Why "The Little Pink Pill" Insults Female Sexuality
There are more dangers to "Female Viagra" than meets the eye.
Viagra changed the sex lives of many men when it arrived in 1998. It fast became a norm of popular culture with references in movies, books, plays and more.
These days, most popular media references to older male sexuality will allude to the little blue pill, rendering it almost vital for healthy male sexual functioning. We watch Jack Nicholson or Alec Baldwin popping the pill in rom coms aimed at over 40's, while younger actors offer themselves perpetual erections mistakenly.
The power of the blue pill has not been lost on society. Now, the little pink pill is finally being pushed for approval for women, so what does this mean for female sexuality?
If we render it right down, Viagra allows men previously unable to achieve erection to finally stand to attention. It takes one biological aspect of sexual functioning and makes this imperative to optimum sexual functioning.
Most men, however, are mostly happy with their sexuality being relegated to the firmness of their erection, without creating too much opposition to such a perspective. Women, on the other hand, might have a little more to say about having their sexual desire manipulated by a pill previously designed as an anti-depressant.
In fact, the women who I have spoken to about this understand that their sexual desire is not simply about turning on or off, it is about many varying aspects of both themselves and their lovers, culminating in an indefinable atmosphere of arousal and desire.
Turning female arousal into a medical concern quite simply removes the very human and subjective nature of female sexuality, and replaces it with a biological function that is still largely misunderstood by science.
We know this because over the years, the numerous proposals of female sexual function increase in complexity and become quite difficult to define. We also know this because of the ongoing debates regarding the G spot, or the A spot, or whichever spot society desperately craves to understand how to get women off.
These debates and arguments only confirm one thing, female sexuality is not as simple as medicine or biology would like to make it. After all, female orgasm is still a hugely debated topic in evolutionary science, with researchers left scratching their heads while trying to understand the complex and intricate nature of female orgasm.
The reality is that female sexual desire and arousal are as unique as each woman who exists. Ask women what turns them on and you will have a multitude of different answers. In fact, ask the same woman, and she will give you a multitude of different answers depending on the day!
So how is it possible that one little pill is going to ensure that women become aroused on demand? After years of research and investigation, resulting in some very complicated models of female sexual arousal and desire, the little pink pill is taking us back to the 1970's when the thought of male and female sexual response cycles being one and the same was the norm.
Just prescribing a pill is not going to guarantee a fulfilling and satisfying sex life. After all, if her partner still can't find her clitoris, or understand that women take three times longer to reach sufficient arousal for sex than men, how are women going to suddenly enjoy sex?
Turning female sexual desire into a biological concern, being cured by a pink pill is going to upset a lot of women. Whether they are for or against the pill, what happens if they use it and it doesn't work as described on the box?
What happens when they realize that their sexuality can't be cured by a pill but by understanding their bodies and communicating their needs and desires to their partners? And what happens when their partners are ready for a night of mind blowing sex because she has taken the pill, only to discover that she still needs sufficient foreplay?
Female sexuality is far more complex and powerful than any medical intervention, and as long as we keep trying to compare female sexuality with male sexuality decades of feminism might as well be dismissed.