Heterosex

[greenie_breizh]

Reading about heterosex and feeling a little down at how male hegemony is just so closely intertwined with the way we see sex - it's like even when we think we're in an egalitarian relationship where the woman is treated the same as the man, our accounts of sex reveal systemic inequalities. :/ I find myself wondering if it's possible to have non-hegemonic heterosex and the thought that maybe it's not is incredibly depressing.

"The way these activities were described, as in these two extracts, often represented her orgasm as something that she had as a result of what he did or gave her. In contrast, his orgasm, achieved through intercourse, was not typically framed as her giving – instead, it was something ‘we’ did together, or about where his orgasm took place. In these accounts, the man is represented as more active in the production of orgasm – both hers and his own – than is the woman. In this way, it is a subtle account of the relative passivity traditionally expected of women in heterosex (e.g. see Gavey and McPhillips, 1999; Gilfoyle et al., 1992)."

[...] "Numerous studies have pointed to the links between male sexuality and performance/competence (e.g. Gilfoyle et al., 1992; Kilmartin, 1999). It also points to how ‘saturated’ heterosexual reciprocity is with unequal status. If a woman’s orgasm is ‘given’ by a man, as it is in the discourse of reciprocity, men stand to gain positive identity positions (sensitive and unselfish) through this discourse. Furthermore, the caring, sensitive man partaking in reciprocal heterosex is also imbued with ‘sexpertise’ (Potts, 1998, 2002) – the competence to know how to meet the complex challenge of producing orgasm in the female body, as well as the more straightforward task of his own orgasm. Women’s ‘gift’, on the other hand, is recognized less as an active gift than as a taken-for-granted expectation. As such, the positive identities to be gained by women through the discourse are less clear (although the negative implications of not participating are clear)."

[...] "It is ironic . . . that the ‘enlightened’ male discourse, in which men take some responsibility for their partner’s pleasure, is yet another example of men abrogating power to themselves, as they take away women’s ability to be an independent sexual agent. (Gilfoyle et al., 1992: 224)"

(Extracted from Virginia Braun, Nicola Gavey and Katrhyn McPhilips, “The ‘Fair Deal’? Unpacking Accounts of Reciprocity in Heterosex,’ Sexualities 6:2 (2003): 237-261.)

Comments

[aislingtheach.livejournal.com]

Merci beaucoup pour les extraits!! C'est très intéressant. C'est vrai que bien des hommes se pètent les bretelles en pensant qu'ils sont les seuls responsables de l'orgasme de leur partenaire, alors que l'inverse est considéré comme redevable aux deux.

J'avais lu quelque chose sur les représentations de la sexualité hétérosexuelle en quelque part, mais je ne me souviens plus qui est l'auteur-e et quel est le titre. Il me semble que ça abordait la dimension de la pénétration. Comment elle est perçu par les hommes en général.

C'est fou parce que même des hommes assez ouverts d'esprit y associent une forme de prise ou d'expression de pouvoir. Alors que quand on y pense, dans l'absolu, une pénétration c'est un truc qui entre dans un autre. La connotation, elle, n'est qu'un produit culturel. On pourrait tout aussi bien imaginer un contexte où on considérerait que le pénis se fait engouffrer/avaler par le allmighty mysterious vagin ou va s'y engouffrer.

[greenie-breizh.livejournal.com]

Il y a aussi l'aspect "regarde, j'ai une vision égalitaire de l'acte sexuel, qu'est ce que je suis un mec bien", une attitude très dérangeante parce que ça ne fait qu'augmenter le malaise quand on leur montre que c'est bien gentil mais c'est insuffisant/pas tout à fait correct, et puis parce qu'on ne sent pas le besoin de se remettre en question quand on pense qu'on est génial.

Cet article-là a quelques éléments sur les perceptions de la sexualité hétéro, et je pense que la biblio pourrait être utile si tu as envie de jeter un coup d'oeil. :)


Oui, c'est très intéressant pour moi la centralité de la pénétration dans la sexualité. Ca me rappelle une conversation que j'ai eu avec une copine sur ce genre de trucs et c'était intéressant, elle explicait que pour elle la sodomie lui semblait foncièrement un acte de domination, ce qui n'était pas le cas pour la pénétration vaginale (j'ai beaucoup aimé cette conversation car mon amie était honnête sur des choses que je pense beaucoup de gens pensent sans le dire ouvertement). Donc en plus il y a un niveau d'hétérosexisme qui fait que le citoyen lambda voit dans certains types de pénétration cet élément de domination alors que pour une autre forme de pénétration, il y a une couverture de neutralité...

[aislingtheach.livejournal.com]

Et on ne mentionnera pas le fait que pour énormément de gars qui adorent pratiquer la sodomie avec leur blonde, la recevoir est un big no-no ;)

[fan-elune.livejournal.com]

I read your little intro up there and got really scared that I might fall into this scheme. And that I'd been having totally hegemonic heterosex. But no.

I've slept with assholes, and I've slept with well-meaning guys who still keep the hegemonic stuff going despite themselves. But I've always considered the giving of an orgasm by one person to another in the same way, no matter which one of those (if any) is male. Or female. Thing is, though, it's all about what it's like in your head. It's not about being passive or active, dom or sub, or any variation thereupon. Those are acts, and they only mean something more than 'I like it that way' when you let them/want them to/etc. At least that's the way I see it, and so I will happily say that I have had non hegemonic heterosex. On both sides. 'Cause I've had non hegemonic heterosex where it was probably hegemonic for the guy, but also where it wasn't. Unless I'm much mistaken, which is possible, but really, I don't think so.

The interesting thing is, I'm thinking of a friend in particular who once told me his sister had once pointed out that he had the sexuality of a lesbian, and I think she was right in that, if you overlook the fact that it means a certain cliché of lesbian sexuality. But it's interesting that because of that, he would be deemed to have a womanly sexuality, whether lesbian or not. It's just one more proof of the way we still assign the same old gender roles. But hey, at least he transcends that.

And now I kinda wish this was flocked 'cause I'm saying a lot here. Oopsie?

[greenie-breizh.livejournal.com]

As nice as it would be to be able to say you have only ever had non-hegemonic sex, it's kind of impossible without knowing the meaning that the men you slept with have constructed around the sexual acts you've done with them. You're a member of the non-dominant group here (aka a woman) and even though part of the trick is that women themselves articulate hegemonic discourses, it's men that are the center of it. Actually I just realized you said you did sleep with both assholes and men who have these hegemonic models in mind, well, that pretty much says it all. The dominant group is the only who ultimately has the power to articulate discourses - that's what makes it dominant - so if the men think in hegemonic terms? In a way, it doesn't much matter what you think. As a non-straight person I might convince myself that I've never been a victim of heterosexism or that I've never played into heterosexist script but 1) that's probably just me not being very attentive and 2) I can say that a hundred times a day, it's not going to change the fact that (let's say) the first thing I ask when a baby is born is "is it a boy or a girl" and that action, no matter the meaning I put on it, is the hegemony of heterosexism at work.

There is also the fact that straight sexuality is by nature hegemonic in our world - so as long as you take part in this system you are being hegemonic, kind of like just because we were born white we're part of an hegemonic system of skin color. You don't create meaning in a vacuum - so just because you, as an individual, did something in a non-hegemonic way doesn't mean that it is part of a larger hegemonic framework.

For example something that we were discussing yesterday with a friend - on an individual level there is nothing wrong with a straight woman who is honest in her desires and wants to sleep with another woman to know what it's like. The problem is that, no matter how she frames her experience, in a heterosexist world, it's always going to be part of a larger context where heterosexuality is valued above other sexual orientations and where her experience is perceived as her dabbling into something 'spicy' or 'sexy' or 'unusual' but (thank the gods) she went back to normal.
So for me a lesbian who has a single experience with a man for example is less problematic because she's not enacting a hegemonic script in the same way (other issues arise, but that's something else).

I think part of trying to challenge hegemony is admitting that we all partake in it, willingly or not, whether we're aware of it or not. It sure doesn't feel too good, but it's a necessary step. You say your acts only have the meaning you give them, but that's not really true - they also have the meanings that other people attach to them, and they relate to the structure that they help construct. Did you watch the video of whiteness? It kind of touches upon that - how we need to own our whiteness, and the privilege that comes with it, so we can do anything about the hegemony of whiteness in this world.