Suzeonline, this is unfair:
"This thread has so far been skewed towards the male point of view, and I know from experience that anything I have to offer from a woman's point of view will be shot down pretty quickly on this male-dominated forum"
I've often taken the feminist perspective and I'd welcome anything you or any female has to say.
And why should you take the passive (missionary) role anyway? Can't you just as easily shoot down the male point of view?
So far I think the men have outmatched the author of the article in terms of thoughtful responses--sorry if we don't observe all the niceties.
Once again it's the ladies (excluding Poirot) who seem stuck for words, or something noteworthy to say, or are missing in action.
By all means shoot the men down! I'll even join in if you give me a lead.

Thanks Squeers :), but you mightn't always be on the thread I want to make a comment on!

I probably did overstate the problems as I see it, however, as much as I enjoy reading some of the opinions on this forum, I often feel that 'feminism' is trotted out too often as being the root of all evil (so to speak!).

I feel like it is understood that it is all the woman's fault that men 'have to' view porn because of this perceived 'declining libido' that women have now.

I very much doubt that any women have had a declining libido because of the actual porn their men have been watching. There would surely be other problems in the relationship as well.

Men in happy relationships look at porn too, so obviously we can't blame women's supposedly declining libido's for an increase in porn viewing, or vise versa

>>If the thread is about women's supposedly declining libido's, then is it too much of a stretch to ask the other posters what their idea of a 'normal' woman's libido is then?<<

Less than a man's. But so what? Women may have less desire for sexual activity than men, but men have absolutely no desire to watch crap romantic 'comedies' or the latest BBC bonnet drama. We do so anyway because we are such nice people who understand that relationships involve compromise. Even though we would rather stab ourselves in the eye with a spoon than watch another bloody Hugh Grant movie, we selflessly put the desires of our partner ahead of our own and submit ourselves to cruel and unusual cinematography. Why would we torture ourselves like this? Because it makes them happy: if you love them, I find that this is reason enough.

Sex usually doesn't last as long as a feature film. If men can put up with two hours of twee foppery what stops women from putting up with ten minutes of sweaty grunting? Can't they just lie back and think of England like men do during Hugh Grant movies?

Cheers,

Tony

This is one subject where it is probably quite fair to ask, in the words of the song, "how the hell would he know", or she in this case?

Many of us, like me, will have the close acquaintance with the libido of only one lady for many years, 36+ of them in my case.

If someone is trying to compare the libido of young ladies today, with those of 30 years ago, it is unlikely he has the material to stir the libido of young ladies today. Comparing that of the 20 year old ladies of his youth with even the same 50 year old ladies today is probably not too sound an indication either.

I did not believe the descriptions of the fantastic sexual exploits of most young men in my youth, & would similarly expect some embellishment from the young men of today. The answers to even a double blind study would probably be skewed by the length of time any respondent had been in a current relationship.

RObert I like, & subscribe to, the old ditty, "once a queen always a queen, but once a night is enough". This of course should not rule out regular morning glories, & the occasional afternoon delight

@Suze

I understand that you feel out-numbered, but if your arguments are too strong to refute, it doesn't matter.

Suse

'I feel like it is understood that it is all the woman's fault that men 'have to' view porn because of this perceived 'declining libido' that women have now.'

This is true. And the radicalism of this article is that it dares to flip this argument around to hypothesise the unthinkable - that the pornifying of the culture is a libido turn off for many women. I do think it's a hugely oversimplistic argument, but one that has more than a grain of truth.

I've never subscribed to the cultural belief that men's libidoes are much stronger than women's. There is just no evolutionary basis for this. If that were the case, then mother nature would have programmed the gender ratio to produce far more women than men.

Patriarchal cultures condition both men and women to believe that men are the proactive gender and women the reactive gender. And our sexuality is culturally programmed in this way. We are all conditioned from the cradle to belive that men are in a perpetual state of readiness for sex, and that women 'respond' to this by allowing or not allowing men to have sex with them. This is why so much of women's erotic energies go into being desired and why they become so obssessed with looking attractive. When you're conditioned to always think that sex is something that comes to you, there's little energy left over to fully develop as a proactive sexual being in your own right.

It's a bit like having parents who expect you to ring them every day and visit them every weekend. Because you are always having to react to their need for your company, you're never given the chance to miss them and actually want THEIR company.

(And PS. Anyone who seeks to derail this comment with all the usual crap interpretations that I think that all women are innocent victims of horrible men, or that I've just walked out of a Wimmenz Studies class will be actively ignored.)