No one actually "needs" sex

[namechangedforthisone35]

Out with the girls last night and my friends talked about the "need" for sex which I can't fathom. It's obviously not a genuine need like air and food.

Clearly if you're ttc, then yes, you need sex. But that's the only situation it would be essential otherwise it's not exactly for survival is it?!

My dh and I (43 and 35) dtd maybe 4-6 times a year. He'd probably like more but that's more than enough for me. Three kids including a toddler, a dog, both work full time, up at 4.30/5, sleep comes first every single time.

Do others really see it as a need?!

So you've told him he can have sex with others but you don't want to know about it... Well it sounds like he probably is.

So you don't need sex, your dh does and is likely getting it elsewhere.

@Josette77 who knows, maybe yes maybe no. Logistically I'd be amazed as he wfh and is here every evening.

There’s something so odd about your tone. You’re almost gleeful about not having sex and assuming he doesn’t either as he doesn’t mention it, as though you’ve won in the argument you started about whether or not sex is important. If you were really so content I can’t see why you’d be posting.

I can’t buy this as an argument.

For many people sex is extremely important for a happy life. Some people may call this a ‘need’. ( I guess that depends on how one defines ‘need’).

However sex is absolutely not a right. The only person one has a right to have sex with is oneself. By definition, you do not have a right to have sex with another person, as that person has to consent, and, in my firm opinion, consent freely and enthusiastically. I personally do not regard an exchange of money as free or enthusiastic consent for sex. I regard it as a form of abuse.

Even if one does regard sex as a need, it does not follow that means one can procure sex unethically. You can still say it is wrong to lie and cheat and deceive to get sex. You can still say it is wrong to expose partners to disease by cheating on them. We can still still say it’s wrong to buy access to another human’s body. And we can still say it’s wrong to have sex with someone e who does not consent.

I highly doubt your husband is okay with the set up, he just doesn't feel like he can communicate it with you as you are so set in your ways.

Perhaps he is getting it elsewhere instead?

bloodyfreezinghere
Excellent post.
Needs and rights are not the same. I can't believe this needs to be pointed out.

Many people need many things in a relationship to feel fulfilled, happy and loved. Sex is part of that for many people but so are many other things such as non sexual physical touch, quality time, words of affirmation, acts of kindness. Nobody is going to die without any of those things, but they sure make a relationship happier and healthier than one where one (or both) parties feel their needs aren't met.

If someone doesn't feel sex is important to them, that's ok. They obviously don't need to have a sex life to feel happy and fulfilled in a relationship. It doesn't mean someone else doesn't have that need for their relationship to be happy and thriving. Someone else may have a low sex drive and have a relationship that is happy and fulfilling with a partner they're compatible with. Someone else may have a similarly happy relationship with a partner who has an equally high sex drive. In many relationships couples aren't perfectly matched on sex drive but they find something that works for them and they're both happy and fulfilled because overall the relationship is meeting their various needs (sexually and otherwise).

Sex aside, I wonder if some people stay in relationships that are comfortable but unfulfilling because it's easier and it's preferable to being on their own, but if and when they meet someone who they share a spark with they realise they're not actually happy, it's the kick they need to leave and their partner thinks the split has come out of the blue.

@namechangedforthisone35 if anything your posts prove that sexless marriage also lack any other sort of intimacy because you don't even know how he feels and you'd rather discuss your lack of sex life with strangers online than ask him

people have affairs all the time and still make it home in the evening, but your insistence that he "probably, most likely, you sure of it" does not have sex with someone else suggests that you are, in fact, not ok with an idea that his needs may be fulfilled somewhere else

thing is - neither of you would be wrong, its fine to be asexual, its fine to have sexual needs, what is not fine is imposing either on the other person which is why sexual incompatibility generally leads to end of the relationship

Still this fixation on sex within relationships while ignoring the apparent need for sex by single people.

I don’t disagree in the slightest that sex / intimacy / kindness are all needed to fuel a healthy, mutually satisfying relationship. You’ll get absolutely zero argument from me on that, so little point in reiterating it (yet again).

We’re still completely ignoring the fact that lots and lots of single people need sex, and especially when it comes to men, that manifests in all sorts of negative ways.

I mean, it just does. We see it around us in every imaginable way.

You can say men shouldn’t, oughtn’t, mustn’t - but they do. Every single one of us has experienced some sort of unwelcome advance, whether low level, or much worse.

Clearly sex is seen as a ‘need’ by many more than just on this thread, and that drives a lot of behaviour that we wish didn’t exist - but does.

GodDammitCecil
Because people are talking about the needs within a relationship so all the what about single people is irrelevant as is but what about some men who feel entitled to behave in a way that ignores consent.

Needs and rights are different.

Someone may need sex within a relationship to feel fulfilled. Someone single may feel they need sex and miss it when they're having a dry spell.

Nobody has the right to ignore someone's boundaries and overrule someone else's lack of consent

Sexual assault and rape doesn't come from people in relationships expressing their need for sex as part of a happy and fulfilling relationship.

Sexual assault and rape doesn't come from single people feeling like they could do with a good shag and miss having a fulfilling sex life.

Sexual assault and rape, along with many other problematic (generally male pattern) behaviour is not about sex. It's about control and misogyny and violent male-pattern behaviour.

To suggest this sort of behaviour comes from men feeling a need for sex sounds a little like incel logic.

Needs and rights are different.

No kidding.

Nobody has the right to ignore someone's boundaries and overrule someone else's lack of consent

You don’t need to tell me that. I know. But too many men do ignore and overrule. They do it all the time. It’s been happening since time immemorial, and it’s not getting any better.

And this talk of sex being a ‘need’ feeds into that.

Men who want to rape will rape, regardless of whether they feel they need sex or categorise it differently.

We're all intelligent people here. We all know that sex as a need simply means it is something we yearn for or strongly desire.

And the inconvenient truth that people keep ignoring, is that plenty of people clearly do see it as a need that must be met.

Again, keep ignoring that. But the fact of the matter is that they, very unfortunately, do.

@GodDammitCecil no, it doesn't. even with more basic needs like food and shelter people have degree of understanding that you cannot just break into someone's house and raid their fridge

so while sex is absolutely a need one may have to feel happy and fulfilled, you can live without it

The original post did not limit the discussion to sex being a need within a relationship. That is a huge restriction of focus and changes the definition of need entirely.

even if you limit the discussion to relationships, it still isn’t a general need. Couples can form relationships with intimacy based on things other than sex. There are couples who are perfectly happy with little to no sex life. Every person is different in that regard. Saying sex is a need says that people who are asexual or who are experiencing disorders can’t be happy and can’t find positive, loving relationships, which is both untrue and discriminatory.

Op stated 'no one needs sex' in the title, not 'some people don't need sex'.

Most people need sex in a relationship, or they'll leave. Most single people feel they need (strongly desire) sex and will seek it out.

I don't want to date an asexual, too bad if that's discriminatory

I maintain it’s a ‘want’ (a strong one for some), not a ‘need’, and the minute you start positioning it as a ‘need’, you open up and validate all kinds of completely and utterly unacceptable behaviour.

But as you say, everyone is different. A d the OP made a sweeping statement that no-one needs sex.

Yes, in order to survive, as individuals no-one NEEDS to have sex. As a species, we absolutely do NEED sex to survive. Within relationships, some people NEED sex and some people don't.

Outside of relationships, some people see it as a NEED to be happy and fulfilled in life.

In none of these circumstances is anyone saying that people should just TAKE sex from others. But the definition of "need" changes with context.

Species survival = vital
Fulfilling life/relationship = important but not vital.

Whether we use "need" or "important aspect" or any other version of it, context is always important. As is consent and people behaving like humans and not ducks (not a typo. Ducks are rapey birds). But to suggest that those who see it as a need for a fulfilling relationship/life are part of the problem of rapists is a big stretch, and very wrong.

i will refer to my own wants and needs however i deem appropriate and for me sex is a need

You don’t need to tell me that. I know. But too many men do ignore and overrule. They do it all the time. It’s been happening since time immemorial, and it’s not getting any better.

And this talk of sex being a ‘need’ feeds into that.
No it doesn't, unless you're someone who is incapable of understanding that needing as part of being a happy and fulfilled human does not equal a right to sexually assault and rape.

Sexual assault and rape does not come from having an unmet need.

Sexual assault and rape does not come from people talking about their needs in life and relationships.

Sexual assault and rape comes from (generally) men holding misogynistic views and a desire to control and be violent.

Sexual assault and rape happens when (generally) a man choose to be a disgusting violent predator.

Let's not start muddying the waters by trying to suggest that disgusting sexual assaults and rapes come about because people talk about needs as part of feeling fulfilled.

What a depressing thread where it goes from (to paraphrase ) "it's not a need because you won't die without it" to "it's also not a need because if you acknowledge it's a need then you're enabling sex offenders and predatory men". As a PP said We're all intelligent people here. We all know that sex as a need simply means it is something we yearn for or strongly desire.

Well said @LolaSmiles, wilful misunderstanding to justify a position will continue though I expect.

Claiming that describing the need for sexual intimacy as a "need" helps justify rape and sexual assault is really desperate attempt to grasp straws.

Eleganz
I suspect it's just a willful desire to downplay the importance of sex to many people.
It's easier to pretend that people don't really need sex, they won't die without it, it's just a want, etc etc etc than it is to acknowledge that for many people it is a need that's part of feeling happy and fulfilled. Downplaying the importance of it (or colloquially expressed as a need, as in something like Maslow's hierarchy of needs, or a deep desire, or important element to feel happy and secure) means being able to run from the awkward reality that at some point when someone is unfulfilled or unhappy in a relationship (be is in the bedroom or any other expressions of love, intimacy and affection) there's a chance that the unhappy spouse will eventually leave the relationship.
I've seen on here and in real life a number of relationships where the romance has died over time and then once the children hit teens or adulthood one person ends the relationship because the incompatibilities become painful and they're not really a romantic relationship anymore. The other spouse insists it was out of the blue, didn't see it coming and so on but the intimacy in the relationship died years ago.

Totally agree with you and @LolaSmiles . Rapists rape because they feel entitled to sex, which is them wanting it and thinking they deserve it, rather than a need for intimacy with someone. Totally different things and the use of the word need plays no part in their active decision to do that to someone.

you can acknowledge that sex is important to many, if not most people, without equating it to a need.

no, someone who is sexual should not partner with someone who is asexual. Two asexuals should find one another and form a partnership. They don’t need sex to create intimacy. The discriminatory aspect is not acknowledging that there are happy, fulfilled people in the world without the same wants as desires as other people.

i need peace and quiet every day. I need space from other humans. I am autistic. Without these things I suffer real, physical distress. For me, isolation is a need.

yet, I would never extrapolate and say that isolation is a human need. I can acknowledge that for some people, a daily period of isolation would cause distress.

I also happen to be a person that greatly enjoys sex as a part of my relationship.

a personal need and a human need are different things. Humans in general don’t need isolation. Aside from reproduction, humans don’t need sex. Yet we can still acknowledge the importance of both of those things to individuals .

Why are asexuals being brought up now?

It doesn't matter what the frequency of sex is in a relationship if both people are feeling happy and fulfilled in the relationship. Throughout the thread people have acknowledged this. There isn't some universal threshold of sex.

Different people need different things in a relationship to feel loved, valued, appreciated, happy, fulfilled (and sex is part of that for many people). It's very common for two people to be similar but not totally aligned on various elements but overall they choose to remain in a relationship that leaves them happy and fulfilled.

Where someone's feeling their needs aren't met in a relationship, the relationship is not going to be as happy or fulfilling as a relationship where both people feel their needs regarding feeling loved, valued, appreciated, happy, fulfilled are being met (and sex is part of that for many people).

If it's good enough for Maslow to talk about a hierarchy of needs, and acknowledge one layer is about what individuals need in terms of love, relationships and intimacy, it should be possible to apply common sense to an online discussion.

@Ponderingwindow but needs are not universal - not even some of the most basic ones

I need my inhaler or I will literally suffocate to death, but someone without asthma does not have the same need

I need sex to be happy and fulfilled, this is quite literally one of the conditions for me to be in relationship, let alone to be happy in that relationship. It may not be for someone else.

Need for sexual intimacy is the same as any other interpersonal need - they vary, but for that individual it may well be an absolute requirement to simply be happy.

Likewise, some people need emotional intimacy, they need to be able to be open with their partner regarding their emotions and they need the same from their partner. Others could not care less for that stuff so they don't need it.