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It’s always amusing to me when some guy has a Big Theory about why he can’t get laid. It’s never his fault; it’s always some Big Trend, usually having something to do with feminism.
Today I want to look at a mess of a post in the Men’s Rights subreddit in which a guy basically tries to pin straight men’s lack of success with women in recent years on what he claims is the “rise in female bisexuality/lesbianism” and the concomitant “devaluation/disdain of men.”
“I’ve nothing against LGBT etc people in general, or want to restrict their rights,” TheNamelessComposer begins, unpromisingly, setting himself up for a big “but.”
But (as I’ve posted before) I do wonder how the rise in female bisexuality/lesbianism will affect the dating scene. Not encouraging hate for anyone, but I find it funny how most straight men celebrate lesbianism/lesbian porn etc, when it’d actually be better for them if more men were gay/bi. More options – you’d think.
Gosh, I wonder why straight men would be into lesbian porn. Such a puzzler.
But if we’re going to do this, let’s begin with the actual facts rather than this dude’s assfacts. Yes, there is a “rise in female bisexuality/lesbianism.” But only because there is also a rise in bisexuality and homosexuality in men. In fact, all categories within the LGBTQ spectrum have seen an enormous rise in recent years, so much so that now that a full 7.1 percent of adult Americans identify as LGBT or “something other than heterosexual,” according to a 2022 Gallup poll, double the percentage found in a survey a decade earlier. The increase is especially pronounced among younger adults, with an incredible 21% of Gen Z adults identifying as LGBTQ, with a large majority of that group identifying as bisexual. Indeed, most American LGBTQ folks are bi.
Anyway, back to this dude’s bullshit.
But if there’s no longer a financial incentive, and more women don’t care about having and raising kids with the child’s father, might more of these women choose female partners?
Well, they might, but men are also more likely to choose male partners.
I read in some populations of Japanese macaques the females often choose other females over males, they’re more lesbian than bisexual. I’ve noticed a lot of it seems like a continuation of the ‘political lesbianism’ of the 70s-90s.
Among the macaques? I don’t think so.
Like you ask most young women now and they’d say theyd prefer another attractive woman to a man, how much they don’t need men, how women are so beautiful, wonderful, men are mostly trash etc. Of course it’s not misogyny it’s ‘their truth.’
This is just fantasy. Though there has been a dramatic increase in female bisexuality in recent years, and to a lesser extent a rise in lesbianism, most women are still straight. So, no, “most young women” don’t prefer women to men. They might prefer women to you in particular, though. Hell, they might prefer macaques.
Also it seems there’s a shitload of studies talking about how fluid women’s sexuality are, category non specific etc, how they can be attracted to both while men only to women (or men if gay).
Well, by all accounts, women’s sexuality is more fluid. According to Gallup,
Women (6.0%) are much more likely than men (2.0%) to say they are bisexual. Men are more likely to identify as gay (2.5%) than as bisexual, while women are much more likely to identify as bisexual than as lesbian (1.9%).
Back to fantasyland:
It was only recently that they ‘admitted’ male bisexuality existed. Sure, some of these scientists might be well meaning, but many do seem to have an agenda to me.
Well, there was one infamous 2005 study that purported to prove that men who said they were bisexual were either wrong or lying, but the study has been thoroughly discredited, and even the researcher behind it now acknowledges that bi men are, indeed, real.
If you look at history and nature, men are just as bisexual as women, but while yes, progressives etc generally are for allowing men to be more open, these studies are reinforcing the idea that all women are bi while no or few men are.
No, most women aren’t bi, but they’re more likely to be bi than men.
Also, while most people say they want monogamy, polyamory is increasing in popularity, and heck is being promoted. Open marriages too.
I’m not sure how “women having sex with a greater number of men” is supposed to hurt straight men, exactly, but this guy does have interesting theories.
Many of these women are also bi/pansexual…all these will make it even harder for the average man.
Poor average man!
As I said in an older post, my prediction is greater gender segregation and more male as well as female homosexuality. In nature, if no females are available males will turn to other males for their sexual needs.
The idea that “no females are available” is simply delusional. In reality, more “males” are turning to other “males” these days because … they’re into other males.
If this becomes the norm, who knows where society will be.
Well, it’ll be gayer, that’s for sure. But, somehow, I’m not seeing that as a bad thing.
As an older bi person, I find the increasing acceptance of young people to be a source of hope. A world where people are more free to be themselves is a better world.
Wasn’t there a study done the better part of a century ago the upshot of which was “almost everyone is bi”? Seems it’s just human sexuality that is fluid, and what’s changing is just that there’s greater social acceptance and even self-acceptance of this (and greater social acceptance of it in women than in men, though increasing for both).
Under this model, most people sometimes have experienced same-sex attractions, but most of them have rejected that internally, and most of the rest have been closeted. For the majority it was possible to live as, and pass as, straight without compromising their romantic prospects and potential happiness very much, and the potential downsides of being an out bisexual were severe. Most wouldn’t even privately identify as bi rather than as “hetero but with occasional inexplicable urges or yearnings” or suchlike.
Now, it’s safer to be out LGBTQ and people, especially younger ones, have less internalized homophobia. So a lot more are identifying as non-straight and a lot more of those who do are publicly out. The apparent gender difference probably stems from a gender bias in acceptance (which in turn is probably largely the result of male MFF fantasies and men still having outsized social clout: to a lot of men, bisexual women are going to seem fascinating while bisexual, as well as gay, men will seem threatening … and, it should be noted, the fact that men see male sexuality as threatening when they themselves could potentially be in its crosshairs means they know darn well how predatory men often are when it comes to pursuing their sexual desires, though some of it is also likely a homophobic fear of homo-guilt-by-association, that being desired by another man will make them be perceived as gay, or, worse, will just plain make them gay … somehow. It also might be an unwelcome reminder of their own occasional same-sex urges, which, if that study is to be believed, are probably present).
David, I love you. But if you haven’t kept up on the sociological research into the political dynamics of queer narratives among 1970s Japanese macaques, I don’t really think you should be commenting on this issue right now. Have some epistemic humility, Mr. Mammoth.
@surplus:
I think you would have to use a very different definition of “bi” than the one that bi people themselves use to come to this conclusion. Sure there are definitions of “bi” that nearly everyone could be fit into, but there are definitions of “invisible” that includes all magma. I still think it’s misleading to say that magma is invisible.
How so?
AFAIK the definition used by the study is “the obvious one”: “is sexually attracted to some masculine-presenting people and to some feminine-presenting people”, or something close to that.
The most obvious narrower definition I could see being used would be “would consider dating, or at least doing” in place of just “is sexually attracted to”, but the obvious problem there is that by the same standard anyone who’s not currently either partnered or interested in pursuing any potential sexual encounter, whatever their reasons, would be ace …
So … what definition did you have in mind?
If you’re an out Bi woman, the danger is that you will be inappropriately sexualized more that you would already be compared to if you were straight or presumed straight.
If you are an out Bi man, the danger is that you will be lumped with gay men as a semi-acceptable assault/murder target, and the gay community won’t necessarily have your back.
If this actually would somehow get rid of the MRAs, I think a lot of women would think about exploring their sapphic impulses more.
It’s amazing how these boys just don’t realize it’s their rhetoric and personalities that turn women off. They could all look like Chads and still wouldn’t get any. Even if they did do the logical thing and turn to men.
Anyway, you kids get on with your authentic selves. Let’s all have a yabba dabba gay old time.
@Crip Dyke: I do doubt the macaques’ politics involve any support for human second wave feminism, as this guy seemed to be saying, due to him not knowing how to grammar. Thus David’s response. Although I think the macaques would reject MRA ideas too.
Speaking of gayer, let’s see what Sam Smith and their dancing buddies are up to this week!
@surplus
Well, these days I would tend to use the definition, “Someone who identifies as bi.”
That doesn’t exactly work across different societies and different eras, however, since meanings are impossible to divorce from their context.
But if I were going to study this and didn’t want to limit it to self-identification (e.g. perhaps b/c I wanted to know something about how many people might be inhibited by social factors from identifying themselves as bi), I would probably use this:
In that definition a plethysmograph reading isn’t sufficient to identify “real bisexual people” or “secret bisexual people”.
I mean, if it’s causing you to think you’re worthless and should be kicked out of your church and as a result you overcompensate or avoid all conversations about sex or in some other way alter how you would otherwise interact with people, okay. It is sufficient to make a difference in your life, so it counts.
But if the attraction is so insignificant that you don’t even remember it unless you search your memory and you certainly don’t alter how you think about yourself and how you behave, then the existence of such an insignificant pattern of attraction can only be included in the definition of bisexuality through a devaluation of the importance of bisexuality in the lives of real people.
I don’t want to minimize it in that way.
I know nothing about macaques. However! There’s a really engaging book about bonobos- “bonobos live in a peaceful society in which females are in charge, war is nonexistent, and sex is as common and friendly as a handshake.”
Written in 2010, it is called Bonobo handshake: A Memoir of Love and Adventure in the Congo, by Vanessa Woods. Entertaining and thought provoking. Bonobo society took the path of bonding and cooperating, instead of the chimpanzee pathway of hierarchical aggression.
Hello.
I wonder if this is really a “trend”. I suppose they always had existed in a fair quantity, the “trend” being just that people fear a bit less (although considering all the threats still existing, it is really just a bit) to said clearly their preferences, and the visibility provided by social media just make it more acknowledged ?
Have a nice day.
My understanding of orientation, and feel free to correct me:
Orientation isn’t who you have sex with, but who you want to have sex with, and people’s orientations are hard-wired into their physiology.
Bisexuality means the person is attracted to both women and men in more or less the same amounts.
Straight or gay means that the particular orientation is the overwhelmingly dominant one for that person, perhaps with only one or two instances of the other attraction.
Sexual desire is not amorphous, contrary to what the Men’s Rights writer implies. Men who have no women to meet their sexual needs don’t turn to other men in frustration. That kind of thinking reduces people to vessels, women in particular, and disconnects sexuality from intimacy.
Sure, it might be fun to imagine women turning to lesbianism because they’re fed up with men’s assholish sense of entitlement, particularly the attitudes of the writer, but that frustration wouldn’t cause a woman to suddenly find other women desirable.
I would say that bi women are more likely to admit they are bi than men are.
I play an online virtual world game. I’ve got three (male) friends who have wives (in real life) and claim to be attracted to women but play with male-presenting avatars and have in-game sex with other male-presenting avatars. I have another (also happily married in real life) who uses male pronouns but has a female presenting, male shape avatar who prefers in-game sex with male-presenting avatars.
When I asked them if they were bi or omni/pan, etc, all of them tell me they are straight, even though they all say they have in-game sex with men because they can’t in do it in real life.
From a biological point of view this makes sense to me – if sexual preference has a biological component, there would be no reason to expect bisexuality it to be biased towards one gender or the other. On the other hand, every bisexual man I’ve ever talked to has experienced stigma and discrimination not just from the straight world, but also the gay world as well.
I think that maybe the poster is correct about this one.
[Emphasis mine]
No, it’s really not “misogyny.” Your attempt at sarcasm is severely undercut by the limits of your vocabulary.
Do you even dictionary, bro?
Speaking of macaques, here’s famous Japanese cat Maru watching some macaques as they visit his back yard.
If Nature wants humans to reproduce less and rising levels of homosexuality is part of that, who am I to argue?
Off-topic, I know, but multiple news sources are reporting that the Pentagon has taken out a “high altitude object” over the coast of Alaska.
@Tim: I adore Maru, as all right-thinking people do. He’s so chill and funny, and his little sisters are also cute.
But it’s such a contrast! Here he lives in what looks like a nice suburban house (I covet the woodwork), and yet there’s monkeys in his yard sometimes! There’s a summertime video of him watching the monkeys swinging around and romping on the porch sunshades too.
The fact that there’s always baby monkeys proves the macaques haven’t all gone lesbian.
@Gaebolga: Can’t grammar, can’t dictionary either.
Did anyone else see this? Another whiny loser claiming to be a “nice guy”. The response is measured, but pointed. Not sure if the vocabulary is too subtle for this chucklehead:
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2023/feb/10/im-technically-an-incel-but-not-a-misogynist-why-arent-women-attracted-to-me
MGTOW has failed. By now I was hoping at least 50% of these guys would have turned their backs on women, gone their own way, and shut up.
I have a Grand Theory as to why I can’t get laid. It consists of two parts:
Beat that logic, MRAs!
Lizzie
I’ve always liked the idea that one of our cousin primates are hard wired to be relaxed about family and sexual interaction.
But I think the Ethiopian baboons who completely changed the way their troop functioned after their greedy aggressive bullying “alpha “ males managed to kill themselves off during an epidemic is much more relevant – and hopeful – for human societies.
Nobody fought them off in an organised or aggressive way. Any new male who tried it on with queue jumping or otherwise disrupting food sharing, Demanding sex or busting into groups where they’re not welcome became the fast track to total exclusion.
Let me jump in on the sexuality and dating discussion as an asexual, whose existence it feels was forgotten by some people, or at least terribly misconstrued. Sexuality in itself, or sexual attraction, rather, has absolutely nothing to do with who you want to date. It is purely sexual attraction and nothing more. Some asexuals also want to date, and do so, myself included. And I will be very agry if anyone tries telling I’m not ace. I don’t have an ounce of sexual attraction to my boyfriend or anyone else in the world. Some allosexuals don’t want to date, ever, but still feel sexually attracted to people (else they wouldn’t be allosexual, obviously). Dating has nothing at all to due with sexual attraction.
And here comes in the really important thing that relates to dating: romantic attraction. People you would date are people you are romantically attracted to (mostly. Some have platonic relationships that are very similar, but that’s outside the scope right now). I am very romantically attracted to my boyfriend even sexual attraction is absent. Romantic attraction for most people is the same as sexual attraction, but not always.
Human sexuality and dating is very, very complicated. But the bottom line is, sexual attraction and romantic attraction are two separate things. And this is why the ace community has the split attraction model. This is also why conflating both is quite upsetting to me. I’m not less ace because I’m dating someone or because I’m panromantic.
@oncewasmagnificent:
But I think the Ethiopian baboons who completely changed the way their troop functioned after their greedy aggressive bullying “alpha “ males managed to kill themselves off during an epidemic is much more relevant – and hopeful – for human societies.
Nobody fought them off in an organised or aggressive way. Any new male who tried it on with queue jumping or otherwise disrupting food sharing, Demanding sex or busting into groups where they’re not welcome became the fast track to total exclusion.
The way I heard it, the troop found a dump of contaminated meat discarded by humans; the alpha bullies proceeded to hog it for themselves, and oh, well—actions had consequences.
@KMB – Yes, that makes a lot of sense! It also relates to the original poster’s assumption that bi people are poly. They could be, of course, but they’re not automatically like that.
This seems to be a common misconception. One day my dad was talking about some debate in the Presbyterian church in this country, since he’s involved in that, and he said to me (very paraphrased, since this was a while ago): “Well…people could have issues with bisexuals wanting to have both a male and female partner.”
Me: “But that wouldn’t be everyone. Lots of bisexual people are monogamous.”
Him: “Oh really? But then why would they be bisexual?”
Me (getting annoyed): “Me. Your daughter. Bisexual. Monogamous. IT IS POSSIBLE.”
…I didn’t mean to throw poly people under the metaphorical bus. Perhaps I made them sound bad, and I regret that. In my defense (?) he has a prejudice that two-people romantic bonds are better, even though he didn’t want to take sides in that church argument.
With my friend after, I was joking about the conversation, going, “It’s because I’m not coordinated enough for threesomes.” The sort of stuff I would be embarrassed to joke about with my parents. But I still felt a bit bad that he understood me less than I thought he did.
ANYWAY, to be concise for once, I’ve also seen that people confuse relationships with attraction by itself.
…
David and @Crip Dyke re the political lesbianism of macaques: thank you for making me giggle ridiculously. I needed that.
@epitome:
“Well, of course they are! How else are those sexy threesomes supposed to happen?” </s>
Ask him why he’s attracted to both brunettes and redheads if he‘s monogamous.
That ought to get the ol’ gears turning.
@Surplus: Heh. If @epitome ever has to have this conversation again, I too suggest that.
Meanwhile, in more news that will give the MRA’s more sads:
https://www.theguardian.com/news/2023/feb/11/the-truth-about-andrew-tate-his-home-is-less-hollywood-hideaway-more-rundown-meat-factory
Summary: Tater has ugly house in mediocre neighborhood, doesn’t have a fraction of the money he claims, and once a trial date is set, he gets moved to a penitentiary which has even worse conditions than where he is now. All delivered factually with a soupcon of restrained British snark. Reporter is fluent in Romanian and familiar with Bucharest, also.