Should I feel guilty for enjoying degrading sex?

[Georgia1987]

Hi everyone,

This is my first post here and I joined because it looks like you have a really good forum here for feminist debate. I registered to ask a question and I'm a bit worried it's not the type of thing people would ask on here or not, but here goes. Sorry if it's too long!

I've been watching porn since I was about 12 and masturbating frequently to it, and grew up thinking I had a healthy sex drive. I got my first boyfriend at 20 and we clicked in every way, he's feminist too (he knows way more about it than I do).

Both in person and in bed I'm submissive, and when aroused my instinct is always to be degraded and I can't help viewing myself through that 'male lens', basically living vicariously through what my boyfriend is experiencing as I'm doing/having things done to me. My boyfriend's always made sure I'm 100% ok with things before he does them, and has admitted that sometimes he feels uncomfortable when he thinks about what he does to me out of context, but at the time he admits how much he loves it. He barely watches any porn, only when I do if he's with me, and I've watched less since becoming sexually active as it's suddenly more "real" to me and I find more of it disturbing.

We've tried me being in power or simply just making love, but I find it really hard to become properly aroused, and when I do I automatically go into "use me!" mode :( I've started to feel guilty all the time because of it and I don't know where many feminists stand on this issue. I also don't want to start subconsciously resenting my boyfriend :(

Please, any opinions at all would be great!!

[VictorGollancz]

Difficult question, isn't it? None of us want to think that our partner, who we love, is actually harming us. If I don't feel harmed, then perhaps I'm not. Personally, I know that my bed is a feminist space, and whatever goes on in there goes on as a result of mutual consent and lots of discussion.

But we can't deny that we are products of our environment? Can any of us really say that we are the special ones whose consent is a gold-plated guarantee of autonomy and objectivity? Certainly, I feel as though I can give informed consent to whatever I please - but I'm perfectly willing to entertain the notion that something I might happily consent to harms other women.

[CaptainNancyBlackett]

Vixaxn, you didn't engage with me. You decided to give a non-answer to a question I'd left which wasn't even directed towards you. This was after having ostentatiously said that you weren't going to engage with me.

And behaviour like yours is exactly why I've been on holiday from this place and have serious considerations about whether I will come back. Because it shouldn't be necessary to have to put up with this kind of treatment in a feminist space, especially from someone who is making anti-woman posts.

If you want to engage honestly then why not actually answer my questions. If you want to engage in a negative and destructive way then make up some nonense about me "disapproving" (if what you're seeing is disapproval then you aren't reading properly) of women spanking men. It turns this into a pointless discussion.

[solidgoldbrass]

CaptainNancy, you seem to suggest that the sex the OP referred to as 'degrading' is sex which givee her no physical pleasure. That isn't what she said. BDSM sex often does involve gential stimulation for both participants, though not always - oh, and BDSM sex is in general far less hung up on PIV than mainstream people are. Nor did the OP imply that the sexual things that occur between her and her boyfriend do not involve physical stimulation of his body (ie he is getting off on 'degrading' her rather than the fact that his cock is being literally stimulated during the scenario they are engaging in, this is an assumption on your behalf based on.. er.... nothing).
OP has not specified what she means by 'degrading' sex, so it really could be anything from a blowjob to group bukkake to fuck knows what. THe point is you don't know (any more than I do), and there is no absolute objective definition of 'degrading' sex. So projecting your own hatred of porn you haven't actually seen onto someone else's actual situation is not all that helpful.

[MooncupGoddess]

Georgia - you are clearly sexually in charge of the situation here, in that what your boyfriend does is based around what you want (and it sounds like he might prefer to have more 'equal' sex sometimes - is that the case?). So, on that level, you're not being degraded, because you're in control and your wishes are being taken into account.

Can I ask (and don't feel you have to answer here!): do you feel 'present' during sex? Or do you feel like you are watching from outside, as if you were watching a porn film? Do you come? If you are 100% engaged and enjoying yourself then I'm not inclined to criticise your sexual desires; if not you might want to think all of this through a bit more.

[CaptainNancyBlackett]

SGB I hate women being harmed, whatever form it takes.

I can't believe that any feminist is happy to hear about a woman's sex life that consists mainly of becoming vicariously excited at the thought of a man enjoying degrading her.

It's. A. Joke.

Is there any point in this section, or is this just going to turn into a place where women find all sorts of rationalisations for male harm towards women and keep the focus continually on women's "choices" instead of examining those of men?

[skrumle]

what i don't get CNB (and i may have missed it) is what the OP is supposed to do?

her post is a question - should she feel guilty? TBH, i think i read her post completely differently to you, it sounds to me that she is asking her boyfriend to do things that he would probably prefer not to but he does them because that's how she gets off (which probably does arouse him).

should she feel guilty? and if the answer is yes presumably she should try and address how she approaches sex, but how? is she not entitled to pleasure?

[CaptainNancyBlackett]

Is anybody actually able to address harmful male behaviour or are we going to stick to feminine (deliberate use of that word) past-times in this section e.g. pointless discussions of female guilt, "disapproval" and examination and rexamination of female behaviour whilst ignoring the elephant in the room which is what some men do to women.

I answered the question about Georgia's guilt upthread in the first post I made to this thread.

Here's the important one. Should her boyfriend feel guilty for getting of on sexually degrading her? Should he feel guilty for telling her he loves it, so she is now well aware that to keep him happy she has to continue with this kind of sex?

The answer is yes, he should. Now why is it so hard for feminists here to address that point? That's the real question. Because whilst that doesn't happen, women in sexually abusive relationships have nowhere to go. They're going to get so-called feminists lining up telling her it's OK what her boyfriend does to her because she consents and anyway he's told her he doesn't think he's degrading her (apparently he's the authority).

[skrumle]

Should he feel guilty for telling her he loves it, so she is now well aware that to keep him happy she has to continue with this kind of sex?

i think the problem is that the OP has been (presumably deliberately) vague about what exactly she means by "degrading", but yes - i guess you're right that if he were really uncomfortable with some of the things they're doing he would emphasise how turned on he is by other activities where it's clear that it's not about him dominating/degrading her.

[solidgoldbrass]

CaptainNancy - You do not own this section and actually there is all kinds of discussion about all kinds of feminist issues going on in here, so I see no need to insist that some stuff is Not Discussed.
Also, there is a big difference between a consensual BDSM relationship and an abusive one - people who like BDSM are often very robust in encouraging people who are unhappy in their relationships to walk away - if you don't want to do something, you should not be pressured to do it. However if you like doing something with other consenting adults, you shouldn't be pressured not to do it because of some other person's ideology.

[Treats]

I don't think it matters what specific actions the OP is referring to. If she were to describe in more detail, other posters would only pile in with "Huh, call that degrading, I've had done to me" and it would be come a salaciousness-fest, and attract the wrong sort of poster

Surely it's enough that we can take the OP at her own estimation - that she enjoys activities that SHE PERCEIVES to be degrading. It's missing the point to insist on knowing what they are.

[MooncupGoddess]

I'm reluctant to pigeonhole this situation as 'nasty man wants "degrading" sex, woman reluctantly consents' because of sentences like this one:

We've tried me being in power or simply just making love, but I find it really hard to become properly aroused, and when I do I automatically go into "use me!" mode

There are clearly some complex dynamics at work here but apart from the fact that Georgia's sexual desires have been strongly affected by watching porn at a young age (which I think we mostly agree is sad, upsetting and another argument against porn), I don't think we can be sure from the information provided quite what's going on. Rather than saying 'your boyfriend is vile', which may or may not be true, isn't it more helpful to help Georgia think through the situation herself?

[Treats]

I'm not sure I've seen anyone respond in quite the way you describe MooncupGoddess (although I agree with what you say). I think the situation is that the OP has internalised the message that sex = degradation of women and Captain Nancy is saying that that's a message we should fight against as it's harmful to women. Other posters are taking the view that it's fine as long as the sex is consensual.

I liked VictorGollancz's point earlier, that none of us can really say we're totally autonomous and objective about our sexual preferences - we're all the products of our environment.

[CaptainNancyBlackett]

"to insist that some stuff is Not Discussed"

Actually I'm insisting that some stuff is discussed, or rather why it isn't being discussed i.e. the elephant in the room:

SOME MEN'S DEGRADING AND SADISTIC SEXUAL BEHAVIOUR TOWARDS WOMEN.

A whole lot of "feminists" don't want to address it for some reason. They'd prefer to have pointless discussions about female guilt. When male behaviour, male choices and male guilt are what really need to be examined.

[TryLikingClarity]

I'd like to know where the OP has gone off to....

Would be good for her to re-join the debate.

[solidgoldbrass]

Some men like BDSM sex, and some of those men are arseholes. Some, however are not.
Some men do not like 'kinky sex' and profoundly disapprove of it, and some of them are arseholes (the more they disapprove of other people's sexual behaviour the more arseholey they often seem to be)
Some men don't like sex at all and are still capable of being utter arseholes.

[Sariah]

My dh gets turned on by turning me on. Sometimes I like to feel degraded in order to be turned on. I am the initiator of sex and I usually set the scene. He is just happy to have sex and will go along with whatever turns me on. If he ever did something to degrade me then I would be very hurt and would feel properly degraded and I would be annoyed with him. But if we are role playing during sex and I am leading it in a particular direction then as far as I am concerned that is not about him degrading me but more about me getting aroused by feeling a certain way. I think there is a huge difference between a man wanting to degrade a woman and a woman who's sexuality is tied up somewhere along the line to being degraded. It is not real and it does not lead to feelings of degradation but rather to an orgasm. It does not carry outside the bedroom. It may not be wholly correct but then most of sex these days seems to have its quirks. I mean when you get down to it you could say that missionary position is degrading as it puts the man in control, blow jobs also, doggy style could be seen as a bit degrading. So maybe that would leave spooning and girl on top.