In the seminal book Every Young Woman’s Battle, much ado is made about the importance of being “equally yoked” in a relationship. As in, it’s important to enter into a relationship only with someone who shares your religious beliefs. I propose that there are lots of ways in which one can be “unequally yoked” (I really loathe that phrase), and that one of the most important areas of compatibility in a relationship is sexual compatibility.
It has been argued that abstaining from premarital sex is not a “huge risk” - or that while it is a risk of sorts, it’s one worth taking when all the potential benefits (what those might be remains lost on me, but I imagine it’s the usual rhetoric) are taken into consideration.
Well, I’m calling bullshit on that.
In the past, I have backed down in arguments about the importance of sex in a relationship. But whenever I’ve done that, I haven’t really believed it - I’ve just grown weary of arguing, and would rather be doing something more interesting (like fucking). What I really think is that sex is one of the most important elements in a relationship. Perhaps this is because I have been blessed (you know, blessed by the Judeo-Christian God I don’t believe in) with a libido that is mighty to behold. Guys in general talk a big game about their sex drives, but there have been several who haven’t been able to keep up with me, and have chosen to deal with their feelings of emasculation by vilifying me. (I know Dacia, for one, shares my frustration in this area.)
Let’s say you’re in a serious relationship and you’ve decided, hey, this young man (or woman) is the marryin’ kind - but you haven’t had sex yet. (We’ll leave aside for the moment the fact that that’s pretty much inconceivable to me…) So you get married and you THANK GOD that you FINALLY have an outlet for all your pent-up sexual frustration - only to find that your new spouse only wants to do it once a week whereas you want it several times a day. That’s going to cause some problems, isn’t it? And if you think that’s not a big problem, and that with the power of compromise it can be solved, you’re living blissfully in denial - and it’s going to bite you in the ass one day.
The aforementioned guys who couldn’t keep up with me? They were back in the day, and most of ‘em weren’t a counterpart in any kind of serious relationship. There’s no way I could enter into a relationship nowadays “unequally yoked” on the sexual front, since that’s usually one of the first things established. Sexual compatibility is of paramount importance to me, because sexuality is of paramount importance; it’s an integral part of who I am, and when I refer to sexuality I’m not referring only to knockin’ boots. Sexuality is as central to my being as my heartbeat, and ghatdammit, this is starting to sound all metaphysical and shit. Dacia wrote a few posts on the subject that are more eloquent and less hippie-woo-woo, so just go search her archives. It’s already taken me over an hour to write this, since my hellacious libido keeps distracting me with other matters at hand.
Update: Post has been updated with relevant picture of coincidental bus stop ad, courtesy of the GDBF’s camera phone (the picture, not the bus stop ad).
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47 Responses to "Attack of the Ferocious Libido!!1!"
I’m not sure whose comments in that discussion you’re summarizing as “what has been argued”, because I don’t think any of us argued that then.
One thing:
You point out that you think sex is one of the most important elements in a relationship. You then go on to say that you believe you believe this because of your own strong sex drive. You then propose a hypothetical about what might happen to your reader, based on different desires for sexual frequency, and write this is going to cause problems, big problems that will not be solved through compromise, and the reader who thinks compromise works is in denial. The reader’s ass will be bitten.
How is this not an argument that assumes whatever is true and working with yourself must also be true and working for everyone else?
Charles,
It’s common sense that if one person wants ass once a week and one wants it six times per day, that both people are going to be pissed off. And if there’s a way to find that out without making with the fucking and the cumming before marriage, I’d be interested to hear what it is.
As for who’s side of the argument I was referring to: example, example, example.
Are you intentionally misreading my post? I know you are more intelligent than this, Charles. I never argued that sex is one of the most important things in a relationship in a “if you’re not fucking 5 times a day then you have an unhealthy relationship” kind of way. I argued that sexual compatibility is highly important. If you want sex 2 or 3 times a week, it would behoove you to find a partner who desires a comparable frequency (as with anything in a relationship). Likewise if you want it 5 times a day or 5 times a month. I used my own sex drive as an example - and I could have done so just as easily even if I weren’t such an obscenely flaming hornball. For example, in that case I could say, “Yeah, I like sex, but I don’t want to do it every day, and it really annoys me when my goddamn boyfriend won’t stop climbing all over me when I’m not in the mood!”
I was going to call you out on your lovely skills as a historical revisionist, but Charles already did it (and in a nicer way than I’m capable of) so I won’t. And that’s all you’ll get from me, since long ago we established the fact that you don’t actually want debate on your blog.
Later.
Just a point of clarification: That supposed “example” from me in which I deny the “huge risk” factor of waiting…
I was talking, within that example, about the absurd proposition that complete physical incompatibilities occur with the frequency you cite. But, of course, you have your 15 or whatever case studies and that far outweighs Kinsey, Masters and Johnson, and all those who have come after them, and their thousands of cases.
I just realized how hilarious this is coming from you right after you misinterpret or misquote or misunderstand or misread my own post on Ep’s blog. Awesome.
Nice, Russ. Passive-aggressively attempt to bait me, and leave.
Next!
Not so much passive, really.
Anyway, I actually wanted to apologize for the cheap shots. I shouldn’t have put up the first comment at all and the secondary comments should have just clarified my comment on Ep’s blog that you cite without the extraneous barbs. So, I apologize.
To be clear - I never cited (unless you can point it out to me) any “frequency” with which physical incompatibilities exist. Furthermore, I stated on more than one occasion in the thread on Ep’s blog that the research of Masters and Johnson, et al obviously far outweighs any anecdotal evidence of my own. However, my point was that when physical incompatibilities do occur, it is a problem for the people involved and of no concern to them that they are in the minority percentile. I suggested that finding this out ahead of time would be beneficial.
Rusty, if it is common sense that differences in desire for frequency of sex result in people being pissed off, so much the worse for common sense, insofar as my earlier point in the conversation linked by Amber is concerned. If the situation you present is one framed within the context of marriage, becoming pissed off, while empirically and obviously it does happen, I don’t take to be a sign of sexual incompatibility. I don’t agree with the line of thinking that feels comfortable reducing the sexual to the function of genitals and organs, or approximating the sexual by those. In this sense, I respectfully disagree with both my friends Amber and Russ, while recognizing the differences they share with one another.
Amber, I don’t see that any of the three examples cited are accurately or charitably summed up as suggesting that sexuality in marriage is a risk worth taking for all the other benefits. valeko, for example, I take as challenging the idea that sexual incompatibility is really so disastrous as to erase the amount of relating accomplished apart from the acts of sexuality. Russ I take as agreeing with the claim that a risk is there, but disagreeing that no amount of effort and counseling and communication can overcome all sexual difficulties. Dan I take as making the argument that retroactive judgments are made about the sexual experiences on the basis of a failure to properly be engaged through the sexual experience with the other person, made so as to selectively reduce those experiences in a way favorable to maintaining the wish to end the relationship and keep intact one’s lack of engagement with the other. Russ and Dan, while Christian, are nowhere near making arguments that match “the usual rhetoric”: Dan’s rather explicit indifference to the moral question of obvious fornication (as opposed to adultery) connected with his Continental language of the Other reveals just how much he is not using the usual rhetoric; Russ’s open acknowledgement of his semi-strict behaviorism along with his equalizing of sexual education between the one and the many is very much abhorrent to those who use the usual rhetoric; and to consider valeko in league with the usual rhetoricians—uniformly conservative Christians—is an injustice to valeko’s own considered and principled stands concerning sexuality that he has been expanding upon for many months in these online conversations.
I think you are free to call bullshit on whatever you want, but bullshit is not homogenous in smell, shape, taste, touch, and constitution. Some shit is effective for fertilizer and growing beautiful earth.
Now, I read your entry as laying down the point that sexual incompatibilities are significant and destructive to relationships. I am in no way disagreeing with this, Amber: there are likely many empirical tests revealing numerous ex-lovers who cite differences in sexual desire as high in their lists of reasons for ending their relationships. But, my thought in reading how you go about bringing your point home is that you make the assumption that anybody who does not consider such a problem a “big problem” is in denial, particularly when they think of the problem as solvable through some form of compromise. Why is it a big problem? Because of how, for you, sexuality is not simply the compatibility of genitals, but it is as ‘central to your being as your heartbeat’. And, as you reiterated here, you’re talking about sexuality as the matching of interests: as being yoked equally with regard to the intensity, the performances, the physicality, the lived situation of sexuality. The intention of my question was not to question the specifics of how you are making your sexual relationship work, but to question the very ways in which you judge and standardize your sexual experiences. I apologize that my question was misleading what it is asking.
But it may very well be the case—as oftentimes it’s been argued against “the usual rhetoric” in your comments—that people are different, and different to such an extent that predicting how things are going to turn out can become very difficult, or impossible (”You just don’t know until …”). In this respect, why should we remove from consideration such a woman as one who has a strong sexual intensity in her, but finds no problem whatsoever in having a partner who has very little to none? Why is she a categorical impossibility, as if there is no such woman or man who regards entering into a serious relationship as also maintaining a place of deference to the wish of the beloved? Why should we automatically think she and her lover are going to be pissed off and have debilitating problems?
Because, as I took it from our earlier conversation, such thoughts are “idealistic” and not reality. But, and this is precisely my point: the assumption that reality just is what one already thinks is true because of one’s own experiences is the most suspect assumption. Perhaps, in the end, there is nothing to be gained in deference and humility anymore in relationships today: achieving a powerful orgasm more than once a week/day has more immediate and practical appeal, as likewise not achieving orgasms is the fulfillment of those desires for the person who cares little for sex. Either way, I find myself in agreement with what Dan was alluding to then about the status of “sex to find compatibility”: examination and testing are not strong indicators of relationships that truly penetrate.
This is why I think that Dan, especially, is not a good example of a person using the usual rhetoric, unless we so misconstrue his point that it just isn’t his point any more. As it stands, I see little difference between your position and equallyyoked.com’s position on relationships in the fundamentals of how to think about what matters in relationships. As their own website puts it, the high rates of divorce are worth mentioning alongside ineffective methods for choosing mates: “The divorce rate has risen to an unacceptable high. Social problems increase as families are torn apart. Poor mate selection has tragic consequence[s]… Most people depend upon chance to meet a compatible partner, essentially looking for a ‘needle in the hay stack.’” What they advocate is acquiring social networks, and particularly married relationships, through a safe, risk-reduced, and secure methodology. They reduce the chances, the risks, of failed and damaging, tragic relationships. And, this is just how they market themselves, as effectively minimizing the role chance and insecurity play in throwing together people and relationships. My thought is that we can point to the shared affinity with late global capitalism as one source for the shared structural fundamentals in your language about risk and relationships and their language. Risk society extends, so it has come, to the bedroom—or, as some queer theorists might posit, this is where it all began, paternally speaking. Either way, this is what becomes so ironic about attempting a criticism of equallyyoked.com as a specific example of how rotten Christianity is with respect to relationships: they completely agree with all of your practical philosophy on the status and place of relationships, even sex, in this culture, they just add onto it some minimally Christian language. The libertarianism, the individualism, the pragmatism, and the identification of chance and risk as destructive: wholesale and whole cloth.
To be clear, though, I don’t want all of what I write here to be negative or critical. I think it worth praise that you take relationships so seriously, Amber, that you want to think of how to ensure that a relationship lasts, is fruitful, and reinforces itself through mutual and demonstrated appreciation of one another’s wants and desires. I fully recognize that your emphasis on sexual compatibility is not simply for the sake of the good orgasm, but that this compatibility is a recognition of the many and varied ways in which people come together in their relationships, which includes the sexual.
For whatever worth it is, I want to encourage you to continue to fight the good fight against apathetic and inhibited relationships, because there is nothing worse than a broken relationship than one done solely in name.
Charles,
I would respond, but I’m afraid I fell asleep in the middle of reading your response.
Before I try to say anything smart about this, I must say - that whole “equally yoked” business makes me think of oxen.
I think the most important point to focus on in this conversation is one of compatibility. As Amber points out, because of the way sex is regarded, the message that sex “isn’t that important” often feels stifling to those of us to whom it is. For some of us, sexual incompatibility is a dealbreaker; for some it isn’t.
From a personal standpoint I can’t understand why a couple wouldn’t want to, try sex out before committing to marriage, but even if they do, things might not work out sexually long term. This can be compared fairly well to financial issues - many people don’t buy a house together before marriage, some don’t manage a household together - for some this leads to disaster, for others it doesn’t. For some people, financial incompatibility is a deal breaker. It’s all about figuring out which issues are of primary importance to you, and not backing down on them. If sex is #1 for Amber or for me, it best be for the folks we date, or that shit is doomed.
Also, speaking of seminal books, if you want a laugh, you should check out the fine literatute of Catholic Answers’ Jason Evert, to whom I may or may not be related, and who may or may not be doing the exact opposite of what I’m doing with my life: http://www.catholic.com/seminars/evert.asp
“The Challenge Task Force on Chastity”? “National Abstinence Clearinghouse”? OMG, that is awesome.
I love how these people always equate any sex that doesn’t take place within the confines of marriage, with regret. Because, yeah, it’s really just that simple.
Also awesome is the price tag on this seminar (check out the “fees” section). But maybe you have extra cash when you’re not paying for condoms and the pill?
Anyway. Yeah. The guy looks like a real toolbox. I’d love to get the two of you in a room together and watch the hilarity unfold.
He-he-hehe. You said seminal.
Y’know, I didn’t see the criticism so much aimed at Christianity, but at anyone attempting define what is important and what the deal-breakers are within your relationship instead of allowing you to do so. That you interpreted it as a criticism of the “christian” equallyyoked site is…telling, to say the least.
Amber’s basic point is that, for her, denying that sexual compatibility is a deal-breaker is ludicrous. Dacia’s follow-up point that everyone else has differing deal-breakers based on what they consider important and not important is even more telling because it allows Christians, atheists, and everyone else get what they want without hardship or coercion on anyone’s part. I think that’s the key, here, Amber, Dacia and I ultimately have no problem with how other people choose their deal-breakers. However, that others would force their own set of deal-breakers on us is where we draw the line and begin to push back.
This equallyyoked site (and those that would support it) subscribe to ONE set of deal-breakers and would like to force everyone else to obey theirs simply because a magical sky fairy talked to some Jew a few thousand years ago. Without even suggesting that different things are important to different people (as both Amber and Dacia are doing), they suggest that there is only one set of important factors to be considered in a relationship and all others are moot. That is what Amber means by those thinking it can “all be worked out” are in denial. Some things can’t and suggesting otherwise to people who might very well have an untennable situation on their hands is crass and self-righteous.
(*before you read this, suspend Christian imposed beliefs about how all homosexuals are okay, as long as they don’t act on it… HAHAHA!)
Maybe it was mentioned, and maybe I missed it in all the above, but what about same sex relationships that aren’t legally permitted to get married? Should we wait until it is legal, then meet someone, only to wait until we are married, in order to have sex and make sure that we are sexually compatible? What if that never happens? Should we just keep holding our breath? By the looks of things… there aren’t too many that are turning blue from that one.
Trying to have a healthy sexual relationship with someone that is not sexually compatible with you is a recipe for disaster. (I speak from experience, and no matter how many theories you shove down my throat, HE still cheated, and WE still broke up.) What works for some, doesn’t work for others. I am with Amber; if someone is not sexually compatible with me, they would make a great friend, but not a good lover. Being a good lover includes a lot of different factors; one of them (a big one), happens to be sex. I truly don’t think that you can have a long-lasting, sustainable, HAPPY relationship with someone unless MANY factors are present; with sex being one of the big ones.
I guess I am saying that I am for finding out BEFORE you take the big marriage plunge. There are enough of us out here that want to get married and can’t, that have to sit back and watch those straight couples that don’t make it (many of which divorce because they are sexually incompatible… I can name 3 off hand) get divorced. Just something to think about.
Charles wrote:
I don’t agree with that line of thinking either - and I haven’t seen anyone here who does. Actually, I don’t know what you’re referring to when you say you disagree with me and Russ, because later you acknowledge that I don’t view sexuality in this way (as I made clear in my post).
Well, that’s the part that I obviously do disagree with.
I have no idea what that means. I lost track about halfway through that sentence.
I never claimed that they were. Perhaps it seemed that my linking to an article which I deem “the usual rhetoric” was some kind of indictment against them, but it wasn’t. The two weren’t closely related and maybe I should have been clearer, I guess.
We don’t. You are misreading. Dacia and eponymous already made this point, but I will reiterate - I am not talking here about sex itself so much as about compatibility. If sex isn’t a huge priority for the people in that relationship (which is weird to me, but whatever), then they’ll probably be alright. They likely have something else that is of high priority, that they need to be compatible on.
This is really bizarre and I don’t know where it’s coming from, or what you are attempting to prove with this statement.
You’re right - there is little difference. I never set out to mock equallyyoked.com - in fact, I didn’t know that web site even existed until after I posted this, and the GDBF and I happened to see an ad for it at a bus stop (and of course had to take a picture). Likewise I never set out to mock the concept of being “equally yoked” (although I loathe that term and, like Dacia, it makes me think of oxen) - my point was that religion is not the only thing on which a couple should or can be “equally yoked” in a relationship. Like eponymous already said, different couples have different priorities. There is no one standard that can apply across the board to everyone. For some, religious compatibility is of the utmost importance; for others it’s sexual compatibility, or financial compatibility, and so on.
Dacia wrote:
That’s actually a good point, and reminds me of another issue I’ve been meaning to blog about - the value of cohabitation prior to marriage. But I shall get to that another time!
Well, you answered that already, duane, with your parenthetical disclaimer. For those types of hardline “conservatives,” suspending the belief about homosexuality being a sin is not possible. The hypothetical situation you pose is unanswerable!
if I may just add…
Without sounding too annoying, though - this also kind of proves any point you want to make about the importance of sex. It goes to show that they ARE sexually compatible, in that neither of them places a high priority on it.
#1: “It has been argued that abstaining from premarital sex is not a “huge risk” - or that while it is a risk of sorts, it’s one worth taking when all the potential benefits (what those might be remains lost on me, but I imagine it’s the usual rhetoric) are taken into consideration.
Well, I’m calling bullshit on that.”
#2: “In the past, I have backed down in arguments about the importance of sex in a relationship. But whenever I’ve done that, I haven’t really believed it…What I really think is that sex is one of the most important elements in a relationship.”
#3: “Let’s say you’re in a serious relationship…but you haven’t had sex yet….So you get married and you THANK GOD that you FINALLY have an outlet for all your pent-up sexual frustration - only to find that your new spouse only wants to do it once a week whereas you want it several times a day. That’s going to cause some problems, isn’t it? And if you think that’s not a big problem, and that with the power of compromise it can be solved, you’re living blissfully in denial - and it’s going to bite you in the ass one day.” (emphasis added)
#4: “I argued that sexual compatibility is highly important. If you want sex 2 or 3 times a week, it would behoove you to find a partner who desires a comparable frequency (as with anything in a relationship).”
#5: “However, my point was that when physical incompatibilities do occur, it is a problem for the people involved and of no concern to them that they are in the minority percentile. I suggested that finding this out ahead of time would be beneficial.”
#6: “We don’t. You are misreading. Dacia and eponymous already made this point, but I will reiterate - I am not talking here about sex itself so much as about compatibility. If sex isn’t a huge priority for the people in that relationship (which is weird to me, but whatever), then they’ll probably be alright. They likely have something else that is of high priority, that they need to be compatible on.”
#7: “For some of us, sexual incompatibility is a dealbreaker; for some it isn’t.” (Dacia)
#8: “Y’know, I didn’t see the criticism so much aimed at Christianity, but at anyone attempting define what is important and what the deal-breakers are within your relationship instead of allowing you to do so…Amber’s basic point is that, for her, denying that sexual compatibility is a deal-breaker is ludicrous. Dacia’s follow-up point that everyone else has differing deal-breakers based on what they consider important and not important is even more telling because it allows Christians, atheists, and everyone else get what they want without hardship or coercion on anyone’s part. I think that’s the key, here, Amber, Dacia and I ultimately have no problem with how other people choose their deal-breakers. However, that others would force their own set of deal-breakers on us is where we draw the line and begin to push back.” (Eponymous)
Oops, that post was a boo-boo. I was just trying to get a bunch of quotes in one place, so I could examine them synoptically. I did not mean to post it as a comment. Please disregard (or delete outright).
I’ll leave ‘em there for now. For one thing, I realized that in my frenzy of attempting to reply while multi-tasking (I’m at work), I probably gave the wrong impression about what my point (and yes, I do have one) really is. This comment (nice and succint) is probably the only one you should pay attention to.
What about changes that occur in people? Or are you asserting that what someone wants when they are X years old will be what someone wants years later. That there is little variation within people regarding sexual matters over time.
So, they get married after testing each other out and finding they are compatible in terms of sexuality (since, for both, this is of high priority), then upon aging some years, their priorities change and no longer match. What happens then, when the outcome of the “testing” done years ago no longer applies to the situation?
That first section should have nothing but question marks as punctuation. One of my own pet peeves.
equally yoked?
I had a girlfriend that went for that.
she liked me to pull her hair too.
and tie her feet to her hands.
I think she was religious, because right before she came she’d shout “Oh, god, oh Jesus, oh keep doing THAT!”
Praise Jesus.
Changes do occur in people so that does need to be taken into account. My sex drive now at 26 is no where near where it was at 20 and will probably change by the time I’m 35 either for better or worse.
Relationships are about people first and foremost. Do you need to be compatible on any level to have a meaningful healthy relationship? I say no but various dating sites would disagree with me. As far as a relationship goes (of any kind) sex really doesn’t make a dent in how your relationship is. Do you bang all of your guy/girl friends? No. Do you want to? That may be a different matter entirely and for some men, that answer is yes which leaves them pretty lost when it comes to actually connecting to people of the opposite sex. So while sex and sexual desire for a person is something of a light switch that can be turned on and off (I would say at will, but people can cop out all they want).
Sexual desire towards a person can change as appearances or other outside influences change. Another thing that can change quite a bit is performance. Sex is somewhat of a learned behavior and while the act itself isn’t, the technique and pleasure can easily be tweaked. Problem with that is most people are content with certain habits and rarely venture outside of their comfort zone. Is it impossible for a man that wants sex once a week to change to match his partner? Nope, not at all. If it was communicated that it was a big deal, (you know, words and such not just banging the next guy that comes along) maybe something could be done about it.
Sexual compatibility is one area of a relationship that has the capacity to change greatly over time. Putting high emphasis on it regardless of whether or not it matters to you seems rather foolish. Who am I to tell people what to do though? I’m a Christian, I’ve had premarital sex and I can say sex does matter to me though I’m not going to go divorcing someone just because I don’t get it enough. I can take that low road if I want to be a total ass but I like to think I’m marrying a person and not just a walking set of boobs and a vagina. I can see how potentially it could get me having fits from time to time but ultimately it should take a lot more than just that to want out of a relationship especially since in the land of marriage compromise should aim for some sort of middle ground.
I can go on about the difference between sacrifice and compromise in a relationship but I’ll save that one. Sacrifice can only be done for so long before it becomes suicide.
Jeremy:
I would like to reply to your comment, but unfortunately, I’m having difficulty making heads or tails of most of it. So, I’ll try to pick out the few bits that come close to almost making sense, and respond to those.
Well, I’m glad you can speak for everyone in the world with your ludicrous blanket statement. Especially since I had stressed in my post that the opposite is true for me.
This is one of those parts where I have no idea what you mean… you can’t just repeat cliché phrases like “connecting to people of the opposite sex” and expect people to glean some kind of deeper meaning automagically. Anyway… what I find interesting is that you attribute the supposed desire to “bang all your friends” to men. I guess your cozy little nest of gender stereotypes must be a comfortable place to be.
I’m not sure what the point of that snarky parenthetical statement is supposed to be. If there’s something you want to come right out and say, then just say it. You seem to have some pretty definite ideas in reaction to my post, even though I clearly spelled out points like the need for communication. I guess you also enjoy selective hearing/reading.
Okay, I said I was going to stay away from the parts of your comment which don’t make any sense whatsoever (aka, the bulk of it), but this is the most nonsensical of them all. This statement should win an award for its ability to befuddle. I’m really at a loss for words as to what to say about it. The big red error message is flashing in front of my eyes, “Logical fallacy! Logical fallacy!” I mean… if something is important to you then you put high emphasis on it. Do I need to stick an ice pick in my temple in order to understand this? Please, explain it to me, because I really don’t want to have to do that.
Hmmm… projecting, much? (I don’t like to use the word “issues” but it sounds like, yeah, there are some of those creeping up here.) Please tell me where anyone made any such suggestion.
That’s a nice line for an AA “One Day at a Time” book, but what does it mean?
Please. Enlighten me.
Amber:
I had assumed that ep’s topic was dead and he and I came to the point where his anecdotal experience and my own had diverged, with him established as being able to engage in the friends with benefits option more successfully than my own negative results would reflect.
I’m still critical of your bourgeois adherence to matters of liberal consensus in your sexuality as opposed to thinking more alternatively, perhaps as in patrick’s post detailing an unbalanced relationship.
In any event, you admit that what you are seeking is to be equally yoked. You and the youth that were being mocked initially in ep’s post diverge only in your yoke being sex and their yoke being faith. The yokes upon my old being where sex, drugs and alcohol, so I had to find a woman, or more accurately women, that shared the same yoke to be compatible.
Christ lifted off that yoke for me and made me a bond servant to Him. As corny as this may sound to you, once I turn to Christ, my sexuality was subordinated to His direction and guidance. For individuals in His service, sexuality will never be a “deal-breaker,” because in Christ those two become one and what for you, obsessed with sex, would be the end, becomes an issue that can be overcome.
But in your case, given your lack of faith and the primacy you grant to sexuality, such an approach would be bullshit. So you’re right. Have sex before marriage, kick the tires wells or you will never be happy with the man you drive home. Just keep in mind, that isn’t the metaphor, to which we Christians subscribe.
I wouldn’t have wrote all that if I had read this. eponymous did it for me.
Take 2 (because I’m actually interested in your response, not as a point to debate, but as a way to understand more your ideas), it seems my questions were answered by Jeremy, but I was asking those “tester outers”:
What about changes that occur in people? Or are you asserting that what someone wants when they are X years old will be what someone wants years later? That there is little variation within people regarding sexual matters over time?
So, they get married after testing each other out and finding they are compatible in terms of sexuality (since, for both, this is of high priority), then upon aging some years, their priorities change and no longer match. What happens then, when the outcome of the “testing” done years ago (i.e., they match in frequencies, openness, etc.) no longer applies to the situation (they no longer match)?
Russ:
No, I am not saying that changes do not occur over time.
I can’t provide a catch-all answer for your second question (”…then upon aging some years, their priorities change and no longer match”). I think it depends on the couple. The people involved will have their own way of dealing with it, wherever on the spectrum of “compromise” it might fall. Once again, this is a perfect example of how people are different, and this question is too complex and personal (that is, pertaining only to the couple) to be answered with a blanket statement.
Right. Generalities won’t work because everyone is different — but upon acknowledging prospective changes, what do you predict will be your solution for dealing with this?
I didn’t really expect you to be able to answer for everyone, just for yourself — if you want to answer, that is.
Sorry to disappoint, but I can’t give a definitive answer to that, either. There are too many other factors to be taken into consideration. It would depend upon the person with whom I’m in a relationship, the nature of our relationship outside of sexual activity, the type of change, what caused the change (e.g., natural shift over time, or predicated by some other circumstance?), willingness to communicate about said change, and so on and so forth et cetera ad nauseum…
You didn’t disappoint me at all. Quite the contrary.
Amber:
To put what you quoted into perspective, hypothetical land is about the only place it can make sense.
Take the relationship with your parents. Does sex affect that? Yes. Sex with them. It’s not the best thing to think about but it proves the point. Not every relationship you have is based on sex, and some of the best in fact have no sexual basis whatsoever. That is a “ludicrous” blanket statement that really can describe “everyone in the world” except for those that actually like to have sex with their parents/kids, and those people are just quite a bit disturbed and don’t really apply.
I can only speak from my own experience and how there’s some inate male quality to want to screw every woman possible. I can’t quite explain it but in discussing with all of my male friends, they agree it seems to exist on a biological level. I did include guys/girls in the sentence before it but I suppose not saying men/women there made it look like it was gender biased. So you’re suggesting that women (a good portion) have this inate desire to screw every man possible? It seems possible but goes against the animal kingdom’s example of lions, apes, and other animals who seem to back up the male desire to have multiple partners.
The bulk of the argument and my “selective hearing” on the comments as a whole lead me to believe the real discussion is sex and how big of a role it plays in the relationship. Yes communication is important but it seemed like there was more emphasis on just getting huffy when things aren’t quite compatible. A relationship takes responsibility from both parties to work effectively. The “big kid” in all of us says just deal with it and not talk about it until it becomes unreconcilable. Then it easily becomes an excuse and a cop out so that people don’t really have to be responsible. I can be in a relationship and give up to a point and then when it doesn’t quite work out to my exact specifications I have a quick exit that leaves me with little remorse. “I tried” would be my excuse, knowing full well all I did was bitch after the fact when it was well passed too late. I’m not saying everyone thinks like this but some people are looking for excuses way more than they want to deal with their responsibilities and this doesn’t apply to just relationships or sex in general.
That’s true but sex is low on a relationship totem pole. You can have meaningful relationships where sex doesn’t matter and in a bulk of the ones you have, it really doesn’t come into play at all. To say it matters 100% is what I meant by it being foolish and I know no sane person says it matters 100% of the time. The vibe I got from the post and comments were that sex at some point can be the only deciding factor and in my book that’s wrong for something that matters so little. Who am I to tell people how to live though? I get annoyed when people put it as the ultimate high priority then turn around and bitch about some effect of doing so. I’m not saying you’re this type but I know many people who are (that aren’t just men) and it’s down right annoying. II’m a different person sexually now than I was 1 year ago, 5 years ago, 10 years ago, so to attribute a snapshot in time to how I’ll always be sexually is foolish yet that’s not any different than what people do when they don’t feel they’re compatible. The one thing that can change greatly over time shouldn’t have that much importance but I won’t deny it does for some.
A relationship, or any interaction between multiple people is about give and take. Compromise is when both parties sacrifice roughly equally. When one party sacrifices more than the other, it becomes suicide no matter how you look at it. Usually the sacrifice works itself out in some ways but there are relationships where some people are a black hole, sucking in sacrifice of others yet producing none of their own, ever. The statement was out of context without some sort of background knowledge but I thought the comment was already long enough. I suppose it being confusing really didn’t help either.
Toadvine:
My girlfriend has a saying. You won’t buy the cow if you can get the milk for free. When one does “taste” of the milk, it makes buying the cow a harder decision though not impossible. I can definately speak from experience but not for the entirety of humanity.
I am glad you had the courage to post on the topic. it’s hard to believe men find this difficult to understand. I have seen no woman argue the validity of your point.
in a nutshell , my understanding of what you’re saying is that values should be shared. if you want to spend more time praying than fucking , as long as you agree , that seems to help be the glue of which relationships are made.
Just for fun, i want to say that sex is pervasive in all relationships IN MY OPINION. Yes, even with parents. here’s why: we all have some kind of sex drive. usually it is motivated by other stuff besides procreation ( unlike in the Animal kingdom ) so whether or not sex is acceptable to do or to discuss will most likely have an effect on relationships with parents. this is because i believe taboo topics lead to lack of intimacy , therefore distance.
lastly, i once had a friend who said she didn’t care if she NEVER had sex. She was married to a guy who wanted it at least once every day.
they were both unhappy in different ways. her unhappiness stemmed from the fact that she knew her hubby was not “fulfilled”. His stemmed from not feeling “loved”.
sex , IN MY OPINION , does not happen in a vacum outside the realm of humanity. whether or not people want to acknowledge it, i’m pretty sure humans are thinking and feeling sexual beings.
how else does one explain erections in infants???
thanks for the room to rant.
Amber,
I know this thread is ancient… but I had to write.
I actually found your blog article because I was looking for a way to FIND someone of equal sexual libido without ending up with a one-night stand. Like many people I prefer monogomous long-term relationships.
Just for background I had a 12 year marriage (that I ended some years back for many reasons — but one big one was sexual libido compatibility). And before and after that I was a semi-frequent dater. And more recently I’m in a long-term relationship that seems to be petering out on the libido end of things.
However in my 40+ years of life so far It seems to me (maybe I’m unlucky) when I finally find someone who has a strong enough libido for us both to be sexually satisified my new partner in high likelihood is not going to be monogomous (as in nymphomania). So the real problem I guess I have is how do I find someone who meets my intellectual, responsible, and highly sexual-charged needs?
So to the readers I ask? What is someone to do? I doubt most online matchmaking services ask for deep sexuality ratings and the ones that do don’t produce long-term monogomous relationships.
Thanks.
Stradius,
I don’t know what advice to give you; it does sound like you’ve been unlucky. But I would start by discontinuing use of deragatory labels such as “nymphomania.” Monogamy isn’t for everyone, and being judgemental isn’t constructive.
I use “nymphomania” as in the dictionary definition and it usually indicates an inability to commit to one sexual partner as in a monogomous relationship. I prefer a monogomous relationship.
So to clarify my point, I have found sexual partners that could equal my “level” and I would have considered them somewhat nymphomaniac because they were never able to commit to a monogomous relationship even when they’re visiting me on a regular basis for booty call. In one case I had to break up with her several times… she couldn’t get the idea of monogomy.
Okay, two months later… based on your latest comment, I will simply repeat my previous point:
So, I don’t know what to tell you other than to make it clear to potential partners before you hop in the sack that you are looking for monogamy. It isn’t fair to hold someone to a standard they don’t know they’re being held to.
>sigh<
I was very clear that’s what I was looking for in the relationships I’ve had. You’ve made a lot of assumptions in your responses.
I’ve only had one or two one-night stands and about seven long-term relationships that started with friendship and accelerated quickly to frequent sexual satisfaction that kept them coming back again and again and evolved into what I clearly stated was monogomous or nothing.
I agree that it isn’t fair to hold someone to a standard to which they don’t know they’re being held.
Now that I’ve had a half-dozen or so long-term relationships in my lifetime I see that it’s unfair to agree to something and then not follow through with it. Especially years and/or months later after you’ve committed the blood of your life to the relationship: emotional, physical, and labor/monetary.
Which of these people are being unfair?
A) The monogomist with sexual needs that makes an agreement with a mate to be faithful and loyal and available at all times?
B) The non-monogomist that agrees to a monogomous relationship and then takes more sexual partners when opportunity arises.
Just because someone hasn’t come to terms with their behavior and leaves the dead and dying along their route doesn’t mean they’re unfairly judged by the dead or dying.
In my lifetime I’ve experimented with both multiple lovers (dating with romance and sexual activity) and monogomy and I’ve found that:
1) it’s too much work and blown resources to be satisfying, and
2) you get an equal amount of fun and satisfaction when you find one person to concentrate your affections upon AS LONG as that person can fulfill their end of the relationship.
I hear you. You’re as clueless about what I should do as I am.
Sadly and ultimately each of my monogomous relationships will probably end and I will fall into another one even though I feel I never want to lose her at each turn. My partners always seem to become emotionally loving but not sexually satisfying which to me is the only point for a straight man to have a long-term relationship anyway (especially in these days of liberated women).
Perhaps the dictionary definition of monogamy is just outdated. “Serial Monogamy” is the new term of the age. It defines people who practice multiple dedicated love relationships OVER TIME. The courtship is a blast. The honeymoon phase is fantastic. But then it’s downhill from there in the sack.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serial_monogamy)
Alternative Plan: Become motionally callous, just dump them quick and find someone else to bang (I’m not the kind of guy that uses the word “bang” about making love so this doesn’t work for me).
Sometimes it feels like we can’t be happy unless we divorce ourselves of love in a relationship and abort the idea that long-term can be satisfying, basically take care of ourselves and let the others fend.
You don’t have to answer but I think I’ve summarized my situation. The beleaguered straight man trapped between helping women liberate from the old school society of male dominated stereotypes and the new world in which love is boiled down to the realism of its uselessness (even though its the source of sexual satisfaction) and the straight man is the Don Quixote of the current sexual age.
Maybe another reader will happen upon this thread and have some good advice to send my way.
I know, poor you, you’ve been hurt so badly, why can’t someone just see what a beautiful special snowflake you are? What a Nice Guy™!
Not sure if my blog is advertised somewhere as a relationship advice column/dumping ground…?
Oh well… I’ll just say: LOL
…and carry on.
Dacia wrote:
My grandma had a plaque that, for some reason, I always loved the looks of. Mom gave it to me when she was moving gram to a sr. citizen’s apt complex. The saying on it was: “When to fond hearts as one unite, the yoke is easy and the burden light.” I can’t find where I put it away, but I swear to dog it had two oxen on the plaque.
Religious folk — doesn’t the yoke reference point at the wonderful mascochistic xtian imagery of “slave to jesus”? yoked to god? is it supposed to be the ultimate fulfillment of who you are to couple up, yoked togther, in service to da lord?
yoke? anything relating to yokel? *g*
hmmm. hungry for scome scrambled eggs now.
yust a yoke!
That jesus. Always the top.
Amber:
dude. it’s like them thar male and female connectors. the male has lots of little needles and pokes them into the female.
Uh-huh. Wow. What could I possibly say?