Female Libertines

Recently, I was listening to talk radio, where the host was talking about how men are "hard-wired" for casual sex. He stated, correctly in most cases, that a man can truly love his significant other, yet will be easily able to have a fleeting encounter with another woman, without it meaning a thing, forgotten as soon as the tryst has concluded. He went on to say that too much familiarity can kill a relationship for a man, which I've found to be true for me.

It was only when he started talking about women when I began to disagree with him, thinking he was excessively simplifying matters; painting too broad of a brush to explain women's behavior. He trotted out the old tired cliches about all women being unable to separate sex from love, always desiring a relationship rather than casual sex, etc.

The underlying assumption here was that "boys will be boys" and women had better not complain when a guy is acting according to his nature. Another implication was that women had better not act like "one of the boys" sexually, as it's presumably easier for women to remain monogamous and that it's almost unnatural for her not to want to do so, thus it's a worse transgression if she is not than it would be for a man.

And I consider those who wink at promiscuous males, but refer to promiscuous females in a derogatory fashion such as "slut", "whore", etc to be hypocrites if the first order. What's good for the gander being good for the goose and all that, you know. Personally, I'm glad to have known so many women with a matter of fact attitude toward sex.

While it may be true that a majority of women do not view casual sex in the same way as the average male, it doesn't necessarily follow that this is an immutable, universal, or necessary thing. Through my vast experience with women, I can say with the utmost confidence that female libertines most assuredly do exist, though likely there are presently fewer of them than male libertines. Logic only backs me up: for every promiscuous male, there are many more women who helped him to earn the title "promiscuous".

Nor does address the reasons why this is generally true. Until recently, in the days before legal and safe birth control and abortion, promiscuous women had the threat of unintended pregnancies hanging over their heads. Considering the varying levels of social disapproval and sanctions that came along with unwed pregnancy, this was a major deterrent for most women to engage in casual sex.

Related to this is that married women have always been punished much more severely for extracurricular sex. The driving force behind this had to do with property and inheritance -- a man needed to know which children were actually his. Nowadays, with DNA testing, this factor has essentially become a moot point.

Also, a woman who had the label "slut" hung on her usually found it hard to enter into a "good" marriage. In the past, when women were prevented from making a decent living to support themselves and when there were few support systems to help raise her children....and certainly no day care centers....not being able to find a suitable husband could ruin a woman's entire life.

There have always been female libertines, especially among the wealthy who have always lived according to their own rules, but nowadays, with effective birth control, legal abortion, DNA testing, and approaching equality in career opportunities, libertinism is no longer just for privileged women. Since the sixties, increasing numbers of women have approached sex in a more "male" fashion, and because recent scientific research has shown that neither sex is naturally monogamous, I'm guessing that women's and men's attitudes toward sex will become more and more similar as time goes by.

Thoughts?