In our generation of oversharing on TikTok, we are more open about sex than ever before - no topic too outrageous to discuss, no concern too personal to talk about to potentially millions of people. Not only are we the most liberated generation in terms of what  we can and can’t talk about, we may be the most beautiful generation ever (at least according to patriarchal beauty standards, which probs isn’t that much of a win tbh). So if everyone is so open about sexy stuff, we’re all drop dead gorgeous and we have more dating apps than pennies in the bank at our disposal, why are we having less sex than ever? Class is in session. Let’s discuss.

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Q: How can you tell LJ wrote a blog?

A: When there’s a needless definition section ofc!

To get into this properly, we need to understand what 'sexual liberation' really means...

Sexual liberation: def. the state of being free from sexual hangups or inhibitions that are considered restrictive.

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The history of sexual liberation

Sexual liberation derived from the Free Love movement in the 60s which challenged the norms of sexuality and sexual relationships throughout the United States. The movement was created to remove the guilt or judgment that comes with freely meeting sexual needs. It’s an ideology that is constantly changing with the environment and for sure requires an open mind. A sexually liberated society is a healthy, connected and empowered society. When we are sexually liberated, we understand that sex goes beyond the physical experience or orientation – beyond gender identity and beyond social expectations. But as well as referring to having loads of sex and loving life, sexual liberation can also include abstaining from sex by personal choice rather than religious or social pressure.

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As explained in Asa Seresin’s much-loved essay On Heteropessism, women who hold attraction to men are often embarrassed by their heterosexuality, framing it as something that has been inflicted on them – like an illness or a prison – and causes them distress. Much like the cries of straight girls on social media screaming about how they wish they could just date a girl because men are terrible and smell bad, heteropessism generally focuses on men as the root of the problem. And sure, they have their issues. But the way heterosexuality is designed in itself is the real issue. As women have (very, very) slowly accumulated more rights and more footing in the world, we’ve not only become more beautiful (praise be to the girlies who provide us with makeup tutorials on the daily), but more independent. And part of that means being picky about who’s in our pants.

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Fuck you, Freud - turns out being a mother figure isn’t so sexy. If you’ve ever been unlucky enough to fall into a relationship with a man who needs to be reminded to wash his own dishes or wash between the cheeks instead of just letting water trickle down the crack, first of all, same girl. Secondly, you’ll know what I mean when I say man child. It’s beyond frustrating to have to baby your boyfriend, but that’s what so many young women are dealing with right now. During lockdown (which I have fully repressed tbh, can’t wait to get actual trauma when I fully grasp the fact I was locked in a one bed flat totally alone for over a year), loads of lads our age moved back in with mummy. And while awwww family values <3, that also means he was likely letting mumsy take care of all the housework, and now has been conditioned to believe that’s what adulthood is - being looked after by a woman who loves you. It’s almost understandable when you put it like that, but then yknow the girlie whirlies were also at home and we still know to put the washing on.

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Now dubbed ‘man-children’, our ex high school heart throbs can be characterised by a number of child-like traits, including ‘not noticing’ the dishes need washing or bins need emptying and weaponising their own incompetence when they eventually do it; being ungrateful for the emotional and physical care provided by their partner, and general helplessness when it comes to taking care of themselves – and, sometimes, their own kids. Ultimately, the man-child isn’t just bad for society, it’s bad for literally everyone’s sex life. Foreplay starts the moment you wake up in the morning. If you wake up to a million chores and a partner who won’t help you, that’s a huge turn-off. It isn’t only about warming the body up, it’s about warming the mind up too. If your partner constantly does things to show you he respects you and wants to be an active partner in your life – nothing is sexier.

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The early 2000s, a period where actresses and models pretended that their thinness was natural, almost accidental. Skinny celebrities confessed their love of burgers and fries in magazines; models bragged about public consumption of pasta and burgers, leading ladies joked about how little they exercised and how much they hated it. It was all bullshit: no one looks like that without calorie restriction. We knew it then, and we know it now. The difference is we don’t pretend anymore. The promotional cycles for blockbuster movies now include detailed descriptions of the performers’ fitness regimens. We even see the character’s excessive exercise habits in movies - just look at American Psycho or Batman (any excuse to oggle daddy christian bale amirite?). But why are these characters getting all swole and sexy? For the purpose of violence, of course. I think about the shower scene in Starship Troopers, a movie about an endless desert war, the ubiquity of military propaganda, and cheerful faces shouting victory as bodies pile up. In the shower scene, the heroic service men and women enjoy some communal grooming as they talk about how excited they are to kill the enemy. A room full of beautiful, bare bodies, and everyone is only horny for war.

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Our society loves violence. We almost crave it. Our movies are more violent than ever, and despite the actors and actresses in 21st century blockbusters being more objectively leng than ever, nobody wants to bone. You’re telling me Inception (2010) enters the deepest level of a rich man’s subconscious and finds not a psychosexual Oedipal nightmare of staggering depravity, but… a ski patrol? We’re told that Tony Stark and Pepper Potts are an item, but no actual romantic or sexual chemistry between them is shown in the films. Chris Hemsworth’s Thor smiles at Natalie Portman like a dumb golden retriever puppy without ever venturing to sheathe his mighty hammer. It’s not like the 80s were the pinnacle of body positivity - far from it - but the bodies we saw on screen were actually obtainable. They looked real. And they fucked. Micheal Keaton’s Batman got royally fucked by a mommy domme Catwoman. And I defy you to find a mainstream film with a moment as horny and gay as the Sexy Saxophone Solo from The Lost Boys. We’re shown beautiful bodies so we’re jealous - Hollywood wants us to want look like these people, not fuck them.

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Until fairly recently, modern dating (in the cis-het world at least) has been imbalanced. Women have been socially programmed to believe that their value and worth are conditional and reflected by their relationship status. Media, including dating self-help books and columns, has played a big part in this, encouraging women to change various aspects of themselves. Y’know just little things like personality, physical appearance, communication style, all to be more desirable to men. In the past, most women needed men for resources - they needed a provider. Now, with more opportunities, women have more independence and recognise that they do not need men in the same way women did in previous generations. Without such high stakes, women are raising the bar. We are no longer looking for a provider but a partner and an equitable relationship. We want more. The American Time Use Survey compared levels of pleasure and misery in unmarried, married, divorced, separated, and widowed individuals in a survey. The results of the survey were basically; if you’re a man, you should probably get married, if you’re a woman, don’t bother.

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Men are feeling lonely, because expectations for men have been famously low and they tend to half-arse both dating and their own personal development, and women are, put simply, giving up on them, weeding out the weak and raising their dating standards. Psychology Today puts it this way: “[Women] prefer men who are emotionally available, good communicators, and share similar values.” And because men are… not always the best at all of those things, women are ditching them. The study is sort of blaming women for men’s loneliness, which is a yikes, and it sort of frames men as a victim of circumstance, as though women’s firm-but-fair standards have rendered men to be single and sexless forever. But these markers feel less like high standards and more like raising the bar for a good boyfriend out of hell and onto the ground. Now that we don’t need men to hunt and gather, and more need them to contribute to relationships emotionally, they don’t always deliver.