I agree that male desire has been pathologized and itβs high time for a correction. A dead bedroom is also perfectly reasonable grounds for divorce. However, this logic also justifies, for example, pestering her for sex while sheβs healing in postpartum or cheating on her. Why canβt she say βnoβ sometimes? When she has a cold? When sheβs very tired? Having unwanted sex creates a vicious cycle that further kills desire because the inability to hold off until tomorrow is immature. Surely a man can sense the difference between duty sex and desirable sex?
Both sides of this debate, in my view, are unwilling to confront the issue head on, which is to say that men get horny and want to have sex and theyβre annoyed if they canβt get it from their wives, who they feel on some level are obligated (and should want to) provide it. From the menβs point of view this is something that they desire, something that they want, something that they enjoy, something that only their wives can give them, and the general message is that this is at bottom not a serious concern.
Neither side wants to take this seriously. Women just say outright that this is a crass, unimportant concern, so then men, some of whom seem to agree with that assessment, try to frame it as though the sex is really about connection and feeling and emotional completeness and really you need to have sex with us because this is how we express love in a relationship.
The only way through this is just to say directly that men get horny, they want sex, and itβs very annoying when their wives wonβt give it to them. The women in their lives either take this seriously and treat the concerns of their husband as something worth caring about and addressing, even if part of them thinks itβs kind of base and crass, or they donβt.
And so while for many men itβs not really true that the sex itself is about connection and emotion, the lack of it is absolutely about denial and rejection and an unwillingness to provide something that the man feels is so simple to provide.
From the manβs point of view itβs just like, actually I am very simple, actually my needs are very simple, actually it is very simple to provide for me what I need and what I desire, actually you have all the tools to provide it, actually itβs not even a little bit complicated.
And yet.