On the desperation of female neediness
a response to James Harris
James Harris from Stiff Upper Quip wrote a post about the helpless hornyness inherent in being a man, and I want to add my two cents on the female flipside of the coin. James and I have a lot in common on the surface. We both write about politics and culture and are based in London. He is an accomplished stand-up comedian. I have recently started dabbling in it. When I dig deeper into his writing, I often hear my own voice, my own complaints, served in a self-deprecating, vulnerable way that is very familiar to me. In his latest post, he describes the tribulations men go through in the pursuit of beautiful women:
Still, I think some women don’t really understand that, for men who are still out and about looking for women, it’s all rather a lot of work. There’s a slight Acme Corporation quality to being a single straight bloke, going out there, getting knocked back and then coming back again and again. I’d never reveal the number of women I went to bed with, but I would like to put on the record – and this is not, to be clear, to indicate that it was an enormous number – that it was an awful lot of effort.
Anyway, my work is now done. The beautiful women haven’t stopped though. Indeed, they seem to be making more and more of them. And what am I to do with this information? When I pass a beautiful woman on the street these days my attitude suddenly becomes almost parodically rabbinical, sort of crying ‘Oh God, why are you testing me?’ and ‘What am I to do with this knowledge, Yahweh!?’ It is difficult to communicate the deep frustrated powerlessness a married man feels in the presence of a beautiful woman as he recedes into a position of advanced harmlessness. As, to be clear, he should.
James describes a desire for female beauty that I am well acquainted with. It reminds me of a friend asking me once what it feels like to be female, young and pretty (for 7 more months when I will be turning 30 and hitting the wall). It feels like this: You slog for hours to get the bare minimum. I am offered the world just for showing up. Does that sound obnoxious? It shouldn’t be. The kindest thing good-looking people can do for the plain and the ugly is not to pretend they don’t experience pretty privilege. I have experienced both sides of the equation and can tell you the difference is hard to miss. So I accept there is power in being a beautiful woman.
James goes on to describe how men are now surrounded by women who become more and more beautiful in a culture that is highly sexualised but without any tangible flirting allowed. I agree with that too. Millennial men inundate my DMs and those of my female friends with lustful fantasies that will never materialise. I dated a 42-year-old man who, halfway through my political rant on our first date, grabbed me by the neck like a kitten and kissed me. I loved it, by the way.
The alternative reality to male hornyness, in my opinion, is female neediness. Where men want sex, women want romance. Men want adventure; women want commitment. It is all on a spectrum, and there are exceptions to the rule, but that’s not my experience, and neither is James’s.
Do you know what it’s like to be a woman who wants a relationship but can’t get one? It is incredibly common and yet hardly acknowledged. Most women I know are well-presented, successful, pleasant, if a little frigid, and looking for a relationship that never seems to arrive. Yet, we are being bombarded by articles written by 30-40-year-old women reassuring the world (themselves?) that being permanently single is fine, actually. For the last few years, the Times has taken it upon itself to be a megaphone for commitmentphobes who want to make singledom glamorous. Their latest attempt had the title: ‘We are the Perma-Singles- eligible, sexy and unattached’. They may well be sexy and unattached, but I am not sure they are eligible if they explicitly want to remain alone. I will dissect the trend in another piece, but for the sake of argument here, I believe there are women who are cool with being single, but they don’t write dating columns.
If I had an avocado toast for every time a female friend told me how much she loves dating around, I would be on the housing ladder by now! It’s a regular conversation, especially with women who are professionally successful and secure in other ways. They will tell me about their escapades with this or that man and will reassure me that all they want is fun, and they definitely don’t care if it leads to something. The other women in the group will nod in agreement and smile reassuringly. Not me. I was raised by an emotionally reactive mother, so when it comes to picking up on other people’s emotions, I am like a predator in the jungle. I can see the increased moisture in their eye socket and the exaggerated curve of their smiles. These women suffer from what I call ‘sexual revolution Stockholm syndrome’ where because they have no choice but to date casually, they have convinced themselves they are having sex without commitment by choice.
This is especially true for women with well-paid, high-flying careers because the ego-bruising of failing to achieve your personal life goals stings so much more when you have mastered control of all the other aspects of your life.
Some of the neediest women I know will repeatedly try to convince you they don’t need a man. On the other side of the coin, I would say horny men will say they want to get laid, but God forbid they move as much as a finger to do what it takes to achieve that (go on a date, get rejected and try again, get to know someone etc.).