In Reasonable Creatures: Essays on Women and Feminism, the incomparable, award-winning journalist, Katha Pollitt writes about the "older man shortage"; as women age their chances of marrying dwindle (or so the media leads us to believe), due to the fact that women of the baby boom generation marry men older than themselves. These men come from a smaller population than do the younger women. This study was thought provoking, and led me to ask a group of women journalists and activists to partake in an intergenerational conversation about marriage and sexuality.
I asked Pollitt why she thought the media paid so much attention to the baby boom generation and the "man shortage," while it seemed to overlook gay women, and discount live-in relationships, without the proverbial wedding ring. Many young women today have chosen this form of unwedded bliss.
Pollitt said, "Most obvious reason is that gay women are a small minority of all women, and live-in situations are harder to measure... the media is obsessed with marriage, and with warning women that they are missing the chance for marriage if they wait, are too choosy, etc. Unfortunately, there is a huge propaganda literature on this written by women."
In her book Reasonable Creatures, Pollitt notes that marriages between older women and younger men are on the rise--she attributes this to greater fluidity in marriage, an increase in inter-ethnic and interracial couplings. While the media may not be paying much heed to this fluidity, they certainly are paying attention to same sex experimentation between women.
Lisa M. Diamond, PhD, assistant professor of psychology and gender studies at the University of Utah, Salt Lake City, studies young women's sexual orientations, sexual attractions, and sexual behavior. According to an article on Foxnews.com, Diamond says,
"Women's sexual behavior is more influenced by cultural and situational and even educational factors than men's," Diamond tells WebMD. "So given that today there is more visibility of same-sex behavior, it's likely there is an increase in young women experimenting with same sex behavior -- and talking openly about their experiments."
While Diamond makes the "heteroflexible phenomenon" out to be a development of greater exposure in the media, with songs like "I Kissed A Girl" by Katy Perry, shows like "The L Word", the MTV Awards on-screen kiss between Madonna and Britney, these women indicate otherwise.
Author and former CEO of Planned Parenthood, Gloria Feldt said, "I remember reading books of fiction when I was a pre-teen a thousand years ago, in which they talked about younger college women having crushes on older ones. So that's not new, though today's ability to completely separate sex from childbearing makes it more likely that gender barriers will be fluid."
Amy Richards founder of Third Wave Foundation and author of Manifesta: young women, feminism and the future and Opting In: Having a Child Without Losing Yourself had a similar take. "Fluidity has always existed, but in past generations it was more likely reserved for later in life-once women had filled society's expectations that they had children, etc. Also, I think that girls in particular have always used other girls to experiment, but I think in this generation it's more than experiment, it's something that can be foreseen as more than temporary."
Pollitt agrees, "This goes way back. I knew lots of women in the 1970s who became gay or bi-some for a while, others for life. It's happening outside the feminist movement too-gay liberation has had a huge effect on both men and women . I think sexual fluidity is here to stay."
While the media may lend a helping hand to those young women who have not been as open about their sexual fluidity in the past, sexual fluidity in women is by no means a new trend, as the media leads us to believe.
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Yay! Nice article.
It seems like older women settling down together whether or not it is a romantic relationship is old news. It's as old as time. Men die younger. We don't even need the added factor of women tending to marry older men, you're still going to end up with more older women and it just makes sense to find a partner, especially later in life.
That's one of many reasons why I think marriage and civil unions should be different issues. If two people who are not romantically attached want to make a commitment to each other and form a legal bond, why stop them? It's a great idea. Civil Unions for heterosexuals!
I currently have plans with one of my high school friends to be old ladies together if we both end up unmarried later in life. We'll live together and be cranky and silly and have adventures, and make sure the other person doesn't get in too much trouble.
But yeah, I agree that heteroflexible women is not a new trend.
I would argue that men are fairly "heteroflexible" as well. If you think about how Pederasty used to be so normative, for example. I hear lots of stories about young boys experimenting with each other, it's just more hush-hush and taboo, as there is greater stigma attached to being gay if you are male.
Yes, there is widespread "heteroflexibility" among men - especially in the Armed Forces and in the (forgive the pun) penal system.
The Navy and the Marine Corps, in particular, which often put men in situations where they are far out at sea without female companionship for long periods of time, have widespread male on male sexuality among nominally straight men.
Prisons, of course, are same sex institutions - and contrary to the "shower room rape" myth, the vast majority of prison sex between men is consensual.
In the prison setting, there are also full blown romantic relationships between nominally straight men (who try and fit those relationships into the heterosexual mold - one partner is the "man" the other is the "woman")
Of course, since there is a strong taboo against man on man sex in our sexist culture, many men will deny these encounters in the broader society.
Society isn't nearly as prejudiced against woman on woman sex, since it's not "real sex" if there's no men involved.
Incidentally, I've noticed in the celebrity press, there will often be stories about straight actresses having sex with other women (often written in a lurid way - obviously for the titilation of male readers) but it's rare to see them sympathetically cover the sexuality of actual lesbian actresses.
Thus we get to hear lurid borderline pornographic stories about (heterosexual actress) Megan Fox's alleged interludes with women but we rarely hear about (lesbian actress) Michelle Rodriguez' long term romantic relationship with another woman (except for the occasional gossip column item about their fights - pieces which don't even openly say that they are in a long term relationship, but just hint at it).
Apparently, to the media - and the broader society - lesbianism is "cute" when it involves straight women "exploring their boundaries", but the sexuality of actual lesbians is another matter altogether (and gay male sexuality is completely beyond the pale!)
Actually, most of what you call "consensual" sex in prisons is in exchange for protection from more violent predators.
we rarely hear about (lesbian actress) Michelle Rodriguez' long term romantic relationship with another woman
From what I've found, despite rumours, Michelle Rodriguez has publicly stated that she is not gay, at least as recently as last November.
Society isn't nearly as prejudiced against woman on woman sex, since it's not "real sex" if there's no men involved.
That makes sense. I hadn't looked at it from exactly that angle, but I think you're right.
Of course, anal is also considered "not sex" by some people. After all, some people think that you can preserve your virginity by having anal sex but abstaining from vaginal intercourse.
Anal sex is not sex when compared to intercourse, but it is sex when compared to oral or manual stimulation. That seems to be the way it works.