Nine out of ten women are aroused by a kitchen in an horrific state.
attempts to develop a Viagra equivalent for women.
It's called wine.
That research report hits a bit too close to home.
I'm going to pass on the opportunity to make a bad joke about wooden teeth.
The bit that popped out for me from the story was a report of research saying that women tend to lose sexual interest a few years into a committed relationship, that reawakens with a new partner, while men are more likely to stay interested in the same partner indefinitely:
This was curious to me, the article presenting the opposite of conventional wisdom as if it was the confirmation of conventional wisdom. Well, obviously everyone knows women get bored with their diligently faithful husbands and can only be excited by a fresh new prospect!
3: Sorry about that. Because I'm nosy, though, anecdotally, how would you say you broke down on the division of domestic responsibilities front?
5: That was exactly what I found entertaining about trying to explain it in on the veldt terms.
Speaking of a messy kitchen, I wonder about the kitchen of the guy who is using his oven to melt plastic for this scientific dildos.
Seems like a just-so story doesn't need to be so strained: Women have an interest in producing more children that live to adulthood, which is easier with a diverse selection of partners. Men have an interest in passing on their genetic inheritance to the maximum number of children. Once a man has settled down with a woman, he wants to produce the maximum number of children, and a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. Once a woman has found a man who is a reasonably good provider, it's in her interest to look for more genetic diversity.
It's a tiny bit convoluted, and doesn't follow the ev-psych tradition of "men have to have access to as many leggy, busty blondes as possible all the time," but it's fairly coherent.
He shows women and men in new relationships reporting, on average, more or less equal lust for each other. But for women who've been with their partners between one and four years, a dive begins -- and continues, leaving male desire far higher.This is of course exactly the reverse of the conventional wisdom we've all been fed since God was a lad. Surprise! Did the study allow for the emotional balance of the relationship? Stress levels of each partner? Age differentials? Etc. ad nauseam. Kudos if it did because I'd say there are way too many variables to identify an underlying pattern.
tl;dr. I smell BS.
6: Not traditional at all. My spouse shoulders more of the domestic work than I do.
11: Do you have kids? Split that work equally?
I raise LB "lesbian bed death" and refute her thus.
(seriously, I have no idea what causes this phenomenon or even if it's a real phenomenon, but I strongly doubt that division of domestic labor is either a necessary or sufficient explanation, except maybe to the extent that a bad division of domestic labor is a sign of an overall bad relationship)
Haven't read the article, so I hope that I can add ethnic stereotyping to the gender talk that will follow. This Northern German shrink, I wonder did he talk with northern Germans willing to lose time with a survey, ie Ossis?
My grad school friend from Hamburg would tell great stories about coworkers of his in that city-- extremely buttoned down dude comes to the office. His phone rings-- It's Mrs buttoned-down, who stays home (no kids). "No dear, I can't come home just now to take out the trash. Yes, I'm very sorry that I didn't do it the way I usually do." Another one had a wife-packed lunch that indicated severe OCD-- individual wrapping and portion size precision as an art form, not ironically either.
I just remembered a visit to a friend who yelled to her girlfriend in the next room, "I'm telling him about Lesbian Bed Death, sweetie!" as she was.
Do hipsters now ironically pack lunches?
This is of course exactly the reverse of the conventional wisdom we've all been fed since God was a lad.
I dunno, I think it can fit in to the stereotype. The ladies get bored and have to wash their hair all the time, so the gentlemen, cruelly neglected at home, are forced to seek satisfaction elsewhere.
I dare you to ggogle "cute healthy treat" restricted to pinterest.
9: And the time required for desire to flatline is roughly that needed to raise a kid to the point where the need for a partner who is *right*there* drops off substantially.
19: That's all stuff for kids, not husbands. Anybody who started doing that for her husband is probably sleeping with the tennis pro.
Or writing an erotic horror novel called, The Lesbian Death Bed.
I'm somewhat surprised there's nothing called The Lesbian Death Bed already.
http://www.examiner.com/article/the-lesbian-death-bed
Do hipsters now ironically pack lunches?
I used to work with someone who semi-ironically had Dairy Lea triangles (processed cheese blobs traditionally eaten by schoolkids in packed lunches) for lunch.
You go to bed with the lesbian you have, not the lesbian you wish you had, Mobes. Then you die.
a) This is the subculture that pays for PBR. The idea of ironic food comes naturally.
b) Messages or even jokes via the food in a packed lunch are not that weird of an idea. The smiley face with syrup on a stack of pancakes can be completely sincere, or a gentle irony; A tasty meal made of perfectly square items say could well be a pretty good in-joke. But in the case of my friend's cow-orker, no.
I have sort of picturing a bed the folded upon the sleeper, trapping the victim inside.
Maybe all those guys are letting themselves go, losing what meager attractions they once had to tempt the fluttering bird of feminine attention.
I wonder if articles like that are a Bad Thing because people are suggestible and women in a long-term relationship who leads that article will now be a little less interested in sex down the road.
Similarly, I wonder if any and all coverage of suicide is a Bad Thing.
What did people think of the Virgin Suicides? I hated that that book was popular - I'll bet that its commercial success caused a lot of suicides.
So, maybe not the unequal division of domestic labor, exactly, and I have no explanation for lesbian bed death. Come to think, though, my anecdotal stereotype about couples who never have sex anymore and the guy complains about it isn't so much unequal division of labor, it's a sitcom-ish relationship; one of those ghastly things like Home Improvement where the man does "I am a bumbling idiot with poor impulse control" shtick and the woman responds with "Men. Whaddaya gonna do?" Like, the couple I'm particularly thinking of, he actually cooks a lot. They just relate to each other in what looks to me like a cartoonishly gender-stereotyped way.
My favorite writer/educator on this subject, Emily Nagoski, thinks the article is pretty bogus. Probably her biggest point is that "responsive desire" is not the same as low desire, but she'll have her own book on the subject out pretty soon.
31. Sorrows of Young Werther generated copycat suicides. (Northern Germany again).
King of Queens and The Nanny are together responsible for lifestyles consisting of funny problems that can be both explained and resolved in 22 minutes.
Had that story been about men, I bet the person responsible for the photo illustrations would have approached it differently.
I love my husband dearly, and have as much attraction to him as possible, years in. (This same thing happened in each of my previous relationships, even ones where the sex was what brought us together.) The basic fact is that I find it a huge turn-on to be with someone new.
It's not so dire that I feel the need to address anything. But it does mean that I have a low sex drive within the marriage.
35: Right. The photos stopped just a bit too high.
I wonder if articles like that are a Bad Thing because people are suggestible and women in a long-term relationship who leads that article will now be a little less interested in sex down the road.
I doubt it.
There is an nice (I don't know about fully credible, but kind of charming) bit in there speculating about how women might be more susceptible to Relationship Bed Death than men because of socialization -- get those THINK ABOUT SEX ALL THE TIME impulses encouraged and nurtured sufficiently in youth, and you too can lay down entrenched pathways to horniness for life!
I doubt it, but, that said, etc.
Probably her biggest point is that "responsive desire" is not the same as low desire, but she'll have her own book on the subject out pretty soon.
Yeah, okay, but (a) it's not the case that spontaneous desire is just what men have while women have responsive desire -- it depends on the circumstances, (b) spontaneous desire can be a lot more fun, and (c) it actually is a drag when you find yourself not doing things you like because it is hard to get up the enthusiasm to do them. That goes for a lot of things that aren't sex, too.
I love not doing things because I can't work up the enthusiasm to do them. Especially when I suspect I'd actually enjoy them were I to be enticed to do them. You're nuts, rfts.
33: I am puzzled by her insistence that the article doesn't address responsive desire. There seems to be quite a lot of discussion of stimulating sexual desire. I'm not understanding what she would have liked the article (or the underlying science) to say.
If the diagnosis is correct and women lose sexual interest in somebody they have been in a relationship for a long time, it doesn't follow that the proper course is to apply a mediation to correct women's desire. The obvious non-medical solution that still fits with monogamy is for men to be widely inconsistent over time. This need not involve the men taking any drugs at all, but I'd guess that heavy drinking would help.
'mediation' s/b 'medication'. I'm not typing well today.
If the diagnosis is correct and women lose sexual interest in somebody they have been in a relationship for a long time, it doesn't follow that the proper course is to apply a mediation to correct women's desire.
It doesn't even imply that there's anything that needs "corrected".
And one of the world's masters of rat lust is Jim Pfaus
Theorizing about mouse orgasms has crossed over from philosophical inquiry into science.
Also, surely the "pill for that" should also have a layer of MDMA.
Maybe 47 is why I don't find the whole project all that pathologizing. Why not have a fun drug to make fun stuff more fun?
it actually is a drag when you find yourself not doing things you like because it is hard to get up the enthusiasm to do them. That goes for a lot of things that aren't sex, too.
It sure does.
Sometimes I'm reminded of Oliver Sacks and Awakenings, and how some people with that one type of Parkinson's lose the ability to start and stop motion, but while they're in motion they are able to stay in motion. There was a lady who kept marbles in her pocket, and when she was frozen and unable to walk, but wanted to go somewhere, she was able to release a marble, and then being able to see the marble move was enough to jumpstart her ability to start walking.
Sometimes I wonder if there isn't a broader version of that broken impetus, that all of us deal with at times. And that anxiety plays the role of the little marble.
I'd think anxiety inhibits more action that it enables.
48: yeah. It's too bad they can't just say "this is a fun drug to make fun stuff more fun".
It's as if you've forgotten that drugs are bad. Unless used to treat approved medical conditions. Or unless traditionally used for fun in Europe before 1800.
And if they *could* say "this is a fun drug to make fun stuff more fun", we'd be in a society with a lot more fun drugs.
Legalizing weed won't just lead to legal weed, it'lll lead to economic incentives to make better weed.
Or maybe just TV commercials in which somebody says they have a better weed.
53: well, right, sure. But it's worth remembering that debating the merits of pathologizing whatever actually means debating the cover story.
Unless used to treat approved medical conditions.
Be interesting if they medicalise "becoming sexually bored of your partner". Can you think of a nice cod-Greek name for it?
I read somewhere that legalizing weed, with the accompanying phenomenon that it's possible to accurately list its ingredients, has led to lack of interest in types with moderate-to-low THC content.
Which is funny, because again, anecdotally, I know at least a few people who don't like smoking pot anymore because it's all too strong for them -- they don't get stoned in a fun way, they just go straight to staring semi-paralyzed at the wall.
they just go straight to staring semi-paralyzed at the wall
It's like they've never even heard of black light posters.
59. I believe the Dutch have put a top limit on the THC content of the stuff that can be sold legally in coffee shops.
57: Lysistrata syndrome? Not exactly on point, but closeish.
63: Good enough. It's isn't like Oedipus wanted to sex up his mom.
63: Not even a little close? The whole point, if you read the play, is that they all really badly want to sex each other like RIGHT NOW.
Be interesting if they medicalise "becoming sexually bored of your partner".
But this already falls under "lowered libido."
Maybe Phaedra? (I mean, not at all, very sorta kinda.)
59: This is one of those stories where I question the amount of research being done. Dale Pendell, in Pharmako/Poeia makes a strong case for cannabidiol (CBD) being the part that makes you go to sleep, while THC provides the actual "high." He was writing in the early '90s though, so presumably more science has happened.
Aphrodite syndrome? But she never liked her husband at all, did she?
But this already falls under "lowered libido."
Not if your libido is fine with other people, surely?
I'm a bore, I realize.
In this context, I think "top" is the term used.
I like Phaedra. I don't think the myth says whether she still fancied Theseus in spite of being cursed with the hots for Hippolytus, but I suspect it's implicit that she didn't.
Not if your libido is fine with other people, surely?
Eh, why not?
Doctor, my libido hurts when I do this!
75. Selectively lowered libido, then? Is that a thing?
Considering libidinousness as the area under the libido curve, total libidousness will still decrease if maximum libido w/r/t one attractor decreases unless that decrease is accompanied by a concomitant increase in libidinousness w/r/t a different attractor or set of attractors.
I read somewhere that legalizing weed, with the accompanying phenomenon that it's possible to accurately list its ingredients, has led to lack of interest in types with moderate-to-low THC content.
One example.
I think testosterone just makes you more indiscriminately and spontaneously horny than other hormones do, and men produce lots of testosterone. That means you're even willing to settle for your long-term partner rather than that mysterious and exotic stranger. The evolutionary reasons that Nature might choose blunter/cruder kinds of aphrodisiacs for the non-pregnancy-having gender are obvious enough and require no elaborate hypothesizing on partner genetic diversity and the like.
I know at least a few people who don't like smoking pot anymore because it's all too strong for them -- they don't get stoned in a fun way, they just go straight to staring semi-paralyzed at the wall.
This. The trouble with the strength of weed today is that its like taking shots of grain alcohol, when really what I want to do is drink a few glasses of wine.
Maybe you should mix the weed with Gatorade?
82: I'd say it was more like only drinking Cisco or MD 20/20. If one were allowed to use analogies.
Somehow it's not much fun to spend 15 minutes wildly hungry before giving in to sleep.
Maybe you should mix the weed with Gatorade?
Pretty sure I've put Gatorade in a bong before. To enhance the flavor, or whatever. Its one of those things that sounds like a good idea when you are stoned.
The invisible hand of a free marijuana trade would result in a variety similar to that of alcohol products. Discuss. (Actually something like cigars might be a better model.)
Its one of those things that sounds like a good idea when you are stoned.
Sure. Not as good of an idea as aquarium burger, but pretty good.
People, seriously: there is still plenty of low-grade weed out there.
Yeah, and it's not super cheap, either.
92: anyhow, the point is that it's the weed, rather than the commentariat, that has changed since the commentariat was in undergrad.
I'm curious why people would see strong weed as a problem rather than an awesome opportunity to smoke less while getting just as high. Why not just take smaller hits?
I know somebody who smokes once or twice a week and has been using the same eighth for over a year.
To enhance the flavor, or whatever. Its one of those things that sounds like a good idea when you are stoned.
I've tried this with red wine. It doesn't really work.
The invisible hand of a free marijuana trade would result in a variety similar to that of alcohol products.
You wish. See link at 79. The thing is that the "invisible hand" is crap in relation to all commodities. Sellers go for a share of the mass market; people with minority tastes are shit out of luck.
eople with minority tastes are shit out of luck.
As demonstrated in the alcohol business.
Also, I think reactions to weed are HIGHLY influenced by socialization, like those studies where college kids act wasted after drinking jungle juice with no alcohol in it, only more so.
96.last: I thought the point of all of this was that there isn't a true "mass market" now -- rather, that drug prohibition has led to a perverse situation where the vast majority of consumers are terribly erudite connoisseurs, leaving the average smoker with fewer options than in a more rationalized market.
I should say, "the smoker with average tastes"
I'm curious why people would see strong weed as a problem rather than an awesome opportunity to smoke less while getting just as high. Why not just take smaller hits?
Because the process of smoking is enjoyable and so I don't want to smoke less? Its nice to be able to roll a joint, smoke it with a friend, and not go into a coma.... and if its a coma you want, don't share it with your friend.
I guess over the years we've all gotten bored with talking to the same people about sex. #threaddrift
Personally, I find the effects of getting high to be an intense interest in everything. Sometimes food/water, but just as likely to be math/sex/basketball.
math/sex/basketball
Which makes for a complicated evening, let me tell you.
I've never smoked pot because I am very, very uptight.
I am very, very uptight.
You know what helps with that? Smoking pot.
105. Hey, I know just the thing to help you chill...
105: But you've smoked it for a lot of other reasons?
101 makes sense to me. Keeping up the alcohol analogy, it would be nice if they could label weed by THC content the way they label alcohol by percent proof, so that you could easily do the equivalent of having a beer on the patio. I hate the taste of alcohol equally whether it's beer, vodka, or anything else - the entire point of drinking for me is to feel drunk. But a lot of people enjoy the act of becoming drunk which is totally understandable.
Sometimes food/water
I call it hot foodwater.
Except for being very, very uptight all the time, I am extremely chill, dude.
Although I doubt that the strength of weed can be fully expressed with one number.
Yeah you need, like, a color. Or a sound almost? You know how sometimes people can see sound? Like that. Oh wow. I love this song. Wait. What?
If you could measure potency by (1) 'head' strength of high, (2) 'body' strength, and (3) duration, you could have some kind of 3 symbol code, like "Blue X9" or whatever, that could give people a helpful sense of which sack to buy.
Here is how the differential desire thing worked out in the 50s:
Some doctors suspect that about three out of every four U.S. women are frigid, i.e., get no sexual satisfaction. In the current Journal of the American Medical Association, Gynecologist William S. Kroger of Chicago and Endocrinologist S. Charles Freed of San Francisco chide U.S. gynecologists for not paying more attention to the problem.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,857838,00.html
If the differential desire is cultural, it isn't anything new. The pathologization of female sexuality has of course declined from 1950s. It is pretty clear those women were not frigid; they just didn't want to have sex with their husbands.
My bet is that this differential desire is veldty and much of the ideology of patriarchy that developed with the rise of agriculture is meant to handle this issue.
Here is what god has to say:
"Your desire will be for your husband,
and he will rule over you."
I also suspect that this is the reason it took until about 1970 or so until for the theory of rape to be transferred from a property based theory to a consent based theory.
One number could be the years you're looking at, hippie, if you don't give up your supplier right now! The other could be a simple cataloguing factor, perhaps referring to cultivation order.
THC isn't the only thing in pot that gets you high. There's also cannabidiol, among other things, which has important effects including medicinal ones. In Togotopia people will breed for a variety of effects by manipulating the proportions of various cannabinoids. Artisanal weed will be available to the connoisseur, and high-THC strains for people who just want to get wasted.
If the differential desire is cultural, it isn't anything new.
Well, no kidding. Was anyone arguing that it was? Close your eyes and think of England.
I also suspect that this is the reason it took until about 1970 or so until for the theory of rape to be transferred from a property based theory to a consent based theory.
Wait, what's the "this" that's the reason here?
80: There's a testable hypothesis, then. Both men and women produce testosterone and how much we produce can be manipulated by social interactions -- either natural or `fixed' victories increase testosterone in either gender, IIRC. (Which I might not, it's been a while.)(IYKWIMAITYD.)(There's a pseud.)
Good monogamous marriages reduce necessary antagonisms for the woman enough that her testosterone drops, whereas Father and Mother William got it on well on in life? I always assumed as much of them.
N.B. artisanal weed at a variety of strength levels and with well-specified differential effects along a number of dimensions is, in fact, available to the California consumer right now in many fine strip mall-located medical establishments.
120: I read that it is new -- three hundred years, less? to assume that women have less desire. Of course, when women had more, it was proof of their weaker nature.
In Togotopia people will breed for a variety of effects by manipulating the proportions of various cannabinoids.
That'll be one hell of a sex grotto.
So, like, if you, diagnosed with mild peripheral neuropathy or chronic back pain or nonspecific ennui or whatever went into one of these establishments and said "I want something that won't just knock me on my ass; I prefer to sit and enjoy many thoughtful puffs on a hand-rolled medicinal cigarette" then the proprietor will say "okay but can you be more specific about which kind of mild come-on are you looking for? Do you prefer to be relaxed or higher energy? Are you interested in watching medicinal cartoons quietly or having therapeutic conversations at high volume in a clinically optimal party atmosphere?"
I really ought to move to California and fake a case of glaucoma.
120: I read that it is new -- three hundred years, less? to assume that women have less desire. Of course, when women had more, it was proof of their weaker nature.
Yeah, I didn't do a good job in 120 of expressing what I was objecting to in 117, namely: The observation that "it isn't anything new" by the terms of 117 is not much of an argument against "if it's culture". The US in the 1950s and the US in the 2010s hardly represent the full range of human culture.
As demonstrated in the alcohol business.
Seriously, I can't find anyone who'll sell me ant-flavored brandy.
same people about sex. #threaddrift
I haven't spoked mot in a long time. Does the great sex that seemed to happen whenever opportunity knocked at a stoner's door persist into middle age? Also, do other people remember much of em-dee-em-a evenings?
FWIW, I think PGD hits on the answer in 80-- men are more content with a suboptimal experience than are women. Not sure if hormones are responsible, but that would be testable. If culture need be invoked, the OP dude is German.
The US in the 1950s and the US in the 2010s hardly represent the full range of human culture.
But they do represent the full range of possible fashions, or maybe they represent exactly the same fashions, or something—I can't really remember how that all went.
|| The voicemail that the doc wants to discuss some things on your EKG, but it's "mostly normal"? Probably not worth panicking, but...
The follow-up that the abnormalities on your EKG probably just mean you are in really good shape? Yes! Much better! (I still have to go follow up to be sure, but I'm just mentally going with good shape. Actually, I'm mentally upgrading to "heart of an elite athlete," because why not?)
This is mostly a humble brag, of course.|>
If you could measure potency by (1) 'head' strength of high, (2) 'body' strength, and (3) duration,
Wait are we talking about pot or singers?
Congrats, humbly nameless 133.
men are more content with a suboptimal experience than are women.
Lots of men have told me that any sex is better than no sex, but I know few women who think the same. I don't know if it's culture or biology.
Lots of men have told me that any sex is better than no sex, but I know few women who think the same.
I wonder, does this hold true if you specify that "any sex" includes "sex that does not progress to orgasm"? I am speculating that men experience this situation less frequently than women. But maybe I've formed that impression based on an inadequate sample size....
133 was me.
Also, surely the "pill for that" should also have a layer of MDMA.
I was actually reading the post in the OP--and thinking that it would be great Unfogged fodder!--on Monday, as I relaxed on a bench at the Mall after wandering around the sculpture gardens, and yeah, RFTS's comment about MDMA seems pretty spot-on. (Not that I've ever tried it, though I'd like to.) Although as LB says, we can't just say this is to make fun stuff more fun (unless it's total woo bullshit, or traditional, like alcohol).
I also found it kind of amusing how the study selection was basically like, "well, we can't allow people with open relationships, because having an open relationship is actually the solution to this problem." (Yes, I know I'm distorting things.)
"Wait, what's the "this" that's the reason here? "
The ideology of patriarchy made male judges less likely to promote consent based theories of rape.
137: Opinions have ranged from not realizing that women don't always have orgasms, to not realizing that women having sex want orgasms, to assuming that women naturally don't orgasm and therefore don't care. Every couple of years I wade into some Slashdot thread or the like to persuade the clueless that a reliable way to get women to have sex with you is to convince them -- perhaps by demonstration -- that they will actually enjoy it. If I've convinced anyone, it may be the largest contribution to public happiness I've made anywhere.
I wonder, does this hold true if you specify that "any sex" includes "sex that does not progress to orgasm"?
Well, I don't believe that any sex is better than no sex, but I do believe that in many cases of series of events including sex-with-orgasm, there are an appreciable number of subsequences that are better than nothing, even though those sequences may not include the big O.
I suppose it's possible that one could think that a series of events that progresses so far is preferable to nothing, even if it doesn't include orgasm, but a series of events that progresses to some other point is not preferable to nothing unless it also includes orgasm. I suppose!
137. Alcohol, middle age, and multiple pairings in short order all make orgasm less immediate for guys. so-- Drunks, old guys, and ABF guys, we wish to compare aggregate libidousness as defined in 78 for this group with that of women who don't always enjoy themselves.
IME follow up tests of any kind are pretty likely for patients with good insurance. But congratulations on the very careful diagnosis that you are fit.
a reliable way to get women to have sex with you is to convince them -- perhaps by demonstration -- that they will actually enjoy it.
If you're convincing them by demonstration, haven't you already gotten them to have sex with you? Or are you imagining the slashdotter having sex with one woman with another looking on by way of demonstrating to the latter that she, like the former, will enjoy having sex with him?
138.last: That struck me too. Swinging or some form of open relationship or occasional hall pass or something along those lines is an obvious and easy answer. Maybe we need to medicalize jealousy rather than low desire.
The references go on the CV, nosflow. Surely your Doktorvater taught you this.
A reference isn't a demonstration, x.
But for women who've been with their partners between one and four years, a dive begins -- and continues, leaving male desire far higher.
Tell that to Mr. Coolidge.
Dancing, nosflow.
For earnest nerds, I recommend seeking win-win strategies in all interactions (demo 1) and reading something like _Joy of Sex_ for suggestions of win-win strategies. Though JoS is now old; anyone have a better current recommendation?
Medicalizing I don't know about but I'd definitely support social pressure not to be jealous over social pressure to have more sex.
"I think testosterone just makes you more indiscriminately and spontaneously horny than other hormones do, and men produce lots of testosterone. That means you're even willing to settle for your long-term partner rather than that mysterious and exotic stranger. The evolutionary reasons that Nature might choose blunter/cruder kinds of aphrodisiacs for the non-pregnancy-having gender are obvious enough and require no elaborate hypothesizing on partner genetic diversity and the like."
Testosterone is not such a blunt instrument:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Testosterone
Falling in love decreases men's testosterone levels while increasing women's testosterone levels. It is speculated that these changes in testosterone result in the temporary reduction of differences in behavior between the sexes.[32] However, it is suggested that after the "honeymoon phase" ends, approximately 1-3 years into the relationship, this change in testosterone levels is no longer apparent.[32]
--
This may be part of the reason men and women have similar levels of desire early on. My bet is that testosterone levels in both men and women are adjusted in a way to enhance fitness and the decline in female testosterone levels (and the decline in female sexual desire mediated or not through testosterone levels) after the honeymoon phase somehow enhances fitness.
anyone have a better current recommendation?
The Eroticon of Yoryis Yatromanolakis, obvi.
I'd be willing to bet that there are good dancers who are lousy in bed, but am willing to defer to clew's greater expertise here.
A reference isn't a demonstration, x.
WMYBSALB?
Testosterone is not such a blunt instrument
If you get enough of it and freeze it into a club, it is.
Kind of like that Roald Dahl story about the leg of lamb.
I've only read the one with the giant peach and the one with the fox.
151.last: This is hardly a proof, but it seems odd to doubt a correlation here. One should be able to improve one's odds of being right about who's good in bed by using dancing diagnostics - say, discovering on the dance floor that a person is unresponsive to body language, or inattentive to same, or self-absorbed.
And that's without accounting for physical skills that apply in both contexts and attempts to notice - while on the dance floor - responsiveness, attentiveness, and interest in mutual pleasure.
102: Doing my best.
To be good to dance with, you have to pay constant attention to your partner's abilities & preferences, and protect them a little, and surprise them occasionally, and indicate your pleasure in their company. And have three to twenty minutes of aerobic capacity. I expect it's possible to take all that into bed and be bad at sex, but it's still a good bet.
It should be easy to tell if somebody is self-absorbed without having to expend as much effort as you do by dancing.
Happy to be pwned. Nerd dances on the 1st & 8th, Bay Area peeps. (And many other dates.)
157.1: Yes, a rare re-tracking of the derailed.
clew's way of spelling it out is much more appealing than mine!
I'd be willing to bet that there are good dancers who are lousy in bed.
The constant counting out loud was a bit of a turn off, but the overuse of "jazz hands" was the real boner killer.
She was a line dancer and insisted we stay side-to-side.
One should be able to improve one's odds of being right about who's good in bed by using dancing diagnostics - say, discovering on the dance floor that a person is unresponsive to body language, or inattentive to same, or self-absorbed.
So you really think there's a correlation both ways between dancing and in-bed-goodness? Crappy dancer, crappy in bed; good dancer, good in bed? That seems even weirder than thinking that there's only a correlation between being a good dancer and being good in bed (and letting being a bad dancer be free of implications about skill in bed).
A previous partner once made the reverse inference, that I'd be a good dancer, and boy was she wrong. It turns out they're different things! I mention this ONLY in order to score points in an argument.
Also it is totally obvious how a man demonstrates to potential partners that sex with him will be enjoyable. First, acquire an ottoman...
So you really think there's a correlation both ways between dancing and in-bed-goodness?
You may be a lover, but you ain't no dancer.
A previous partner once made the reverse inference
So you're saying she reversed the "sign" of the effect? Brave and transgressive, Neb.
Hunter gatherers in tropical climates all know which men are good at sex. The living spaces don't tend to have walls. Plus, they know who have the bigger penises because they don't tend to wear much clothes.
I think clew was only making a claim about a low false-positive rate. After all, the initial wording was about a demonstration, a performance that indicates good sex will be had. Which implies nothing more than a low false-positive rate: if the test implies you'll be good in bed, you probably will be. It's possible that such a demonstration will be out of reach for plenty of those who're also able to perform well in bed, but that doesn't negate its utility.
164: An ironclad correlation? Surely not!
But a useful one, that should affect one's judgment about how likely it is that one will enjoy going to bed with this dancer versus that one? I'll stand by that.
("Improve one's odds", my original language, seems not only conservative but a pretty low bar. Does it seem to you that trying to get information about sex from dancing is going to make the conclusion you draw less reliable?)
So you really think there's a correlation both ways between dancing and in-bed-goodness?
Uh, I have to say that there is no correlation, in my experience.
170: yes, that's why I expressed my surprise at what seemed to be a different use for the test as suggested by joyslinger.
Does it seem to you that trying to get information about sex from dancing is going to make the conclusion you draw less reliable?
Yes?
Well, look. Suppose we take a population of 100 guys, 90 of whom are bad dancers. Of the good dancers, 9 are good in bed, 1 is not. Of the bad dancers, 40 are good in bed, 50 are bad. Knowing someone's a bad dancer shouldn't actually shift one's belief in their sex skill very much (from 49% to ~44.5%), but knowing they're a good dancer really is useful info (raising the likelihood from 49% to 90%!).
So, parsimon, nosflow, what would you tell slashdotters if you were trying to save them from PUAs?
Maybe a simple set of floor exercises would be a better test.
174: Are you thinking of shifting into statistics?
174: what's your point? Won't anyone who's skeptical of the correlation just object to the way you've constructed your hypothetical dataset? (Yes.)
I am now wondering what good sex I missed because it didn't present with motorcycles or dancing or wing chun. Oh well, more for the rest of you.
174 is useless without confidence intervals.
Knowing how to calculate negative and positive predictive value lacks specificity as an indicator for being good in bed.
Also, b-girl feminism: fascinating. Also I have to write my goddamn chapter.
So, parsimon, nosflow, what would you tell slashdotters if you were trying to save them from PUAs?
I'm told you can meet nice women at dances.
I'm not especially familiar with slashdotters, but if people need to be saved from PUAs, I doubt that judging their dancing skills is going to do it.
Sex is natural, sex is fun, sex is best when we both wing chun
174: what's your point? Won't anyone who's skeptical of the correlation just object to the way you've constructed your hypothetical dataset? (Yes.)
Sure, my point was just that a sufficiently good positive predictive value may well be useful for the purpose in question, even if it's pretty useless in the other direction (at properly ruling out non-dancers). If, from clew's sampling, good dancers really are almost always good in bed, and she's able to find enough of them as she needs, it doesn't really matter how many false negatives the test generates. I was trying to generate an example where the test *is* close to useless the other way, but still valuable. A thought experiment, one might say.
Really, we need clew's sample data.
Lord knows I can't dance; I signal my sexual prowess through karaoke and blog-commenting.
A thought experiment
Not generally useful for sexual signalling.
We can dance if we want to
We can leave your friends behind
'Cause your friends don't dance and if they don't dance
Well they're no friends of mine...Lay Deez
Parsimon, how would you alter 148.2, for instance?
...What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why, I cannot now remember...
She would recommend the Eroticon of Yoryis Yatromanolakis, obvi.
If you're convincing them by demonstration, haven't you already gotten them to have sex with you? Or are you imagining the slashdotter having sex with one woman with another looking on by way of demonstrating to the latter that she, like the former, will enjoy having sex with him?
It's like you've never heard of an ottoman.
But for women who've been with their partners between one and four years, a dive begins -- and continues, leaving male desire far higher.
Sonja: I know I could have been a better wife to you... kinder. I could have made love with you more often... or once, even.
Leon Voskovec: Once would have been nice.
Maybe it's important to move away from talking about being a "good" dancer. I'm not really thinking of technical prowess here; I want to say that among a set of dancers, some will exhibit behaviors - which are partly social behaviors, as clew indicated in 170 - that help you decide, if this is information you want, how good they'd be in bed. You're not judging the precision of their steps or exactly how skilled they are at dancing qua dancing; you're judging their willingness and ability to respond to physical and social cues in a way that's common to dancing and sex.
It's true, as x. trapnel implied, that there are plenty of people who aren't going to get on the floor and open this line of communication; I do want to be mindful of that. But among the subset of people who are dancing, the way each one dances is a useful sexual signal. That signal is best read in conjunction with social signals that also provide information about responsiveness, attentiveness, etc. - but having it would improve my confidence in my judgment about whether my dance partner would also be a good sexual partner.
I persist in doubting that willingness and ability to respond to physical and social cues in dancing is something that translates into willingness and ability to respond to physical and social cues in sex, and therefore that the behavior exhibited on the dancefloor does not help one (accurately) decide how good they'd be in bed. (I'm also not sure how you can separate technical prowess from the "willingness and ability" you speak of.)
All I know is that if you're doing some kind of motherfucking Morris Dancing or Square Dancing, you're not gonna be having sex with me.
You're missing out on some rhythmic, synchronized sex, dude.
Ha ha Halford doesn't have anybody to call out moves when he's having sex.
Who needs an app when you have a commentariat?
I'm about to be offline for a while, but for examples of "technical prowess" I've already given precision - meaning at minimum the ability to know where your limbs are headed - but speaking off the cuff I might add flexibility, the ability to bear a partner's weight (I'm picturing a tango, which I don't do) ... reflexes maybe? Those are all useful on the dance floor, but achieveable by other means, and you can bring them to the floor without having also found out how to bring them to bear there.
There are some learned pieces of "willingness and ability", and those skills too can improve with practice, but I'd say they differ in kind from the technical list above, mostly in that they concern the way one treats one's partner and interacts with them. Here, sensitivity to a partner's wants and needs is the key skill I've already put on the table.
(Also: "translates" is still too direct for my taste. I'm not offering a guarantee, just a claim that dancing with someone [who dances] is useful if you want to refine your prediction of whether going to bed with them would be enjoyable.)
I have to rush off now - and I wish I could say "Off to dance!" applied, but it ain't so.
But you can only be sensitive to a partner's needs and wants given a substantial background: you need to be able to recognize what they are or might be and to know, in the moment, how to respond to them.
Sensitivity to a partner's needs and wants are traits that come into play in a lot of arenas, not just sex and dancing. Much of what has been said with reference to dancing could, it seems to me, also be said with reference to cooking alongside another person: there are relatively autonomous technical elements, and there's an aspect that involves relating to what your co-chef might need or want or be doing him or herself as you move around the kitchen without interfering with each other and anticipating what might helpfully be done or fetched or whatever. Naturally, this element and the technical element can't fully be divorced; you need a lot of local knowledge to make the sensitivity-to-needs-and-wants bits go. And, of course, sensitivity to needs and wants is a component of being with others no matter what the pursuit is, though in some arenas one can get away with being or is encouraged to be more brusque than in others. Would I infer that someone who's a good (in the sense of exhibiting sensitivity) dancer would also be a good person with whom to live? With whom to work? With whom to cook? I would not. Such a person could be inconsiderate in daily life or incompetent in the kitchen, quite easily.
I guess 208.1 is supposed to be accounted for by the parenthesis in "dancing with someone [who dances]".
Anyhow, sexual prowess is reliably signaled by big hair, amirite nosflow?
And by the absence of hair. Don't mess with Mr. In-Between.
I'm watching Case Histories (the tv series of the Kate Atkinson books). Is there a sexier name than Jackson Brodie? I can't think of one. Although when I was 17 I massively fancied O1iver Rebe11ato, which is pretty damn good too.
Sonja: I know I could have been a better wife to you... kinder. I could have made love with you more often... or once, even.
Leon Voskovec: Once would have been nice.
"Swimming out to the open sea, like the great, wild herring." Exit Leon.
"I realise this must be a great blow to you, Sonja. But you must not allow yourself to be consumed with grief. The dead pass on, and life is for the living."
Sonja: "I guess you're right. Where do you wanna eat?"
212: Oh, I didn't know there were shows! I'll bet they'd lend themselves well to that.
I've avoided this thread all day on the assumption that it's trolling me because I somehow avoided angry drunken ranting this weekend and am now going to be goaded to defend or deny female sexual dysfunctuon or something.
Instead I can sidestep and wonder whether the people who are arguing that good dancing correlates to good sex are people who enjoy and throw themselves into dancing. I'm not much of a dancer and I think Lee was actually repelled when I was bellydancubg, but I've always had a history of being hit on in used book stores and libraries while I'm mooning delightedly over what's on the shelves. I'd guess that conversation can be a good proxy too, because you get to gauge a person's responsiveness, intensity, attentiveness, spontaneity, and so forth.
I definitely do not like dancing but I do think of myself as someone who gives good banter and yet even here I'm going to express skepticism that the traits supposedly revealed in these pursuits are indicative of skill or lack thereof in bed. I mean the sort of mental whateverness (yeah, I went there) that leads to delightful spontaneity in conversation, what is this supposed to indicate regarding a person's sexual practice?
If a detour into analogyland is permitted, the whole 'dancing and good sex' thing is questionable. What if I like to foxtrot but my partner is into krumping?
I mean the same logic would indicate a correlation between skill at dancing and quality of conversation. I mean!
217: I feel like meat, not a cheese sandwich.
218 is more than fair. I don't know that there's any really reliable way to guess beforehand, so whatever gets you to a point of wanting to find out is the important part and I thought privileging dancing there seemed inadequate.
so whatever gets you to a point of wanting to find out is the important part and I thought privileging dancing there seemed inadequate.
Comity!
I've had lots of friends I love talking to and cooking with but don't want to go to bed with, though. Dancing generally involves embraces and rhythmic movement and not throwing an accidental elbow and finding a dance you both like.
It's possible that dancing lets me smell a partner and everything else is rationalizing my response to that, though I think I know how people smell after even a chaste conversational evening together.
If what you mean, clew, is that good dancers float your boat, that's fine, but it's not exactly what you've been saying hitherto.
Countess Alexandrovna: My bedroom at midnight?
Boris: Perfect. Will you be there too?
227: The prancing, the camel toe, or both?
I think all women should assume that skill at skiing positively correlates with being good in bed, while being tidy is negatively correlated. Precise sustained rhythmic movement, paying close attention to one's partner (the terrain), body control, balance - all while being amped up on the hormones rushing through your body. Dancing, well, if you're looking someone to bring to an orgy, maybe. Tidiness - do you really want your partner getting all upset and distracted because you didn't properly fold and put away your clothes?
229: it's the gestalt, man. The perm! The earrings! The oddly breezy natual surroundings! The music!
You'd like her to be able to find the bed, though.
Precise sustained rhythmic movement, paying close attention to one's partner (the terrain)
I dunno could you hit a helicopter jump off an ottoman?
207 sounds like any generally athletic person (reflexes, flexibility, strength, coordination)
227, 229: We have some good characters in my neighborhood, but I can't even dream about how much better my life would be if her morning routine pranced her by my house.
I'm trying to come up with an argument for fine crochet work as the best possible predictor of sexual skills...
But I got nothing.
Um. Attention to detail? Patience? Ability to tolerate excruciating levels of boredom?
This just isn't sounding any better, is it.
Well come on, doesn't the entire hobby revolve around putting things into holes over and over and over and over and over, tirelessly?
.... I guess maybe dudes should take up crocheting? I just confused myself.
Having lots of small children could be a believable predictor.
"I'm going to do you like a baby bootie."
OK, I ban myself, from living.
241 to 238 and 237, not 240 where it's even creepier.
"If you have a gold top-hat, wear it;
If you can jump high, do that too..."
You know what is a sign that someone is not good in bed? Misquoting that poem!
Then wear the gold hat, if it will move her;
If you can bounce high, bounce high for her too,
Till she cry, "Lover, gold-hatted, high-bouncing lover,
I must have you!"
FROM MEMORY, biatchen.
The Countess: You're the greatest lover I've ever had.
Boris: Well, I practice a lot when I'm alone.
Thank you, neb. But why do you pretend I've confused the inverse for the contrapositive ?
Actually on topic, judging "if it will move her" is the hard part. Might as well be a talking frog.
I am quite sure I have pretended, or believed, no such thing.
Might as well be a talking frog.
230:
do you really want your partner getting all upset and distracted because you didn't properly fold and put away your clothes?
Shit. I really am terrible.
But it's really annoying to have to re-iron haphazardly flung-in-the-heat-of-the-moment pants!
I agree with nosflow 100% on the dancing stuff, but then I suppose I would.
Nah, Thorn, I think the thread is trolling me--note the crochet reference!
All I have to say on the subject (while sober) is that antidepressants, while wonderful in many respects, can seriously kill one's sex drive. Of course, so can depression.
Crochet references make J, R quaver.
My main conclusion from this thread is that Neb must be a really bad dancer.
I was without power last night - this is the first time I've seen the thread since I left it.
I concede that thread has potentially gone quiet for good, but the parallel claims for other of life's arts seem kosher to me; I wouldn't argue that dance is uniquely useful, only that it is useful. The claim that puzzles me most is the one in 173, that learning how someone dances is not useful for - even actively interferes with - improving one's guess about how they'd be in bed.
Epilogue: Last night at dinner, without foreknowledge of this conversation, my host played the Jim Steinman album, unfamiliar to me, that includes the lyric "I'm a lover not a dancer" in the chorus of Dance in My Pants. I see from the rest of the lyrics that I don't (at all) want to submit that track as evidence, but the coincidence was striking.
I think, though, I will concede that my claim holds much better for the case where one wants to discern whether a skilled dancer is a worthwhile lover than for the case where one has to decide whether to write off a partner one didn't enjoy dancing with - the useful scenario there is that the one where they dance skilfully but betray offputting insensitivity or dullness. Reluctance, lack of skill, or clumsiness isn't predictive.
I propose a grand unified theory which states the ability to Prancercise to dance music while on an eliptical machine while wearing a baby bjorn is a reliable indicator of sexual skill.
My main conclusion from this thread is that Neb must be a really bad dancer.
A safe takeaway, given that I said as much.
261. It's certainly a reliable indicator of something.
Anecdata to the OP. After some years together, with stereotypical concomitant declining interest, Sophia tried testosterone cream on the recommendation of a friend. Results have been dramatic, in terms of both interest and outcomes.
the useful scenario there is that the one where they dance skilfully but betray offputting insensitivity or dullness.
I thought the really useful scenario was a total left-footed newbie who is still aiming for mutual satisfaction and enjoying what s/he can do. A: charm them before everyone is chasing them; B: even in my rose-tinted midlife recollections sex rarely went perfectly either; C: oooo, maybe also a sexual innocent exploring.
I wonder if the non-dancers here are assuming I mean technical skill at dancing. No. I've been describing applied character and a modicum of haptic and aerobic capability.
Sophia tried testosterone cream on the recommendation of a friend.
Where did she put it?
OP! Veldt! Doesn't seem at all hard to retro-explain:
Once they have achieved top rank within the group, male yellow baboons maintain it for an average of two years before being displaced by a younger male, but tenure can be as short as one month and as long as 11.5 years (Alberts & Altmann 1995a). Males transfer groups throughout their lives and the average residency duration is 2.8 to 4.25 years (Altmann et al. 1988).
Or: I expect someone new to come `round every few years and amuse me between my food fights in the matriline. Which explains Thanksgiving dinner politics, too.
266: Her friend's recommendation. Duh.
Inner thigh, but it doesn't matter. Takes several weeks to start making a difference.
265.1: I'll agree, but then I would, wouldn't I?
I got too tangled up in lay epistemology* about veterans to try to also make the case for the ingenues, but I sure have seen your scenario in the wild too.
*Pun not originally intended, but I'm glad it's there.
Lizard Breath,
Your anecdotes aren't representative. In reality, marriages with a sharper/more gendered division of labour tend to have more sex. Most women, and most men, seem to naturally gravitate to defined gender roles within relationships, and to prefer them.
I'm always rather amused by how cultural liberals treat 'evolutionary psychology" as a bad world (though I prefer to just say 'behavioural ecology'), and are so reluctant to acknowledge that most gender differences we see are the result of biology and our innate natures, not culture.
On the veldt, people who waited for the development of an evolutionary psychology with falsifiable theories were eaten by lions.
Most women, and most men, seem to naturally gravitate to defined gender roles within relationships
Since in most heterosexual relationships there's one woman and one man "defined gender roles" doesn't differ from "defined roles". There are two partners and two genders.
Two or more partners, if you want to go into biology and how slutty some of those animals get.
marriages with a sharper/more gendered division of labour tend to have more sex
sex is viewed as a labor to be dutifully performed?
marriages with a sharper/more gendered division of labour tend to have more sex
sex is viewed as a labor to be dutifully performed?
Technically, the claim doesn't say what counts as labor and what doesn't.
So stupid story. Hanging out with HS friends this weekend, I learned that a boyfriend cheated on me. "Wait, the summer after which year? Yeah, I figured the reason he dumped me was something like that..." More than 20 years later, and yet I am totally pissed. And annoyed about it, because, really, why on earth should I cats?
277: Yeah, I was just hypothedizing a theory on why sec mighty be more frequent. If it's a wifely duty to closer you're eyes and think of England, you might do so more often.
Cats in 278 should be care. And I'm banning myself until I learn to type on a touchscreen phone.
To cats: to get so hung up on a painful past experience that you give up on romance entirely, and fill the love-shaped hole in your life with housecats.
276: Getting good at sex is just like any other kind of deliberate practice; if you're having fun, you're doing it wrong.
Re: Yeah, I was just hypothedizing a theory on why sec mighty be more frequent. If it's a wifely duty to closer you're eyes and think of England, you might do so more often.
My guess is that husbands who observe a more gendered division of household labour seem more dominant or masculine to their spouses, and thus more sexually appealing. That seems like the most obvious explanation.
That seems like the most obvious explanation.
You are a man, right?
Just so you know -- Hector St. Clare is a nut, . I don't want to judge -- maybe you enjoy arguing with a crazy person -- but be aware that you are beginning to argue with a crazy person.