Sunday, January 25, 2009

What Do Women Want?

My thoughts on Daniel Bergner's article in this week's NY Times Magazine...

Fantasies of submission – of the “caring caveman” – as a cornerstone of female desire makes sense if viewed through the gender-neutral lens of BDSM. All slaves – male or female, straight or gay – long for that powerful, compassionate caveman or cavewoman to seize control of them, body, heart and soul. Could this simply be a longing to experience female desire in its purest, most explicit form? As a gay male born into a female body I know that certainly could be one explanation for why only a master can make me feel complete. (And for why so many dominant men and women get turned on by making visible this ultimate expression of female desire.) Only BDSM allows me to comprehend that magic that women talk about when they talk about sex.

1 comment:

Don Arrup said...

i read the nyts mag article and was struck that most of the researchers (themselves women) each took such a narrow view of female desire as if there was only one key. i don't think one theory contradicts another but compliments it. also, male desire was swept away as singular and simple. it probably is simpler but certainly not singular.

there is a growing for straight women porn industry in which the woman is dominant and powerful. i don't think it is because the researchers and conventional wisdom are wrong but that there many facets to women's desire (which in a good relationship will provoke the man to explore his wider desires) that are rarely portrayed in popular arts. faye raye and king kong are not the only template.