Sitting near the top of the front page of the Men’s Rights Reddit at the moment, with more than 300 upvotes: A post, based on a three and a half year old comment on a Fat Acceptance blog, with the title “Woman gains 65 pounds after getting married, forces husband to get Viagra after he is no longer attracted to her.”
Brace yourself for the HORROR of a wife who put on weight in blatant disregard of the rights of her husband’s boner.
Naturally, the Men’s Rights Redditors are OUTRAGED at this insidious assault on a man’s right to tell his wife that she’s too fat and ugly to fuck.
Here’s the top comment, with more than 100 upvotes:
The charming blueoak9 set the “ignorant sow” straight on a question of Boner Science:
Others concluded, from the fact that he agreed to try Viagra, that she was essentially drugging and raping him. No, really.
![Surprentis 50 points 4 hours ago Might as well be rape at that point. permalink embed save report give gold reply [–]ManRAh 31 points 3 hours ago She's literally drugging him so he'll have sex with her. By definition, it absolutely is.](https://i0.wp.com/www.wehuntedthemammoth.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/drugrape.png?resize=526%2C209&ssl=1)
Carchamp1 expanded on this, er, logic:
So never let it be said that Men’s Rights activists don’t take rape seriously. They take it very seriously when a man is raped by a woman by agreeing to try Viagra and then having consensual sex with her even though she’s a fatty.
Typo on last post, I meant to say “There’s just NOT enough details to engage in conversations about this couple’s personal life.”
Also, exploded often just means “getting angry at”, which happens all the time in most relationships as far as I’m aware.
And hey, sexless relationships are actually non-relationships for many people, so it can be an issue worth getting angry over.
Catalpa, I’m going to second you. Also going to second Uncivilized Elk though, with the assumptions and jumping the gun feeling a bit icky.
As worded, it does sound sort of coercive. It might come across as more coercive than it really is, though. I’m going to chalk it up to interwebs and it being notoriously hard to read tone and not make a ton of assumptions, because it’s impossible to really know what was going on.
Hope the couple figures out things and both of them are happy with whatever result/decision they end up making.
About the weight gain ad from the 1970’s. A lot more people tended to smoke back then, and often smoking will keep you very thin, at least when you are young. So that might have been the thing with the weight-gain ads. They probably didn’t have photo-shopped size 0 models so much, either.
Let me amend that, smoking will *sometimes* keep you very thin. Like most things, the effects vary from person to person.
Men don’t owe you sex.
….WHOA. FULL STOP.
Uncivilized Elk, could you please reconsider this little bit?
Yes, sudden withdrawal probably hurts a ton. Yes, people in relationships who love each other ought to try and do things to not hurt each other and to make each other happy.
But there’s a line.
Being angry because someone doesn’t feel like having sex is not a thing that should be acceptable.
Feeling hurt? Totally. Blowing up out of hurt and frustration because not understanding something is totally understandable.
But angry?
That makes me nervous, because generally anger seems like it comes from a place of feeling owed or entitled, and an awful lot of damage comes out of anger.
I don’t think you meant it in a bad way, but… yeah.
[for clarity, not talking about this particular case, just in general.]
[[also, going to admit that I’m totes not an authority and could totally be in the wrong]]
I will be honest, I don’t believe OP is a real person either. Like, I do think this scenario is possible but yeah. I don’t think a woman is obliged to stay slim, that said, if he really can’t be with her because he doesn’t find her attractive, he would be better off leaving. I think if you are truly in love with someone their weight shouldn’t bother you.
I’m iffy on her “exploding”: could be a run of the mill argument, could be coercive.
Why are people assuming viagra is the prescription? Could be something else: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-567202/Better-Viagra-The-new-libido-drug-boosts-sex-drive-AND-causes-arousal.html
70s weight gain ads mess with my head something fierce. They make me feel like I should hate myself for being too skinny while I’m busy hating myself for being too fat. I can only really do one at a time! (Or, preferably, neither; but that’s a tricky goal to meet.)
I believe the OP is a real person, because the original quote is from a Health at Every Size blog that’s filled with real people trying to give up disordered eating behaviours (keeping a diary and only eating puddings three times a week is pretty ordinary in that respect). And yeah, sometimes giving up disordered eating behaviours means you will gain weight because not everyone is naturally slender, which is pretty much the entire point of health at every size. OK, her situation and her reaction don’t sound ideal, but humans are all fallible. I have more trouble believing the MRAs are real humans, because their crushing lack of empathy for half the species is way less believable than someone getting fat on a fat-positivity blog…
Desert only three times a week doesn’t sound like a bad idea, TBH. Actually, I’d avoid desert entirely, unless you use strong sunblock and a big hat.
Bina:
“No, she’s an “ignorant sow” for getting her husband to consent to taking Viagra so they can have sex again and he can adjust to what she looks like now, and learn to find her attractive again. Like the dude has no agency, and she’s “raping” him by asserting her desire for a normal married sex life. Yuh-huh…”
Okay, whether real or just a dreamt up scenario, some disturbing things implied here and in some other comments.
Why should he be subject to guilt trips so SHE can have a normal sex life? What about what he wants?
A total lack of arousal isn’t normal, particularly for men. If he really couldn’t get aroused the likely explanation is a partner who isn’t within NORMAL parameters appearance/weight wise. Instead of acknowledging men also have the right to their preferences in regards to what they find attractive, the guy must have a horrible waif fetish or something.
Viagra is meant for erectile dysfunction, sometimes circulatory problems, not lack of desire. Requesting someone take a drug to make them physically amenable for sex they don’t want is obviously questionable. We don’t even have to go into the defcon one level outrage that would ensue should the roles be reversed here.
And to think people here have previously argued that consent always involves desire, that sex should involve mutual pleasure 😕 (something I agree with but, you know, double standards).
Whoever said this must be a “crappy husband” is off base too. Terrible people would abandon their spouse or emotionally withdraw in these circumstances. Merely expressing lack of interest in intercourse however, isn’t a moral failing.
You know, gaining 65 pounds might even be healthy if you weigh 70 pounds or so. I would be curious how much weight the woman had before she started to gain weight. But geez, why is it always that if a problem in a relationship comes up, everyone asks “who is at fault?”
She says she’d maintained the physique she’d had 65lbs prior for four years of their relationship. You can’t survive for four years being 65lbs underweight. Even she says she wasn’t unhealthy at the time, just miserable, and you know what? Dessert no more than three times a week and working out every other day isn’t unhealthy.
The most likely scenario is she’d been a fitness junkie, the pendulum swung to the other extreme and she became obese.
AND THAT’S FINE. If she understands the associated risks of obesity and their sharp increase with age and decides that’s still better than whatever it would take for her to attain an ideal body fat percentage, that’s OK. It’s her own damn body. She’s not on life support. She’s just fat.
At the same time, it’s completely unreasonable to get pissed with someone for not being attracted to you. I’m guessing she “blew up” out of hurt, not actual entitlement to her husband’s attraction to her. It’s still not OK though.
And, yes, the way the comment is worded could be interpreted as “I scared him into taking boner pills and sexing me”.
I don’t want to sound like an MRA troll or whatever, but I can’t get mad at a person for not wanting to have sex with someone. Being married doesn’t entitle someone to sex and that goes for men and women. If her husband doesn’t want to have sex with her, that’s not a good sign for the marriage, but it’s still his right refuse sex. From what the woman wrote, I can’t see how he’s being an asshole.
Now, I’m not trying to say that she did anything wrong by gaining weight. It’s normal for people to gain weight as they age and there is nothing wrong at all with being overweight. I just think it’s wrong to expect people to have sex with you, even if you’re married.
@marinerachel “At the same time, it’s completely unreasonable to get pissed with someone for not being attracted to you.”
Totally agree with that.
I do think the husband should have let her know how he felt sooner though, but it sounds like he avoided saying anything cause he wanted to spare her feelings. I can imagine she’d be a bit angry after he’d kept quiet about how he felt for such a long time, so her exploding at him seems understandable to me.
See “Neglect Rape” 2 posts back
Seconding contrapangloss on this – could just be interweb miswording and stuffs, but I find this really problematic.
My partner identifies as grey-A (not strictly asexual, but in the ‘grey’ area between sexual and asexual). I would never be ‘angry’ at him if he no longer felt like engaging in a sexual relationship, and I feel it would be incredibly wrong to be angry at anyone who no longer wants to have sex.
I would be upset, sure. Understanding that sexuality isn’t something you can control doesn’t mean a part of me wouldn’t still worry and self-blame, or cry, or talk about the fears this might bring up concerning the relationship – the grey-A spectrum varies massively, Mr Misha’s place on it means we’ve actually had a consistently sexual relationship – but I can’t imagine ‘exploding’ at him in any sense. Becoming angry and taking those feelings out on him would be coming from a place of entitlement within me, and nobody is entitled to sex from anyone.
Actually (potential over-sharing ahead y’all, like it hasn’t happened already) it’s myself and not Mr M who is currently experiencing complete lack of a sex drive because of stress, mental health and, ironically, weight-gain on my part. And thinking about it, I can only imagine how much pain it would cause me if Mr M were to explode at me for not wanting sex right now.
NB: Just to clarify this isn’t really directed at the OP. Looked over what I wrote and realise it could be taken as judging the wife for saying she exploded at her husband. Seconding what other folks have said – there’s not enough info to really assume too much about their RL interactions and relationship dynamic. I just wanted to directly challenge the comment that no sex in relationships is something that warrants anger as a response.
peristyle:
marinerachel:
Um guys, can we stop speculating on what this woman weighed then and what she weighs now and whether one can healthily gain 65 pounds and under what circumstances and whether she actually underwent a major physical transformation etc etc?Because that’s not the point of this story. The point of this story is that a woman abandoned a lifestyle that was making her miserable for one that makes her happier, and now her husband no longer finds her physically attractive due to the weight gain that ensued.
marinerachel:
I can understand being incredibly upset and hurt upon discovering that a long-term partner no longer finds you physically attractive. I can also imagine expressing that upset through anger. Not all anger is coercive or manipulative. It’s unreasonable to get pissed at a stranger or acquaintance for not being attracted to you, but if my boyfriend told me that he’s no longer attracted to me because I stopped shaving my legs, I’d be angry. Not because I think he has an obligation to be attracted to hairy legs, but because it would be shattering to discover that his attraction to me is contingent on such a small thing.
I think counselling is a good idea for this couple, but not the Viagra, or the husband “trying to have sex” with his wife out of a sense of obligation. Husband’s not in the wrong here either; like, it’s obviously sad that his physical attraction to his wife turned out to be predicated almost entirely on her weight, but even with the best of intentions at heart, you really can’t force yourself to be attracted to someone. He doesn’t owe her sex, and similarly she has no obligation to maintain a lifestyle that makes her sad for the sake of his boner. It sounds like they both value the relationship enough to try and make it work, but it’s possible this was the beginning of the end of that marriage. Which is also fine. Wife deserves someone who is attracted to her when she is living a life that makes her happy. Husband deserves someone can maintain a weight he finds attractive without sacrificing her happiness.
Well, it’s a good thing no one’s claiming that to be the case, either. Now, if only we could get a lot of men to realize the same thing regarding women…
As for the OP: My SO gained a lot of weight a few years into our relationship, and we did stop sexing for many months, but not because I didn’t want to; She felt unattractive and undesirable because of her weight, and nothing I said made her realize that I didn’t care about the extra kilos because I desired her, not just her body.
I do echo the opinion that if you truly love someone as a person, not just as a flesh handbag to show off, some additional weight really doesn’t matter. People change, bodies change, and nobody can be expected to stay the same weight forever. If the other party starts getting dangerously over- or underweight health-wise, then it’s time to talk. And yet, nobody should be expected to have sex with someone they don’t find attractive for whatever reason*.
All that is secondary, though. The real issue here is that MRAs are, once again, comparing rape to things that aren’t rape. Do I think the woman is being unreasonable? I do. Is she raping him? Hell no, only a willfully word-challenged dumbass would claim anything remotely like that.
*This is, of course, something that flies right over the head of Nice Guys(TM) and their ilk, who insist women should just give them a chaaaaaance despite feeling no attraction towards them.
HAES was actually my entry point into feminism. While I’ve never become a full-on card-carrying adherent–partially because I’ve always been in the average-to-somewhat-overweight, “You’re not REALLY fat” (uuuuuugh) zone and therefore haven’t received the brunt of fat hate like other people have—it was super, super helpful to me to help navigate some of my own body issues, and how to support some dear friends who were significantly obese and dealing with poor treatment from their doctors, self hatred, etc.
HAES is way more about learning to accept your own body, and find out how to treat it well (eat well and get yourself moving a bit) than it is about forcing other people to like your body. Aside from demanding that the doctor find out what is actually wrong, rather than just saying, “Well of course your knee hurts; you’re too fat” and refusing to take x-rays (yeah, that happens sometimes), there’s no call for HAES-folks to go ballistic on their friends and family for Not Getting It.
So I got as far as “exploded” before I went, “Hm. Could be a troll.”
But you know what? It could also not be. When MRAs scour the internet for damning quotes from feminists—and, y’know, don’t just make them up *coughcoughJB*—they almost always end up in comment sections, Facebook pages, or small, obscure Tumblrs. Because people are people, and people from any slice of society can have short tempers, problematic ideas, and serious misconceptions. Especially if that person is isolated, struggling through a new concept on their own. But if those people get any kind of real platform and fame, they will get shot down and called out by others in the movement they’re trying to join, which is why you have to find the smaller, more private areas of the internet to find them going unchallenged.
Yes, fifteen year-olds on Tumblr who are just discovering the academic terms of patriarchy, oppression, etc., can sometimes say really wrong and unhelpful things about it. Because they’re fifteen, and probably haven’t been at this for very long. (Of course, some of them are also 4chan sockpuppets.) Of course a woman who is trying to figure out how to take care of her body and be happy can make mistakes in how she navigates that with her husband, because this is all new and her emotions are raw and she’s trying to figure out how not to hate herself anymore.
And of course, MRAs are too delighted to discover, “THEY DO IT TOO” to slow down and realize that a lone commenter on a blog is not even equivalent to the hateful Redditors with hundreds/thousands of upvotes, much less so to the figureheads of MRA/PUA/MGTOW who say terrible things as the leaders of their respective movements.
Just to clarify the above: I quoted Bina for agreement/expounding purposes, not as a contradiction. 🙂
It’s extremely unlikely she was ever 65 lbs underweight. For all but the tallest people with bigger body types, that is on-your-death-bed thin.
On the other hand, say her ideal weight for her height and body type is 140. She went through high school and college at 185, which would be borderline obese according to the charts but is a normal looking and healthy weight to the vast majority of us. If she starved herself and exercised heavily to get down to 120 for years, she would be way too skinny but still might think that number isn’t abnormally low because other women with smaller builds weigh less.
Then she goes back to 185 and they both seem to be having a little trouble adjusting to accepting that as normal. Yes, it’s shallow and judgmental, but we all have moments of being more shallow and judgmental than we ideally see ourselves as, and they seem to have reacted like adults and accepted their lives as they are now rather than pretending nothing was different. He seems like a decent guy from the info we have, I assume a few therapy sessions will help him realize that almost all of the things that attracted him to his wife are still there.
.She and her husband both seem normal to me in the story, though viagra does seem like an extreme solution if he isn’t have erectile problems in general. Even if he doesn’t get aroused by her as easily as he did when she was thinner, there have to be many types of foreplay they can try that would work more cheaply and more entertainingly than taking a drug.
As for the MRA response, they show over and over that they wouldn’t react like the husband at all. Therapy? Viagra? They would all have been cheating on her as soon as she gained weight and divorced her when she got upset about the lack-of-sex. That is how actual selfish assholes react.
That last one rests upon an interesting point: sex, even sex done freely of your own accord, is rape if you don’t want it or don’t like it.
Principled these guys are not.