Why Is It So Hard For Men to Do the Bare Minimum?
It never ceases to boggle my mind how often men fail to consider doing even the bare minimum.
Yes, as a woman I have needs, as does everyone. But let me say this, loudly, for the people in the back, for the peanut gallery, for the men and women, and for anyone in-between, non-binary, along the spectrum, gender fluid, etc: Any physical encounter inherently carries more risk and cost for a woman than it does for a man.
I don’t just mean because a woman risks violence and unwanted actions, with a man overstepping his bounds in both subtle and not-so-subtle ways, but yes, that is certainly true, and it is significant. Even with a man we feel safe with, we risk a man overstepping or crossing a boundary or boundaries. We also face pregnancy risks. Women are also more at risk than men of contracting STIs in unprotected sex. This is simply factual. These are huge risks.
Ok, say you don’t have to worry about STIs because you know the potential partner and you are both clean/recently tested or protection will be used (again, even with protection, there is a risk, such as with a condom breaking). Sex for women can often cause complications (in addition to pregnancy), such as UTIs. I say this as someone who has often suffered from UTIs. There are many women who are susceptible to UTIs after any sexual intercourse. Bacterial vaginosis is another condition that can be caused by having sex with a new partner.
Is it fair for women to bear the brunt of all of these costs? Or to disproportionately face these risks? Ok, life is not fair. Yes, we know this. Yes, of course, the fact of life being unfair and of women bearing more risk and more costs from any physical, intimate interaction with a man than he carries is not a man’s fault. But as a man, knowing that a woman faces greater risks and costs, why then do you approach women and expect time, attention, and most of all, sex, without doing anything in return besides offering physical intimacy?
While I’ve evaded fully reading The Five Love Languages thus far, I have to say, it is shocking to me that men can see physical touch as a love language and not realize that a woman is more receptive to physical touch when accompanied by literally any of the other five love languages, which are acts of service, receiving gifts, quality time, and words of affirmation.
If I as a woman am hosting a guy for an NSA encounter, that time and energy takes away from my own free time. Particularly when a woman has a child, and as in my case, when she is a sole care provider (and this is true for a woman who is a care provider for adults as well), free time is scant and must be scheduled. To say that time is money is actually undervaluing time; time is non-fungible (irreplaceable), while money is fungible, meaning it can be replaced. Hosting also means I incur the cost of any food/snack I provide, the costs of washing my linens, and so forth. My housing isn’t free. My upkeep isn’t free. My time isn’t free. So why should a man’s access to me as a woman be free?
Domestic labor, particularly the labor involved in child-rearing, is not currently economically valued in our society (at least in the United States, where I reside, it is not). That means that I, or any parent, is doing a tremendous amount of unpaid labor. Yes, men are parents too, but statistically, the fact remains that women do the bulk of domestic labor (this includes housekeeping and cooking in addition to child-rearing).
It is also true that the last couple of pandemic years, with distance learning, work-from-home (WFH), and pandemic pods becoming more of the norm, have put increased pressure on women and caused setbacks to the progress made toward equality between men and women in the workplace. According to the International Labour Organization, “the more educated women are, the less likely they are to agree they have similar opportunities to men.” This is even truer today than it was in 2016 when this research was conducted.
I also fundamentally believe that marriage is an institution created by the patriarchy. As I’ve written in a previous article, Reclaiming My Divine Femininity: Ushering in a New, Matriarchal Age, the patriarchal, individualist model that views women as property and is based on the isolating nuclear family model is not ultimately benefiting either men or women. Yes, women are more disadvantaged by patriarchal norms, but we as men and women are both actively harmed by such an individualist, “pharmacologically-deprived” (as Terence McKenna put it), ego-centric, competitive, rationalist, individualist, and materialist way of being and thinking.
As Ryan and Jetha have argued in their controversial book, Sex at Dawn: How We Mate, Why We Stray, and What It Means for Modern Relationships, humans evolved to be promiscuous and polyamorous rather than monogamous. The rise of monogamy coincided with the rise of agriculture and humans being tied to the land. Furthermore, the so-called monogamy of other animals that we use to justify monogamy in humans is actually generally only romantic, and not sexual. The proliferation of pornography (and its drive to build the internet) supports the idea that humans did not evolve to be monogamous creatures and that, rather, we are quite driven by sex and sexual desires.
So, given that the myth of monogamy is finally beginning to crumble in our society, and particularly if you are a man who is not available or interested in being a primary partner, why then is it so difficult for so many men to approach women with nothing more than desire? We are taught that it is wrong to make romantic relationships transactional, yet marriage at its core represents the heights of a transactional relationship: in exchange for her commitment to a man, a woman receives support raising their children and traditionally financial support as well.
So dear men, you need to do better. Dear reader, each one of us needs to be more conscious and intentional in our actions. If you are a man who identifies as partnered and ethically non-monogamous (ENM), or if you are single, I as a woman, and especially as a single woman and a sole care provider, need more than just your interest for company and sex. Women have more on the line than men. Men: you need to show us more love languages than physical touch alone; you need to balance out physical touch with at least some of the other love languages. Energetics work both ways.
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References:
“Animal Attraction: The Many Forms of Monogamy in the Animal Kingdom.” (February 13, 2013). The National Science Foundation. Retrieved from https://www.nsf.gov/discoveries/disc_summ.jsp?cntn_id=126932
Chapman, Gary. (January 2015). The 5 Love Languages: The Secret to Love that Lasts.” Northfield Publishing, Chicago. Retrieved from https://www.amazon.com/Love-Languages-Secret-that-Lasts/dp/080241270X/
Eisler, R. (1988). The Chalice and the Blade: Our History, Our Future. HarperOne: San Francisco.
Harford, T. (5 June 2019). “Does Pornography Still Drive the Internet?” BBC News. Retrieved from https://www.bbc.com/news/business-48283409
International Labour Organization. (2016). The Gender Gap in Employment: What’s Holding Women Back? InfoStories. Retrieved from https://www.ilo.org/infostories/en-GB/Stories/Employment/barriers-women#what-women
Raghavan, S. (January 29, 2018). “7 Reasons Women Are More Prone to STDs Than Men.” Retrieved from https://www.thehealthsite.com/diseases-conditions/sexually-transmitted-diseases/reasons-why-women-are-more-prone-to-stds-than-men-k0118-552928/
Ryan, C. and Jetha, C. (2012). Sex at Dawn: How We Mate, Why We Stray, and What It Means for Modern Relationships. Harper Perennial: New York.
