My man idk if you’ve noticed, but most history has been written by men. Do you think maybe they might have got a few things wrong about womens sexuality? I’d say the notion that women are “less sexual” than men is an equally false idea rooted in sexism as the notion that they are “more sexual”. Women were portrayed as more sexual than men because their sexuality was viewed as dangerous in the context of a strictly patriarchal society in which paternity and property were of extreme importance and inextricably bound up with notions of family honor. In more modern times we’ve switched to a view of womens sexuality that emphasizes their passivity in contrast to a supposedly uncontrollable male libido. This both justifies a paternalistic kind of protection of “weak” women against rapacious men and also serves as a backhanded rationalization of rape (because men are simply uncontrollable, “boys will be boys” etc). These are all socially constructed ideas that reflect the gender ideology of the society they come from. Nothing about our own ideas on gender or sexuality are necessarily objectively true or more valid than previous societies. They just arise from different material and ideological conditions.
arm2610 t1_iuwbpno wrote
Reply to Why, in the last two centuries, have women become to be considered less sexual than men, if, throughout history, they were believed to have a much higher libido? by [deleted]
My man idk if you’ve noticed, but most history has been written by men. Do you think maybe they might have got a few things wrong about womens sexuality? I’d say the notion that women are “less sexual” than men is an equally false idea rooted in sexism as the notion that they are “more sexual”. Women were portrayed as more sexual than men because their sexuality was viewed as dangerous in the context of a strictly patriarchal society in which paternity and property were of extreme importance and inextricably bound up with notions of family honor. In more modern times we’ve switched to a view of womens sexuality that emphasizes their passivity in contrast to a supposedly uncontrollable male libido. This both justifies a paternalistic kind of protection of “weak” women against rapacious men and also serves as a backhanded rationalization of rape (because men are simply uncontrollable, “boys will be boys” etc). These are all socially constructed ideas that reflect the gender ideology of the society they come from. Nothing about our own ideas on gender or sexuality are necessarily objectively true or more valid than previous societies. They just arise from different material and ideological conditions.