A sales manager once reported that the company needed a special stratagem to market left leg shoes as there was a backlog of the same in the store. That statement amounts to a mathematical impossibility since majority of the people buy a pair of shoes, both right and left with the percentage of those single legged individuals who may buy a singular right leg shoe being negligible few and canceling out with the other negligible number who for one reason or the other would buy a singular left shoe (Fry et al., 2015). Even the father of doubt himself, René Descartes in his Cartesian doubt theories admitted that mathematics is absolute: it is on this premise that I categorically state that the contention that males 30-44 have had more female sexual partners that males of a similar age, and further that the difference emanates from the accuracy of the number of sexual partners reported not the number of sexual partners had.
The first argument in support of this mythical contention however lies in the traditional polygamous tendencies where a man would have more than one wife with the same not available for women. Whereas this contention is indeed factually true, it is also true that in the aforesaid traditional world, few men lived to their thirties due to constant wars. The few remaining men had to take care of the entire feminine population which made polygamy the norm rather than exception being the only mathematical solution for that predicament (Fry et al., 2015). This situation however does not exist today as the number of women in the world today is congruent to that of men with countries like China; the most populous in the world actually having more men than women. This ground can therefore not stand as it does not solve or even begin to explain the prevalent mathematical impossibility (Fry et al., 2015; Kolata, 2015).
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The only solid explanation for this phenomenon lies in the accuracy of the reports made either by a singular gender, or by both genders. There are definitely reasons for a man to try and hype up the number of women he has had sex with in the very same way that there are good reason for a woman to try and diminish the number of her sexual partners. The first reason is societal perceptions. The 30 to 44 year old was born and brought up in the 1980s where culturally, women were expected to be chaste virgins who only have sex with their husbands and after marriage (Fry et al., 2015). Albeit the women did not live up to these standards, it is not easy to admit the same so just as when they are asked about their age or weight, women lie about the number of sexual partners they have had by reducing the number (Kolata, 2015).
On the side of men, they will also lie due to the machismo concept which makes every man want to consider himself as successful and attractive. A man who has had sex with more women will create the impression that he is attractive enough to attract all those sexual partners (Beckford, 2008). This fact is further cemented by the psychologically confirmed concept that men who suffer from inferiority concept will try to overcompensate for the same by having as many sexual partners as possible. For this reason, just as with the amount of money they have in the bank and their shoe sizes, when a man is asked how many sexual partners he has had, he is predisposed to lie about it by increasing the number (Fry et al., 2015).
Another reason for the falsifying the reports about how many sexual partners an individual has had lies in the ease or difficulty of having sex by the respective genders. According to comedian Chris Rock in his 2008 HBO special Kill the Messenger , the average man has to strive in order to find a feminine sexual partner while a woman has to strive in order to fend of the high volume of sexual advances she gets. The demand and supply rules make sex seem more valuable to men than to women. Further, a woman who has sex seemed to have given in while a man who does the same seems to have conquered. This is another contributory factor for men giving a higher number and women a lower number despite the two having generally the same number of sexual partners (Kolata, 2015).
Finally, the difference could rise from the difference in the interpretation of sex between the two genders. As long a penetration occurred and even in some instances when it does not, men will always add that to the tally and include it in his answer when the surveys are being conducted as sex is generally a physical endeavor for them. On their part, women tend to differentiate between sex and sexually related ‘accidents’ based on whether or not the intercourse meant something to the woman or otherwise (Beckford, 2008). It therefore follows that as women answer the survey question on the how many men they have slept with, they only mention the meaningful sex leaving out the ‘accidents’ thus contributing further to the discrepancy in the numbers (Kolata, 2015).
Considering that this trend is based on culture and beliefs, it is both to remain for as long as both the culture and the belief will remain (Fry et al., 2015). Therefore, when this cultural principles and beliefs will change, the numbers given by men and women regarding their sexual partners will either equal or even end up with women given higher number than men as happened in a not very recent poll conducted in the United Kingdom on an early to mid-twenties age group (Beckford, 2008). The results of that survey actually showed that women are now both having as many sexual partners as their male partners and admitting it.
References
Beckford, M. (2008). Young women “have more sexual partners” than men. The Telegraph . Retrieved from <http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/3685314/Young-women-have-more-sexual-partners-than-men.html/>
Fry, H., Frankel, B., Brescia, G., Jacobs, H., & Mosley, M. (2015). Do men average more sexual partners than women? Retrieved <http://www.tipsonlifeandlove.com/love-and-relationships/do-men-average-more-sexual-partners-than-women/>
Kolata, G. (2015). The myth, the math, the sex. Week in Review. Retrieved from <http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/12/weekinreview/12kolata.html?_r=0/>
