Do Men and Women Enjoy Sexual Pleasure in the Same Way or in Quite Different Ways?

The main focus of my work is discussing how women orgasm during sex. This article presents another perspective by illustrating how many women approach sex solely through a loving relationship rather than in the more explicit terms that men do.

This explains why even though sex is not usually intended to lead to pregnancy, for most couples ‘marital sex’ in particular, continues to be defined by intercourse. More genitally-focused sex play is typically associated with liberated or younger couples.

Alfred Kinsey highlighted men’s much greater sexual responsiveness (to the point of orgasm) in the 1950s. Although he emphasised the huge range in sex drives that defines ‘normal’ for both sexes, we like to believe that everyone is equally sexual.

Our competitive world assumes that more is always better. Yet there is no proof that individuals with a high sex drive are any happier than those with a low sex drive.

Female orgasm is an evolutionary redundancy that allows a woman, who is motivated by do so, to enjoy her fantasies and orgasm through masturbation alone. Other women have little to gain by being explicit, so orgasm is simply assumed with a lover. Yet few women exhibit the same motivation as men do to be actively sexual.

• A woman cannot oblige a man to have intercourse, so what is ‘female sex drive’?
• If sexual pleasure is so equal then why do women almost never pay for sex?
• Why are women so badly informed about sex that they can’t locate their own clitoris?
• How can women be aroused by sex when they object to images of sexual activity?
• Women are much slower to arouse so how do they orgasm BEFORE the man does?
• Why are women usually looking for relationship rewards from sex (e.g. marriage)?
• Why are women who orgasm at the drop of a hat so sensationally newsworthy?
• Why are the equally valid but more realistic experiences of other women ignored?
• Why is female sexual dysfunction defined in terms of intercourse rather than orgasm?

There is no reason why intercourse (or any form of sexual activity) should facilitate orgasm since a woman becomes pregnant regardless of her own orgasmic ability.

These are not rhetorical questions. My aim is to re-define female sexuality in terms that are consistent with women’s real life experiences and their social behaviours.

Given men’s primary focus on the erotic and women’s focus on relationships it is difficult to appreciate that the opposite sex has such a different perspective on sex. So men still hope for a woman who is motivated by orgasm and women still hope for a man with the emotional sensitivity displayed by the romantic heroes of novels.

My work highlights the misunderstandings that surround sexual pleasure and the issues that make it challenging to achieve every time over decades with a partner.