The sexual imperative.

I was chatting to someone this evening, and got to thinking about gender stereotypes. You know… the whole concept of men being from Mars and women from Venus. (Or was it the other way around?) Anyway, I thought I’d just ramble on about it for a while, as it’s a subject that has the capacity to amuse me at times, bemuse me at others, but fascinate me constantly. (Then again, I find most things fascinate me in one way or another… I think it must be a character flaw. Or a gift from god, I’m not really sure.)

Anyway, I was reading a forum on a dating site the other day (okay, I lied when I said I hadn’t been looking at them, but I was only reading the forum on ONE particular site!), and someone was decrying sex without love. You know, sex for sex’s sake… f*cking for the sake of f*cking. I think the argument was along the lines of (yawn) if you’re not in love, sex is a soulless, unsatisfying and empty experience. And you won’t find women doing it – oh no, it’s a male preserve. Because men are unable to think unless it’s with their dicks, and we don’t give a toss about morality or self-respect. Because we’re men.

And I got to thinking about the rollercoaster that’s been my life for the last year or two. Not just the realisation that sex is out there if you want it (and I’m not saying that because it’s out there I always want it, either). But that, now, the sexual agenda is being set as much by women as it is by men, or more so. Not just the understanding amongst men that women want sex as much as they do, but the awakening to the fact that they always have. It’s just that now there’s no stigma. No pretence that sex has to be hidden behind the veil of love. Hallelujah, praise the lord!

And is it just me, or is sex without commitment (love?) often the most incredibly liberating experience? It was a rhetorical question… I know it’s liberating, because there’s no agenda, no guilt, no obligation. The fact is that – from a physical perspective – love is simply not a requirement. Yes, for anyone yearning for that emotional connection, that feeling of touching souls, then – after the last flush or orgasm fades - there might be something missing, some intangible sense of loss… but it’s not physical, it’s spiritual. And it can be there one day, and gone the next. And it applies to men and women alike. Well, it does - doesn't it? If not, why not?

The strange thing is, despite this little vent of mine I’m a romantic in the true sense. When people tell me love is just the consequence of endocrinal or chemical reactions, honed by evolution to ensure the bonding process and the survival of the species through procreation, I just want to laugh. I don’t care why it happens, I just know it happens. But whilst I may be a romantic, I’m not a hypocrite.