Bettina Arndt is a leading commentator on issues of sexuality. Trained as a clinical psychologist, Bettina Arndt entered public debate in the 1970s as the editor of Forum, a controversial adult sex education magazine. Since then, Arndt has worked as a writer for The Australian, The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald, hosted her own radio show, advised government bodies and published two collections of her writings. In 2009, Bettina Arndt published The Sex Diaries, the result of a project which asked 98 couples to keep a record of their sex lives, became an international best seller. On 5 October 2010, Bettina Arndt addressed The Sydney Institute on her follow-up project, What Men Want – in Bed.

MAN’S BEST FRIEND

BETTINA ARNDT

Forty years ago American writer Philip Roth made a huge splash with Portnoy’s Complaint, his exuberant tale of the randy Jewish adolescent who spends half his waking life locked behind the bathroom door. Ever since, Roth has been writing about the pulsating, driving life force that is male sexuality.

As Roth turned 70, the lion of literature was still pondering that never-ending itch: “The fact that, as far as I can tell, nothing, nothing is put to rest, however old a man may be?” In The Dying Animal, Roth has his central character, David Kepesh, look back on the frustrations of curtailing that robust drive within the constraints of marriage, and provides a telling insight into what sex means to men. He asks what there is, besides sex, to help men take the defeats, and the frustrations. Yes, there’s having children, and making money.

“That helps, but it’s nothing like the other thing. Because the other thing is based in your physical being, in the flesh that is born and the flesh that dies. Because only when you fuck is everything that you dislike in life and everything by which are you defeated in life purely, if momentarily, revenged.”

Both men and women wrote vividly, describing how they deal with tensions over mismatched desire, but it was men who really seized the opportunity to pour out their emotions, sometimes in daily emails.

The greed of desire. This notion of sex as a reason for being is alien to most women. They don’t begin to understand that robust, compulsive male drive—relentless, uncontrollable, all-consuming. That hydra-headed urge. Constant, sparking sexual energy. Roth’s other thing.

Men have been talking to me about that ‘other thing’ for much of my adult life. It was the male voices that resonated most strongly in the project that led to my book, The Sex Diaries. Ninety-eight couples wrote diaries describing how they negotiate their sex supply. Both men and women wrote vividly, describing how they deal with tensions over mismatched desire, but it was men who really seized the opportunity to pour out their emotions, sometimes in daily emails. Long after the book was published, letters continue to arrive from men keen to have the chance to explain the place of sex in their lives, its intense joys and incredible frustrations.

But women often don’t understand all this. It is rare for women to experience sex as a driving, compulsive life force. Sure they may go through periods in their lives when sex is very important to them – particularly at the start of new relationships – but many women go through much of their lives rarely experiencing spontaneous desire.

So it made sense to give men a chance to answer that constant refrain from women—what is it with men and sex? I recruited another 150 or so men to write for me for over a year. They came from all walks of life and age groups, supplying long, detailed sexual histories. Many responded to in-depth survey questions, but others also kept diaries, recording their innermost thoughts about their day-to-day experiences. The new diarists were recruited through interviews on radio, and articles I wrote for the media.

Sometimes their wives and partners wrote diaries as well, and other women sent in their own contributions about what they observed about male sexuality. But the heart of my new book, What Men Want – in bed, is about men and sex – their sexual dreams, longings, frustrations and the thrill, the elation they experience through carnal pleasures.

Men talk about why it is worth it, why they are willing to risk so much for the sake of that tangle of sweaty bodies, those brief moments of puffing and panting.

Men wrote at length about internet pornography – why a man would choose to sit there night after night staring at the flittering computer screen, pretending to be working but secretly delving into the vast, throbbing sexual world now laid open to him. Men know all too well the trouble it will cause if they are caught out. They are stunned by the intensity of women’s reaction to what they see as a harmless outlet for their unrequited lust. What is a man to do when his wife tells him his viewing habits leave her feeling betrayed, when she acts as if he is some kind of criminal, pervert, low-life?

Men talk extensively about their delight in their partner’s bodies: “We are more than happy to take the rough edges and imperfections – after all we men are full of them. We can look beyond the flab and saggy boobs and love a woman for who she is”, one writes. In a loving relationship, that forgiving gaze can be such a gift to a partner who doubts her own attractiveness. Yet his-and-hers diaries expose the tension created as a woman’s self-consciousness clashes with a man’s enjoyment of his partner’s nakedness.

Then there’s the quest for sexual adventure, that restless male urge that brings so many men unstuck. The oral sex in the Oval Office that helped lose Clinton his presidency; the parade of mistresses that soiled the reputation of the squeaky clean golfing hero; the erotic, exotic temptations of swinging that lured a Melbourne millionaire into dangerous sexual company. Men talk about why it is worth it, why they are willing to risk so much for the sake of that tangle of sweaty bodies, those brief moments of puffing and panting.

But the central theme was the business of living with men’s powerful sex drive. Following my request for volunteers for this project, I received an intriguing letter from a man who said he wouldn’t be able to help with the diaries – because he was a 71-year-old virgin. No, he wasn’t joking. He explained that he didn’t want to have sex until he met the right woman and she simply never came along.

But he’s still a man with strong sexual needs and firm views about their importance to men: “My impression of women is that they appear to have a choice – sex or no sex. I don’t believe that men do. They are wired to propagate the species. Men build up a sexual tension that needs to be released at regular intervals”, he writes, explaining he tries to suppress these feelings but his body won’t let him.

My diarists write so openly about the heart-break they experienced when their bodies started to let them down. Men explain the plight of the impotent man.

He’s now on medication that reduces his libido. But even now that powerful drive breaks through: “I go happily along for about three to four weeks, not really thinking about sex at all. Then early one morning, out of the blue, I will have a sexual dream. I will probably wake up with half an erection and feel an overwhelming urge to masturbate. This urge will not and cannot be denied. This process is something that I have no conscious control over at all. So there it is – the hidden power of men’s sex drive, which nature has given us to ensure the survival of the species.”

Of course there are men who are different. I heard their stories mainly through their frustrated partners, who complain bitterly about being sexually rejected. A few brave men with low drive did take part in the project, with some explaining that they were never very interested, and others talking about the reasons that once-burning drive simply faded away. But they are rare compared to the vast numbers of men who just can’t get sex out of their minds.

It is the older men who intrigue me most. I was keen to discover how they were dealing with the Viagra revolution, the new erection treatments offering a new lease of sexual life to so many older couples. My diarists write so openly about the heart-break they experienced when their bodies started to let them down. Men explain the plight of the impotent man, the misery so eloquently described by Roth: “The once rigid instrument of procreation was now like the end of a pipe you see sticking out of a field somewhere, a meaningless piece of pipe that spurts and gushes intermittently, spitting forth water to no end”.

My diarists show why it matters so much when the ageing body, or ill-health or prostate-cancer treatments render erections a thing of the past, why they can’t let nature take its course. And why they are so delighted by the drug company’s promise of never-ending Viagra-inspired virility.

Who could resist the intriguing story of the pensioner who, with his wife’s approval, wears her knickers under his bowling shorts?

They display a truly remarkable inventiveness when it comes to finding ways of keeping their equipment fully functioning. There was the diarist who fashioned his own ‘cock rings’, cut out of soft inner tubes from bicycle tyres. I dubbed him the ‘Toilet Roll Houdini’ after learning of his extraordinary exploits with his pelvic muscles. He boasted that he was able to insert his penis into the cardboard core of a toilet roll and with one flick of his muscles, his penis would burst forth, splitting it from end to end.

Inventiveness abounds too when it comes to their rich variety of sexual interests, their exotic kinks and special quirks. Men are 20 times more likely than women to acquire unusual sexual habits, forbidden tastes that even their partners rarely know about. With my diarists, it all came pouring out. Who could resist the intriguing story of the pensioner who, with his wife’s approval, wears her knickers under his bowling shorts?

I was often touched to receive such open, revealing material from men who admit that they had never before spoken of these matters. Some wrote with great eloquence; others expressed themselves far more simply. “Why at age 71 have I spent so much time and effort to try and still have some enjoyment from sexual activity?” pondered Lewis, describing a long and tortuous journey to try to regain his erections after prostate-cancer surgery. His wife feels that at his age he should have “grown out of all that”, but he concludes that with age it makes sense to try to hang on to as many of the good things in life as long as possible. “Sex is one of life’s pleasures that I hope to enjoy for at least a few more years.”

There are so many questions that must flit through the minds of men confronting the prospect of trying the new treatments – questions that very few are willing to answer. That’s what my diarists have now provided.

Men have gained a lot more than a few extra years in this new age – with the coming of Viagra and the other miraculous new erection treatments. An astonishing one in two men aged over 50 experience erection problems, but now they have a whole new armament to attack their fading potency. The revolutionary change this has produced in the sex lives of many older couples is an untold story that is truly fascinating.

What is it like to pop a little blue pill? Does the erection feel the same or different? Is poking an injection into the penis as bad as it sounds? There are so many questions that must flit through the minds of men confronting the prospect of trying the new treatments – questions that very few are willing to answer. That’s what my diarists have now provided – stories from the coalface of this brave new world, as men tell their stories, often with humour, and sometimes perhaps providing far too much information.

What Men Want includes five chapters on erections – not just on restoring faulty equipment but on how this all plays out between couples. What about the woman who was delighted at that thought that her man was being forced to hang up his spurs – how does she feel about this miraculous rejuvenated penis? How does a woman support a man who is giving up hope that any treatment will work for him? That’s where my couples come in – providing his-and-her accounts of this bumpy journey. And while there are many women who feel they have earned a rest and who now react to all this with a shudder of horror, there are some who are delighted.

There’s a wonderful cartoon featuring an elderly man sitting on a bench overlooking a cliff top. Next to him is a little boy who asks, “Grandpa, why are you sitting there naked like that?” “It was your grandmother’s idea”, the old chap explains. “Yesterday I sat here with my shirt off and got a stiff neck…”

Women pushing men back into the saddle are not common but they do exist, as my diarists show. And there are older men who find themselves quite bewildered when their partners attempt to whip them back into action.

It’s all just part of the sexual journey that lies ahead for the younger man – a journey for which most men are grossly underprepared. How tragic to read men’s stories and see them missing out on sexual pleasure, on connecting with their partners, simply because they never share their knowledge of what makes sex work for them. By lifting the lid on so many aspects of their intimate lives, my diarists will make it just a little easier for men everywhere to start the conversations they need to have – to share that knowledge with each other and with their partners.