Oh my, this is going to get ugly…..
Not too terribly long ago while riffling through the used book section at a second-hand store (one of my most favorite things to do in the whole world ever), I came across a most horrifying, trauma-inducing book. After coughing up the obligatory half a dollar required to make it mine, I took it home to read, knowing perfectly well that because I am very familiar with and really, really hate the author, I’d probably at some point end up at the kitchen sink trying my damndest to cram it into oblivion down the disposal. But hey, I’m a trooper, and after having previously read some of the horrible advice Mister Fella doles out on the regular, I figured it was worth the money that it cost me to satisfy my curiosity. (It wasn’t.)
Anyway, so the book–you’ve probably heard of it, given that it’s been around since forever– is Mars and Venus in the Bedroom, by author and so-called relationship expert John Gray, and it’s one of several that follows the heretofore established reasoning of his bestselling lump of garbage, Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus. Reasoning that, sadly, many of us are familiar with, and even more sadly, some of us believe, and it goes something like this: Human characteristics come in two sets. One set of characteristics comprises physical strength, dominance, aggression, logic, ambition, courage, responsibility, and an excessively high sex drive. The other is sympathetic, kind, nurturing, needy, intuitive, emotional, giving, cooperative, passive, docile, and submissive, durr hur dumb fucking hurrr.
And as most of you probably see coming a mile away, these characteristics are divvied up by sex. As we’ve previously discussed, this is just stupid. And yet, Gray is just one of many so-called experts who irresponsibly center their views about relationships and sex around such an unsound and defective (not to mention harmful) belief system and then proceed to speak authoritatively on the subject.
According to the cultural narrative, men need sex while women merely (sigh…and infrequently) desire sex, or, more specifically, women desire love and security, which we seek to get in return for sex. Because of this (in part), the tone in public discourse regarding sex is often placed within the context of women giving men sex. The reason I mention this is because not only does Gray make the same claim several times in the book but because it’s also an underlying theme throughout.
He completely sticks to the script regarding female sexuality, which is to say he pretends it doesn’t exist outside of its ability to please men. Women don’t want sex, women want love! Because of this belief, any conversation regarding the woman’s physical pleasure is practically non-existent. The reality that women are just as ‘visual’ as men is completely ignored. The reality that women can and do have sex purely for the physical pleasure, with little or no emotional attachment to our sexual partners, is completely ignored. But we do get to learn plenty about the ways in which to physically please our man in order to keep him from satisfying his (snicker) “biological need” for variety behind our backs. Convenient, right?
It’s a little frustrating to think about how many men have grown up in this fog of delusion regarding women and women’s sexuality. It almost makes me feel sorry for the little buggers. How sad to spend childhood believing that women are these pure, ethereal, magical creatures (who exist to serve you and only you) only to learn that in real life most of us aren’t really like that at all– we’re every bit as fucked up and depraved and sexual as men are. In other words, we’re human.
The book begins with these oh so fitting words:
He wants sex. She wants romance.
He wants sex. Him. Not her, because again, independent of a woman’s ability to please her partner with her body and to successfully barter sex for validation, romance, security, and love, her sexuality does not exist. Let me make this perfectly clear because it’s kind of an important point: In a book that claims to be about sex for couples, here is an author who frames his entire premise around the notion that sex is actually only desired by one person in the couple. This book, therefore, isn’t meant to benefit the couple; it’s meant to benefit the man in the couple.
He further clarifies his philosophy by stating that “Sex allows a man to feel his needs for love.” The idea that men use sex as a pathway of sorts to love and emotional fulfillment pops up frequently throughout the book. It is significant because the message it conveys is that when women turn men down for sex, we aren’t just denying men physical pleasure but the ability to connect to their emotions. Not only is this stupid, it’s also super manipulative. Women are increasingly expected to cater to our partner’s sexual demands (wooo! thanx porn! thanx, asshole relationship “experts”!) and this is just another way to further guilt us into shutting up and putting out.
Incidentally, Gray is also a proponent of the trope that men try to score with random hot women on the regular because they ‘need’ variety and have a biological need to ‘spread their seed’. The idea that they do this, while at the same time seeking sex to access feelings of ‘love’ is so absurdly oxymoronic that it’s almost funny.
I kept a pencil handy while reading the book, with the intention of making notes in the margins about all his whacked-out notions regarding sex. I realized pretty quickly, however, that such an undertaking would require a book of my own and way more time than I care to spend. But because this shit is harmful to women, it needs to be discussed, because even though you know it’s bullshit, and I know know it’s bullshit….some people don’t know it’s bullshit. So, on we go.
When he wants sex and she is not readily in the mood, he easily misunderstands and feels rejected. He does not instinctively realize that a woman generally needs to feel loved and romanced before she can feel her hunger for sex.
Okay look. I’m going to speak my own personal experience into this for a minute. I’ve done the casual sex thing. Sometimes I took men home with me during my bar scene years because I was drunk. Sometimes I had sex with men I didn’t care about or want anything else from because my body needed the physical release and pleasure of sex. And I can say with absolute certainty that there wasn’t one time– not a single, solitary time– that I had the casual-sexytime with these men because they filled up my love cup first. And no, sorry, I’m not an anomaly.
It’s weird how that works. It’s almost, like I said before, it’s almost like we’re all human or something.
Do women want to have sex with men who don’t objectify, dehumanize, and degrade us? Well obviously. The reason I mention this, and this is quite possibly the most important point of all, is because Gray, and so many whacked-out freak-shows like him, often construct a narrative in which the man does seem to disrespect, disregard, dehumanize and degrade his partner, and this seems to be the premise from which Gray et al. work, and then they confuse respect and basic human decency with love and romance and sparkles.
It is Gray who makes the claim that women need to feel loved first in order to become turned on to sex. But then he tells us, several times over in fact, that if a couple is experiencing problems in the relationship, it is the woman’s responsibility to put this need aside and sexy-up up for the man regardless of her desire to do so. Because men can’t (or won’t) express love when they aren’t feeling it, the onus is on women to have sex when we aren’t feeling it in order to improve or save the relationship. This directive comes up frequently in the book:
When sex gets better, suddenly the whole relationship gets better. Through great sex, the man begins to feel more love, and, as a result, the woman starts getting the love she may have been missing.
Great sex is the most powerful way to open a man’s heart and help him to feel his love and express it to a woman. Great sex softens a woman’s heart and helps her to relax and receive her partner’s support in other areas of the relationship. This softening of her feelings dramatically improves her ability to communicate in a manner that her partner can hear without becoming defensive.
When a couple is experiencing relationship problems, sometimes, instead of focusing on the problems, taking a shortcut and creating great sex immediately reduces the problems and makes them easier to solve.
What a narcissistic snotrag this guy is. Can we flush him down the toilet now?
Through sex, a man’s heart begins to open up. Through sex, a man can give and receive love the most. When a woman begins to understand this difference, it changes her whole perspective on sex. Instead of a man’s desire for sex being something crude and divorced from love, she can begin to see it as his way of eventually finding love.
Please take note of the word ‘eventually’. He’s been saying that men use sex to access their feelings of love for their partners. Up until now, he’s given us the impression (even though we know it’s bullshit) that men find the magical pot of love at the end of the sex rainbow. But now he tells us that if we give in to the man’s demands for sex, and he still treats us like garbage, then we just need to keep on having sex! Because you know….he will eventually be a loving person instead of a selfish, disrespectful fuckwad.
It is confusing to her when he wants sex and they are not even talking or he has ignored her for days. To her, it seems as if he doesn’t care if they have much of a relationship. She has no idea that when he begins to hunger for sex it is because he wants to reconnect and share love.
Goddamn you, John Gray. There is nothing confusing about not wanting to have sex with someone who treats you like dirt, you big rotten bundle of ass fungus. Goddamn you to hell for telling any woman anywhere that she should acquiesce to an emotionally abusive man who would ignore her for days and then turn around and degrade her by treating her like a sex object who’d better bend over and put out on command or else. Fucking hell!
Most men are never taught how to have sex. Once they can get turned on or can masturbate, they are somehow expected to be sexual experts. Sure, they know where to put it and how to have an orgasm in two minutes, but the art of giving a woman an orgasm is a different story altogether.
Well, gee. I guess that’s what happens when people like Gray are allowed to open their fucking mouths and speak for all men for the whole world to hear. When sex is something that women give to men and the pleasure is the man’s for the taking, I guess it makes sense that no one bothers to teach men how to please women. That would just fuck up the whole paradigm altogether, now wouldn’t it?
Men don’t instinctively know what women like, and even when they hear about it, they tend to forget.
Well fucking duh to the first part of that thought, bullshit to the second part of it. Men aren’t ALL thoughtless, forgetful morons, but I feel more pity for Gray’s wife that I’d have ever thought possible!
A man’s immediate desire to touch and be touched in his sensitive zones is a given. He does not need much help in getting excited. He needs help in releasing or letting go of his excitement. In a sense, he seeks to end his excitement, while a woman seeks to extend her excitement to feel more deeply her inner longing.
What the actual fuck does this even mean? And why in the world would a woman want to ‘feel more deeply her inner longing’ (barf) for someone who acts like a stupid asshole?
For a woman, arousal slowly builds long before it becomes a physical desire for sex. Before longing for sexual stimulation, a woman first feels warm, sensual, and attractive. She feels drawn to a man and enjoys sharing time together. It could be days before she wants to have sex.
I’m guessing that in his wife’s world that’s called ‘delaying the inevitable.’ I mean, christ on a mutherfucking cracker! this is such goofy, ridiculous drivel that I just can’t even. It takes days to turn a woman on, John? Really? Days? Or is it really, possibly, just a case of, some days I want to have sex and some days I don’t?
And why must a woman feel that she is attractive to her partner in order to feel sexual? Could it possibly have anything to do with the way we’ve had one single beauty ideal (thin, bronzed, blond, etc.) shoved in our goddamn faces everywhere forever until we begin to feel somewhat less-than for failing to live up to that airbrushed, non-existent ideal? Pshaw….nah, that can’t be it. Surely it’s biological. Because EVO-PSYCH ya’ll!
To wait days requires enormous restraint on his part.
It’s really too bad you can’t have someone neutered against their will.
Oh the poor, poor menz!
Of course, if you’re really just feeling gross and yucky and totally unsexy, don’t feel like fucking a complete assbag, and have access to a hammer, you do have other options…
For many men, other than hitting their finger with a hammer or watching a football game, sex is one of the only ways they can feel!
Hey, I’m game. Although I’m pretty sure it isn’t the finger that I’d be aiming for.
[Edit to add: And just so you don’t think I’m completely full of shit when I say that John Gray is full of shit, I present to you some actual research (and oh lookie here, here’s some more! and wooooooooo here’s some more!) to validate my assertion that he is, in fact, completely full of shit.]
Carole S said:
I just love you to bits!
I’ll admit I’ve never read this book….and have no desire to do so, even at 50cents it seems a big ask!
I can’t believe this person thinks he’s an expert on matters such as these….and I’m with you, I feel sorry for his poor wife!
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Miranda said:
Yeah, I don’t know why I feel the need to torture myself by reading this crap. It really sucks that he’s not the only one perpetuating these bullshit tropes, our culture is eaten alive with this mentality at this point. Trying to push back against it is a little like trying to hold off a tsunami with your pinkie finger after it’s been severed and all you have left is a stump. But jesus christ, this shit is so freaking damaging in so many ways that you have to TRY, you know?
Oh, and I love you to bits, too!!!
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Patrick Bonacoscia said:
“He wants sex. She wants romance” and Mr Gray just wants money from idiots.
What he did is fill a book with gender and sexist stereotypes (easy to do).The sad thing is that many people think that book is good only because it validates the stereotypes they themselves learned.
The only way to improve women / men relation is to remove these harmful stereotypes, certainly not reading that book
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Miranda said:
Amen, Patrick.
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Amy Wilson said:
Miranda, you rock! I was reading this at 1:30 a.m. and just howling with laughter. (And was not even drinking!) You are so right. My sister and I are your new Georgia fans!
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theredmonphobia said:
Yes it is bad, but you did sit down a read a book which is great brain exercise. I love reading and hope more people will get back to just sitting down and reading a book or in this case i just read a blog.
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Miranda said:
I don’t think I want anymore brain exercise. I THINK I’M DONE WITH BRAIN EXERCISE.
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theredmonphobia said:
Well don’t stop reading and writing blogs then please. I enjoy reading them.
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Miranda said:
Well thank you, John. :)
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Julie Gillis said:
We may have disagreed on FB, but we most certainly agree here. I hated that book.
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Miranda said:
I knew we had some common ground somewhere! :)
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Atomic Reach (@Atomic_Reach) said:
Hi Miranda,
I really like how you dissected Gray’s argument and gave more of a realistic view on female sexuality. Thank you for sharing your post. :)
I’ve taken a look through your website and we think you’ve done a fantastic job in covering topics that our brand’s audience of modern, independent women would be interested in reading about, such as relationship advice, women’s issues and positive body image. It would be great if you could join our community to feature your blog entries.
If you would like to learn more about this, please send an email with “twirlit” in the subject line to info at atomicreach.com.
Sincerely,
Tina
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Miranda said:
Hi there, spambot *giggle*. Do you like me?
YES or NO
(CIRCLE ONE)
I heart spambots 4-EVER!!!!!1!1!!11!!!11!!!!
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Constance Fry said:
I AM SUCH a sad LITTLE TROLL person. Maybe I should GO HUMP MY DOG’S LEG AND talk to HIM ABOUT HOW MUCH I SUCK AT THIS.
[There. I fixed that for you.]
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Miranda said:
I agree. Best of luck to you in your endeavor to stop being a moron.
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rootedinbeing said:
Hahaha! Love it
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Ro said:
This could have been a good article.
Its a pity that you saw the need to stoop down to the same pitiful level as you describe John to have reached.
I believe that all mankind is born “perfectly”. Indeed when God made ‘man’, he made him in His own image. Then God said approvingly, it was VERY GOOD, not just Good.
As for sexual relationships. The Bible goes on to describe how this will work too. In fact the Bible is quite explicit.
ONE. ….its the domain of a ‘Husband’ and ‘Wife’.
TWO. …..for it (the marriage) to be Blessed it needs to come under the blessings of God. A sexual relationship outside the covenant of marriage before God – is controlled by the enemy (satan).
THREE……. such marriages are anointed as follows:
(a). The husband should fulfill his wife’s sexual needs and the wife should fulfill her husband’s needs. …..
(b). The wife gives authority over her body to her husband and the husband gives authority over his body to his wife.
(c). Do not deprive each other of sexual relations.
NOTE: This relates to a husband and a wife, not a man and a woman, or a boyfriend and a girlfriend.
Bring your relationship under the protection of God, not the enemy (devil).
I trust that you will see that there’s no protection other under the eyes of God.
When you comment on the writings of those in their Worldly understanding, be mindful of the depths of their despair when things don’t work out as they had hoped.
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Miranda said:
This isn’t a religious blog. Go peddle it somewhere else.
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Mason Jar said:
You’re a WONDERFUL PERSON. Please KEEP IT UP. I CAN’T BELIEIVE you’re single and alone, and I AM A FUCKING LAME TOILET HOLE. NO man (or any person for that matter) would want to tolerate MY disgusting attitude. Your writing IS FUCKING AMAZING. Chock full of obscenities too. Like a dirty trucker mouth.
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Miranda said:
Hey thanks Mason Jar! I hope you don’t mind that I tweaked a few things in your comment, but if I’d let it stand the way you wrote it, I’d have to tell you to go fuck yourself, and this way is much nicer, don’t you think?
PS. Go fuck yourself.
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NunYa said:
You Truly Are An Inspiration To All <3
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NunYa said:
(And I’m not being sarcastic like most of these idiots are) ily <3
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Miranda said:
Love you too Miss Freaking Awesome.
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itstheotherwayaround said:
Thank you Miranda, for shining the light on this assholes ridiculous and twisted insight to male female relations.
Men who buy into this “women should coddle your caveman” mentality really don’t care to understand women and how we REALLY feel.
This is going up on my facebook page right now because people need to take this shit seriously and become proactive against society perpetuating this sexist bullshit!!
Thank you again Miranda!
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Heretic said:
Reblogged this on Your social constructs are showing.
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Heretic said:
This was hysterical! I never read that book but I did briefly skim through one entitled,”Men are from Mars, women are from Venus.”
Oh hey, it turns out it’s by the same asshole! Still in the genre of crap!
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ellahawthorne100 said:
Wow, what an awful book! I can’t believe you were able to get all the way through it!
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Lily said:
Thank you so very very much!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I read the original piece of shit, and I came away feeling like shit! The whole “Could you hang this picture?” is castrating vs. “Would you hang this picture on the wall?” is showing faith in his manliness. (as is the b.s. of him driving in circles without asking directions and my only response is to be “we’d have never seen that lovely sunset if we had actually gone to Mike and Susy’s chalet instead of our lovely 4 hour tour of back roads and dead ends”. And my personal baffler — the part about him saying his wife would tell him to go get milk and he’d pitch a fit and slam doors and bitch his head of before leaving an hour later, and when he’d bring his sorry as home with the stupid milk and midnight, she’d just say “thank you” and act like he was a complete saint. HE MARRIED A STEPFORD WIFE, I’M SURE OF IT!
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Claudia said:
I know.My head hurt after reading his book. Seriously? How many times is this woman going to ask her man to get some damn milk when he’s sportin’ pj’s headed for bed. I mean at what point is the guy gonna start thinking ‘is this bitch trying to set me up with this repetitive late night milk thing?’…Seriously, I know I’m supposed to be this Venusian marshmallow person but I would love( real unbridled kind) to throttle this douche and punch him soundly in the face. :-)
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Tibletcat said:
Wow. I Love you to death. And am turned on by your independent personality. How did you get out of the matrix?
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chloetron2014 said:
Men can only ‘feel’ if they hit their finger with a hammer or watch football??? what kind of morons does he think they are??
Correct me if I am wrong, but I believe J.Gray married a thundering nincompoop called Babara des Angeles who also writes twerpy dating books. They divorced at some point. Being experts on relationships that they are.
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Tracy Q. Loxley said:
“He wants sex. Him. Not her, because again, independent of a woman’s ability to please her partner with her body and to successfully barter sex for validation, romance, security, and love, her sexuality does not exist.” THIS is a wonderful summation of everything that’s wrong with how we talk about sexual relationships between men and women.
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sellmaeth said:
Wow, this book is even worse than I suspected it would be, which is really a feat.
Somehow, he doesn’t really have a convincing argument why, if men are such incomplete, faulty cavemen who cannot “feel” anything without being allowed to stick their dicks into a woman, we should want to have anything to do with men.
I mean, as the saying goes, if you want love, absolute loyalty and walks in the moonlight, then get a dog and be happy.
Sex would be a reason to keep a man around, but apparently a) women don’t want sex and b) men suck at it, so why bother?
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Connie said:
I’m so glad I found this! I attempted to read this book years ago, but couldn’t stomach it. I have always been very sexual, when I was single and wanted sex, I got it and didn’t want an emotional attachment. Now, here I am 54 years old and I still want sex. I like make up sex, but after an argument, my husband says the last thing he wants is to be close to me. Some of the things Gray says about stopping an argument are helpful, even some of the how we say crap will work, but his idea about sex, is BS. I’m sick of hearing how men need sex to feel better …excuse me…SO DO I! Sex makes me feel wanted, attractive and even loved. I hate hearing that a man cheated because his wife wasn’t “giving” him sex, well if he treated her nice she would be all over him.
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Myra Singh said:
I don’t understand why do you buy books with which you disagree so much?
These books are not for everyone.
Not everyone can understand John Gray’s message.
I guess you do it simply to make more blog posts regd. books and dating coaches you dislike.
Buying a book which you are anyways going to diss is NOT a productive thing.
As is,there is so much hatred spewing all over the internet with everyone thinking they are right and the other person is wrong/stupid because he/she has some beliefs which they don’t agree with.And your blog only adds to this misery.
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Miranda said:
I don’t understand why you read blogs you disagree with so much?
This blog isn’t for everyone.
Not everyone can understand my message.
I guess you do it simply to make comments regarding blog posts you dislike.
Reading a blog which you are anyways going to diss (sic) is NOT a productive thing. (Unless, from reading the title of the blog post, you thought I was going to say something that *wasn’t* negative about the book or Gray?)
As is, there is so much hatred spewing all over the internet with everyone thinking they are right and the other person is wrong/stupid because he/she has some beliefs which they don’t agree with. And your comment only adds to this misery.
(Oh look. I can do it, too).
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Greta Growls said:
I was so insulted and angry as I read parts of this book. Basically it says, “Look ladies, this is the way men are, and you need to adapt”. Well, FUCK YOU! I recently found a YouTube video where gray says there is no pleasing women , so don’t bother trying. Wow, I couldn’t believe it. And some women are stupid enough to fall for it!
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sjglaze said:
Dear Miranda, just found your blog while looking up comments on “dating advice” from Evan Katz. Love your blog, love this article. It so nails it. I used to be ashamed of having a really high sex drive, thinking there must be something wrong with me for not following the female script. Holy cow, did that mess me up. Luckily I found a guy who appreciates it :)
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Joseph said:
I am glad to see that I’m not the only person out there who finds “Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus” to be filled to the brim with highly questionable advice, which reeks of sexist stereotypes that, by rights, ought to go the way of the dodo.
Thanks for writing this.
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Eva said:
What do you think of his new book? It’s about hormones and relationships.
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TheRamblingThinker said:
“Men are from Mars, women are from Venus,” is a book built around stereotypes, caricatures, and broad-sweeping generalisations. Dr Gray appears to have a PhD in the logical fallacy of the generalisation.
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pat said:
Seems he got his PHD in a degree mill in Calif.
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Lbreezy said:
I swear he is full of Shit
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