Introduction:
In this myTake I will give my perspective on the slut/stud double standard, what the word slut really means, whether guys are judged negatively for their sex count, female on female shaming, and if/why guys are praised for sleeping around. Due to character restrictions, I will not be covering WHY promiscuity is often seen as a negative attribute or why guys often judge it more harrshly, however I’d be more than happy to cover that in future take if anyone wants me to. I will warn you that this mytake is longer than average so maybe read it in sections...or not at all. Whatever floats your boat.
What do “slut” and “whore” mean?
The official definition of slut is “a woman who has many casual sexual partners”. The word whore, despite the dictionary definition: “a woman who engages in sexual acts for money", is often used as a synonym for the word slut. Since they are often used interchangeably, lets cover, what is a slut? The dictionary doesn’t exactly specify what constitutes “a lot” or “many”. Is it 3 in a day, 20 by the time you’re 30, cheating on your SO, sleeping with a taken man? Sure, at the extreme end, most people might agree that someone who has been with 50 people in a year is a slut. But where’s the imaginary line drawn between “slut” and “not a slut”? There really isn’t any. There are no agreed-upon, objective, set of criteria to separate a “slut” from “not a slut”. You could ask 100 people and all their answers would be slightly different.
I look at it like this: every guy has a tolerance for what kind of behavior and/or sexual history that he is willing to accept in a potential romantic partner. In my opinion, slut is basically just a negative label that they apply to any girl who falls outside of his personal tolerance. Since every guy has a different tolerance, that is why some guys will say a girl who has had 2 one night stands is a slut , while his friend thinks it’s a girl who sends nudes to strangers, while another guy might think anything is fine as long as it was in the past. Since there are so many different opinions, based on the way the word is actually used, a more realistic definition of slut would be: “Derogatory label applied to a woman who is not relationship material by- that individual’s- standards”. Now, I dont want to get into the ethics of SHOULD the word be used. Im simply saying that WHEN it is used, that is what I think is usually being implied.
Are Guys Judged For Their Sexual Behavior?
Girls have standards/preferences for what kind of sexual behavior they are willing to accept in a potential partner just like guys do. In 2010, Barbara J. Risman, a professor of Sociology at the University of Illinois conducted a college survey of 20,000 students and found that
“63% of men say they lose respect for women who hook up frequently, while only 41% say they feel the same way about men who engage in the same behavior. However 70% of women say they lose respect for men who engage in casual sex, while less than 60% lose respect for other women.
So the whole idea of men not being judged is a little exagerated. We can also look at some polls on Gag to see that girls do take a guy’s sexual history into consideration when deciding whether or not a he is relationship material. We can also see that there are actually a decent amount of men who don’t hold a girls past against her. Or at least they claim not to :/
It’s not this black and white thing where all the girls get shamed into oblivion while guys are let off without a scratch. Just like slut is a negative label to describe promiscuous women, the same could be said of the words: “fuckboy” “manwhore”, “womanizer” and sometimes “player”. They all have negative connotations and when a girl calls a guy any of those terms, she is essentially implying the same thing as when a guy calls a girl a slut (by her standards, that guy is not relationship material). The reason that I say sometimes for player is because the word player technically implies that he uses deceit to get sex, although sometimes a girl will falsely label a guy a player even if he was completely honest regarding his intentions.
Additonally the words "creep" and "pervert" are used almost exclusivley as negative labels for men. Sure sometimes they are warrented but they also get thrown around losely (just as the word slut often does) and unfairly label guys who are undeserving of the title.
Girls Slut Shame Other Girls
It’s no secret that girls commonly shame other girls for their sex lives, but if a girl is strictly heterosexual, why would she care how many men another girl sleeps with? In my opinion, there are 3 reasons for why a girl might judge another girl for sleeping around.
-Falsely Assigning Morality Onto Others: She views sex as something scared and would see herself in a negative light for engaging in that kind of behavior. As such, she applies her own moral standards onto other women and judges them accordingly.
- Shame the Competition: Contrary to popular belief, Sluts don’t sleep with just anyone, It could even be argued that “sluts” have higher standards for the guys they hook up with than the guys they would seriously date. They generally sleep with attractive men, often times men that lots of other women want. The women who are “relationship types” want a man who will wait for sex, and when the “sluts” are willing to have sex on the first date, it makes it harder for the relationship oriented girls to get the guys they want to wait. The girls who offer “easy sex” restrict the bargaining power of the girls who want to get desirable guys to wait. They see it as stealing the men away, so rather than lower their own ddemans; they will instead shame the girls by calling them sluts. Or sometimes the girl being slut shamed isn't even promiscuous and they get called a slut simply because the other girl is jealous of her looks or the attention she gets from guys.
-Generic Insult: Sometimes it is just a generic insult like “bitch”. EX: *Becky cuts Mandy in line* Mandy: "You slut!" Also similar to how guys might get mocked by other guys for being a virgin and “not being able to get laid”, girls might mock other girls for “not being able to get commitment” because getting commitment is seen as more of a challenge for a girl. So by calling a girl a slut she could be saying “you can get guys to stick their dicks in you but you can’t make any of them stay” which can be pretty insulting for a woman to hear.
Sour Grapes Slut/Player Shaming:
Sometimes a guy will, ironically, call a girl a slut after she REFUSES to have sex with him. This is just a classic example of entitlement and “sour grapes” mentality. He wanted to have sex with her but once he gets denied the thing that he wanted (sex), he’s like: “oh yeah, well I never wanted you anyways slut”. There’s also a saying “a slut sleeps with everyone, a whore sleeps with everyone EXCEPT you” . So sometimes it's just pure bitterness.
Girls will often do something similar but for different reasons. Sometimes a girl will agree to enter a strictly physical relationship or hook up with a guy but later on, develop feelings. When the guy unfortunately lets her know that he doesn’t feel the same way, the girl will often get mad for being denied the thing that she wanted (a relationship). So she will potentially call him a player or a jerk, asshole etc or whatever negative word she can think of. Its same principle, he didn’t play her, he just didn't give her what she felt entitled to. Then she’s like: “oh yeah, well you’re a (fuckboy/asshole/jerk/player), I never wanted you anyways”. Sour grapes :p
Her girlfriends might even chime in "Oh Mindy, you dont need him! he's an asshole, you can do so much better!"
Positive stigma for men?
Girls often claim something like "Why are girls shamed for having sex while guys are praised and seen as heroes?” This sort of implies that if a guy sleeps around, everyone will congratulate him and that he will face zero judgement while girls are shamed by everyone. Personally I don’t believe this true. As far as guys getting congratulated, Yeah it happens but its somewhat exaggerated as far as how often it happens and to what degree. The survey of 20,000 student that I mentioned earlier, found that 40% of men claimed to lose respect for promiscuous guys, so it’s clear that they don’t get praised by everyone. Also, IF a guy does get congratulated for getting laid, he is congratulated by OTHER MEN, NOT by women. I have never in my entire life heard of a girl praising a guy for sleeping around. As I stated above, women do have tolerances for what kind of past they are willing to accept in a man and do often lose respect for promiscuous men.
With that being said, I will concede that despite what people claim on polls, guy do get shamed less than women and that women are more likely to accept a mans past but it’s not as black and white as the initial claim at the top of the previous paragraph. Yes, a guy’s friends might be happy for him if he gets laid or be envious if he got to hook up with a hot girl but it’s not this huge thing were he’s getting high fives left and right or paraded around while everyone cheers his name. After highschool, nobody likes a braggart who goes around telling everyone whenever he gets laid. Also worth noting is that its mainly guys who sleep with -average or better girls- who will be praised or envied the most. Guys who regularly sleep with prositutes or below everage looking women are not seen in a positive light. They do NOT get praised and are often even looked down upon.
Two questions that need to be asked:
Why do guys sometimes praise other guys for getting laid? and Why DON’T girls praise other girls for getting laid?
Why do guys praise other guys for getting laid? Guys are often very competitive and getting sex is often seen as part of the identity of a man. It is one of the various arenas in which men will compete against each other. In a way, Girls play right into this. How often have you noticed on gag where a guy says something that girls disagree with and they will condescendingly say something like “Oh I bet you never get laid” or "someone really needs to get laid" ? All the time, right. Doing this plays right into the mentality that not getting sex as a man is something to be ashamed of. However that insult is rarely-never used against a girl. there's this assumption that if a guy isn't getting laid, its because he can't but if a girl isn't getting laid, its because she is choosing not to.
Guys praise other guys for getting casual sex because guys like sex and for the typical guy, it is harder to find girls willing to hook up with you no strings attached than it is to find girls who will have sex with you after you have: taken them on 20 dates, become emottionally available to them, and made a commitment. Bassically, getting sex for free on the first date is more impressive than having to work for it. Another thing worth noting is that girls often have higher standards on things like looks and charm for the guys they hook up with. Out of 100 guys, the typical girl might be open to dating 40 of them, but she'd probably only consider casual sex with the top 10. Perhaps this girl explains it more clearly than I am:
My one night stands were with HOT men; men that I would have considered out of my league.....When it came to hooking up, my partners prerequisite were higher; at least superficially, than those I deemed necessary in a man I was dating. Seems weird to see that admission in type but quite frankly my criteria for a man I had a one night stand with were all superficially higher; looks, swag, attitude, dress, etc. When dating, the qualities in the men I sought dealt more with depth of character and intellect.
It has also been found that:
Summary of Study: https://www.hookingupsmart.com/2013/02/12/hookinguprealities/the-most-attractive-women-have-the-least-casual-sex/
Actual Study:https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/19485565.2011.615172?journalCode=hsbi20
So by getting casual sex, its more of a complement to your sexual desirability as a man. It means that based on JUST your sexual desirability she was willing to have sex with you. You didn't have to pay to take her on dates,win her over or make any sort of longterm sacrifices. You got sex for free on the first date, sex that many of the guys she meets in the future will have to wait/work for. You won! Realistically only a handful of men have the combination of looks, confidence, and seduction skills required to rack up a high partner count and consistently get casual sex with -average or better girls-.
Why DON’T girls praise other girls for getting laid? Girls just don’t see getting casual sex as much of an accomplishment since they could easily do the same if they really wanted to. For most girls, finding guys willing to have sex without having to make a commitment isn’t a matter of Can you? Or Do you have the attributes necessary? It’s usually Does the girl actually want to? In most cases commitment is harder to get for girls than sex is. Not only that, but unlike girls, guys actually have LOWER standards for the girls they hook up with. Guys have terms like Moped to describe the girls they hook up with.
MOPED-A person of the opposite sex who is not attractive, but you would have sex with.
-She's a moped: She'd be fun to ride, but I wouldn't want any of my friends seeing me on her.
Thats not to say that most guys will sleep with anyone, because thats not true. It's just when comparing like to like (EX: average looking guy-average looking girl) the guy will likely have lower standards for casual sex than the girl does. The same study that found that more attractive men had more partner, found the reverse corelation in women:
Summary of Study: https://www.hookingupsmart.com/2013/02/12/hookinguprealities/the-most-attractive-women-have-the-least-casual-sex/
Actual Study:https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/19485565.2011.615172?journalCode=hsbi20
Here we have the reverse, the most attractive girls reported the least ammount of casual sex. Overweight women reported having MORE partners than normal women. So if a girl were to brag about having hooked up with 20 guys she has shown that she can convince guys to accept no strings attached sex (something that is easy for most girls to get) but she hasn’t displayed whether she could actually get any of them to want to stay or make a commitment ( which is actually a challenge for most girls).
When comparing a man and a woman who have racked up 20 partners, they have done the same thing but due to the dating dynamics the degree of dificulty was different. Its similar to comparing a 6'5 guy who dunks and a 5'10 guy who dunks. They both score the same 2 points but the crowd likely to be more excited at the sight of the shorter guy dunking due to the added difficulty.
Conclusion
I'll end with this. A question I often see on Gag is :Why is it ok for men to sleep around but women?
Technically its “ok” for everyone, there aren’t any laws preventing it. Nobody is stopping you, not only are you as a woman, allowed to sleep around, you can actually get paid for it. In fact you can get paid just for taking your clothes off or doing webcam shows. Even further, you can get profit simply for offering the possibility of sex (going on dates). This girls saved $1200 a month just by going on dates and this girl decided to use desperate guys on tinder to get free pizza.
So you are allowed to sleep with as many people as you want. Sex is something most women can either get for free or profit off of. Will some people potentially refuse to date you or perhaps judge you for it? Sure, people are allowed to have their preferences for their romantic partners. Just like you may refuse to date a guy based on his sexual partners, his height or how much money he makes,or what ever set of chriteria you may have, he can refuse to date you based on your number of sexual partners.
As far as judgment, to judge means: “ to form an opinion about something or someone after careful thought". As I have discussed throughout this take, neither gender is completely immune from being judged on their sexual history. If you think about it, we judge everything,and sometimes those judgments are positive and sometimes they are negative. Unfortunately you can’t only accept the positives and avoid all the negatives. Just like you have a right to sleep with whomever you want, other people have a right to refuse to date you and form an opinion of you whether it be positive or negative. In life you will never make everyone happy, you will never have everyone on your side. But chances are, you’ll never have everyone against you either.
The end....
Try to play nicely in the comments section ;)
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