SEX & RELATIONSHIPS

'If the Victorian era represents the repression of sexual desire, then the era of the hookup is about the repression of romantic feeling, love, and sexual desire too., in favor of greater access to sex - sex for the sake of sex. Women and men both learn to shove their desires deep down into a dark place, to be revealed to no one. They learn to be ashamed if they long for love, and embarrassed if they fail to uphold the social contract of hookup culture and do not happen to enjoy no-strings attached sex that much. 

The further irony of hookup culture is that, while being sexually active is the norm for students, the sex itself becomes unmechanical as a result of so much repression of emotion. College, ideally, is supposed to function as a time in life when people get to let go of repression; it's supposed to open them up to the world, not shut them down to it; it's supposed to encourage them to become who they are meant to become, not teach them to hide that self; and, most of all, college is supposed to empower them to find their voices and speak up, not learn that the voices bubbling up inside them are shameful. That a culture that has come to dominate so many colleges and universities thwarts those ideals among its students - and within an aspect of their lives that is so central, intimate, and identity-shaping as sex - is unacceptable.' 

Donna Freitas, The End of Sex, p.181. 

MASCULINITY

'Our view of men and masculinity in America is not only deeply flawed and misleading but disastrous for the psyches of young men. It interferes with their ability to mature and develop emotionally as well as to express emotion, to have healthy and fulfilling relationships and sex lives, to communicate emotional pain when they experience it, to feel empathy, and to do all these things without believing that by doing so, they are imperiling their standing as men.  Women experience glass ceilings just about every...way they try to move, but men also face an emotional glass ceiling. We ask that they repress their feelings surrounding their own vulnerabilities and need for love, respect, and relationship so intensely that we've convinced them that to express such feeling is to have somehow failed as men; that to express such feeling not only makes them look bad in front of other men, but in front of women too. And we do all of this on college campuses, where we imagine that students will open up and grow into who they really are. Within hookup culture, no one really wins, but perhaps men loose most of all.'

Donna Freitas, The End of Sex, p.114. 

MASCULINITY

'The stereotype that men are animals and will act like animals until a woman civilizes them is not only exploited in popular and broader media. It's also the kind of rigid view of gender common to evangelical books that give advice about dating, purity, courtship, and marriage to teens and young adults. Much of this literature teaches young men that they are naturally sexual predators. One guide by a Christian author tells young men that the "ultimate test of your manhood" is to"1) Think clearly,. 2) About sex." The presumption is that, when it comes to sex, men's brains stop working, and all sorts of idiotic, unfeeling, hurtful, and jerkish behaviour ensues - and than men can't help this. In the most successful manual in this genre, Every Young Man's Battle: Strategies for Victory in the Real World of Sexual Temptation, authors Stephen Arterburn and Fred Stoeker employ war metaphors in their discussions of men and sex, speaking of all men as sex addicts who need to be taught how to cope with their "addictive sexual cravings." For a young man not to feel such constant lust for women the second they hit puberty is the equivalent to failing one's masculinity.

From all directions young men are taught that they want sex far more than young women do, and that part of their job - part of what it means to be a man - is to either continually battle to deny themselves any indulgence in sex (the Christian view) or to trick women into having sex, even if this requires lying to them (the secular view). What we don't see much in our culture is an intelligent gender critique for men, by men, on the movie, TV, sex and porn industries.' 

Donna Freitas, The End of Sex, p.99. 

RELATIONSHIPS TODAY

'Rather than looking at people right in front of us, we look at our phones, preferring to touch a screen rather than the hand of a partner. Instead of engaging in conversation with those sitting next to us, we text, email, and chat with people nowhere near our bodies. We have become more excited about interacting with the various technological devices at our disposal than about developing relationships with real people, even our own children.' 

Donna Freitas, The End of Sex: How Hookup Culture Is Leaving a Generation Unhappy, Sexually Unfulfilled, and Confused About Intimacy, p.7.