Ever since I watched the movie What’s Your Number? I’ve been thinking about this topic but am just now putting thoughts to paper or really to screen. Please let me start this post with this, these views are my personal opinion and I do not speak for anyone but myself and I do not mean to offend anyone with this. Okay that said, the double standards between men and women.
Does a number really matter? I have met people who don’t care as well as those who think less of a person, in my experience always a woman, because she had a higher number than they thought was appropriate. Let’s talk about that for a moment though shall we. What is the appropriate number of lovers one should have by a certain age? A very good guy friend of mine whom I discuss everything under the sun with gave me a pretty interesting figure. First let me say he doesn’t care about how many were before him as long as he isn’t compared to them, which I think is fair and I agree.
However, he also had a mathematical system for an estimate. He said he assumes that you have 2 lovers a year since your 17th birthday. I’m 23 so he would assume I’d had approximately 12 lovers thus far. No that is not my number by a long shot mine is substantially lower but I liked the math. He also explained that for the general man, women might assume they are the same only maybe to be safe make it 3 a year. He doesn't mean to say that there are two lovers in every year. He explains that looking at the whole picture, both the long and short relationships balance the numbers. I found this intriguing.
This is probably a touchy subject for most people especially as I live in the south and am non-religious but why does it matter? No I’m not condoning the ways of many of the people I went to high school with who came to class on Monday talking about how drunk they’d gotten and hooked up with. It was always a different guy every time I heard them. I think that may have been a bit young to start that way of life but I do not judge. The issue I took with those girls (come on everyone had those girls at their school) was they would do all of that then put down others for something so minor in retrospect. Anyways I myself don’t care what a person’s number is or have any expectations of their number because frankly it’s no one’s business as long as they were safe.
Aside from if you care or don’t care about a person’s number let’s face it social media has portrayed it in a way that makes it so much more acceptable for a man than a woman. I know there are plenty of examples on both sides but even in those the woman is 9 out of 10 times judged more harshly than the man. Why is this? Men are almost expected to be ‘horn dogs’, to borrow a phrase from my mother. Something scientific we’ve all heard or read at one point that men think about sex ‘x’ amount of times a…minute, hours, day. Okay that may be true but there are also studies that show women can be just as sexually driven. Those women who have many different lovers are by many considered promiscuous or slutty and I’ve heard men say they would surely sleep with a woman like that but never be in a relationship.
What’s my point? Everyone has their opinions and I’m not trying to change any one’s minds. I just honestly want to know why the double standard? I would love to hear the thoughts of anyone who reads this and is willing to share. Why do men both in real life and social media (books, TV/movies) get away without harsh judgments’ where women don’t?
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