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Paean to Men
by Lisa Chavez I use the Greek word in honor of the Olympics: paean, a song of praise. And this is my song of praise to men and the wonderful way they are hard wired for sex. After I read Kris Kennedy's review of the book "Watching Sex" (by David Loftus -- our see archives), I started seeing something. And this is it: men don't just like one type of woman, they like lots of types of women. And after I started to get this, I started listening to my men friends and my boyfriend just a little more closely. And they were all saying it. Sure the movie stars are appealing, but there are so many other qualities -- unique, unpopular, unexpected -- that men find attractive.

I praise men because I'm finally listening to what they say. I think I'm learning that even guys who go for a favorite "type" of woman will admit to being attracted by a woman who is NOT their type if she is in command of her sexuality, if she feels confidence in her sexy bad self and has the moves to prove it. This, men say, they find intoxicating.

Men will also say that there's a certain something about women; men will go on about "the way they walk," "the way they talk," and so forth as if they're writing romance novels. And you know what, I've begun to realize that in a male sort of way, they are. Men can be just as romantic about women as women are about men, if we women only take the time to listen for it. But to hear how they express it, we have to stop expecting it to sound like what WE call romance.

And because the male hormones are wired directly to these physical "little somethings" about women, a man can fall in love twenty times a day. How romantic! You think I'm trying to be snide, don't you? But I'm not.

It's a simple, wonderful thing about men that many of us women don't get. I didn't for a long time. Or, I should say, we don't understand how liberating and wonderful it is that men are wired to love lots of women. Anyone who has witnessed a new or youthful relationship has probably had the experience: The romantic couple are cooing all low in their restaurant booth when suddenly the guy's eyes rove to follow a passing beauty. Uh-oh. Bam, his date is all over him, angry as hell. He'll say, "It doesn't mean anything." And she'll say any number of things, the worst of which might be something like "You rather have that? Well, fine then. I'm outa here."

Such women (and I admit I have been guilty -- way in the past -- OK somewhat recently) don't realize that it's not a question of "rather." There's no hierarchy of likes and wants when a man's chemistry goes bingo. A guy with a healthy sexual system can get a rush from a wide palette of female shapes, movements, and figures, and when he looks, he's just appreciating the moment.

The thing is, lots of us women are wired a bit differently. Some sexologists say the predominant way for a woman to get turned on is through her emotions. This could explain why on AFF, many women want to know more about a guy before they agree to meet him. Some experts say that women are conditioned through life to be more careful and that they are just going through a sophisticated form of screening. Another way to look at it, though, is that a woman wants to investigate the potential for emotional attraction before she is interested enough to meet a man. And from what my men friends say, a guy is more anxious to get in her physical presence and see how she affects him.

Now here's my theory: if women's sexuality runs from emotional response to physical response, it can often happen that the guy they have the strongest emotional bond with is going to trump all others. Mere physical attractiveness ( a passing hottie or hunk) may not always be enough to divert a woman's attention, or when she is emotionally engaged, it's harder for "outside influences" to get to her sexual response.

Hence, women may not do the "roving eye" thing as much as men do. But there's a down side to this. At least I had to admit to a male friend of mine recently that I've been there. Say I'm watching a movie with a real romantic hero -- attractive, attentive, kind -- and my long-time boyfriend comes up to me to begin foreplay. Well, callous as it sounds, I actually have wanted to brush him away and say, come back later. As cruel as that sounds, my explanation (alright defense) is that it was simply hard to shift emotional allegiances on a dime, especially if my boyfriend is not at all acting like the hero in the film. How bad is that?

Eventually when the film's over and my boyfriend has engaged me in his usual clever way, my earlier arousal may carry over into our lovemaking, but not always, and certainly not at the snap of a finger. On the other hand, a male friend of mine says that when he sees beautiful women, it only amplifies the desire with which he goes after his wife when he goes home. So she's reaping sexual benefits from all the roving his eyes have conducted. That sounds like pay dirt to me. Of course, a woman may not always appreciate that benefit. She sees the object of his roving eye as competition.

And then, look out -- I think we women can make our guys feel pretty guilty. What if it's what we know about OURSELVES that makes us feel so threatened? Maybe the secret truth we women are harboring is that if HER eyes rove, he's in trouble -- she's losing interest.

There's even another benefit to the male hard drive: Men love women who are confident in their sexuality, poised, dripping with sexual power. Here, a man's desires are actually supportive of women's growth and sexual well-being! Our men would love to see us grow to claim sexual confidence (they would also love to see us enjoy ourselves with sex). All we women have to do is accept and enjoy our sexuality and we'll be sexy. Praise the lovely sexy wiring of the male animal!

According to what many men on this site have said, they will respond to a woman's sexual confidence in all shapes and sizes. Contrary to what Cosmo and Elle would have us believe, we don't all have to be stick figure starlets or big breasted bimbos to be appreciated. And because men can feel sexually aroused by many women at once, we don't have to feel competitive. When it comes to our feelings about being attractive to men, women are often stuck in Highlander mode: "there can be only one." We blame men for wanting Angelina Jolie and Halle Berry when we're Oprah or Cameron Manheim. But the fact is, any one guy might be turned on by Oprah, Halle, Angelina, Cameron, and his bank teller, all at the same time, without any conflict. That's good news for women.

Most of us eventually catch on. And of course the women on this site get it -- don't we? When a man looks, we enjoy feeling attractive. And over time we learn not to feel less attractive when he turns away to look at someone else ("oh, she's prettier; oh she's slimmer"). And once we do that, enjoy the wonderful wiring that allows us to get so many nods of appreciation in a day, it's praise men and pass the prophylactics! And then everyone gets to feel good.