Do women trade sex for love?

[rednosedays]

Okay I am starting a new thread as I did not want to hijack NJ's thread with discussions about rape and there were responses from a couple of people that I wanted to reply to.

I suggested that without a little bit of manipulation or coercion teenage boys would find it quite difficult to get laid. At least that was how things were way back when I was a teenager but perhaps things have changed.

In my mind I was thinking along the lines of: I will always respect you/I really love you/You are gorgeous/You are the only person for me etc which, in my very humble opinion (but perhaps I am just old and cynical or got it all wrong) were used by members of the male sex in order to get into a female's knickers. I KNOW women can do these types of things to, but in my humble opinion, it was more difficult for a teenage boy to get laid than vice versa.

The female, being susceptible to flattery and (hopefully) fancying the boy (and maybe hoping that he would fall in love with her or whatever) would agree to sex even though there were risk factors eg: she might get pregnant/he might have been lying about how he felt just to get her into bed/he might go around telling all his friends that she was an easy lay etc etc. She might genuinely have feelings for him whereas he might just be pretending.

Okay I was a teenager quite a long time ago and hopefully things have changed (but judging from the discussions that I have heard from my teenagers and their friends they have not changed THAT much).

Just want people's thoughts on this.

I cross-posted with your last. I agree that prevailing cultural attitudes still tend towards the 1950s in regard to female sexuality. There's a huge difference, though. A woman with genuine self-belief and self-respect can do what the hell she likes. She will NOT suffer financial or social exclusion in punishment. So there's no need to teach her that she might

"However, given your extraordinarily old-fashioned, patriarchal & misanthropic views on the topic, I'm not sure you will be able to educate your young adults into a healthy, well-balanced, respectful sex life"

Thank you for the compliments! Funnily enough I slightly pride myself on the fact that I have manged to avoid (some) of the mistakes of my parents. Friends and indeed complete strangers (who have met my children but not me) have complimented my on how well my children have turned out. For me, given that I consider my family background to be a bit dysfunctional, that is the biggest compliment anyone could ever give me. But I am probably too obsessed with this, because I don't want to repeat what I consider to be my parents mistakes.

I think I unwittingly ommitted an important detail from the facebook incident: the girl got pregant. Whatever your views on female sexuality, this IS a big deal for a 16 year old girl and her family. When you have children of a similar age, it makes you all sit up, notice and talk about the issues involved here. I can tell you we had some very lively discussions with some of the teenagers claiming that the parents "should" adopt the baby etc, etc. To be honest I told my teenage girls that they could not necessarily expect that backup option from me (feel I have made quite enough sacrifices already thank you very much) so it was probably best to exercise a certain amount of caution with regard to sexual partners.

But Grace - are you disagreeing with me that society treats married women who are struggling with dilemmas relating to responsibility towards children/family versus resonsibility towards themselves in a fair and responsible manner?

It seems that half the posts on here revolve around the contradiction between the need to be a good parent and partner and the need to find personal fulfillment? Correct me if I am wrong.

Sex is not something that women do for men.

I'm sorry to hear about the unwanted pregnancy, rnd. Yes, I should think that did provoke some discussion! Some young women of my acquaintance seemed quite shocked when I said I feel they should use the Pill and a condom. They did see why, just that no-one had mentioned the idea before (to my surprise.)

Sorry I offended you. The ideas you expressed in your posts honestly do seem archaic and ... hampering for a girl. Times really have changed - primarily, legislation has changed. It's my belief that an individual woman may choose to grab that fact and run with it. She doesn't have to listen to the bilge around her; there's plenty of affirmation for her to listen to instead, if she just has the confidence.

So, If I understood your fourth paragraph correctly, I probably do disagree with you. I feel parents can empower their children to celebrate their uniqueness; to seek personal fulfilment with confidence - in spite of a disempowering cultural environment.

Grace, I've always hammered it into DD to use condoms whilst also being on the pill.
She took a carrier bag full to University and her room was known as the family planning clinic!
There really don't seem to be the double standards regarding sexuality / promiscuity among her age group ( early 20's), thankfully.

Lol at the clinic-in-a-carrier!

No, times have changed, haven't they ... thank goodness!

Someone wrote some tosh higher up about rich older women not being able to get men while rich older men can get women. This is not true, thoughout history we have examples of powerful women with younger suitors. Today a solvent older woman who wished for a toyboy could pick one up off the next in 5 minutes flat.

Some PEOPLE trade sex.

Eurostar, you've revealed my Secret Ambition Joan Collins might be odd, but she's not stupid ...

Mal - that is good to hear! Hopefully attitudes really are changing. Grace - take on board what you have written.

I think that there is possibly a reasonably lively discussion to be had about dovetailing the role of mother and wife/long term partner with the desire to seek personal fulfillment. I personally feel I have made a number of sacrifices in this respect but heck, I am proud of my rather lovely offspring.

I do still feel that quite a few of the postings on here seem to have that kind of dilemma at heart. This is not just some silly little theoretical, over-intellectual discussion. I listen to what my teenagers tell me about what is going on in their friend's lives and some of the struggles with parents. Some don't talk to them, others have run away etc. It is sad when a relationship with a parent breaks down so badly.

Another time, another thread maybe.

It's also that female promiscuity is more unusual partly because women have less of a biological incentive and less personal interest in it

Dogfish, I again invite you to respond to my posts addressing this assumption. Clearly you can read my posts, since you responded to one tiny element that wasn't actually addressed to you, so how about responding to the bits that were? To make this easier, the posts are at 12:12:39 and 12:50:52 (that one even has your name in it!) And hey, what the hell, why not go ahead and read the one at 12:29:15 while you're there.

I may be being particularly dense, rnd, but I'm unclear about what you want to discuss: Your role as a woman, and a mother of daughters? The expectations your daughters may have, as women of the next generation? Whether women trade sex for love? Whether women trade sex for something else? Or what??

Your thread's been divided along traditional lines - the "a woman needs a man; a man needs many women" old guard vs us "bollocks to that" pragmatists. Which is always stimulating, but I'm not sure it's what you intended?

Spot on Grace. I've stalked this thread thoroughly but as usual there is no point in adding, and probably muddling, anything you've said.

Grace - I started this thread as I felt certain issues arose out of one (and indeed more) of the posters on these boards and I didn't want to hijack a thread that was about a specific problem with more general musings/observations about the thorny issues of dealing with relationships/sex in relationships/ when you have the added complications of bringing up children. I was interested in how much more liberal our society had become compared with previous generations, among other things.

It does seem that in some relationships sex ends up being something of an emotional/psychological football and this lead me to wonder whether there is any truth in the old myth that women trade sex for love. As the parent of teenagers my suspicions are that this is still the case and I see a few lost teenage souls who I consider have not had the support of loving, stable parents who are hopping in and out of beds trying to get someone to love them, sometimes with disastrous consequences.

I feel that both parents have duty to try to act as good role models for their children and not slag off the other parent repeatedly for instance (this was mentioned in another thread) as children model their behaviour on their parents.

Which kind of links in with good parenting I suppose and also with how there might be a dilemma between pursuing one's own personal satisfaction (eg: sick of dull husband, decide to embark on passionate affair with personal trainer etc etc - stupid example) and trying to stick around in a long term relationship which is not necessarily perfect but okay in order to provide a stable home life for children.

No doubt there are way too many issues in here but nevertheless I still think it's interesting hearing other people's points of view. Take it off on a tangent - why not this is a talk/discussion board after all?

Swallowed a fly: yes you are absolutely right think every women should lie back, think of England and do her duty to her husband!

"there is nothing wrong with a man forcing his wife to have sex she doesn't want and here she's trying to prove that that's ok because that's what women do, we don't enjoy sex we trade it to get what we want"

Yes, an excellent idea - in fact it should be enshrined in the constitution!

Oh dear - must slip away into my neglige as hubby coming back and needs to be serviced asap!!

FWIW: Think it is really important as parents to teach our daughters/sons to say NO and be honest about their feelings. Passive aggressive (ie: I don't want you to do this but I am not going to say that, you have to work it out but I will be upset afterwards) is not a good way to communicate in relationships, in my humble experience.

*To take another example, many gay men go to sex clubs and shag randomly; gay women generally don't.

as a woman who spent a lot of time in what passed for a lesbian scene in my small northern town can i just say, hahahahahahaha

you have no idea

Haven't read all of this so I'm probably waaaaaay off topic by now. But.

Men and women both mistake sex for love.

Men and women both mistake the withdrawl of sex as lack of love.

Men and women both think lots of sex will get them approval and raise their self-esteem.

Men and women both get confused between pleasure and happiness.

As for older women and younger men, just look at the older single ladies going over to turkey etc and bagging a toyboy in return for a visa, i know two women who have done exactly that, the age gap is huge, both parties are getting what they want out of it.

We are obviously living in different worlds, swallowed a fly. In my little world I seem to be surrounded by flawed people like myself, married, or not married with flawed husbands or ex husbands or some kind of partner or ex partner who they had kids with at some stage.

Whether they are with that man or not is irrelevant. What is relevant is that both parents have a responsiblity towards bringing up the children that resulted from those nights of wild sexual abandonment and passion (hopefully! Although my father always says one moment of pleasure, a lifetime of hard labour but then he is a sexist, selfish old bugger...)

I think we can agree at least on the bit about both parents having some kind of responsiblity with regard to bringing up children?

In my grey little world I see the people around me on a spectrum - at one end are the worst type of people (in your eyes, me, swallowed a fly!!) - selfish but self-righteous, ignorant but opinionated, narrow minded, bigoted etc etc - hopefully even I am not all those things all of the time, hehe!

At the other end are those paragons of virtue we all wish were the fathers of our children - gorgeous, selfless, handsome, kind, fully mature, emotionally mature - actually that sounds awful (vomit bucket out) but you get my drift.

I always seem to have ended up with people who are some where in the middle and I have to kick them into shape a bit. No doubt they feel the same about me. Just muddling along really dealing with each other's irritating habits (which get worse) but thinking that maybe the devil we know is better than the one we dont etc.

But however hideous one's (ex) partner might be, they are still the parent of one's children. Take my father - sexist, selfish, irritating old bugger but I love him to bits as I have forgiven him for being a rubbish father. Managed to marry a man who was not like that as I had a good role model in terms of what kind of man NOT to chose as father of one's children.

"At the other end are those paragons of virtue we all wish were the fathers of our children - gorgeous, selfless, handsome, kind, fully mature, emotionally mature - actually that sounds awful (vomit bucket out) but you get my drift."

Why does that sound so awful ?{confused) that's exactly the kind of man my husband is, even at the age of 18, I wouldn't have settled for anything less, despite my shitty upbringing - I didn't know what a real family was until I joined his.

Mal - thanks that that response. Sounds like you have landed a good one! Other responders, thank you. The gay northern club scene sounds interesting....

I know the thread has probably been confused and garbled but hopefully it was interesting, at least in parts.

Dogfish - I find your very non PC view of the world quite amusing, if cynical.

It's Grace - back to that facebook episode which links in better with what this thread was trying to be about. Yes - the boy was a total plonker BUT the parents of the girl (and the girl?) felt upset, angy, humiliated (and maybe also guilty.....?) enough about the whole episode to try to take the case to court and try to ensure that the boy received a criminal conviction for rape.

However badly the boy had behaved, the girl had given consent and in the eyes of the law it was not rape