Having Sex Like A Man

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In a wonderfully memorable episode of Sex and the City, a Carrie voice-over makes the following statement: “After I began to get dressed, I realized that I’d done it. I’d just had sex like a man. I left feeling powerful, potent, and incredibly alive. I felt like I owned this city – nothing and no one could get in my way.”

For those of you non-Sex & the City fans out there, in this episode, Carrie accepts oral sex from a past lover but does not offer any in return. This apparently equivocates her having sex like a man. Now, as a sexually active female, I am all-too-aware of the male hesitance to head down south. Still, I am disturbed by this notion that, as women, we are expected to do more giving and less taking.

Every sexual encounter should leave us feeling “powerful, potent, and incredibly alive.” Enjoyable sex shouldn’t be restricted to those with external genitalia! If anything, women ought to be given extra attention since their orgasms are harder to come by. Instead, hook-up after hook-up finishes leaves women craving more attention, more intimacy. If pregnancies were measured based on women’s orgasms instead of men’s, our overpopulation issue would be resolved. Am I right or am I right?

The “sex like a man” concept entered one of my recent conversations. This is a less-than-honorable anecdote, but bear with me, if you please. Last night, I met a beautiful man on Tinder and he picked me up from the club at midnight to head over to his place for drinks. Obviously, we both suspected a little more than just drinks. One thing led to another and I ended up taking a blissful “walk of shame” this morning.

A dear friend told me that this unplanned, emotionless sex was an expression of my learning to “have sex like a man.” Do men only have emotionless sex, or can their emotions be involved too? And more importantly, are women not allowed to have emotionless sex without their gender identity being questioned? Are women suspected to only have clingy, smitten sex?

Perhaps the real thing at issue here is choice. The concept of having sex like a man entails getting what you want, when you want it, emotions involved or not. In that case, no one should ever resign herself to having sex like women.  No one should be expected to play a submissive role when it’s her very own sexuality that ought to thrive while in bed. Sharing an orgasm with someone (or working towards one) is an incredibly intimate experience and it’s one in which both participants should feel at ease.

Can’t we all just have sex like plain old people? Not like men, not like women. The bedroom is no place for such cut-and-dry roles to play. I’m not saying that emotions should always be involved. I’m simply saying that sex should always be consensual and should feature an equal balance between satisfying each participant’s desires, both physical and emotional. That isn’t too much to ask.

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