Sometimes--way too often--I think "I should go have sex with someone, so I'll have some juicy content for the blog."
Unfortunately for you, about a minute after that the common sense kicks in.
(I guess I could just read articles or something, but eh. Articles.)
EDIT: Here's some content, courtesy of Eurosabra on this post, and I'm not saying anything mean-spirited, I'm just quoting, so don't go rashly assuming I don't agree with him:
I am going to go with the snark and say that the average straight vanilla man *already* experiences femdom, with the woman deciding when, and where, and under what prior conditions of relationship expectations (or not), dating expectations (or not), etc. etc. I don't know if I'm seeing a gendered power relationship that ONLY reflects the educated Euro-American middle classes, but in my reality women are always negotiating only exactly the type of sex they want, with the men they want, utopia is already here, and I stop before this gets into the TMI zone.
Not long ago I would have agreed with wholeheartedly. But that was before I found I was unintentionally misleading a woman, and absent that mindset I might have noticed earlier.
ReplyDeleteEvery gender assumes someone else has it easier.
Bruno - Oy. I think Euro's statement only makes the faintest sense when you replace "woman" with "attractive woman"--I think a lot of guys who complain about women being unavailable are 4s setting their sights on 9s.
ReplyDelete(Not that overreaching doesn't go both ways; I'll freely admit that I've drooled over rock-hard abs quite a few more times than I've gone to the gym myself.)
Well, that and for chrissake, he seems to feel "dominated" by the fact that women have a choice at all. "...always negotiating only exactly the type of sex they want, with the men they want..." Oh noes, the womans aren't having sex with people they don't want to have sex with, NOES.
Holly, I guess that is one of the occupational hazards of being a sex blogger. As with all occupational hazards, risk can be minimized by use of proper protective equipment, common sense, and good pornography. (I once saw (for sale) a pair of panties with 'I'm blogging this' printed across the crotch'. Do you own such a pair?)
ReplyDeleteIn a some sort of tangent to Euro, there is a book called 'Self Made Man' about a woman who spends a year living (in drag) as a straight man. Some of it is quite interesting, particularly the section where he/she tries out dating straight women. The authors impression was that women seem to bring an awful lot of unfair baggage into the start of a dating relationship. But most of them slept with him (her) anyway.
I was never any good at dating anyway.
Ah, Holly, I keep failing to remind you you, my backstory means that "sex" for me is a torrid, delicate negotiation of the capacities of non-standard bodies. EXTREMELY non-standard bodies. As in "suicide bomber@shopping mall" body mod.
ReplyDeleteSuffice to say that things are slow right now, and Sabra is busy only on paper, meeting for dinner and a movie, and the long, slow approach to intimacy is impressing me with how completely women call the dance and set the pace of the steps. I think the last time I played with anyone was Thanksgiving. Most of that delay is because of the emotional delicacy involved in the process of becoming more intimate with someone I've known as a friend for years. So I'd be remiss if not noting how this personal relationship pattern of mine complicates things.
And the "4s who want 9s" problem? Please, not in my world. Women who wanted me were content to passively signal, women who didn't were in my face about my approaches, and the end result was a tremendous discontent among the masses. And as a man, I am always facing the challenge of initiating intimacy.
I think you really, really don't get the fact that for some of us getting laid is a very delicate and fraught process, even among people who want sex.
Euro - I know this is personal but you allude to it often enough that I feel okay asking--are you missing a face or something? Do you have some sort of major visible disability? Because honestly that would make your posting make a lot more sense (although it wouldn't explain why you generalize your experiences to all men).
ReplyDelete(I'm going to work now so don't take it personal if I don't respond until about 7 PM)
Holly,
ReplyDeleteI have a pretty extreme thoracic kyphosis, both naturally and from the repairs after the bombings. It's pretty noticeable but doesn't affect my movement. Not nice in a culture where "Nôtre Dame de Paris" is people's basic text on this type of disability.
Most of my partners have been women who were in some way "non-standard", although a few have been nerds of normal physical ability.
Being extremely clingy for a very long time didn't help, either.
women are always negotiating only exactly the type of sex they want, with the men they want
ReplyDeleteNot to be daft, but isn't that what everyone is doing?? Both men and women? I mean, I can't speak for anyone else, but I've never personally gone out with anyone unless I thought I was interested. And who the hell wants to have sex they don't like?!
Frankly what strikes me, is that this Euro person seems to only really want someone to fuck, but is fishing in the 'dating/relationship' pool. If all you want is sex, then get a fuck buddy, not a girlfriend.
Seeing the 'getting to know you' phase of a relationship - the part I always found the most fun and carefree - as a careful, delicate ordeal, like negotiating with a crazed person holding a baby over a ledge, seems somehow wrong... I mean, this 'negotiating goes both ways. It's a time where you decide wether or not you like each other well enough to do other things together. Maybe it's becuase I'm a woman, but both parties are fully capable and apt to pull out.
Melissa: If his previous comments are any indication, he IS just looking for someone to fuck, he's just mad it's not easier.
ReplyDeleteBecause there's no slut-shaming there, in that remark, is there? "Mad that it's not easier.." Sheesh.
ReplyDeleteGranted that 90% of my problems come from NOT recognizing when women were interested, if any of the ones in my past had been empowered enough to, say, take my hand, my life would have been radically different. However, for various reasons, they couldn't, most of which were perfectly reasonable and due to being ciswomen in a patriarchy.
And, well, my experience is that "Friends with Benefits" is even harder to negotiate than a relationship, precisely *because* of the burden of slut-shaming. And I tend towards relationship-stuff with FWBs anyway.
"Niche dating" is harder than you think. For whatever reason, now I'm *rarely* seen as an object of desire, except by women with whom I go through that long-drawn-out process. Whereas *before* the incidents, I'd attract women who were too nervous, flustered, and potentially slut-shamed to DO anything about it. So even if women aren't crazy, I tend to think the Universe *is*.
Ned/Norah Vincent (in _Self-Made Man_) was pretty much sleeping with bi-curious straight women who knew he was a lesbian.
Euro - I had a hunch it was something like that...
ReplyDeleteAnyway, trust me here, it is in fact possible for a man to get laid. The trick is that instead of trying to convince [girls/the universe/me for some goddamn reason when a sane person would've left my blog long ago considering the way I and my friends talk to you] that you deserve charity sex or something, go out there and actually have something to offer women.
So you've got a screwed-up back. You still have options in life. You can be the mopey guy with the screwed-up back who comes up with elaborate justifications for why he ought to receive a Federal Sex Grant, or you can be the awesome guy people actually like (who happens to have a screwed-up back).
Let me give you an analogy here, Euro: you're going on a road trip and can only bring one friend along, but two people want to go. One of them tells you that he's hasn't been out of town in ages even though he really wants to and it's just no fair that no one will take him even though he asks everyone and at this point it just feels like the world is against him goddamit no matter what he tries. The other one is a guy who tells hilarious stories, brings along excellent music, knows all the cool roadside stops, and will howl at the moon with you over the campfire.
Who do you go with? The one who deseeeerves it, or the one who'd actually be some goddamn FUN?
Oh, and please stop using the phrase "slut-shaming" to mean "c'mon baby, don't be ashamed to have slutty sex with me!" That's gross. Likewise saying women weren't "empowered enough" to shower you with sex. Christ.
Holly,
ReplyDeleteThanks for the pep talk, it's nothing I haven't heard before, but coming from you, quite nice. In general I'm not the grumpy entitled bastard I seem, but I play one on the Internet, to a certain extent. I came here from Figleaf's blog, and (w/respect to "how you and...friends talk [to me]") consider that I'm Israeli and I comment a lot on Middle Eastern blogs. Really, you and company are sweetness and light by comparison.
Figleaf's post kind of scrambled my brains a bit because some of us went to university in the early 90s, and have been exposed to Antioch Code etc. for so long that the arguments in Friedman and Valenti's _Yes Means Yes_ seem not only intuitive, but the way things have always been. So I've been having the experience of having to ask a lot, and be turned down a lot, but also of getting a detailed discussion of boundaries, expectations, and of course explicit consent along the way. Which is fine, but leaves me a bit non-plussed, because in this utopia I'm still getting a "grass is greener" vibe. Although calling that femdom is probably not exactly fair.
If it's not to late to interject a comment, I have to say that I've noticed a lot of guys--a lot more than general media would have us believe--have this attitude. They get rejected once and are afraid to make a move on someone else.
ReplyDeleteFear of rejection stifles sex. Likewise viewing one's preferred sex as an incomprehensible monolith and trying to extract sex from them. This is true regardless of physical appearance/ability; all that changes are the players.
Sheesh. I have a sort of prisoners' game outlook on human relationships, and even I manage better than this.
Some men are experienced enough with the sort of delay requested by women because they "don't want to ruin the experience" or "rush things" that they don't resent it too much. The _Yes Means Yes_ blog had a post about raping women who were "up for it", which is apparently a common enough male practice--raping someone who likes you and trusts you enough to eventually have sex but doesn't want to have sex right then and there.
ReplyDeleteMy reading of my situation WAS completely accurate at the time: women who liked me were completely unable to do anything but passively signal, because actually telling me or touching me or anything else would have been slutty. As visibly responding to my touch in public would have been. So I had to get them in private without scaring them, and then start touching them, which is pretty difficult when you're a teenager and "I need you to say YES PLEASE SAY YES OH PLEASE PLEASE" is oozing from every pore of your body. So I've had about 15 phone conversations with ex-dates-I-never-got-with as to why I was so totally clueless at the time: "You know I wanted to, right?" NO, you never let me know.
In general, they read that as my preemptive rejection of them. Food for thought.