Are women less sexual than men?

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I think women enjoy sex as much as men do, but they are less overt about it for a few reasons:

1) Slut-shaming. Unfair double standard. Men are praised for sleeping around while women are shamed for it.

2) Women want to filter out creeps and pervs. There are a portion of men who lack self-control. If women are too overt on dating apps, they'll get even more attention from the kind of guys they don't want.

3) Safety. There's a physical risk of sexual assault, especially since men tend to be bigger/heavier/stronger than women.

4) Women want sex they actually enjoy. For men, the floor and ceiling of good/bad sex is more consistent. But for women, the floor of what could go wrong is a lot lower and the ceiling, while high is rarely achieved. It's not that most women are inherently opposed to hookups; it's that the odds of them getting pleasure out of a hookup are low.

Last edited by Minervx_2 on 10 Jun 2021, 12:08 am, edited 1 time in total.

No. For sure no.

In my experience, absolutely not. But much "wisdom" regarding male/female relationships seems to assume otherwise. For example, it's generally understand that when a man and woman feel mutual attraction, it's the man who "wants sex" and the woman is expected to decide whether she should "allow" it, which implies the woman could just as soon do without. Which has never been true in my experience.

My last partner was not sexual at all.

It was 15 years ago, and she was an Evangelical Christian, so there was that.

5) Women are the ones ending up pregnant.

6) Women are much more vulnerable than men in every way during sexual activity.  Physically, of course; men are usually stronger than women anyway, and more aggressive overall.  Emotionally ... it must be devastating for a woman to realize that all the sweet-talk from her date was just an act to get her to have sex with him.  No wonder women may appear less interested in sex than men.

Love?  Hmph!
Respect?  Hah!
A male knows not these things.

// Whoops, honey I accidentally wrote an essay again.

TW : Discussion of societal shame surrounding sex, objectification, mentions of rape jokes and brief casual homophobia.

Recently, during my breaks, I have been looking into the concept of the male gaze VS the female gaze in cinema. Specifically, how male directors present female characters compared to how female directors portray male characters (as a generalisation). I find this interesting because I have an interest in cinema, as well as in human behaviour (rest assured, I am still working to do my best to pass my final year of university, but I digress).

I have seen a couple of conversations online where it has been brought to my attention that a significant amount of what we think of as traits that women find attractive in men are actually based on standards that other men have put in place based on what they think women want, and as result may perhaps be inaccurate / misleading. However, as a lesbian, I don't think I can speak with much certainty on the matter.

Yet, it does beg the question - how does attraction vary between the two predominant groups being discussed (straight women and straight men)?

I think that there are some good points that have already been brought up in this thread; practical concerns, safety, societal expectations and stigmas. The concept of women having a more emotion-based attraction is certainly not a new one. I think that there is a difference, but it is one that is often greatly exaggerated and misunderstood.

Historically, female sexuality was stigmatised and often discussed as almost non-existent - something that only existed in relation to male sexuality to please their husbands rather than as something that can exist independently from making a male partner happy. For a woman to suggest otherwise, she would have likely ended up being labelled as hysterical.

This is notable when it comes to relationships between two women, in mainstream media it is often framed under male voyeurism (for example, the line "I hope my boyfriend don't mind it" in 'I kissed a girl' by Katy Perry). Further, it is not unheard of for straight women to kiss each other to gain the attention of men. I remember finding this baffling in high school, where I knew girls who would kiss and post it on social media but then turn around and insult lesbians. When I asked about this, the explanation I received was that it was OK if it was for men.

From a young age, I was taught that how I should present myself and my actions in general should appeal to men. I was slut-shamed and sexualised despite being a late-bloomer who just wanted to avoid all that stuff. Even now I have a disturbing memory of being around 12 or 13 and going in and out consciousness at a dance show. I was sick and waiting for my parents to pick me up. There were teenage boys making jokes about rape and what they'd do to me when I fell asleep. I knew they were joking, but it still made me feel uncomfortable and my experience isn't unique. A lot of this behaviour is normalised with a 'boys will be boys' dismissal.

Even in sex-ed, I remember watching an old tape that described masturbation as something that teenage boys and men did. I remember one teenage girl going around asking the girls if anyone masturbated and shaming anyone who said yes because that was for guys. The message was clear, a sexual woman was a bad woman. Whereas, a sexual man was expected.

I think that was why it wasn't inherently obvious to me that I didn't like men at first, I thought that it was just a given that women were the fairer sex and that were we all just picking men to have a crush on because that's just what you do. Gay men were an absolute mystery to me. Even choosing to write poetry 'from a male perspective' about women because it was easier and that I 'just understand men better' was apparently not raising any questions about my supposed heterosexuality in my mind.

Then, as I got older it dawned on me that most women do in fact like men sexually. It wasn't just a decision made by women to continue the human race, but an innate drive like men have (duh). Writing this out now, I'm just laughing at how oblivious I was as young teenager.

The stakes are much, much higher for women.

In a sense I get the impression that this awareness permeates their lives, not just the risks of meeting the wrong desperate man or sociopath on the street by bad luck late at night but even consensual acts with a guy whose emotional integrity is questionable and whether he might flee the scene if the birth control doesn't work.

A) No they aren't

B) Their hormones do tend to slow down more than men's, at menopause.

7) They often have more passionate imagination than men, and can't be satisfied so they feel bored.

and

C) Let's not forget this includes lesbians and bi women.

Sometimes my parents have old 1940's films which may either be musicals or movies about musicals and so often you have ten guys flocked around a single starlet whose elevated in desirability for the audience, a focal point for their attention and being in that spot she's narrating the spirit of that stretch of the play or musical through song and dance. I see similar things where a really good jazz or neosoul band might have a really beautiful singer and they sort of funnel their energy into and around her vocals (thinking of groups like Jorja Smith band or Submotion Orchestra w/ Rubie) and - it works out pretty well as a creative focal point if the singer is genuinely good.

One anomaly I've heard mentioned with humans, and as far as I know it might be unique to us, is that sexual displays are reversed with us. What I mean is thinking of that with examples like peacocks, cuttlefish, or various kind of birds where it will be the males who are competing on the beauty of their feathers, or in the case of cuttlefish throwing raves on their skin, and the females are less flashy but they do the selection of the males based on these characteristics whereas with us, while men can have beauty, it's typically not as pronounced and not nearly as marketed to for augmentation and emphasis.

Not only are women less likely to be virgins at later ages, but they also on average have more sexual partners compared to men.

That should answer your question.

Women are not “less sexual” than men.

I’ve known some pretty libidinous post-menopausal women.

I think it depends on how you define sexual. If you refer to sexual intercourse, then women definitely are less likely to enjoy this (regardless of neurotype). Autistic women are least likely to enjoy sexual intercourse and NT men most, with NT women and autistic men being somewhere in between.

If the question refers to sexual thoughts & desires in general, then I think the answer is no.

That's probably the reason why women are less likely to enjoy sexual intercourse, regardless of the presence of contraceptives.

Not according to this

As for losing virginity at an earlier age, that does not necessarily correlate with enjoyment of sex.

I have never seen any evidence of this, except that it may be more likely for a woman to have a physical condition that makes it uncomfortable. But barring such a condition, women seem to me to enjoy it more.