New stories in evolution of sex
If you’ve ever wondered how sex will look in the future, just ask Emily Witt. She’s scoped out that whole scene — in San Francisco, mostly — and came back with a book titled Future Sex.
Well, not really. For one thing, Witt, a respected New York City-based journalist and essayist, didn’t engage in any timetravelling. And for another, in her intelligent if idiosyncratic first book, she argues convincingly that “(a) futuristic sex was not going to be a new kind of historically unrecognizable sex, just a new story.”
Strictly speaking, that story is evolving, not beginning. A good number of men and women who don’t want to marry or can’t land their preferred partner continue to find ways to achieve sexual satisfaction, forge romantic relationships and experience the joys of parenthood — in other words, all the basic elements of what so many of us deem a full and rewarding life.
Future Sex is a stylistically uneven book, in large part because Witt the essayist outshines Witt the journalist. The author’s gonzo-style exploration of alternative sexual lifestyles — from polyamory to BDSM to a New Age and feminist-inspired fusion between yoga and sex called One Taste — yields a number of interesting observations that relate to her overall arguments. Yet these episodes drag on too long and often lack focus.
Witt is at her best when laying bare the infantilization of women woven into assertions made by people, even certain feminists, who ostensibly wish to empower them. Viewing (heterosexual) women as naturally desirous of happily-ever-after monogamy, for example, means regarding those who choose an alternative romantic model as having subordinated their wishes to those of lascivious men. Also, what if you do, in fact, start out seeking a life partner, but don’t find the right guy? Should you shun other forms of love?
That said, Future Sex proves much too optimistic when it comes to resolving one particularly fraught issue. Witt argues that single or non-monogamous women who aspire to motherhood shouldn’t sacrifice their dream for fear of stigmatization, but then points out that “our society was set up economically and socially in ways that make it difficult to raise a child as a single person.” For this reason, having a child on one’s own complicates matters. Even taking that route, as Witt herself is considering, seems a risky proposition. Rayyan Al-Shawaf is a writer in Beirut.