Blog 8, Kelsey Hippen
I want to assign a personal perspective to what we’re learning. When we read about men, women, sex, rape, and so on, we read about real people and situations, most of which we can associate someone from our lives to match that experience. When we read such an academic perspective on sexuality, remembering that is challenging, but I think it’s crucial if we are to glean real-world perspective. Koedt and Rich challenge one another from an academic standpoint, and I lose a sense of the humanity behind the subjects they discuss. However, Rich stays the truest to the people behind her writing.
In “The Myth of the Vaginal Orgasm�, Koedt describes how women are trapped in a patriarchal relationship to men. Her writing does not acknowledge that, in some cases, a woman can A) maneuver around patriarchy with a willing partner to create an equally enjoyable experience for both partners, and B) experience trauma even if she recognizes that the vagina is not the source of the orgasm, and that the clitoris is. Koedt’s perspective is exceedingly factual (yet probably based on improperly conducted studies) and it misses the point. The point is that, yes, misinformation on the woman’s (in)ability to vaginally orgasm has shaped heterosexuality, but once heterosexual women recognize this, they need to situate themselves within their sexuality with a partner who not only also recognizes this, but recognizes it to the extent that the woman knows it.
Unlike Koedt, Rich captures the personal essence to the sexuality she describes. She says that “female friendship and comradeship have been set apart from the erotic, thus limiting the erotic itself�. I want to extend this to heterosexuality as well. Friendship and comradeship between a man and a woman has somehow been lost in this discussion, singled out from the sexuality, limiting sexuality itself. To understand heterosexual sex, we need to apply Rich’s concept of lesbian relationships to heterosexual relationships, recognizing that in each sexual encounter, two people are interacting in a dynamic way. After all, both Koedt and Rich would not be able to write about these dynamics if they had no sexual experience themselves.