Someone sent me an interesting piece where a bi-sexual woman talks about her respective issues dating men and women.

I thought I would post it, in the interest of getting some content that's not about affirmative consent on the forum. I also think the perspective of bi-people on dating/gender issues is always interesting. I've pulled out some sections of the article below.

1. Do people here identify with her descriptions of dating men/women?
2. Is this provider/property dynamic changing via feminism, technology, etc.? Or is it fundamentally the same?

Her experience dating women

Something like 80% of women fake their orgasms sometimes. What does this mean?

It means that, when women date, they’re optimizing for something that’s not sexual pleasure. So what are they optimizing for?

Security and status, I think. Sure, not all women, but a lot of women. Enough women. And, maybe you think that lesbians aren’t like straight women on this front, but enough of them are for it to be inconvenient. I have observed...

One thing is, when attracting women, their attention always seems very contingent — contingent to my continued conformation to a certain set of standards. However, what’s weird is what they say to me will be nicer than what men say to me. I dated a guy who told me he’d dump me if I put on 10 pounds; I can’t imagine a women ever saying that. However, I have definitely received a frosty “no calls returned” after voicing a few controversial political opinions. A perverse irony is that men actually tend to be a lot less superficial than they claim (when I told 10lb guy obviously we could never have kids because he’d dump me, he cried and said he hadn’t been serious) and women are often a lot more superficial than they claim. But, women won’t vocalize their judgements. Men will knock out all this hurtful shit, but when push comes to shove, sometimes they don’t actually care. Women often won’t complain, but will seethe in silent dissatisfaction.

Her experience dating men

Men, on the other hand, do voice their dissatisfactions. They seem to derive significant parts of their identity and masculinity from traits their partner has, traits often their partner can’t control. So, the nice part of this is that, once you make the cut, you have relative freedom. I can have completely different political opinions from the men I date, for example, and this usually isn’t a problem. On the other hand, if there’s something they don’t like about you, the game’s over before it begins. You don’t get a chance, there are no personality admits to this ride.

And, this has a deeper more sinister, objectifying vibe. There are three things that seem to matter the most to men I date:

1. How pretty I am
2. How smart I am
3. If I am willing to physically bear young

I feel like a horse being analyzed as breeding stock. Men don’t date me because they think we can have a nice life together, they date me because they think I will produce good children. (And, while I have met men who didn’t want kids, I have never dated one. They’re a little rare.)

Conclusion

When dating, women look at me and wonder “will this girl give me the life I want?” and men look at me and think “is this girl worth the money I had to earn to get her?” For women I am a provider and for men I am a purchase. But, is any of that love?

As much as we wish it weren’t so, it’s very hard to step out of our assigned social roles (though I do think it’s possible.) I don’t think these things are love, but it’s possible that these dynamics can exist alongside love. But, for many people they don’t. Many people opt for what they can get from their partner, and assume that is love.