Thread: Women And Masterbation

I'm not a girl, I'm a grown up and very sexual, woman. That is the first part of your answer - "girls" are children. (pet peeve of mine )

I think a lot of women do have a problem with the idea, the action and/or talking about masterbation and sex. Whether people are religious or not, there is a deep social stigma attached to female sexuality. Recent studies of brain activity (it's amazing how they can map responses now) show that women are just as visually stimulated as men, just as easily aroused and yet a large percentage have apparently blocked the response or fail to recognise it. In the lab, women whose brains and physical responses indicate orgasm has occured, state that it hasn't. They are so out of touch with their own bodies and responses that they actually do not feel them.

This is probably due to a combination of factors; men's sexual responses are very upfront and obvious to them, a woman's arousal is far less noticable, casually. She gets less immediate feedback to support understanding of what arouses her and how. Add to that all the "nice girl" and that's "dirty" messages she likely got growing up, then throw in all the derrogatory messages we have as a society about female sexuality and you have a lot to overcome. Just look at all the negative terms we have for sexual women - most aren't allowed here - but ho, that S/t word, loose, bimbo, and broad are a few milder ones. Notice that we do not have comparable words for men?

Even if we aren't religious, the messages are deeply embeded - women and women's sexuality in particular, is what destroys men, brought evil into the world, original sin, those awful, bad women, distract men from the business of seriously destroying themselves and each other and making sacrifices and making sure life is grim before you die. I won't get into citing specific references (that might offend someone) but every major faith has a legacy of anti female beliefs and rhetoric. After all if you are going to control people and make them feel guilty, you have to take the fun away and hold that in reserve for an after death party.

Women who want to be "good" know that sex, sexual self pleasure and probably sexual pleasure with a partner, are, if not down right bad, at least highly questionable and better avoided. I once went to a business sponsored partnership program which dealt with both working partnerships and life partnerships. It was a type of business which often involved couples. The couple conducting it were very successful, quite wealthy and had a very strong faith base. When talking about sex to the women, the wife, told the ladies that you have to learn to like sex because it makes the men happy and improves the relationship. While the results could be true, I thought it an odd way to put it. What about coming to enjoy sex because it enhances your own life? Because it will make you, as a woman, happier? Because it will improve the relationship for both? Nope, learn to like it, to improve things for him. So the postive message that sex is ok, was corrupted with the message that it's ok only because it makes men happier.

This is the reality we live with. Change is slow and while there is a movement toward acceptance of women's sexual needs the route is strange and still lined with negative messages. The idea that the nice, fresh, clean cut, girl next door masterbates and expects an orgasm when she has sex and is still a nice, fresh, clean cut girl, hasn't really caught on. All that means is she is an undercover "bad" girl, secretly a ho.

It's no wonder that your wife and many other women refuse to talk about masterbation, may never touch themselves sexually and really aren't very comfortable with sex. It's an unsafe and distrusted arena for many women. Some women do manage very successfully to turn that around. As we get older we may drop inhibitions and get far more proactive about our own needs. You can facilitate that by being a caring lover, educating yourself about pleasuring women -there are is a rapidly growing collection of books on the subject, gently encouraging her to express her needs. That means you have to listen nonjudgementally and not try to "correct" her, if what she says she wants or needs isn't what you think it should be - men do that a lot and it can shut a woman down. (It's kind of like telling someone how to pronouce their own name - yes, people do that)

I'm sure if you do some reading here and jump into some of the threads you will get lots of ideas and feed back.