This is how you make a baby the old-fashioned way: man ejaculates (usually coincides with orgasm) into a woman’s vagina and the sperm make their way through the cervix and into the uterus to reach an ovum. So…where does the female orgasm play into all of this?
Back in ancient Greece, Hippocrates believed that a man and a woman conceived when their respective seeds intermixed:
In the case of women, it is my contention that when during intercourse the vagina is rubbed and the womb is disturbed, an irritation is set up in the womb which produces pleasure and heat in the rest of the body. A woman also releases something from her body, sometimes into the womb, which then becomes moist, and sometimes externally as well, if the womb is open wider than normal. Once intercourse has begun, she experiences pleasure throughout the whole time, until the man ejaculates. If her desire for intercourse is excited, she emits before the man, and for the remainder of the time she does not feel pleasure to the same extent; but if she is not in a state of excitement, then her pleasure terminates along with that of the man.
Which isn’t that far from a popular contemporary theory on the whys of the female orgasm.
Scientifically known as the upsuck theory (I kid you not), the idea contends that when a biological female orgasms, her uterine contractions cause the cervix to open and suck up the deposited semen. Ah, so that’s where I lost my tampon.
This doesn’t mean that a woman must orgasm in order to conceive, but it certainly could help. It’s a beautiful moment in babymaking: he cums, she cums, and her cervix sucks up all the cum like it’s reached the end of its green tea frappuccino. Except…I don’t know about you, but how often do you and your partner cum at the same time?
The authors of Sex at Dawn would interject to explain the natural promiscuity of pre-agriculture humans. In the first place, as the book points out, the average copulation duration for humans is between four and seven minutes. And second of all, women on average orgasm less easily than men and can take on a bevy of, erm, gentleman callers in one go to satiate their needs.
Rough translation, in the possibility of perverting Sex at Dawn‘s words? Everybody loves a gangbang. And that cervix gets one helluva feast. (Please tell me you are not eating while reading this. Or maybe you are, you pervert.)
Sex at Dawn also argues that sex is not purely designed for reproduction’s sake. At its referenced rough 1,000 copulations per birth, that’s not difficult to believe. Sex can make babies, yes, but sex also forms and maintains social bonds.
So what good is the female orgasm? It encourages sex by making sex pleasurable. It relieves stress and promotes good health. It makes her smile; it makes her cry. It makes her really loud. And with those uterine contractions, it makes her cramps go away. Yes, period sex FTW.
Despite all the (literal) fucking around we humans do, we forget that much of the sex we have in our lifetimes is not procreative. Those hookups, those LTRs that went nowhere…even couples who want to conceive have to try multiple times. It’s part of a social design. Not to discount reproduction or the role of natural selection, but our sex is often social: we seek it for pleasure or companionship or a certain sort of intimacy.
And so the female orgasm: social, biological, or procreative? Yes, and much more.
Image from Simon Pais Thomas.
The Sexual Manifesto is Christine Borden’s weekly column on sex in the city, sex and culture, and, well, sex. Got a tip for Christine (and it’s not in your pants)? Email her at christine@sfappeal.com.
