Female Sexuality in Society and Self
‘La Grand Odalisque,’ by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres (1814). Le Louvre, Paris, France.
January 15, 2025
In my therapist’s office, stiff as a board on that leather couch, I was asked the obscure “What’s something you like about yourself?” At the time, I couldn’t think of anything besides being a girl, a woman. But then I hear of a man having sex with someone new every week, or witness their impressive uncaring, and I am filled with such deep, consuming envy. Back to square one.
Why exactly do I feel this guilt in personal desire? Where does this burning judgment of becoming “impure” stem from? How do I decipher between what I want and what society has pushed onto me? And is there a boundary I should be looking out for if I neglect one or the other?
History
Sex Is In. The conversation is by no means new, appearing countless times– the Sabine women of Rome’s origin, nudity of Renaissance paintings, undertones of sensuality depicted in seemingly all aspects of art forms. Asceticism or hedonism. Carnality or abstinence.
From an education centered on Western themes and ideals, Christianity immoralized human sexuality, yes, but there has always been a double standard, from ancient civilizations to the present day. Was there truly ever an openness, or were men allowed to seek out brothels and young boys, while women were held to a certain standard as a wife and a mother? A prisoner and an object to possess?
Early Christianity harbored strict views of intimacy, homosexuality, modesty, etc., but once again, were women the seducers, the temptresses, and men, the victims of desire. Dante, Italian poet and member of the Catholic church, wrote of the circles of Hell (Inferno), and the conditions in which one would spend eternity if the sin is committed in one’s mere lifetime.
In Lust, the second circle, Dante encompasses the act of falling to appetite, of desire, through Francesca da Rimini’s marital affair. A woman, the face of sexual impulse. A woman, the face of sin. (Don’t get me started on Eve.)
Upbringing
A few years ago, I was told I carry myself with an air of “pious guilt.”
Although I bring up the impact it had on the perception of eroticism, I was raised without any religious structure. Not even simply without, but more accurately against. Unbaptised, I felt like a splash of holy water would singe my flesh. Condemned. Not believing in condemnation.
My parents are opposites. Mother, an unyielding atheist, and Father, born and raised in the Christian Church. She raves, spent the 80s busking in New York City subways, and had met her first love in jail for protesting. He voted for Reagan, remarried to a conservative Catholic, and still has to be reminded what a slur is.
Where I conclude in values and politics when raised by parents with greatly differing views has, for years, been this blurry line, difficult to materialize into the how, why, and who of my personhood. My mother’s daughter, I lean politically blue, faithless, praise the great search for pleasure. Though also of my father, I am passive, privileged, shortsighted.
Where he respects, and she scoffs, I am often torn.
I am not drawn to a great presence, not pulled to a larger force. I do not have faith– I do not necessarily even want to. Yet when I act in a way I feel ashamed of, or made impure by, I go to Sunday service and apologize to the floor-to-ceiling wooden cross. Whether I am truly “sorry” or if I believe in “forgiveness” is still something I question. When I was told of this pious guilt I emit, that I must have been devout in my past life, and my instinct is to repent, the juxtaposition of my parents grew daunting.
At 17, I (instinctively, I want to type “gave/lost/offered my virginity”) had sex with my boyfriend at the time. My mother hugged me, said she was proud. My father, in anger, asked me to break up with him. My stepmother avoided speaking to me for three months. Called me a slut.
Even more confusing, my boyfriend’s family gifted him a box of condoms as a Christmas gift after they found out. Who was I meant to resonate with? Whose belief system was most accurate with my own opinion of my actions? The truth is both and neither.
I immediately wanted to defend as well as hate myself for having sex.
On one hand, as I told the Reprimander, it had been with someone I dated for a year before this “milestone,” we were safe about it, and intimacy is natural within relationships. Arguably as natural as the air in our lungs, as the chain of predator and prey. On the other hand, as I said to the Joyous, I have now given away something as sacred and profound as my virginity as a woman, every relationship will now become centered around this intimate act, and an innocent high school dynamic has been sullied into one of maturity and adult behavior.
I fought for this part of my life to be seen as freeing and feminist, but I also felt my skin crawling with remorse.
In my utmost youth, I claimed to be waiting until marriage. In high school, I promised to keep sexual relations contained to long-term relationships. Now, in college and single, I feel this push and pull between what I desire and what society encourages.
The ‘College Experience’
One of the major reasons the aforementioned boyfriend I dated from 16-18 ended things the summer after graduation was for the “college experience.” Both in fear of and hope for it. While he stayed in our hometown, I moved two hours away to start University.
Certainly helping his argument, I joined a sorority in my first month of freshman year and quickly settled into the bubble that is UCSB Greek Life. Over a year later, while I certainly protest many stereotypes, ‘hookup culture’ is a clearly integrated aspect of college, perhaps especially within this sector.
My participation in this culture is what has brought me to question my stance on female sexuality. I suppose that is too broad a term, for I do not consider the sexuality of anyone else but my own. Therefore, I mean my stance on whether or not I should be having sex, in what context to have it, where this visceral judging of myself was born, and if it is valid.
Weekends consist of parties where, under the influence of seltzers, blaring music, and flashing lights, one succumbs to the touch of another. Sweating on the dance floor, your back pressed to two people kissing who met seconds prior, the stranger making their way toward you appears angelic in the haze. It is when that haze dissipates, and a body is turned away from you beneath skewed sheets, that the burning of guilt settles low.
One-night stands do not embody sex. Rather, it is more known as the reckoning of emotional connection. So while it is the extreme, I find it to be a more intimidating stimulant to my inner turmoil with personal desire versus societal expectation. I debate whether the urge to judge the act is a show of values or an impulse to be a “proper woman.”
Quote, Morals, Unquote
While still appearing in committed relationships, the core of societal reprimand of female sexuality derives from the casual and unlabeled. Under the guise of being unromantic and at risk of emotional consequences, one-night stands are considered the pinnacle of sexual immorality.
Men are not invulnerable to the negative stigma around hookup culture. Though, like all things, women are held to a separate standard. The pressure is strict and ruinous.
Why are hookups evil? Do they truly represent a potent act of love performed without love? Or is something more sinister left in its wake?
During sex, hormones are released, contributing to the very human feelings of bonding and affection. The problem is that, when it's over, you are then attached to a person who is not committed to you, and vice versa. The endorphins are met with the coldness of their following absence, creating the emptiness so often associated with one-night stands.
What if that doesn’t happen for you, though? You have mastered the art of detachment and are intimate without dwelling on being nothing but a body, but you still judge yourself harshly for having multiple sexual partners. That harsh and horrible question eats away at your conscience:
“Am I a slut?”
At the end of the day, sexual guilt is a result of validation, both of society and men. Along with the emotional aspect of physical intimacy, “wrongness” is woven into the female cognitive process.
When I looked up the definition of ‘slut,’ the result was: “offensive– a woman who has many casual sexual partners.” Curious, I then searched for the male equivalent, to which the internet provided no equal terminology. Instead, there are insults with similar meanings (rake, manwhore, womanizer, etc.), but none carry the history of stereotyping and dissolution.
One may argue that one-night stands are immoral and empty. That we, as humans, are biologically meant for more, in terms of connection. Before college, I only read romance novels. Grand displays of affection, yearning, and great love. I thought this was what to live for, and to settle for less would be a disservice. Physical intimacy was to be saved for a so-called Soulmate.
Fast forward to now– chivalry pronounced dead, commitment-phobia at its historical peak, youth worshipped. People are “finding” themselves, freedom is prioritized, and independence is vital.
Above all, pleasure can be abstract.
Nature vs Nurture
The simple conclusion as to why people have sex is because of pleasure.
Ignore reproduction and evolution, or any biological factor, as to why humans and animals need it. Desire. Lustful sin. The act of will. Let’s then analyze: if I’m single and enjoying this independence but enjoy pleasure, what is wrong with casual sex?
The terrifying truth is, I have different reasons. Male validation– the craving for it, the crippling need– is my greatest vice.
There is no pinpointing where it started. Like at 5, when my grandpa’s first words when seeing me were “How many boyfriends you got?” or playground crushes. Teenage standard low self-esteem or getting broken up with. Generational trauma to the patriarchy. Yada yada.
When it comes to sexual relations, whether committed or casual, deep down I know it is more for them than it will ever be for me. For if it were about my pleasure, their perception of me, or their desire for me, would not impact each minuscule movement. Would not have me peeling away layers of clothes rather than layers of me.
At first, it was to please my high school boyfriend, and the expectations were narrowing. After, to prove myself attractive after a break-up. And now, to feel wanted in the way contemporary society allows, to be easily accessible.
The guilt and judgment I am consumed by are not in fear of derogatory claims or public shaming. It is in knowing that I give away crucial and vulnerable pieces of myself with the goal of validation in mind.
I think the two fighting voices in my head, personified by clashing parents– to be conservative or liberal with sexuality– may be half-desensitized and half-attempted healing. Partly a subservient instinct I have built, as well as partly an urge to be protected from their eager hands.
What, then, is the solution? Align ideals with those of society, or rebel in service to both of you and men? Whether or not one-night stands do please me– and not a false venture for the grave I began to dig in my childhood– depends on what I aim to achieve from the interaction. Where I do find pleasure and power in this, I am also aware of the sacrifices I offer at their will.
To have sex, or not to have sex, that is the question.
Like anything, as long as you are safe and happy, feel free to make any decision suited to you. Adhere to the concept of sexual abstinence. Break free from the stigma around casual. World’s your oyster.
How do I feel? It’s complex; I can’t come up with a definitive answer.
Told I treat intimacy like a constant struggle between starvation and binge eating, once I’m handed a slice of cake (validation, connection), I live off of it, need it. Then, the guilt consumes me, and I shut myself off from eating anything at all.
Therefore, where is my medium? It’s something I’m honestly still attempting to understand.
Being a woman of this age and environment is empowering, and I agree we should feel this way. Just first, ask if it is in the hope of giving power to yourself or others. The only aspect that matters for either is loving yourself in this choice. Life is for you, so don’t waste it pleasing others at your own expense. As always, get good at pleasing yourself.
