Free What You Really Really Want by Jaclyn Friedman Page B

the first time. “But then, when it happened, I didn’t think I wanted to,” she told Deborah Tolman, “and it wasn’t like I myself felt bad about it, but I just didn’t want to,’cause I felt good about it, and I didn’t want anyone else passing judgment on me, that’s what it was.” 2
    On the flip side of that coin, young women are also treated as the most desirable sex objects there are and are pressured to act as sexy as possible—wear sexy Halloween costumes, work out to stripper-pole aerobics, and wear panties that say WHO NEEDS CREDIT CARDS . . . 3 These sexual expressions aren’t about the girls engaging in them, they’re about fulfilling the fantasies of heterosexual men. So, to review what’s expected of you if you’re a young woman in our culture: Be drop-dead sexy, but don’t think about sex ever. Good luck with that.
    And, because women get shamed coming and going, older women face certain assumptions and stigmas as well. Past a certain, nebulous (though still fairly young) age, women are considered prudish or frigid if they’re not sexually desirous and experienced. And that kind of pressure can be just as isolating if it doesn’t match up with how you actually feel.

    Or, if older women are sexually desirous and experienced and happen to have a partner who’s younger than they are, they’re called “cougars” or “pumas” or some other predatory-cat name, and become the butt of jokes.
    Or, if older women start looking like, well, older women—as they naturally will—we suddenly assume that they’ve lost any sexual drive they may have once had, or, worse, any sexual desirability. Furthermore, younger women sometimes assume that their foremothers are easily scandalized by the sexual antics of young women. This is too bad for many reasons, not the least of which is that some older women have been through a lot of what young women are just starting to experience and can share their wisdom about how to navigate the tricky waters of sexuality, if only young women would ask.
    Are you noticing what I am? There’s basically no right age to be in this paradigm. You’ll always be accused of being too young or too old to behave or think or feel a certain way. And whatever age you are, there are only wrong ways to be sexual. Know what that means? The whole paradigm is a trap.
    Dive In: Imagine you’re twenty years older or younger than you are now. Think about what life might be like for you then, sexually speaking. What did/will people expect you to act like, and what do you think you might want or have wanted to be doing sexually? Now take on the voice of that older or younger self, and write your current-day self a letter. What would your future or past self want your present self to know about sex and sexuality?

RACE
    As with all things racial, the intersection of race and sexuality is complicated. It’s complicated by the ways race and economic class intersect, by the history of slavery in the United States and around the world, by the fact that race is both an utterly bogus way to look at people and simultaneously very real. And yet while it’s definitely not simple, it sure is important to think about.
    Consider, for example, the “innocent virgin” we were describing in the section on age earlier in this chapter. Picture her in your mind’s eye. Maybe take a moment now to draw a picture of her, or write down a description of what she looks like.
    What did you draw or describe? Was it a white girl with long hair? Maybe blond, blue-eyed, or freckle-faced?
    If it was, it’s not an accident. Because we live in a racist society that values white girls more than girls of color, we tend to imagine that purity is pale. That assumption has a terrible flip side: Girls of color are often viewed as always sexually available, simply because of their race. Just look at the specific