I count fellow Angeleno and men’s rights advocate Glenn Sacks as a friend, even though he and I are likely to disagree on virtually every issue. I winced a bit, however, at his rather snarky linking to my re-post in praise of erectile dysfunction. Glenn writes:
I guess if it’s humiliating to men, it must be good. Feminist professor/blogger Hugo Schwyzer recently wrote a blog post “in praise of ED.” Schwyzer writes:
“In my Humanities class on the ‘body’ yesterday, I noted in passing that there was much to be said for erectile dysfunction. I have always maintained that men would be far more insufferable than they otherwise are trained to be if the penis was, in fact, a muscle entirely under their control….ED literally softens the penis; it can also figuratively soften a man by forcing him to rethink his allegiance to a cruel and unattainable standard.”
In light of this, it kind of reminds me of an odd interaction I had with Hugo when he was on my radio show a couple years ago. We were discussing something related to sex–I can’t remember what–and I said something like “Of course, Hugo, men’s perspectives change as they get older. Like me, I’m sure you’re not quite the stallion you used to be.”
Hugo is a very nice guy, and it’s hard to get him angry over anything, but he was not happy over this remark. I was surprised, and didn’t quite know what to make of it. Any amateur psychologists out there have any ideas?
Uh, amateur psychologists? Leave your remarks over at Glenn’s place, please.
But my praise of periodic bouts of ED is not rooted in the internalized misandry of which I — and all other male feminists — are regularly accused. It’s rooted in many things, not least my own experience, about which more (because there’s a fair amount of TMI) below the cut.
Like many men, my struggle with erections was not something that came about as a result of ageing. (My annoyance — which Glenn was right about — was based upon his insinuation that because my libido had presumably dipped with age, I was no longer able to “relate” to testosterone-crazed lads in their teens and twenties. I was angry less in defense of my own potency than in defense of the universal applicability of the pro-feminist solutions I proposed.)
The first time I couldn’t get an erection was with my high school girlfriend; I was 17 and she was 16. We had been fighting, and we tried make-up sex. I felt unresolved anger and confusion, and like her, wanted the soothing of sexual connection. But though I was presumably near the peak of my teenage libidinousness, my penis stayed soft. My girlfriend burst into tears, crying that I wasn’t attracted to her anymore. I felt horrible, and, frankly, terrified. Had something broken? I tried making myself hard, to no avail; the more effort I applied (and that she applied), the more flaccid I became. I was frantic, and ended up leaping out of bed, putting on my clothes, and driving home. I couldn’t face anyone.
And of course, I figured out the lesson: the penis is not a muscle. I can’t get hard on command every time. Like every other part, my penis is connected to my consciousness, my mind, my heart. In this instance, my body was telling me: “Hugo, don’t use sex to deal with this issue.” I wanted escape, my girlfriend wanted escape, and my brain — in some blessed burst of common sense — said “Not so fast, bud. Ya can’t fuck the feelings away.”
I’ve been married four times. I’ve lived for extended periods with three other women, and had many other short (uh, some very short)-term relationships. In every single relationship that lasted at least three months — and in at least half of the shorter-term encounters or hook-ups, this same problem emerged. Invariably, it proved to be psychological, though the specific psychological triggers varied: anxiety, unresolved anger, depression all took turns playing roles. Some women were immensely understanding; some weren’t. One woman with whom I had a one-night stand said, after a prolonged amount of foreplay did not result in a “workable” hard-on, “Christ, I always knew you were a faggot.” Ouch. And other women have become anxious, worrying that this was evidence I didn’t really want them.
My point is that I know a great deal about ED. It’s not a medical problem. When I am emotionally connected with my partner, and there is no undercurrent of rage or deceit, there’s never an issue. That’s the case today for me as a 40 year-old married man, just as it was true at 17 when I was first in a sexual relationship and at 29, when I was at the height of my promiscuity. My ability to understand my own body has grown enormously in my quarter-century of sexual experience with women. I presume my skills as a lover have grown as well. More importantly, I know damned well that my penis is not a “tool”, a “drill”, a “rod” at my disposal. It may be hard as rock or soft as vegan jello, but it is always, always, part of me. ED taught me that my penis is not an “it”, a “thing”, it is not all of Hugo but it is inextricably linked to the rest of Hugo. It is part of me, and if I cannot connect with a partner on other levels, then my penis will remind me that I probably ought not to be connecting “down there.”
Heck, sometimes I wish I had had ED more often! There were plenty of times in my life when I ended up having sex (PIV) that I probably ought not to have had. I had dishonest, unfaithful, and emotion-free sex many a time without having any problems getting and maintaining an erection. The mind-body correlation is powerful, but far from flawless; for reasons that I do not always fully understand, sometimes things “worked” when it might have been better if they hadn’t.
Not being able to get an erection every time I’ve wanted one has made me a better lover in a technical sense. It was ED that first forced me to see sex as more than “penis-in-vagina” intercourse. I’d like to think that my desire to connect and to play would have helped me grow as a partner anyway, but not being able to have an erection on command forced the issue in a way nothing else could. Much more importantly, however, periodic bouts of ED forced me to be honest with myself and with the women with whom I was being sexual. Developing other skills was nice, but learning that my body is an integral whole was a far greater reward. The humiliation of a soft penis at a critical moment (and I have had my share of stories in that regard, as have most of the experienced men I know) was a blessing. Humiliation takes its root from the Latin humus, meaning earth — and you can also sense the word “human” within it, even if its not a perfect etymological link. ED brought me down to earth, and it reminded me of my humanness at the very moments that I most needed that reminder. May God’s name be praised that I couldn’t always get an erection on “command.” I would be so much less of a lover and so much less of a man if, particularly in my younger years, I always could.
I know that some men do have physiological issues that cause ED. For these fellas, pharmaceuticals might make sense. But I also know that my experience of impotence has not been unique. I’ve shared my tales of erection trouble with many men of all ages, usually in all-male settings. The vast majority have admitted to occasional bouts with ED, and most acknowledged that the root causes were emotional rather than physical. Most of us found that when the time really was right, and we really were connected to a partner, we had no trouble whatsoever.
If ED forces men to rethink what sex is and why we have it; if it forces us to talk openly with our lovers; if it forces us to admit that we are not invulnerable; if it serves in any way as a barometer of our true emotions — then the periodic inability to get an erection is, if you’ll pardon the phrase, a marvelous opportunity for growth.
It’s good to be hard. But hardness, as delightful and exciting as it is, is a transitory state. Our natural state is soft; it’s how we come into and out of this world. The first and last people to love us in our lives will see our frailty; it is best, I think, when those who love us in the prime of our life also get to see that softness from time to time.
If only all human beings were as open about their lives as you are, we’d be living in an unimaginably better place now. I’ve learned that with my problems saying them aloud to someone else (starting with a therapist and then working up) puts them outside of myself so that they’re no longer subjective, but objective. When something is just in your head, it’s very easy to twist it around, make it something it isn’t, justify, make excuses, etc. But when you tell someone else you can’t change the facts and because someone else knows you have to look at it like “what would I say to someone else in this situation?” So many of people’s problems come from fooling themselves and keeping things secret. This doesn’t directly have to do with your post, but I wanted to say it.
All the men that have been sexually significant in my life have had instances of ED for what I thought were an interesting variety of reasons. Three of four had somewhat consistent problems because of anti-depressants, however it wasn’t a matter of achieving an erection, but an orgasm, so that’s different.
One had problems early in our relationship because of post traumatic stress disorder from a four month stay in prison; he’d just gotten off three years of probation. In both men and women, trauma can attach itself to your emotions in powerful ways you might not expect. It was instances like this that communicated to him that he couldn’t just walk away from what had happened, but needed help and to look at the emotions in a safe space. Lots of men like to think they’re made of stone but they’re not.
Another was very different. I was being abused by a 20yo when I was 14 and the first time he had me alone he had trouble maintaining an erection. That is your conscious…or fear of punishment…that you’ve been suppressing trying to come out in your body functions and keep you from doing something stupid or terrible. From people I’ve been in contact with and research, ED is often common in cases of sexual abuse.
I wonder if this corresponds to any sort of reaction in women? I think maybe it does. Like you said about yourself, sometimes when you were doing something stupid sexually ED happened and sometimes it didn’t, but it would have been better if it had happened every time.
The Christmas I was 16, I was having a lot of problems dealing with things that had happened to me and my desire for affection and closeness being cross wired with sex. I had met a young man that night in from the military at a church youth gathering that was held somewhere an hour from my small town (he was a little too old to be there, but I digress). He showed me a lot of attention and wanted us to go in my car and park somewhere, and I agreed. It was the most boring and numb consensual sexual experience of my life; I felt absolutely nothing. It was this experience that finally convinced me that sex wasn’t going to give me what I was looking for and I’ve been far more careful and discriminating when it’s come to my choice of sexual activity ever since.
Conscience…not conscious…blah…
Quarter Century? Can we expect any commemorative stamps or plates anytime soon?
Hugo,
I think you’re making an important point. Though I’m not sure everyone needs an early episode of ED to understand that their sexuality is also psychological.
However, I don’t really think that realization does logically rule out the assumption that you could not relate anymore to the “testosterone-crazed lads” and that things get “softer” with age. Not all people are alike, are they? You seem to be quite different from most men, and sometimes I’m getting the feeling that you’re generalising from your personal, uncommon experience. Being different is proof that people are different, not that the exception is some kind of hidden rule (”I was angry less in defense of my own potency than in defense of the universal applicability of the pro-feminist solutions I proposed” >>> leading to >>> “But my praise of periodic bouts of ED is not rooted in the internalized misandry of which I — and all other male feminists — are regularly accused.”).
As for the consequences of age on the “controllability” of erections, I couldn’t go to a mixed sauna (common in my country) without getting an erection from the first bare breast I saw when I was 19, so, being embarrassed about it, I didn’t go for years. Now, ten years on, that’s not really a problem anymore.
So, it’s a little of both, I suppose.
Just realised that the last sentence is not clear enough: I meant, today I’m no longer getting erections from the first bare breast I see in a sauna. Getting one would still be hugely embarrassing.
Could his objection, perhaps, stem from your use of the word “insufferable” to describe men?
I had been thinking that but I didn’t say it. If the true platform of feminisim is equality then isn’t it just as wrong for you to refer to men that way as it would be with women?
I use the term “testosterone-crazed” ironically. I have always, always maintained that a voracious libido (something, as many women will attest, found in the young of both sexes) is not an excuse for bad behavior. My point was that my aging did not mean that I had lost sight of what it meant to be young; indeed, I spend more time around teenage boys — really talking to them, mind you, and listening to them — then 95% of adult men my age. And I know that the experiences I describe here are not nearly as unusual as my detractors would like to believe.
If I am exceptional at all, it is in my candor and in the volume of my experiences — not in my feelings.
Glenn Sacks as a friend? The guy who looked at and listened to the novelty items that depict women being sexually penetrated in the gut and anus and screamed for help and didn’t think anything of it? Who’s clearly misogynist as he finds ways to blame feminism, egalitarianism and in general just women for all the worlds problems?
That’s blatantly anti-feminist of you, Hugo. Shit, what the fuck? I’m no longer subscribing to your feed now.
Aerik, it’s fairly obvious you’ve never actually been to GS’s blog. Sacks clearly said that the pencil sharpener you cite was in poor taste, but that it most likely represented consensual sex enjoyed by both parties. He mentioned it only to point out that many upset by the pencil sharpener seem to have no problem with, from the same catalog, the knife-sharpener in the shape of a male figure.
GS and HS are cordial with one another. They don’t always agree, but neither one sees the other as a monster.
The thing that this post makes me think about is how incredibly male-centic and phallo-centic the hetero experience of sex can be. I think about how upset your partners have been when you have stayed soft, and realize that often (for myself included at times) the presence and duration and discharge of the hard-on is the singular measure of whether a sexual encounter is good. Really– if he doesn’t get hard, then: she’s a failure as a woman because she’s unattractive to him; he’s a failure as a man because he can’t ‘perform’; and for everyone concerned the be-all and end-all focus of the encounter becomes the penis. The trope that men are the sexual desirers/actors and women as the desired/acted upon puts a whole lot of pressure on one fallible phallus.
Bingo, Ruth.
Ruth,
That men are the sexual desirers and women are the desired is not a “trope”. It is the reality, and it doesn’t magically stop being the reality when you call it “trope”. Discourse doesn’t really have _that_ much power over reality :)
Gosh, Basta, this thread really brings out the silliness. It will come as stunning news to a great many women that they don’t actually “desire” with the same libidinous intensity as men. I’ll have to figure out how to break the news to my wife.
Yes, Basta. Please don’t take your life views from sitcoms.
If you don’t have any medical problems, you don’t have “erectile dysfunction,” or “bouts of ED,” though, do you? You just have times when you’re not physically turned on. Like other humans (read: women) do. If you see what’s wrong with the sex-organs-as-tools mentality, surely you can go just an inch further and break out of the rhetorical framework that gives a special label, terminology, and mystique to men who are just sharing a universal, awkward, mundane human experience with women.
Agreed, sophonisba. It isn’t a “dysfunction” at all. It would be nice to have a short-hand term that didn’t confuse the issue.
Nomenclature is important. (Tell that to Eve Ensler, who has a lot of people confusing the vagina with the entire female pelvic region as the result of her otherwise splendid play!)
Hugo,
Ah, come on, “silliness”? And sarkasm as a reply to someone who doesn’t believe that all the differences between males and females/men and women are nurture-based (”software”, as you seem to call it)? That’s a tad bit inappropriate in my opinion. As far as I remember both nature and nurture play an important role in the behavioral development of humans, and even those neuro-psychologists who believe that there are hardly any biological differences between the male and female brains will assert that there is one area where the small anatomical/chemical differences make for big behavioral ones: mating.
And as long as no one really knows how to usefully measure the “intensity” of “desire” for one sex alone, or how to come up with a scale that would then allow the comparison of the measures for the two sexes, everything said with respect to unobservable behavioral motivation is speculation at best and propaganda at worst.
What we can say is that a) there are differences between men and women with respect to how “desire” and “libidinous intensity” (be they equal or different) are translated into *observable behavior*, and b) that (sorry) sociological approaches (though obviously very important, just look at how sexually aggressive, say, British girls have become in recent years) *alone* are very likely insufficient to explain those behavioral differences entirely (which, on the other hand, makes total sense given that humans are social (nuture) animals (nature).)
Nature vs. nurture is a ridiculous war to fight. And I think disregarding “nature” is the most imporatant (non epistemological) shortcoming of much of gender research. To put it bluntly, I sometimes wonder how people who argue that biology has no independent behavioral influence can, as they usually do, argue against creationism…?
I have never argued biology has no behavioral influence, and if you can find me a well-known feminist who has said that biology is utterly irrelevant to sex difference, I’ll be surprised. What we do tend to say is that biological differences are oversold, overemphasized, and over-relied upon by popular culture. We like relying on biological and evolutionary explanations because they seem to — at least in part — absolve us from the responsibility to resist the negative messages of our culture. See this post from two years ago:
http://hugoschwyzer.net/2006/07/07/biology-and-bladders-excuses-and-explanations-why-im-tired-of-hearing-about-testosterone/
But in any event, we’re thread-drifting a bit here… let’s try and stay on erections.
But in any event, we’re thread-drifting a bit here… let’s try and stay on erections.
Staying on an erection is pretty straightforward. Whoever is on the erection just needs not to move too far on one pump. Keep your stroke length to less than the length of the penis, and you should stay on it just fine.
“I have never argued biology has no behavioral influence, and if you can find me a well-known feminist who has said that biology is utterly irrelevant to sex difference, I’ll be surprised. What we do tend to say is that biological differences are oversold, overemphasized, and over-relied upon by popular culture. We like relying on biological and evolutionary explanations because they seem to — at least in part — absolve us from the responsibility to resist the negative messages of our culture.”
I agree, even if we are thread drifting. I think what you said here is relevant enough to repeat in this post. Of course biology has some behavioral influence, but I agree that it is overemphasized and oversold by the PC culture and I’m tired of it being used as a convenient excuse or justification to avoid taking any personal responsibility for making poor choices with negative consequences. It’s too bad we cannot think of another easier term to use in place of erectile dysfunction, when the psychological and body disconnect is really what you are talking about. I’ve known some men (very few) who are willing to be more open and honest (rather than blame women) about their experiences and feelings on this subject. I think they are greater in number, but finding a safe environment of which to discuss these issues is probably difficult and maybe humiliating. I wish that were not so.
Yeah, sorry. Tends to happen in discussions, though… last reply on that topic:
Well, I think we should start with Simone de Beauvoir then (’women are made, not born’ - and yes, I’m kidding).
Which is true to an extent. Still, I think the origins of the discipline have caused gender research to downplay/ignore the importance of biology, partly for simple lack of understanding. I think that a certain over-reliance on simple biological explanations in pop culture and over-reliance on simple sociological explanations in “pop (academic) feminism” are completely compatible (and create a lot of misunderstandings).
SamSeaborn
“Which is true to an extent. Still, I think the origins of the discipline have caused gender research to downplay/ignore the importance of biology, partly for simple lack of understanding. I think that a certain over-reliance on simple biological explanations in pop culture and over-reliance on simple sociological explanations in “pop (academic) feminism” are completely compatible (and create a lot of misunderstandings).”
At one time maybe, however I think the pendulum has definitely swung in the other direction and the importance of biology seems to be over-emphasized, in my opinion. At any rate for some it’s serves as a nifty excuse making technique.
“I agree. Although sexual arousal and bladder control cannot be fairly compared, and doing so creates unfair behavioral standards, in my opinion.”
I don’t think his point was about comparing sexual arousal and bladder control. The point was about learning to control one’s urges (appropriate time, place, etc.) which has its advantages.
We have much in common you and I Hugo. Both of us have been married several times, shagged lots of women and also have concluded that the penis probably knows what it is doing when it doesnt want to play..
Best listen to it and remember that the tool is controlled by aspects of the mind that we need to better understand for our own good!!
Hugo, you are very good at finding loop-holes so that you may dodge and retract when you need to to cover your ass. You should have been a lawyer.
Hugo, the occasional inability to achieve or maintain any state of arousal is not ED. This can happen from a variety of causes.
ED is when it is every day, or near so. ED is when you take antidepressants, like I did about a decade back, and find yourself unable to function - or worse, change them and find yourself totally disinterested, to boot. Many times it can be so severe even drugs such as viagra are of no help.
This is not a trivial difference. This is the difference between a sneeze or the pneumonic plague.
Good point about the difference between ED and occasional trouble, especially related to antidepressant use. Women get erections too, after all - just that our clitorises aren’t big enough to pitch tents in our trousers. And while the antidepressant packaging may say something about erectile dysfunction, for women it just says vaginal dryness, which is simply not the same as actually being unable to get physically aroused. The concern is just whether we can be penetrated easily. Feh.
I think this also ties in to what Sophonisba said about making erectile dysfunction, or just not being able to get physically turned on, a Big Bad Thing, instead of something that men and women both have to go through, since the idea of a woman having an erection is Simply Not Discussed.
I really enjoyed this posting. I have always been deeply troubled by the normative assumptions behind the pathologization of various types of sexual libido and I think you are spot-on with your critique that the connection between sexuality and states-of-mind are not something that is discussed in our culture. Although I would think ED is the action condition of being aroused and not being able to get an erection, but I take your point to be that we probably often interpret the not-getting-erection in the medical sense rather than the psycho-sexual sense, because of assumptions about masculine sexuality, and that we should pay more attention to the latter. Much agreed.
I’ve also thought, regarding ED, that perhaps part of our problem is the necessary connection to PIV sex and sex itself. From what I understand, you don’t need an erection to orgasm, just for PIV sex. So is our narrow definition of “what counts” as “ideal” (read: normative) sex part of the problem here too? And I shudder when here in Canada, I see treatments to increase women’s sex drive. I can’t help but think that a lot of women’s “problems” come from our very underdeveloped understandings (or practices regarding) female sexuality, so I don’t think we should be so quick to push women on a pill!
And I completely agree with Ruth’s comment.
Hugo:
The etymological link between “humiliation” and “human” seems fairly strong to me, despite your disclaimer. Both derive from “humus”, earth: “homo”, human, is a being made from earth, while “humilis”, humility, is being made low and brought to earth.
Thank you, Picador!