I saw a similar article on MSNBC that did make references to why men had sex, though, of course, the focus was on why women had sex. It was interesting to read, but as it turns out, sexual desire in women is a complicated matter (surprise, surprise) and the article highlighted the still unanswered questions more than the few things correctly understood.

What I found was most sad is the contention that half of women under 60 had low sex drives and that a quarter of those were unable to orgasm. I suppose I have been very lucky to not have had that problem with lovers and relationship partners. I wonder if female readers would have more on the matter to share?

I wonder if any studies have looked at *why* women have trouble with orgasm. Could it have something to do with the fact that our pleasure is not considered all that essential? After all, men can orgasm without pleasing women. The reverse is a little tougher. And if our pleasure is not so important, then the unspoken message in society is that it won't get taken care of. Like so many other things... Unless we take charge. But only in the company of men, of course, since it is very bad form not to need them, isn't it?

Instead of spending all that money on research, I'd given them the answer for about $10,000. BECAUSE IT FEELS GOOD!

And they say that the media is gone "feminine" or that there is a liberal media. Clearly, the media is still clueless about gender issues, as evident by this article (most popular on CNN!), along with their lack of examining gender problems each time there is a story that involves domestic violence. Reporting the news is fine, but if they're going to pretend to be investigative - at least ...INVESTIGATE!

Now, if there were to do an exclusive report on why women sometimes have sex against their own wishes, or something about women's sexuality in a greater context, it'd be great, but of course, talking about it will make the conservative idiots so mad they'll label the reporting "rauchy," because, you know, women don't enjoy cumming.

Morning rant over.

OMG! Women have sex for lots of reason?! Actually, no, women WANT to have sex at all?! When did this happen?!?!?!?! :O

Seriously, people. It's kinda like "Oh wow, ANOTHER study showing that women want to have sex and have sex for reasons that aren't stereotypical." And people pay for this kind of research. *sigh* What I would like is a more comprehensive study on why men have sex. 'Cause we LOVE to throw around the male stereotypes too and people love to accept them. It would be nice to see men's sexuality given as much depth as women's because women aren't the only ones allowed to be deep about sex either. Mostly, I would like a study that shows that all men aren't sex hounds just so I could get some answers for myself. My boyfriend is really not very sexual at all (he's very much a cuddler which is frustrating for me sometimes) and I'm fairly certain he is not the only man on planet earth like this. But you'd think he was the only one the way people look at me when I mention that fact. And then I get the "Well, maybe he just doesn't love you" comments which drive me batshit crazy.

So researchers: Get off you lazy bums and actually put some effort into looking into men's sexuality as well. 'Cause just going "we all know what men want" doesn't help people like me who wonder what the hell is wrong with them and their boyfriends then. Also, if I remember correctly (I read this a couple of days ago) the study didn't seem to be THAT extensive. Wasn't it only about 1,500 women they interviewed or something. Not what I'd consider a horribly big sample of the population.

Side note: If there are indepth and extensive studies about guys and sex links would be greatly appreciated. :) I just have never seen any mention of a study on men's sexuality and NOT had it come up with results like "Men like having sex all the time and generally have asshat reasons for having sex."

Oh good lord.

From the article:

"A study from Meston's lab showed a strong correlation between how erect a man's penis is and how aroused he says he is. By contrast, the link is much weaker between a woman's physical arousal (as measured inside her vagina) and the arousal she says she feels, the researchers found. This is why drugs to treat erectile dysfunction such as Viagra don't work as well in women, the authors said."

ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME? Was "The Myth of the Vaginal Orgasm" never written or something? I cannot believe this. OF COURSE men's reports of their arousal levels will closely correlate to their erections, since this study postulated (and rightly so) that male arousal is centered on the penis. And, since women's arousal is centered on THE FUCKING CLITORIS and NOT in the vagina, OF COURSE the researchers will assume women are simply misreporting THEIR OWN LEVELS OF AROUSAL when they test for arousal IN THE VAGINA. Freaking seriously. What were they thinking? Did they even review any previous literature on female arousal or did they just find a book from 1910 and go from there? What kind of respectable researcher of sexuality uses the vagina as the body part to measure in order to guage female sexual arousal? I bet you fifty million dollars that if they measured clitoral erection, they would find a correlation between clitoral erection and reports of arousal that looks very similar to the correlation found between penile erection and reports of arousal in men. But they would probably throw such impossible data out, since their findings wouldn't fit into the most exasperating of patriarchal memes, "Women lie."

For those who appear to protest the study's not being "comprehensive," which without further explanation I assume to mean, you don't feel they surveyed enough people, I offer you this on sampling methods:

http://www.isixsigma.com/library/content/c040607a.asp

Take note of sample size and margin of error.

Gallup Polls may also rely on sample sizes as low as 1,500 in its polls as when polling potential voters, but because of their statistical methods, can report with 95% confidence with a sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

http://media.gallup.com/PDF/FAQ/HowArePolls.pdf

"One key question faced by Gallup statisticians: how many interviews does it take to provide an adequate cross-section of Americans? The answer is, not many -- that is, if the respondents to be interviewed are selected entirely at random, giving every adult American an equal probability of falling into the sample. The current U.S. adult population in the continental United States is 187 million. The typical sample size for a Gallup poll, which is designed to represent this general population, is 1,000 national adults."

You read that correctly. Just 1,000 adults RANDOMLY selected (my issue with many studies cited here, feminist and anti-feminist), are sufficient to give you a representative sample of adults in the US. Asking 2,000 or 1,000,000 is not going to give you that proportional increase (double or 1,000 times) in margin of error or accuracy, though it may cost you that much more or take that much more time.

Finding 237 reasons women have sex in a previous study, to question them about in this study, is something I consider a feat, probably difficult for many to imagine. Which is why it was necessary to do it.

In fact, I'd bet many more than 237 reasons were given by the previous study's 1,000 women, but had to be narrowed down in an effort to make it more manageable, similarly to how polls have to ask voters to choose between a given selection of candidates (as few as two), versus asking millions of potential voters to identify who they'd personally like as President.

Statisticians recognize the importance of question selection and wording. It would do little good to conduct a survey on the attitudes of Americans to abortion, with a question like "Do you agree with killing babies in the womb?" It would also not be helpful to stop at "Do you believe women have the right to make decisions about their own bodies?" without follow up, as even 100% agreement would not indicate 100% approval for abortions.