Cathy reads books: Tomorrow, Sex Will Be Good Again
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On his amazing Sex and Psychology Podcast, Justin Lehmiller recently interviewed the author of Tomorrow, Sex Will Be Good Again. I liked what she had to say, so I listened to it on Audible. It’s my first read from Verso, a publisher my friend Nick is always going on abut.
It’s a short, concise book that’s surprisingly readable.
I found it challenging in an enjoyable way. I rarely encounter critiques of sex-positivity and consent culture that aren’t overtly sex-negative. This book didn’t really have any moralizing about sex or too much scaremongering about porn or sex work.
The book makes the point that consent culture demands that women keep ourselves safe from bad sex and rape by knowing what we want and don’t want in sex and advocating for it. We must know when we want to have sex and how, and clearly ask for what we want in sex and decline what we don’t want.
But there are several problems with this advice. First, it puts the onus on women to avoid bad sex and rape.
Second, society punishes women for wanting sex. For example, courts use women’s desire for sex in any context against them in rape cases. There’s also the problem that for many women, and men, desire for sex is responsive, rather than spontaneous.
Third, how can anyone go into sex fully knowing everything they might want out of it or enjoy within it? We’re asking women to know what they want going in when a crucial component of great sex is mutual discovery.
Fourth, we’re asking women to go into sex armored against unpleasant experiences. But great sex also requires vulnerability.
The book also points out that men are in a bind as well. Society requires men to seek sex, obtain sex, and perform during sex. Any deviation provokes shame and ridicule.
The solution, as always, is to abolish gender, stop moralizing about sex, and be kind to each other in order to facilitate the kind of vulnerability that leads to mutual discovery.
“Know what you want and don’t want and communicate clearly” is good advice, to the extent that it’s possible. But it has to be part of a larger conversation about what sex really is and how desire really works.
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