The New Male Sexuality (8 page)

The clear message to men and to women is that a man showing up at a sexual event without a rock-hard penis is as inappropriate as a carpenter showing up for work without his hammer and tape measure. You simply can’t leave home without your stiff dick. Almost needless to say, these
requirements make men feel inadequate about the size and power of their penises and under a bit of pressure to have and keep erections.

MYTH 7: IF YOUR PENIS ISN’T UP TO SNUFF, WE HAVE A PILL THAT WILL TAKE CARE OF EVERYTHING

This is the newest myth, brought on by the advent of Viagra in the spring of 1998. The news was incredible: All you had to do is take a little pill and
voilà
—a man would have a great, long-lasting erection. Some thought we were on the verge of sexual nirvana.

It is true that Viagra does give many men an erection. If that is all that is wanted and if the pill works for you, it’s like magic. But Viagra does not fix most sexual problems, because being erect is hardly all there is to good sex. Viagra does not make you a good lover—or even make you want to make love—and it does not heal relationship problems.

I saw a couple in which the man was eagerly waiting for Viagra to go on sale. His wife didn’t say much until it was announced that the pill would be available soon and he said he was calling his doctor for a prescription, whereupon she announced that she would leave him if he brought the pill into the house. He was shocked and asked why. Her response: “Because, as I’ve been trying to make clear for a very long time, the problem is not that you sometimes can’t keep your erection. What’s making me crazy is that you aren’t with me in bed. Hard or soft, all you’re relating to is your penis. I want you to relate to me. Until we’ve ironed this part out, I don’t want anything to do with erection pills.”

She was right. Viagra-induced erections would not make him more present and attentive. He accepted her perspective and worked with me on being more present. With that goal achieved, their sex life improved so dramatically that he never did get the prescription filled.

Pills are tools and, like most tools, have their place. But they usually are only part of what is needed, and that’s definitely the case with sex.

Another couple had had serious relationship problems for over twenty years. Given the state of war between them, it was not surprising that the man was not getting erections. Nonetheless, in a last-ditch effort to save the marriage, they agreed he should take Viagra. But his wife wasn’t interested in sex with him even when he came into the bedroom with a full erection. More surprising to both of them was that he wasn’t interested, either. When he thought about it, he realized that when he ran into the bedroom with his erection, he was much more excited about the fact of
the erection than the possibility of having sex with his wife. It was evident that after so many years of tension and hostility, the relationship was over. Not all the king’s horses and men, not even Viagra, could make a difference.

Let us celebrate Viagra and all the other wonderful tools medical science is providing us, and let us also use them appropriately. That means thinking clearly about what they can and cannot do.

MYTH 8: SEX EQUALS INTERCOURSE

Both men and women learn that the main thing in sex is intercourse, and for most of us the two terms are synonymous. Almost all resources that deal with sex—medical books, textbooks, popular books, and articles, as well as erotic materials—treat sex and intercourse as if they were the same. Kissing, caressing, and manual and oral stimulation of genitals are all fine, but mainly as preliminaries to the ultimate: having the penis in the vagina. The very term we use to describe these other activities—
foreplay
—indicates their lowly status relative to intercourse. They are presumably important only as means to that main event.

This is silly. Since the goal of the vast majority of sexual encounters is
not
conception, there is no good reason why they have to include or end in intercourse, unless that is what the participants desire. There is no “normal” or “natural” way for sex to proceed. There are lots of possibilities, most of which do not include intercourse. These are discussed in the next chapter.

But we men continue to expect and press for intercourse. Although women in general are more likely to enjoy other aspects of sex, many of them also demand intercourse even though they may not be orgasmic with it.

Insisting on intercourse as a necessary part of sex—the only real way to go—creates a number of problems. One is that it reinforces our performance orientation and makes it difficult to enjoy other aspects of what’s going on because we’re so focused about getting to intercourse. In this way we rob ourselves of pleasure and of fully experiencing the stimulation necessary for an enjoyable sexual response.

Because intercourse requires some kind of erection (not as much as most men think, but still some hardness), making it a mandatory part of sex reinforces our anxiety about erections. And this, not surprisingly, is likely to result in erection problems.

I’m not against erections or intercourse. If it were up to me, you’d have as many and as much as you wanted. But the absolute need to have them causes lots of problems. When the penis doesn’t operate as we want it to, many of us get upset and refuse to have sex at all. If we can’t do it the “right way,” why do it at all? Should we deprive ourselves of all sexual pleasure because we can’t do sex one particular way? Does this make any sense?

Say a man is fortunate enough to have a Mercedes, a car he gets a lot of pleasure from. Then his luck changes and he has to sell the car. What would we think if he refused to drive any other car or take public transportation, saying, “If I can’t go the right way, I won’t go at all”? Wouldn’t we consider him silly or even mad? Suppose he finally came to terms with taking buses or driving another car, but his wife refused to go with him because she considered a bus or Toyota “settling for second best”? Wouldn’t we see her as a bit rigid in her thinking?

Yet when it comes to sex, people behave in these peculiar ways all the time. Some men who have trouble with erections stop having sex altogether. Others are willing to try sex but give up as soon as it’s clear they’re not going to get hard. Still others will do other things—for example, stimulate their partners by hand or mouth—but still feel terrible because they didn’t have an erection. And some women whose partners are having erection problems do the same: “I don’t want to get myself all worked up and be left hanging. To the suggestion that he could satisfy her another way, she replies: “It’s not the same. I’d rather do without.”

There’s nothing wrong with wanting a Mercedes and erections and intercourse. But there’s also a lot to be said for flexibility. In fact, it’s one of the hallmarks of maturity.

MYTH 9: A MAN SHOULD MAKE THE EARTH MOVE FOR HIS PARTNER, OR AT THE VERY LEAST KNOCK HER SOCKS OFF

It used to be that scoring was all that mattered. Any man who got a lot of sex could consider himself fulfilling the male role in the sex department. But now we are much more focused on the pleasure of our partners. You can’t consider yourself a good lover unless you give your partner an earth-shaking experience.

Here are a few examples from novels of what a man should be able to bring about. From Sidney Sheldon’s
If Tomorrow Comes:

Then Jeff rolled on top of her and was inside of her and it began again, more exciting than before, a fountain spilling over with unbearable pleasure, and Tracy thought,
Now I know. For the first time, I know
.

Sometimes it’s more than purely physical. In
Nightwalker
, the beautiful Grey has sex with Khan (who, of course, had a “large, rigid penis [that] was formidable”). This was not a one-shot affair: “He took her time after time. When she thought she could bear no more, he took her again.” And there was variety: “He was gentle, softly stroking, coaxing, his soft lips teasing, then suddenly he was again demanding, hard, plummeting the very depths of her passion.” The outcome: “She was all woman now, spirit truly touched by the earth-shaking revelations her body had revealed.… There were no words to describe the intensity of her feelings.”

But another popular author found the words: “Alix felt as if she had been thrown into a fire, felt as if her bones were melting. She had never felt such overwhelming pleasure.” Once her bones start melting, you know you’re doing it right.

If you’re in doubt, she’ll probably tell you. In a novel by Irving Wallace, a man receives the ultimate accolade from his lover: “You’re good, Ezra, very good. You’re the best I know. You’re spoiling me for all other men.” And a woman in another novel: “You’re the most man I ever had.”

In fantasyland, sex is always the best, the greatest, the most wonderful. The earth always moves. At minimum, you should be able to “give” your woman at least one and preferably several orgasms. It is now rare to view a sexual scene in a movie or read of one in a book that doesn’t include at least one per experience. Ever since Masters and Johnson’s research showed that some women are capable of multiple orgasms, expectations have soared. “One climax after another” is a common way of putting it in novels. Here’s one happy woman: “Deeper, harder, faster, until she cried out again, barely recovered from her first overwhelming orgasm before she was thrust into her second.” Any man who can’t generate at least a dozen or so orgasms in his partner is hardly worth considering.

There’s also concern about the type of orgasm women have. In fantasyland, they are quick and furious. Women have orgasms “instantaneously” or “almost before he was fully inside her,” always accompanied by screams and a thrashing of limbs. “With three violent thrusts he brought her to orgasm” is one example, as is “Within seconds they reached orgasm simultaneously.”

The equating of sex with orgasm has become so common that many
men might react with incredulity to my calling it a myth, asking, “What’s the point of sex without a climax?” What’s the point indeed? And what’s the point of dinner without dessert? Or a football game without a touchdown?

The point is simple. With or without an orgasm, with or without dessert, with or without a touchdown, the sex, dinner, and game go on. There’s interesting stuff to be had, if only you can pay attention and not get upset because it doesn’t have the ending you want.

I have nothing against orgasms. If it can happen without making everyone miserable, enjoy it. But what’s the point of twisting oneself into a pretzel in order to have an orgasm? Many men try to force their own orgasms by thrusting wildly and calling up every fantasy they can think of. Although it surprises many people when I say this, more than a few men I’ve talked to have faked orgasm. They felt bad about doing this, but they didn’t want their partners to know they didn’t come. Besides, they had no idea of how to stop the activity without an orgasm.

Men also put pressure on their partners to have quick, loud orgasms so that they, the men, will be able to feel good about themselves.
No wonder that faking orgasms on the part of women hasn’t gone out of style. Even if she has a real one, she may feel pressured to fake several more, or to make it more dramatic than it really is. What’s the point of doing this to one’s partner?

There is a point, come to think of it, understandable but still harmful. We men are obsessed with specifications and indicators. Now that women are supposed to enjoy sex—which men take to mean that we are supposed to make it enjoyable for them—how do we know they enjoyed it? We need a clear sign, and orgasm is the clearest sign we can think of.

Yet all of this is foolishness. There can be good sex that doesn’t include orgasm for either partner, that has orgasm for only one partner, that has only one orgasm for the woman, that involves less than house-shaking and bed-breaking orgasms.

One result of this myth is added pressure on a man to perform. Not only does he have to get it up and keep it up, he also has to use his tool, and everything else he has, to give his partner a mind-blowing experience. And of course no one ever tells him exactly how he’s supposed to accomplish that.

This belief has another unfortunate consequence. It can make it difficult for a man to feel good about a sexual encounter that consists solely of being pleasured by his partner. Sometimes when the woman is not in the mood and the man is, she can engage in intercourse or some other act for
his pleasure. As long as she feels good about what she’s doing and there’s no coercion, I don’t see anything wrong with this, just as I don’t see anything wrong with a man’s stimulating his partner for her satisfaction when he isn’t in the mood for something for himself. This practice can be quite helpful in a relationship where one partner wants sex more frequently than the other.

But because of the idea that sex isn’t complete unless the woman has orgasmic convulsions, many men put such activities down as “servicing” and say they aren’t interested. So the man may deprive himself of the sex he could have had and feels frustrated, annoyed, or angry. The woman is also in a bad place. What she was able and willing to provide isn’t good enough, and now she’s got an upset partner. Should she just accept that, or should she try to force feelings that aren’t there or even fake them? This kind of stuff does not make for happy relationships.

MYTH 10: GOOD SEX IS SPONTANEOUS, WITH NO PLANNING AND NO TALKING

Fantasyland sex is spontaneous. People get turned on to each other and one thing leads to another, as we like to say. Of course, one or both partners may have been thinking about sex beforehand, hoping for it, anticipating it. And the partners may hint, flirt, tease, and seduce. But apparently it’s not okay to talk openly and plan together for sex.

A quote from best-selling author Jackie Collins illustrates part of this myth. A man and woman who don’t know each other and who have barely exchanged a dozen words start having sex: “There was nothing awkward about their lovemaking. He entered her smoothly and she moved with him as if they had been together many times before. Instinctively she knew his rhythm and he knew hers.” Isn’t that nice? Nothing was awkward, and each “instinctively” knew the other’s rhythm and presumably desires as well. Just like in real life, right? Later, as the man recalls the experience, he thinks this: “No corny lines or bullshit. Just wonderfully uninhibited silent sex.” The message is clear: Discussing sex, or even getting to know one another—all this is “corny lines or bullshit.” Only silent sex is real and meaningful.