is about being in a loving relationship, but for most guys, they can separate love and sex, and fuck someone just for fun. Now I will be the first to agree that many (most?) women, certainly in my age group, can only fuck someone with whom they are in a deep relationship. I have no problem with that.
Maybe my brain is wired differently, but I am in a great relationship. But I do like to fuck around with other guys and with women too, and it is about mutually satisfying pleasure, not about love, although I can't imagine screwing someone I didn't like, that comes first.
That is why (and this is true for my man as well) we aren't dishonest with each other. We both know that we go with other partners, and we enjoy 3/4somes (as readers of my posts will know) together as a couple.
I'd like to know how many women there are out there who are in satisfying relationships (or maybe not) but who enjoy sex with different partners for pleasure, just as men do (and what age these women are). Surely I'm not that unique!
And how do we women stop people from treating us as whores because we get turned on by a good fuck. I'd love to hear from more women like me, particularly those who are older.

 

[RuneBlade]

This goes back to a very old social standard, I think. Women aren't supposed to enjoy sex. Men can. I'll talk about my rear for a moment and say: go back far enough and you'll probably find the roots in religion.

 

[Firebrain]

Firstly, I think you need to differentiate between "whorish" behavior - liking sex, having a high sex drive, enjoying more adventurous acts - with enjoying being promiscuous. It is the promiscuity which is the big issue these days, I feel - or at least it is for me. I am 25; I imagine that if you are a little older, you will come up against more conservative peers.

For what it's worth...I enjoy being a whore. In fact I take it as a compliment. You can reclaim the term.

As for promiscuity, I'm in a monogamous marriage so it's not really relevant for me. However, I find that most people seem to equate it with low self esteem. It is worth pointing out that it can be reconciled with high self esteem, too; I love who I am and I think I deserve to do what feels good (safely, of course).

You have to be confident in these edicts. You'll stop encountering then opinions of idiots (whether they have them or not) if you are visibly and vocally comfortable in what you do.

Of course - and this is meant in the best possible way! - there is a small chance that you are conducting yourself in an indiscrete manner, and to be fair, I'd expect to take a bit of crap if you are easily making yourself someone else's business.

 

[CWatson]

Well, first off, let me point out that not everyone is able (or wants) to separate sex and love. I mean, I think we all know it intellectually, but that doesn't necessarily mean we can (or want to) live it. (I mean, I don't. I've had casual sex encounters before, and, personally, I'd rather have non-casual ones. *shrug*) So, while the attitude seems completely logical to you, it may actually be quite progressive to most people.

As to the reception you receive... Well, I think that depends largely on who you speak to. You identified, correctly, that many women your age hold themselves to sexual standards which were considered normal when you were young, but are considered conservative (or even backward) by modern standards. Well, not everyone modernizes. In that sense, coming here is a very good thing, because we're a collection of sex-positive (and, in some cases, downright perverted) people. We're the right demographic for you.


Finally, runeblade, I must be pedantic and say that no, it doesn't trace back to religion. It traces back to morality. Morality is, simply, the set of rules and relations used to make it easy (or, at least, easier) for people to live together in a close environment. Things that encourage harmony are "virtues". Things that don't are "vices". Thus, laws and religions are both extensions of morality, codifications of them. Now, how does that lead to the attitude that women should not enjoy sex? Why does that attitude have positive moral value--by which we mean, positive survival value? Well, probably because men have two heads--and half a brain. Someone had to stop the fornication, and since you couldn't count on the guy doing it, you had to train the girls. If not, your community--and remember, we're going waaaay back in human history here, to the caveman days, to a time before there were laws or religions--if not, your community would collapse under the weight of all those pregnant teenagers who are popping out more babies than the tribe can collectively deal with.

The part where it gets tricky is where the religion gets mixed in. From a utilitarian / evolutionary standpoint (the one I'm working from), a religion's purpose is to encourage moral behavior (whatever that society's or religion's definition of "moral behavior" is), generally by positing a Higher Power who can beat your ass into a pulp if you aren't good. Some religions, like the one that worships Santa Claus, have that happen in this world, while others, like Christianity, have it happen in the next. But by adding the Higher Power, religion exaggerates how good or bad an action is, because it now has twice as many repercussions: not only right now, but later too, when that Higher Power starts making his list and checking it twice. Plus, because the gods said it, it must be true and must always be true--even when situations arise to make the original rule unnecessary. For instance, birth control can today replace abstinence (and with quite a higher success rate to boot, if those abstinence-pledge campaigns are any indication). Does it not stand to reason, then, that we can now discard the previous anti-fornication rule, as long as it is replaced with an equally strict birth-control rule? (STDs notwithstanding.) A reasonable person would say, Yes. A religious person would shoot you where you stand, because The Holy Word (TM) says NO SEX, and thus NO SEX it must be, for EVAAAAR.

(Religions adapt too; they have to. They're just a lot slower about it.)

So, no, not religion. Morality. ...But, as I've just pointed out, they're practically the same thing. So I'm a nitpicker. So sue me.

 

[shiny5437]

Not religion
Not morality
Economics!

Attitudes towards sex developed precontraception so these attitudes are based around mate selection and child rearing. Since sexual activity could result in a long term commitment to a child there is a pressure on a woman to be selective in her copulations. The child benefits from having good genes and a clear parental lineage for the purpose of inheritance, social connections, etc. For the guys, they need to ensure they have sole access to a woman's fertility so that their investment of time etc results in their (and not the pool boys') genes continuing.

 

[kaycee217]

I admire people like you lindahotstuff, but you're right, there is an unfortunate double standard.

Just like Firebrain, I use the term "whore" as a compliment. Wanting sex and going after it (safely, of course) is an admirable quality.

 

[infinity706]

Honestly, I prefer slut over whore. To me, whore usually comes with prostitution, whereas sluttiness is more sex because you actually want it.

 

[emap]

It actually is religion, before christianity saved us for the most part sex was done and the woman well generally child at that point picked who she married. Look back, the only major religion to say no sex before marriage, only with your husband/wife is christianity, in europe of course. The religions of europe before that had orgies, which of course did tend to lead to not knowing who fathered that kid.

Even after the holy roman empire shoved christianity down the throat of europe there was pre marital sex, lots of it actually. Think about it, if your going to be stuck with the same man for the rest of your life, wouldn't it make sense to try what was on offer and figure out who you well wanted to share a bed with.

Didn't always work out well for her, once she goes pregnant it's a crapshoot on who will accept he's the father, much like today actually.

 

[Cattypuss]

I guess my question would be "Why does the double standard bother you?".

I behave as I want to behave. If people judge me for it that's their problem, not mine. If they judge me differently because I am a woman, again - that's their problem, not mine.

For the record, I'm 42.

 

[CWatson]

Look back, the only major religion to say no sex before marriage, only with your husband/wife is christianity, in europe of course.

Citation needed.

No, srsly: I wanna see where you got this opinion from. If you're right--and, my god, wouldn't it be awesome if you were?

 

[Eilan]

Economics!

I agree with you, but I kinda see it differently. Marrying for love is a relatively modern** concept, and women were passed from father to husband in what amounted to an economic transaction.

Even though we've loosened up in some ways, the double standard is still there. I think it always will be, unfortunately.

My own father called me a slut on Christmas Day 2001 because I dared to spend the night with my husband before we were married--never mind that I'd already been married once before and had two children at the time, so I was far from virginal. Yet my brother and his fiancée have lived together for three or four years now, and that's okay.



** by "modern," I mean in the last 200 or so years

 

[Mysty61]

I sure do have to agree with the OP there is a double standard that will not go away. When women are looked down on because they just want to fuck and enjoy it gets me very upset. I have been divorced for a long, long time and have chosen to remain single, but that does not mean my sexual desires have been turned off. It does mean I get a lot of flack for fucking around. I think this goes back to almost the beginning of time. Women needed a man to make a home, hunt, and provide security. Then it progressed to families arranging marriages, basically the woman was sold to a man who would take care of her. At some point religion came in and attached some kind of moral code to all of this. The fact that women had no control over their bodies, and was likely to have many children having more then one partner who might get her pregnant began the double standard. A man could go out and screw any woman he wanted and move on but if that woman became pregnant she became a slut/whore or whatever anyone wanted to call her. Since she had no man to take care of her and her children she was condemned. Thus the double standard. This attitude of society carried on until the time of the pill, other reliable birth control methods, and abortion. However, there were many still in society who clung to the old attitudes. Now as generations are changing so too are attitudes. However, religion continues to hold on to their old attitudes, and since many people are religious or cling to what their parents taught to them the double stand continues to hang on. I do think it is changing,as more and more people understand women can enjoy sexual activities just as men do, but it take a long long time to change 1,000's of years of thinking. We as women need to continue to put our desires out in public, talk to men, help them to see we are not sex objects, but sex partners. Make sure all conversation is positive and every time we hear someone being called a slut or whore point out that a woman who like sex is just as good as anyone else and there is no need to degrade them. The more we make positive points the more attitudes will change. Should this be necessary - no, but if it is not done the double standard will be around for much much much longer.

 

[CWatson]

I'm with you on this one, Mysty.

When did reliable--reliable, mind you--birth control first start coming into being? Condoms have been around since the 1600s, but the existence of The Pill is considered a bigger deal, having kicked off the Free Love movement and all that. That was the 60s. So my point is this: we're all used to the idea of greater sexual freedom, but it's only been about 50 years. That's not a long time, not on a societal scale, and especially not in a society like America, which is terrified of sex . But we forget that; we see the world around us, as it is right now, and have trouble imagining it any other way. It's a blindspot of the species.

There are undoubtedly people on this board who came of age before The Pill existed--back in the time, in other words, when they were still teaching women to be sex-negative, because encouraging them to be sex-positive would be even worse. Obviously, in that those Lit Boardies are on Lit, they probably don't agree... but that makes them the exceptions to the rules of their generations. Until the old, "sex-negativity is a necessary evil" mindset is finally wiped out, it's premature to assume the standards will shift. Not with living people trying to prevent it. (And let's not even talk about the post-60s people who cling to the old paradigm for religious reasons. Fortunately, the religions will shift too--or die of obsolescence. Natural Selection does not limit itself to the savannahs of Africa.)

And that's the Good News I'm here to proclaim today: eventually, it will change. Eventually. The simple fact is that, today, a sex-positive lifestyle is a positive survival trait, much more useful than the sex-negative lifestyle. But my point is, that's a new thing: technology has made it useful, has rescued it from its exile. And I believe that's enough. I believe that the human race, as a whole, keeps moving in a direction of greater wisdom and lesser stupidity. I believe that, eventually, people will catch on that we don't have to teach little girls that letting a man touch your haha is always, always bad, even if he's trying to make you preggers--I mean, some of us already have. I believe that there's hope. Things will change. We may not live to see it, but things will change.

(In other news, a double standard in the opposite direction:
("Apparently, I Write Like A Girl")

 

[RuneBlade]

If not, your community--and remember, we're going waaaay back in human history here, to the caveman days, to a time before there were laws or religions

Damn, you think the cave dudes looked down on their women for enjoying sex too? That's pretty rough. I bet the shaman got it on with multiple partners though. You betcha.

"Apparently, I Write Like A Girl"

It's the avatar. *sage nod*

 

[pplwatching]

We as women need to continue to put our desires out in public, talk to men, help them to see we are not sex objects, but sex partners.

IMHO you can not have that cake and eat it too. I have observed over the years that men who enjoy no-strings sex with women rarely consider the women to be partners. I have asked several what they think of the women who are making themselves available for sex. The answer has generally been "she's a good lay". In other words these women are encouraging men to view them as a sex objects, which runs against the grain of your post.

I think that women perceive more of a double standard than actually exists. Men who engage in promiscuous sex are not viewed in such a positive light as these posts suggest. The men in my circle of friends do not think highly of men that we know (single or married) who have a revolving bedroom door.

You are free to put your sexual desires out there, but people will always be just as free to form opinions of you.

 

[VelvetDarkness]

Master has the right to select women for us to play with and if he wanted to, he could introduce another woman as a sub or slave. I have no issue with safely practised, consensual promiscuity that is liberating but for myself, I prefer to leave these things at his discretion, as part of my service to him.

I don't have a problem with separating love and sex but like you, it has to be with someone I like as a person. Fortunately Master knows both of us well enough to select wisely. I'm not a jealous or possessive person and my journey into a Master/slave relationship has lessened my emotional need for monogamy. I will always be his and so to share him is less daunting than I imagine it would be for many people.

 

[samanthamom]

Citation needed.

No, srsly: I wanna see where you got this opinion from. If you're right--and, my god, wouldn't it be awesome if you were?

I don't have a citation for you, but well, if you did go back and study the historical roots of most of today's major religions you'd find that before Christianity infected the world, most religions, while they may not have encouraged premarital or extramarital (if there was recognized marriage at all) certainly didn't look down on it like Christianity does. The whole concept of it takes a village to raise a child is actually from some very old African proverb (no clue what tribe) but it's because at the time, the only recognized parent was the mother, and all the women and all the men contributed to raising every child.

As for the OP, I, as a woman who enjoys her slut behavior, have given up on worrying about what others think of Me. I accept who I am and that's enough.

And being a slut doesn't mean just random sex. I say random because I have a lot of casual sex with people I know very well, and love in a myriad of ways. That's casual, we do it when we can, when we want. Random is picking up the stranger at the bar who may be a sociopath and taking him or her home.

 

[HornyProf]

it is my understanding

that the sexual double standars was alive and well in pagan greece and rome. Women were to be married off early, made property of their husbands more or less (I think this changed somewhat in later roman empire) and for a woman to be adulterous.. that was really really bad. for men, not so much. Historians, feel free to correct me

The best way to correct the double standard is not go along with it! Its only a 'standard' because people agree to it. And if you are having a discussion with another person who apparently has the double standard, you can try to disabuse him or her of it.

As for love and sex.. it does sometimes go together. and having sex is to me in some ways necessarily emotional (though not necessarily loving)..

I always thought if you are going to fuck someone, you should be happy to have breakfast with them in the morning.

 

[A_Kefka]

I've been following this for a bit and thought I'd write. I think this double standard stems as much or more from attitudes about inheritance in patriarchial societies than from religious or moral views of promiscuity.

The mother of a child is never in doubt (unless you steal a kid to pass off as your own), but until recently there were no ways to know for sure who the father was. This meant the only way to make sure that it was really your child inheiriting your land, possessions, or title was to make sure the women had sex only with their husband.

A woman having a child before marriage would likely make her undesirable as a wife, therefore her and the child would be the responsibility of her father or oldest brother. A good reason for them to discourage premarital sex in the girls of the family.

 

[Cattypuss]

The mother of a child is never in doubt (unless you steal a kid to pass off as your own), but until recently there were no ways to know for sure who the father was.

This also led to practices we'd frown on today such as Pharaohs marrying their sisters.

 

[Firebrain]

A woman having a child before marriage would likely make her undesirable as a wife, therefore her and the child would be the responsibility of her father or oldest brother. A good reason for them to discourage premarital sex in the girls of the family.

And yet still, in some parts of the world, a woman who already has children is greatly desirable because it proves that she's fertile.

Damn you to hell, western world!

 

[emap]

Royalty inbreeding isn't really because of anything besides one simple thing, vanity. The royal family is god of whatever chunk of land they control, they are the final say in everything.

Not common but a king could travel his land and proclaim that this person should be dead, this woman should marry this man and so forth as he saw fit. Because of this, the royal family started to see themselves as better than the commoners, they weren't common, they were royalty. Not all of the royal family members slept with relatives, the ones that didn't kept the families viable longer than they would have if nobody went for common booty, however sleeping with a commoner and being caught was highly scandalous, to the royals of course.

 

[mythtrav16]

MT's Rant

I can't speak for the masses, being an old fuddy-duddy stuck in a young man's body, but I would just like to clarify my views on this issue.

I have no problems with women who take multiple partners if they are open about it. Women like you, lindahotstuff, who can have multiple partners, with the knowledge and blessing of your husband/bf are not doing any harm, and if you enjoy that life then that is wonderful.

My problem is with women who live that life wearing the guise of someone wanting/offering a more emotional bond. Back in my student days, I had many female friends. A few were the type who had a new lover every few days and we got on fine. Why? because I knew that they only wanted meaningless sex and they knew I was looking for love. There was no sexual tension and no judgement between us. One woman, though... Made a habit out of leading guys on, not the ones looking for a quick score, ones like me looking for something serious. She would flirt with us, not the way that the promiscuous women flirted, no... this was far more tender. She would say kind and romantic things to us, and didn't shoot us down, even though a woman as inteligent as her must've seen our interest. Then, at parties and getaways, she would suddenly be acting like one of the promiscuous women, wrapping herself around a guy who, by her own confession was a violent jerk. Why? because he was muscular, toned and (apparently) well-endowed. At one party, I ended up slumped upon the floor of a small room with two other guys whom, it turned out, she had also been leading on at the same time as myself. All three of us were in utter melancholy over the way that the girl of our dreams had suddenly become just another horny woman obsessed with big cocks.

But that door swung both ways; at another party the same woman was leading a horny guy on with obvious "do me" signals; keeping her body pressed against him, sitting on his lap whenever possible, and then suddenly she becomes all shocked and mortified when he actually wanted something to happen.

I'm not saying she was wrong for wanting to have sex with these horny guys, I'm not saying she was wrong for acting on those desires. But, IMHO, she should've been more open with this persona and taken herself off the market for guys who wanted something serious.

Women (and men) like that are the type that are immoral, because they are the ones that hurt people. Them, and of course, cheaters; people who pledge themselves to one partner, and then go and sleep with someone else while pretending to be loyal to their significant other. Very few people deserve to have their trust abused like that.

In a nutshell - so long as your sexual activities don't abuse the feelings of others, I don't believe that promiscuity is wrong. As far as I'm concerned, Men who are openly promiscuous are studs and women who are openly promiscuous are studettes. But men who abuse a sacred trust with casual sex are bastards, and women who do likewise are bitches.

Those are my rational thoughts on the matter. As for my irrational ones... I must confess that while I don't believe that studettes are immoral, there have been moments in my life when they seemed like a threating influence to society. Particularly when I've been single. It's starting to seem like casual sex is becoming more and more trendy these days, and when you're a single guy looking for love - after a while it gets a little infuriating when you can't find a girl who saves herself for something special. And I wouldn't mind betting that that's where a lot of the judgemental attidutes of prudish people (like me ) comes from. We're not angry that you don't share our values, we're just scared that one day soon we won't be able to find anyone who does share them. Mind you, when you're in a relationship, you're outlook is a lot more optimistic.

 

[Cattypuss]

It's starting to seem like casual sex is becoming more and more trendy these days, and when you're a single guy looking for love - after a while it gets a little infuriating when you can't find a girl who saves herself for something special. And I wouldn't mind betting that that's where a lot of the judgemental attidutes of prudish people (like me ) comes from. We're not angry that you don't share our values, we're just scared that one day soon we won't be able to find anyone who does share them. Mind you, when you're in a relationship, you're outlook is a lot more optimistic.

Does it matter? What about the girl who is happily promiscuous, not saving herself for anything sepcial at all, and who starts seeing a man who she realises IS something special, and settles down with him? It does happen. I've been that girl

 

[Tuomas]

Speaking of double standard, have you noticed that it's mostly the women who look down at the "whores"? Most men's opinion on girls who like sex (well, hot ones at least) is *double thumbs up* (of course, in a rather objectifying way, but that's not my point).

I'm surprised with all the women here, no one has expressed how much women don't like other women being promiscuous around their men. Note: their men. Probably because most women realize that men are dicks and have really no judgment when it comes to the possibility of sex. In fact, it was during Victorian Britain that we had the most "no-sex" attitude among the (aristocratic) population -and that was under the rule of a Queen! (Who, if the rumor is to be believed, had plenty of fun on the side as well.)

Now, it's politically expedient -and personally satisfying- for a lot of people to see this as a man-vs-woman thing and blame their particular antagonist du jour, like the people talking about "religion", the "patriarchy", "conservative values", etc. But most double standards are simply the difference between how we want the world to be, contrasted against how the world really is. "Slutty" girls -promiscuous women who are proud of it- want to have sex with whomever they please (usually with the caveat "as long as I like him", which signifies they look down on having sex with just anyone, maybe for money- being this the technical definition of "slut"), but they don't want people to have sex with with them if they don't want to. They want the world to be full of hot, appealing, willing men who will have sex with them. They do not want the real world full of average, uninteresting, unavailable men, who feel snubbed when she has sex with one, but not with the other. They don't want the real world where there are jealous girlfriends and wives, who don't approve of their men sleeping with other girls.

Thus the double standard: you want men to have sex with you, so easy men are OK. But you don't want other women muscling (err, curving?) into your turf, so easy women are not OK. I know you are thinking right now: "but I really don't care! It's a mutual, he can have sex with other girls, too! In fact, he does..." But you aren't society. Maybe it's OK with you, but it's not OK with the millions of monogamous women who feel their type of relationship is more satisfying than yours -just as you think your relationship(s) are more satisfying than theirs. You call them "backward traditionalists" while they call you "whore". *shrugs* Different strokes for different folks, but for now, the "backward traditionalists" severely outnumber you.

Since this is very politically incorrect, I should expect quite a lot of people having problem with it. If they manage to read this far

CWatson:
Unfortunately, it's hard to get citations on pre-Christian Europe, mostly because the Christian Church destroyed as much pagan knowledge they could get their hands on. I could suggest Trevelyan's "History of England" in the Anglican invasion chapters. Probably the most noted account of Pagan life would be Tacitus' Germania, and Ahmad ibn Fadlan's memoirs, both of which are extremely biased. J. F. del Giorgio wrote a book specifically on sexuality in pre-Christian Europe which is decent, but still somewhat laced with the author's opinion.

Unfortunately, though emap was somewhat exaggerating. All religions, as have striven to enforce morality and contribute to social order and civilization (though often failed miserably). While there is a general myth that pagan sexuality was full of orgies and wanton sexuality (including sexual religious rites) this is part propaganda, part wistful thinking. Movies like "The Wickerman" or popular -and again highly inaccurate- media such as "The DaVinci Code" overstate the sexuality of paganism, often pulling different ethos into one idea: conveniently adopting portions of different religions and calling it "paganism". There were lots of pre-Christian religions, and even para-Christian ones, each with different beliefs and rites. The Greco-Roman pantheon, for example, although dealing with quite a lot of sexuality (Homer's Illiad, and Ovid's Metamophosis just to quote two), make it abundantly clear that orgies and other wanton sexuality were not normal or common in pre-Christian religion. In fact, the societies described seem very much like our own in terms of sexual acceptance and promotion.

What Christianity had done, however, was severely reduce the influence and importance of women and femininity within society. Pre-Christian pantheons featured women prominently -from Athena, to Freya, to Juno- and mirrored women's position within society. Christianity -and other monotheistic religions like Judaism and Islam- features only one deity, who just happens to be male, with no room for "feminine competition" (although some lip-service is given to Mary). Thus, these religions tended to be comparatively more "patriarchal" and clashed violently in Northern Europe where women were the major component of the religion (being the centre of religious rites -for example, women called "Volvas" were thought to be able to see the future and were often consulted before major social/political and even military events). Which is why there were so many witch-burnings in northern Europe: the Church was trying to stamp out her competition. And it's why even today it's called "the Holy Mother Church".

How this ties in with sexuality is that the feminist "flower child" movement (the first movement) had a lot to do with "sexual liberation", mostly the feminist movement banded around ideas or "freedom of sex". Lots of women of the movement were "promiscuous" by the day's standard (1950's America, Victorian age Britain), and liberal sexuality has been associated with feminine power within our collective consciousness since then. Thus, when people read about pre-Christian religions and the prominent roles that women held in them, they automatically assume that there was a lot of "sexual freedom" as well. This idea gets reinforced with post-modern "paganism" such as Wicca which is basically a bunch of made-up rites and features a lot more sex than the actual pagan rituals did. From their the exaggerated vision of pre-Christian sexuality that permeates our society today.

(Sorry for the rant, I'm interested in this subject )