Opinion: While the recent sex-positive movement is important, not all media created around it is inherently feminist.
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Our generation has worked hard to push acceptance and normalize sexual expression for all genders. This attempt to update social mores, labeled the sex-positive movement, has been primarily led by women, who have successfully advocated for becoming more sexually liberated and erased the stigma of publicly celebrating and discussing their bedroom escapades.
While the movement has helped leave behind the era of slut-shaming and other double standards, it isn’t without issues in its approach. Sex positivity has been labeled part of the current feminist movement, and this is where the problem lies.
Many media outlets have capitalized on the female push toward sex positivity, with a slew of women-lead podcasts discussing and dishing out sex advice. But despite the girl power marketing these podcasts receive, not all sex-positive media is inherently feminist.
The main issue is that while the media is geared toward women embracing their sexuality, it still essentially benefits men in the long run. The sexual relationships these shows discuss are predominantly heterosexual ones and take a “this is what you have to do to keep your man happy” stance. Layla, a woman who runs the well-known Instagram account for sex advice @lalalaletmeexplain, agrees that, while she supports the movement, it isn’t without drawbacks.
“Sexual liberation is great, but in some ways, we ran with that, and then ended up in a model of sex that has been created by men,” Layla said in an interview with the Guardian.
Call Her Daddy, the most popular of these “sex-positive” podcasts — and the number four Spotify exclusive podcast overall — is a prime example of this issue. Host Alex Cooper uses the traditionally masculine locker room-like jargon to promote sexual boldness to her women listeners and reclaim female sexuality.
In one of Call Her Daddy’s most infamous episodes, titled “If you’re a 5 or a 6, die for that d-ck,” Cooper argues that women who are rated lower on the attractiveness scale need to be more sexually adventurous to make up for it. In another, Cooper jokingly tells her audiences they are “just a hole,” insinuating that we shouldn’t expect the men we hook up with to respect us. Both of these sentiments are things you could have heard a shock jock radio DJ say 15 years ago; they don’t suddenly become feminist when a woman says them.
While many of the show’s listeners appreciate the openness of Cooper’s sex advice, we can’t continue to pretend this show is “for the girls.” First, Call Her Daddy is a part of the larger Barstool Sports company, whose own president, David Portnoy, has been quoted “joking” that, while he doesn’t condone rape at his parties, “if a chick passes out that’s a gray area.” Of course, legally and morally speaking, there’s nothing gray about it, and I’m not sure what’s funny about the “joke.” Further, in addition to being a part of a company that doesn’t support feminist values, the podcast is clearly oriented toward the male gaze.
The entire essence of Call Her Daddy is telling girls how to please men sexually. Episodes detail how to give the perfect blowjob and send nudes to men but do little to cover how women themselves should gain sexual confidence and pleasure, let alone demand that their sexual partners treat them like actual human beings.
This isn’t uncommon within the sex-positive movement, but it needs to change. Too much of the media coverage embracing female sexuality doesn’t actually tell women how to enjoy sex more for themselves. Podcasts like Call Her Daddy and Cosmopolitan articles titled “Top Ten Sex Tips that Drive Men Wild” do nothing to push the narrative of female pleasure and thus the feminist movement. Far from being feminist works, these texts reinforce the traditional and heteronormative role of women as sex objects for men.
Sure, maybe it’s not that deep and raunchy sex podcasts like Call Her Daddy should be taken as humor, but I argue that degrading and objectifying fellow women to numbers based on their attractiveness isn’t all that funny.
Additionally, young women are huge consumers of this media as they try to navigate the new sex-positive culture in the internet age. With this, we must ask what message it sends when almost all these young women see the media telling them embracing their sexuality is essentially about pleasing men.
