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Men don’t know where the clit is and women fake it til’ they make it – that’s right, we’ve all heard the jokes, but what if I told you there’s some semblance of truth to that? Women face disparity in many faucets of life, jobs, careers, income, education and much more, but the lesser-known disparity is that of sex and pleasure. Society says we shouldn’t talk about this because sex isn’t for women to enjoy, but artists like Megan Thee Stallion, Cardi B and more are taking a fiery, hot sledgehammer to that stereotype – so let’s get into it.
From the brutality and lack of female pleasure found within mainstream porn, to the way Kim Kardashian is still being shamed for filming a sex tape 15 years after the fact, society has found lots of different ways to discreetly teach girls and women that sexual pleasure isn’t for them. Slut shaming, body shaming, ‘it will hurt, you’ll bleed’ - as young girls, you’re sold this idea through a severely lacking sex ed curriculum, social stereotypes, and popular culture that sex will be something you will struggle to enjoy. Orgasm elusive, but pain ever present.
Growing up I felt a strong sense of shame around my own pleasure, as though it were some illicit feeling that I had to supress, I suffered sexual harassment and assault, took part in sex ed classes that portrayed sex in a strictly heteronormative light, and all of these things came together to teach me this false narrative that my body is not mine. Watching documentaries, talking to friends, reading articles written by other women, I’ve learned that many have had similar experiences and feel the same way. The idea of sex is so intrinsically tied to male pleasure that if you do not fit into that category, you are not given the space to learn you can experience those feelings too. But you can and you don’t need anyone else’s permission or presence to do it.
The male gaze and heterosexuality have influenced so much of what we consider to be sex. If you watch any porn video, you will likely see a whole lot of vaginal penetration, mixed in with a few moans from the woman to stroke the man’s ego, let him know he is doing a good job, and the whole thing is over once the man orgasms. When you combine this with the lack of sex education and a general unwillingness from most people to talk about it, you end up with people using these porn videos as an educational tool (this was literally the case for my school’s sex ed classes, they stook an old porno on and told us this is what happens). This is an issue for a multitude of reasons; the aggression and roughness it can create within men, the pressure on women to meet these expectations on what enjoyable sex should look, sound and feel like, and of course not everyone’s sex will look like the straight penetration that is so widely mainstream.
Whilst the porn industry does have a lot to answer for, they can’t be blamed for everything. The suppression and the exploitation of female sexuality has been going on for a lot longer than the mainstream porn sites of today have been capitalising off it. Adverts for deodorant, coffee, cars, and many more inanimate objects have been rooted in sexism and exploitation for as long as I, your parents, and your parents’ parents can remember. Using the female body to sell material objects is a technique that many claim to be fruitful, ever heard the phrase ‘sex sells?’ But there’s a problem with using the female body as a marketing technique, it plays into the narrative that a woman’s body is an object with a price tag, a purchasable commodity for the masses.
The impact these social messages and educational failings are having on women are staggering and undeniable. In straight relationships, 66% of women regularly orgasm, lesbian women experience slightly higher rates at 86%, but for men that figure jumps up to 95%. Various studies have found different statistics, with one I found going as little as 40% of women reach orgasm, compared to 80% of men during a causal hook up. No matter where you look, women are having significantly less pleasurable sex than men. This may seem like a topic that’s not important enough to discuss, just another disparity between men and women, but sex is so important that the World Health Organisation (WHO) consider it to be a fundamental to our quality of life. So, if the WHO consider sexual pleasure to be integral to our ability to live a rich lifestyle, maybe it’s time we take this seriously.
New waves of popular culture are moving towards giving women that quality of life within their sexual encounters, taking control of their narrative and leaving behind the shame and stigma attached to the female orgasm. In the summer of 2020, as the world was shut down from Covid-19, Megan Thee Stallion and Cardi B dropped a single so hot, so explicitly sex positive and loud about female pleasure, people were instantly hooked. People loved it, or hated it, blasted it from their car stereo systems, or took to twitter to demonise the artists. I am, of course, talking about WAP. This song, with all its unabashed sexuality, seemed to take the conversation of female pleasure to the world stage – Women think about sex. Women talk about sex. Women enjoy sex. It seems so simple but it’s an idea the world was, and still is, waking up to.
It's a liberating feeling, having songs dominate the charts with powerful women singing about their own sexuality, the way they like it, the things they want to do. Women are taking up the space they need to learn and talk about their own pleasure in a way that is authentic, unbridled, and exciting. My hope is that in 10 years my words will be a relic, a snapshot of a distant past in a future where female sexuality is unchained from its male heterosexual keeper. No one’s permission is needed to solve this issue, let’s work together to close the pleasure gap for good.
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