Sex Ed. is collaborative effort of The Free Press Staff with a goal of instituting a frank and candid discussion around sex. The questions we use are provided by the students, faculty and staff of USM.

This past week Sex Ed. received responses from readers regarding our response to “Why do men orgasm so much quicker than women”:

“Ed” has completely left out the biological need for female orgasm. The way the answer reads would lead one to believe it has no function other than perhaps to make her more likely to want to make the guy a sandwich afterwards.

This is exceedingly disappointing.

There has been controversy regarding the function of female orgasm, from the Baker and Bellis “upsuck” theory of improved contraception, to Gould’s insistence that female orgasm is vestigial. Freud said that female orgasm was entirely psychological, and this theory was widely accepted for almost 100 years, even though we know now it is not.

However, in recent years studies regarding the evolution of the female orgasm argue your statement that “… the length of coupling isn’t relevant. All that matters is that the male impregnates the female.”

According to some studies, men who last longer are better mates, better fathers. Women have evolved to reach orgasm less quickly to help her weed out the potentially cruddy fathers.

There are so many studies out there, and so many conflicting “answers,” that “Why do men orgasm more quickly than women” does NOT have a simple answer.

Sexuality, in particular female sexuality, is still taboo even now. Trailblazing researchers like Kinsey have broken through some of the archaic notions of female sexuality and orgasm, but obviously there is still a lot of old ideas out there (i.e. “All that matters is that the male impregnates the female.”) — E