“Sexually Shaming Women… How To Stop?” Q & A [VIDEO]

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In today’s video, I address an interesting question I received recently: “How can I convince myself that women can be sexual?”

Read or watch below to know more about how to stop sexually shaming women.

Zachary Stockill: It’s no secret that a lot of men struggle with the idea of female sexuality for a lot of complicated social, cultural, and sometimes religious reasons. A lot of guys struggle with the idea that women can be absolutely ravenous sexual creatures. 

A lot of guys struggle with the idea that women enjoy sex just as much as men do. I received a question on my Instagram page recently from a guy asking me: “How can I convince myself that women can be sexual?” So in today’s video, that’s exactly what I’m going to address. 

The first thing I would say to any man struggling with the idea of female sexuality is to realize that we are not only human beings; we are mammals.

We are mammals, and mammals have sex. It’s always struck me as odd that when we go to the zoo, what do we say we’re doing? How do we describe that experience? We say we’re going to the zoo to look at the animals. 

…Without realizing that we are animals.

We may be at the top of the food chain, but we are still part of the food chain. 

We are still animals, we are products of this planet. We are just another species of primates. I don’t mean to offend the religious people or the creationists watching this, but it is what it is. 

We evolved from apes, and we are animals. And it doesn’t take too long on the Discovery Channel to realize that animals have sex, mammals have sex. We are all products of procreation activities.

You can even spend some time watching nature shows. Spend some time watching the Discovery Channel and watch some David Attenborough documentaries. Try to familiarize yourself with the idea that animals have sex. And there’s nothing necessarily or inherently good or bad about that. It is what it is; mammals have sex. Don’t separate us from the animal kingdom. Realize that we may be highly advanced apes, but we’re still apes. 

Another tip I would offer. And this is kind of a fun, little, and somewhat disorienting thought experiment:

But you can walk down the street in any busy town or city. Walk around, look at all the people around you, and realize they are all products of sex. The young people, the old people, and everyone in between. 

Everyone, at one point, was a sperm fertilizing an egg, so to speak. We are all products of sex.

We all have sex, or at least most people in the world have sex aside from certain groups. Everyone around you wouldn’t be there unless it came to two people having sex. There’s nothing wrong with that. 

Everyone around you, at some point, was the product of an orgasm. Many people will find that shocking or disorienting or nasty to think about, it is what it is. Sex is all around us all the time. 

Another suggestion I would pose to men struggling with the idea of female sexuality: think about your mom and your grandmother. Think about your great-grandmother, if you ever had the chance to meet her while she was still around.

Yes, all of these women…

They all had sex. That’s why you’re here. 

A lot of people do not like the idea of thinking about their parents or thinking about their grandparents having sex. I understand that. But to be honest, I also think that’s probably part of the problem.

I’m not saying you should go around fantasizing about your mom or your grandmother or anything like that. Of course not. But we have such a stigma around sex. We just don’t want to go there mentally.

Now, you don’t have to go into detail mentally. But the fact is, you should probably familiarize yourself with the idea that yes, dear sweet mom, and even dear sweet grandma had sex probably many times in their lives. And there’s nothing wrong with that.

I would also encourage you to think about your earliest ideas around sex and sexuality. Think about the house you grew up in. Think about maybe your school or your church or the kind of media or culture that you were exposed to as a youth.

What were your earliest conceptions around sex, around dating good girls and bad girls? What were your earliest ideas around this stuff? Your role models? What did they say about sex? 

How did they talk about women? Did they divide women into “good” and “bad” girl categories? 

Did they engage in slut-shaming? Go down this mental rabbit hole and I think it’ll pay off to get clarity about your earliest ideas around sex and sexuality. 

Some of them you’ll probably want to keep, and some of them have probably served you well. But I would imagine not all of them have served you entirely well.

I would also encourage you to recognize the very strange times that we live in.

In many ways, we are still dealing with the unintended consequences of the sexual revolution of the 1960s and 1970s. Premarital sex is now all around us. There is no taboo. Associated with that, many young women are encouraged and having sex that maybe they don’t even necessarily want. 

We live in a very, very strange age of dating apps and Tinder and swiping and hookup culture and all this stuff. And I think…

We’re in the very early stages of realizing as a society that maybe this hookup culture, and these very promiscuous times we live in, don’t work for all of us. 

They don’t work for a lot of the men who are engaging in this kind of hollow hookup culture, and it doesn’t work for a lot of the women involved as well. 

But needless to say, many of us took some time to learn those lessons; to learn that a long-term relationship is the better choice for us. Your girlfriend is probably no different. I’m just trying to encourage empathy when it comes to this very delicate question of female sexuality because I think it’s a very confusing time for all of us. 

It doesn’t seem to me that there are a lot of people out there who have it all figured out and who are really thriving through this time.

For many of us, if we make it to our 30s and 40s, chances are almost 100% that we’ve made a few mistakes, and a few blips along the way. 

And even if we don’t define our past as a mistake, per se, maybe certain kinds of sexual behavior that we engage in our 20s are not necessarily what we’re interested in in our 30s 40s and beyond.

Also spend some time learning and reading about the history of female sexuality and attempts to suppress female sexuality. 

Many of the world’s major religions in particular have known for thousands of years, that…

Female sexuality is incredibly potent and incredibly powerful. 

Otherwise, they wouldn’t have taken such great lengths to try to stifle and suppress it. I could go on about this all day. 

But I wanted to close this video with a poignant quote about this history of the attempted suppression of female sexuality. This quote is from Dr. Chris Ryan, in his wonderful book Sex at Dawn, which I encourage you to read.

Here’s the quote 

“And yet, despite repeated assurances that women aren’t particularly sexual creatures, in cultures around the world men have gone to extraordinary lengths to control female libido:

Female genital mutilation, head-to-toe chadors, medieval witch burnings, chastity belts, suffocating corsets, muttered insults about “insatiable” whores, pathologizing, paternalistic medical diagnoses of nymphomania or hysteria, the debilitating scorn heaped on any female who chooses to be generous with her sexuality…

… all parts of a worldwide campaign to keep the supposedly low-key female libido under control. Why the electrified high-security razor-wire fence to contain a kitty-cat?”

All of this is to say that female sexuality is incredibly potent, incredibly powerful, and there’s nothing wrong with that whatsoever. 

That’s why we’re all here. That’s what makes the world go around. 

The more you can simply accept that fact, the better your dating life is going to be. The better your sex life is going to be. And the more at ease in the world, as a man, you will be.

If you are struggling with your partner’s sexuality, and partner’s past, and need more guidance, consider signing up for one-on-one coaching with me.