#MeToo—How Hookup Culture Puts Women In Danger
Why is this still a debate? If most women who engage in hookup culture were honest with themselves, instead of being busy heaping the blame of everything wrong with hookup culture on men, then they’d rethink what they’re planning for Friday night.
“Women’s Empowerment” is a funny term. Not for its pure semantic definition, but what our culture and society expect it to look like. As it turns out, women’s empowerment to them doesn’t include sharpening your purpose, embracing your nature, or celebrating the things only women can do. No, they’re more worried about feeding into outrage culture, defying motherhood as revenge against nature, and being able to have sex with whomever they like whenever they like.
In other words, they’re trying to reconstruct women into hedonists instead of developing what they actually are - women.
Afraid of Being Alone
A big reason why people go off and enjoy a casual encounter is because they enjoy feeling desired, even if it's for the briefest of nights. We’re lonely - and more than ever before. And we need some kind of validation more than ever before. But casual sex is all about seeking external validation.
A big reason why people go off and enjoy a casual encounters is because they enjoy feeling desired, even if it's for the briefest of nights.
They’ll tell you it’s about “reclaiming your body,” but how exactly are you reclaiming it if you're willingly sharing it with anyone who's interested? Aren’t you now increasing your chances of surrendering yourself to some predator who has that "patriarchal" mindset you wish to overthrow?
Trying To “Casualize” Sex
At its very core, sex is a bonding act. Trying to corrupt it, rebrand it, and redefine it with a nonchalant wave, like it’s no-big-deal, doesn’t make any sense. You can’t change the very nature, the science of sex. And even if you wish to believe you can turn sex into a fun pastime that you can wake up the next morning and forget about, it isn’t that simple for the majority of women who engage in it.
Women need to understand, at least on a basic level, what happens to their brains when they engage in any kind of lovemaking (your brain hardly distinguishes between a casual vs. a serious encounter). According to Dr. Ruth C. White in her article No Strings Attached Sex (NSA): Can Women Really Do It?, “When women have sex, oxytocin gets released because of the evolutionary drive to attach to someone who may be the potential father of a possible child. Evolution is not switched off because the pill, IUD, condoms and all other forms of contraception came into existence. Oxytocin makes women want to bond.”
At its very core, sex is a bonding act.
We can try to deny it, or at least try to “train” ourselves to override biology by controlling our emotions, but that’s not easy and often requires you to put yourself in more encounters.
Casual Sex Will Always Risk Being Sexist
Miri, a writer for the-orbit.net who is very pro casual encounters, even admits in her article Is Casual Sex Intrinsically Demeaning? that:
“Ultimately, I think that any sexual relationship - whether it lasts for an hour or a lifetime - can only be as respectful as the people involved in it. The partners I had were not respectful, and they would not have been any more respectful if I’d been in a serious relationship with them. I felt disrespected and demeaned not because I choose to have casual sex with them, but because I chose to interact with them period.”
Not all casual experiences are negative, but, unfortunately, you’ll stumble upon a lot of those types of guys if you choose to lounge around their corner.
Of course, I’m not saying that all men who want to engage with women in that way are misogynistic lowlifes. Not all casual experiences are negative. But, unfortunately, you’ll stumble upon a lot of those types of guys if you choose to lounge around their corner. I’m not quite sure how one could justify spending even a little bit of time with such people, let alone share a bed with them for a night.
It Puts Women in Physical Danger Too
Let me get this out of the way: I'm not blaming sexual assaults on hookup culture. But it's also naive to think that putting yourself in a very vulnerable position - alone with a man you don't know well - doesn't increase your chances of falling victim to a predator.
And it's not just a sexual assault, but other physical dangers as well. What if the man insists on painful positions, or is too physically rough and you end up injured? Men are larger and stronger than women, and a man you don't know or trust is much more likely than a loving partner to force your boundaries and hurt or scare you during sex.
None of this is to say that any woman who is assaulted deserves it or caused it. But all women should be very careful what men they're getting intimate with, because it puts them in both an emotionally and physically vulnerable place.
Closing Thoughts
What makes women happy is sharing love, not acting in constant rebellion towards their nature. And I think that’s my biggest gripe with casual sex; it disguises itself as female empowerment, but its leaders seem to want to "get back at society" by showing them that they can experience sex the same way the opposite gender can. Knowing that in the process it’s hurting tons of women, I just can’t get on board with this ideology, and I think more young women should at least seriously think it through before deciding that lifestyle is for them.