Is It Immoral For Women To Enjoy Sex?

By Karen and Erica

We were lucky enough to come of age after the Pill became widely available and before AIDS became widely devastating. So yes, everyone we knew had sex. And yes, it was fun! and carefree! and pretty judgment free! We grew up thinking sex was one of the finer things in life.

Things have changed since then. We’re not worried about getting pregnant any more (though we wonder why women’s reproductive health options have not advanced since we were teenagers). But we still think sex is one of the finer things in life, and it seems to have excellent benefits for older adults. Just look at Netflix’s Grace (Jane Fonda) and Frankie (Lily Tomlin). Clearly, their purple vibrators, made for older hands, are standing them in good stead. So let’s carry on!

Of course, now we need other stuff to help us carry on (including protection against STIs and STDs). Fifty years or so after the sexual revolution, access to those things should be unexceptional. So we were astonished to read (after coming to work on the subway) that sex toys for women are too immoral to be financed, and advertisements for women’s health and sexual options are too immoral to be acceptable on media channels that accept a wide variety of other topics. Apparently, for example, Facebook will not carry ads offering lubricants and telehealth consultations for women going through menopause, but will accept ads for erectile dysfunction. Soooo… products and services that allow women to enjoy sex are too sexual to promote, but products that allow men to have sex are—medicinal?

Times are strange, but it is way too late to be thinking that adult women’s enjoyment of sex is immoral. We are not prepared to go back to the time of Queen Victoria. We’re a bit too old for that.