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Culture War Roundup for the week of July 10, 2023

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Also casual sex tends to be a mediocre experience for women

How do you compare the experience of the two sexes. Tiresias at least experienced both conditions and voted conclusively for being a women, though it cost him his sight. "Of ten parts a man enjoys one only."

I wonder which trans people prefer. Are there cases where transwomen feel that they have lost out in switching teams? Similarly, do trans men feel they are on to a good thing? My guess is that this effect is swamped by other issues.

I’m a bisexual trans woman so I got to experience some manner of both, but I do agree that the effect is greatly confounded by deeper issues like dysphoria.

My main experience would be that sex with men is a lot more variable, in that the bad is much worse but the good is a lot better, and the quality depends quite a lot on your partner, while with women it’s generally fairly average and depends more on your own state than the other person. So casual sex would be better for most men, but relationship sex would be better for women with the right partner.

The peak physiological pleasure is definitely greater when you’re a woman though, multiple full-body orgasms aren’t really a thing for men (trans men generally keep the ability to have multiple if they had it before, but they become otherwise closer to the male ones: brief and concentrated in the genitals). I certainly don’t miss the male sexual experience at all and see it as the equivalent of sexual fast food vs. going to a proper restaurant.

Would you actually expect the experience of trans people to be relevant here? I would personally expect a trans woman to have an extremely different sexual experience than a cis woman.

If post-op trans women prefer sex as a woman rather than a man, then I would consider this strong evidence that the woman's role is more enjoyable.

I agree that the sexual experience is probably very different, but my sense is that it would be better for natal women than trans women.

Similarly, if post-op trans men enjoy sex more as men, then that would be evidence the other way. Here are a bunch of transmen talking about sex. They seem hornier and more comfortable, but none claim that the sex is better. In contrast, a plurality of transwomen seem to enjoy sex post-op more.

The effect of testosterone also muddies the waters, I think, since the anecdotal accounts of FtM do seem to be "I'm a lot hornier since I started T" (as well as aggressive, self-confident, etc.)

How well a neo-phallus performs as against a neo-vagina is something I have no idea about. And not every trans person does have bottom surgery, and (it seems like) a fair percentage of trans women are lesbians. All very much confounding factors.

"I had miserable 'straight' (with women)/'gay' (with men) sex when I was still living as a man" versus "I have great 'straight' (with men)/'lesbian' (with women) sex as a transwoman" would seem to depend on psychological adjustment as well as physical factors. How do you even go about getting data on "When I slept with men as a man I didn't enjoy it, but sleeping with men as a woman I love it"?

If post-op trans women prefer sex as a woman rather than a man, then I would consider this strong evidence that the woman's role is more enjoyable.

If autogynephilia plays as large a role in the transwoman phenomenon as many posters here believe, then an autogynephiliac trans woman in a sexual encounter is getting off as much (if not more so) on her realised fantasy of being treated as a woman as she is from the actual mechanics of the encounter. This is a massive confounder making apples-to-apples comparisons with the experiences of cis women essentially impossible.