Out From Under

Are you female? If so, your orgasm is not essential, you know.

Are those fighting words?

If I were hearing those words from my sex partner, they sure as hell would be.

But if they’re coming from a scientist, a female scientist, and she’s talking in evolutionary terms, not relational, not personal? (This post is inspired by her book, The Case of the Female Orgasm, and her name is Elisabeth A. Lloyd. Fascinating stuff.)

Me, I’d shrug and say, “Meh. This is news? And so what?”

Because who with a brain in their head has not noticed that women do not need to have an orgasm in order to become pregnant? And THAT, my friends, is ALL that evolution is after: babies, more babies, healthy babies, babies who live to become adults who will make babies. Propagation of the species is IT.

So. Speaking evolutionarily, my orgasm is not essential.

Like I care.

But you know what? Some women do! They really, really care. And they are seriously PISSED OFF. Even more oddly, some female scientists care. They read studies and interpretation of data which suggest that the female orgasm may not be an evolutionary essential, that, in fact, it’s likely more of an evolutionary hiccup (and a very happy one, thanksomuch). They read that, and they take it PERSONALLY.

Hello?

This is not some grand conspiracy against women (unless you happen to believe, with all good fundamentalists, in a sexist, misogynist god). This is not personal. It simply is what it is.

Yes, the male orgasm is pretty much essential, evolutionarily. Because orgasm is part of ejaculation, and without ejaculation, no babies. (Yes, I know there are men who can climax without ejaculating, but I’d be betting they’re so rare as to not count as far as evoluation is concerned.)

So the male’s orgasm is biologically essential. And again, who cares? Does that make his better? Why would you assume that? Male and female descriptions of their experience of orgasm are essentially identical. And then there’s that whole female multiple orgasm thing. That may not be essential, either, but what woman isn’t proud of that? Nyah, nyah. (No nyahs to you non-ejaculating climaxers; I know you guys can multiple, too.)

Let’s separate the personal from the global/species/march-of-time-down-eons, shall we? The individual human is not considering his/her actions from an evolutionary standpoint when they size up the hottie across the room, or start peeling off their partner’s clothes. The point of an orgasm, for the individual human, is pleasure.

Full stop.

I suppose it could be argued it’s also relational — you’re with someone who takes no heed of yours, who takes no steps to ensure you/allow you to have yours and takes no pleasure in your pleasure? Well, you’re with an ass, and you need to ditch ‘em and move on. (That is also personal, not evolutionary … except insofar as, if you have any sense at all, you won’t be making babies with this dork. However, since it’s only in the tiniest slivers of the sadly misogynist history of the human race where the woman’s feelings have had a whole helluva lot to do with whether she has sex, you certainly can’t count that in evolutionary terms.)

So. It seems probable that while the male orgasm is pretty much evolutionarily essential, the female orgasm is a fringe benefit. Why does that matter in the slightest?

Bring it on!

This entry was posted on Monday, June 30th, 2008 at 5:23 am and is filed under Ilona's Take, women on top. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.