Why is there such a negative attitude towards women having sex during ther period? Does this relate to a general disgust of menstruation itself?

It doesn’t bother me in the slightest.

Doesn’t bother me. My boyfriend isn’t bothered by it, either.

That’s cool. I just wonder what the 30+ people who gave a GA to this have to say.

I don’t know as to whether it points to a greater anti-woman sentiment or anti-blood.

Humans are equally frightened of women and mortality.

I just prefer to avoid the mess. I will go to town in the shower. On my bed, no thanks.

I think both questions were a little smutty, could not really be called intelligent as a 100% drunk, redneck bar in Alberta would have plenty of answers for you. I think the hypocrisy is that men like talking about BJ’s.

Leviticus 15:19–24 sums up the practice (and bodily fluids in general, elsewhere) as being unsanitary, or at least bad sanitation policy. When you consider that faith is one of the core elements of a culture, and that that religious background in the West is Christianity, you’ve pinned down most (if not all) of the reasons for the aversion.

@Nullo I agree with you on that. Religion is one of the root causes of this attitude. But I still think there may be other reasons.

I got a feeling, when reading the other question, that it was meant to disgust rather than to discuss. Fluther is not the place for people to try to gross each other out for a laugh, that’s 4chan. Now, maybe that wasn’t the intent of the question, and maybe I’m the only one that got that out of it, but that was my take.

I love it as long as it’s only us two… more than two… get’s a little sticky.

I personally have no problems with women having sex during their period, it’s their choice & if their partner is happy to do so too, then fine no big deal.
It’s not something I would be comfortable with but depending on the situation, if the mood was right then maybe I guess I’d dive right in, there has also been times when it has only been discovered while during the course of sex that the lady was menstruating, it is of course a little bit too late by then to worry about! :-/

I have a negative attitude towards it because blood is gross. It’s not something I want to think about and it’s not something I want to see on my parts, nor on hers.

I didn’t bother reading either of those questions, I don’t bother reading the majority of the NSFW-tagged questions (they’re generally dumb). However, someone linked the menstruation sex one in the chatroom and I had an AstroChuckle at AstroChuck’s comment.

I think blood is gross too but I wonder why a question about blow jobs is of higher quality than one about having sex during a woman’s period. Anyone?

@HTDC
Blowjobs are more fun, particularly when on the receiving end, that’s all I know! :-/

Probably because in the West sex is still a male-dominated industry. 95% of everything sexual is catered to them. Despite the fact that women are just as sexual, that doesn’t seem to matter in this society. What men desire, above all, is what matters here. (As pathetic as I think it is, that doesn’t change the facts.) And because men don’t have periods and think they’re disgusting and dirty, well… Of course a question about blow jobs is going to get a better reaction.

It falls along the same lines, in my opinion, of people getting pissed (it tends to be men more than anyone) to see a woman breastfeed in public. They become angered that they have to see boobs as anything other than sexual objects.

Truth is, in terms of quality, neither of those questions was better than the other. They were equally legitimate.

Really great answer @DrasticDreamer. It definitely helps answer my question.

As I have posted in earlier questions on the same topic, I am a man and I have absolutely no problem with it. In fact, in my experience it is usually the woman who has problems with it.

Yeah I’ve found that too @tb1570 go figure!?

@DrasticDreamer – right on! I always love your answers!

I always thought the smell of blood was a little off putting… it’s not gross but definitely different than the normal scent of a woman

I don’t think there is anything wrong with penetration, I don’t have sex during my period, but that’s just personal choice. But the whole oral sex during the period makes me cringe. I can’t imagine how that would be enjoyable. But that’s just me. If someone wants to do it, I ain’t gonna hate them.

There are evolutionary reasons to avoid intercourse during menstruation. It has to do with the importance of ovulatory clues for synchronizing intercourse with the time of the cycle that is most conducive to impregnation.

@HTDC That great answer that you are complaining about wasn’t for disgust with just that question, but for a string of NSFW questions in just two days that seemed as if each new question was trying to one up the other. @trumi explains exactly how I felt about that question, and why I gave Astrochuck one of those 34 great answers.

you really shouldn’t take it so personal

Personally, I prefer to not have sex during my period because it is uncomfortable for me. If someone else wants to do it, fine. I’m not going to tell them that they are gross for doing it.

@HTDC- First off, I don’t have a negative attitude towards women having sex during ther period. I think you have a misunderstanding about my post. The question was Do you enjoy your girls period blood? I simply felt that the way the question was presented it was in poor taste. I clicked on the link in your remarks and see that the moderators have added “NSFW” in front on it now. I’ll admit that helps a bit.

@HTDC, It may be that the cervix is expanded to allow the menstrual flow to escape, and this allows the possibility of infection to enter the uterus. I suspect that our caution about bleeding and the possibility of infection may be the underlieing and combined reasons for the idea.

HTDC, for me, it’s not about the fact of menstruation itself, it’s about the mess afterwards. I do enough cleaning up around the house that there’s no appeal to having one more mess to deal with.

@trumi The purpose of the other question was definitely to discuss not disgust. Apparently others, including @AstroChuck found the way the question was stated to be offensive. It is unfortunate if that detracted from the discussion.

@Nullo Christians are no longer under the “Old Law” as a result of Jesus’ death and resurrection if I remember correctly.

It’s not a negative attitude toward periods, it’s a negative attitude toward blood for me. I don’t care where your blood came from, I don’t necessarily want it on me.

Back when I had partners who were still menstruating, I can’t remember ever having thought much about it. Some partners were less sexually interested when menstruating, some were more.

@Facade
That’s more or less true (no time to go into the matter); however, that doesn’t mean that we just throw the Law out altogether. “I have not come to destroy the law” and all that.
There is a large chunk of the Law that had to do with regulating your society, including rules for quarantine and sanitation. This is part of that, as is keeping your lepers outside the camp.
There is no legal penalty (afaik) for stuffing your hand into the used-syringe box at the doctor’s office, but you don’t do it anyway because it’s not a good idea.

Most people are brainwashed by popular culture. It doesn’t bother me one way or the other :-)

It doesn’t bother my fiancé at all. He’ll willingly have sex with me anytime of the month.

Nullo and gemiwing have got it right. The reason for the disgust is a combination of religious thought and a distaste for things associated with women (feminine or “girly” things are generally looked down upon in Western culture). People can argue that blood is gross (i.e. messy, unpleasant smelling, etc.), but the same can be said about male bodily fluids, and yet both are treated differently in our culture.

Also, it could be that there’s an association between blood and injuries, so people instinctively react to menstrual blood in the same way that they would to blood from a wound (i.e. with horror), although menstrual blood is perfectly natural.

Interestingly, this same level of disgust about menstruation isn’t found in some other cultures. When I was reading an article about attitudes towards love-making in Latin America, most of the subjects interviewed said that if the girl was on her period, they just threw down a dark towel and didn’t worry about it.

@tb1570 The girls you know are probably reacting negatively to the idea because men are squeamish about menstruation, and they’re afraid of turning off their partners. My brother was always afraid of tampons. When my sister left a tampon on the bathroom counter (we’re talking about an unused one, still in its wrapper), he’d complain about it, but he refused to move it himself. He acted like he’d be physically and spiritually tainted if he touched it. I feel sorry for all his girlfriends.

@lonelydragon – Bravo! Best answer!

Good question! With porn sites dominated by depictions of anal sex which means that’s what people are fantasizing about then I’m really curious why anyone would balk at some smeared menstrual blood. I figure if anyone wants me to put my mouth and fingers all over/in their various orifices then there’s nothing on me they should take issue with and that means not being squeamish over a regularly occurring bodily function. Men don’t seem to freak out when they want to spooge all over a woman’s face and body or in her mouth so they can put up with and wipe off a little blood, no biggie.

@hungryhungryhortence – Indeed! I have no objection to rimming a woman any more than going down on her during her period…

I have an objection to both..

@lonelydragon Fantastic. That was the kind of answer I was looking for. Same with @DrasticDreamer That’s why I was wondering why men find sex during a woman’s period disgusting yet all the other bodily fluids that occur during sex and all the other sexual acts are perfectly fine and not disgusting.

That’s what my question was meant to ask. It wasn’t really asking if people liked or didn’t like to have sex during that time of month, it was asking why they object to it yet happily engage in other equally messy sexual acts. And you both gave some really good reasons as to why. Thanks!

@hungryhungryhortence. Exactly!

Some things just should be between the people involved.

@Facade
The Mosaic Law can be divided into three major categories: ceremonial, civil, and moral.
The ceremonial parts (particularly with regard to things like sacrifices) no longer applies because of Jesus’ death (a sort of infinitely big sacrifice) and resurrection. The civil parts -things like dealing with interpersonal conflicts and how far away you go from camp to do your business, don’t have much traction outside of ancient Israel -jurisdiction and such. But the moral parts (things like prohibitions of theft, blasphemy, etc, which in the Law have civil and ceremonial ramifications), reflect God’s standard of morality, and are not safely deviated from.

@Nullo – Christians say that Jesus died on the cross. But Jesus didn’t really die, because He was rersurrected, right? Or am I missing something? Though I guess being tortured on that cross was, itself, a pretty horrific ordeal and counts as a pretty good sacrifice…

@HungryGuy
He really died -crosses kill via asphyxiation if the blood loss doesn’t finish the victim off first – but didn’t stay dead.

@Nullo – Right. But it’s no different than, say, someone dying in a horrible crash, and then being rescuscitated at the hospital. I don’t mean to diminish the horrible experience He went through at the hands of the Romans, but being as He didn’t stay dead, He didn’t really die then in the sense that he’s gone, period, end of story. His death really occurred several weeks/months after that as I understand it…

because what if you have wild crazy sex and when your done the bed room looks like the scene of a grizzly murder..lmao – im kidding ” to each is own ”

Resurrection within 3 days of death was a common meme in messiah stories long before Christ could have been born.

@HungryGuy
No, the guy was dead. My sources say that the asphyxiation, coupled with the massive blood loss from the scourging, triggered a cardiac arrest. Records show that the Romans would stick a spear between the ribs to ascertain the victim’s status: Heart failure results in a buildup of fluid around the heart and lungs (called pericardial and pleural effusions, respectively), and sticking the area with a spear causes it all to drain out onto the ground (John 19:34 says, “Instead [of breaking His legs to hasten death-by-asphyxiation], one of the soldiers pierced Jesus’ side with a spear, bringing a sudden flow of blood and water”). The Romans were very good with death and the dealing thereof; this blood-and-water business meant as much to them as the flatline tone in our medical dramas does to us. Stabbing at the heart also served to make extra sure that the deceased was dead.
Then, with little preamble (and no first aid, nor blood infusions, or any of the other procedures that go into resuscitating) , Jesus was wrapped up and put in a generously-offered tomb, and the tomb closed.
Now completely out of blood (part of the embalming process, unless I’m mistaken), there’s no way to still be alive. Three days of decomposition isn’t going to help that.
Per the Judeo-Christian tradition, nobody ever entirely ceases to exist, no matter how dead they get. Call it conservation of existence. In the present setup, the person part of people is either allowed into the presence of God, or isn’t. In those days, however, it was more like going to Hell or going to Heaven’s waiting room. Jesus, bearing all the sins of the world, was shunted to Hell, messed up Hell some (related in concept to a jailbreak), and then was resurrected.

Wow, you make it sound like Dean in Supernatural! -one of my favorite TV shows. And I don’t think they embalmed back then, formaldehyde.

@faye
“Embalming” may in fact be the wrong term (though Wiki seems to back me up a bit). Different techniques, maybe? The Egyptians would embalm their mummies, after all. All that I am certain of is that the body is wrapped in cloth, and the cloth usually treated with myrrh and similar.

@pdworkin
When you consider the metaphysical setting -God wants to save mankind through Christ, Satan wants to destroy it in any way he can – it becomes reasonable for there to be counterfeit cases.
Could you provide some examples?

@lonelydragon Might I suggest that you amend your response to ”some men are squeamish about menstruation…”?

@Nullo – Okay. I agree. Jesus died in the sense that His body ceased to be alive end even decomposed while in that tomb. But you’re missing the point I’m trying to make. He was brought back to life by God in a “new and improved” body a few days later. So He didn’t really “die” as in gone-and-not-coming-back until he died a second time a few weeks/months after His resurrection.

BTW, I’m not sure I believe in the existence of Hell. To wit: (1) God is loving, kind, and just; (2) God created everything; there is nothing that God didn’t create; (3) God alone decided the rules that determines a person’s destination after death, nobody is in authority over God. Therefore: if all three of those conditions are true, then it’s a logical conclusion that Hell cannot exist. And the corollary of this is that if Hell exists, then at least one of the three points must be false.

@HungryGuy
There was separation of body and soul, if that’s what you mean and Jesus didn’t die a second time. Perhaps you could clarify more?

How exactly is that a logical conclusion? It’s 4a.m., certainly, but your conclusion doesn’t seem to follow.
One can make the argument that Hell and all its misery is a total absence of God. Being just and righteous and good (etc.), God abhors evil (sin, etc.) the way nature abhors a vacuum. When a person’s time comes and he has sin (evil, wickedness, etc.), he is cast out from the presence of the Lord.
To use an almost inappropriately petty example of the concept, think of those restaurants that require you to wear a tie. No tie, no service, but they do have some spare ties if you’re willing to wear one.

Bit-o-Trivia: The Greek Orthodox Christians believe that Hell is how a non-believer perceives Heaven.

@tb1570 I would be glad to, if the editing period hadn’t already expired!

@Nullo – Now I’m getting confused. Yes, I agree, there was a separation of body and soul (or mind, or whatever you wish to call it). Jesus’s body died, and God took His soul/mind up to Heaven. So His mind didn’t die, only His body. Then a few days later, God gave Him a new and imrpoved body and “installed” His soul/mind into that one. In that sense, Jesus didn’t die since His mind continued with all His memories of his life intact.

As for Hell, I guess I made the mistake of speaking of the traditional Christian view of Hell as a place of eternal pain and torture, forever and ever. For how could a loving and caring and just God create a universe in which such a place exists and impos rules where people could go there? If you are saying that Hell is merely a benign place where people who reject God go in the afterlife, that’s more palatable. I believe the Bible can be interpreted in a number of different ways. There are passages that suggest that when a non-Christian dies, he simply ceases to exist, i.e., second death…unfortunate for said non-Christian, but not a sadistic punishment. And there are passages that suggest that when a non-Christian dies, he continues to live in some sort of afterlife other than Heaven.

@HungryGuy
Per the Christian faith, physical death is the cessation of biological processes, and it is followed by the body decomposing. Spiritual death, on the other hand, is the state in which the unsaved find themselves, in a sort of “if God is life, then without God you’re not alive which means that you’re dead” kind of way. Neither state is necessarily permanent, though the former usually is.

There is no question about Hell: it sucks, and sucks for eternity. As for how God could create such a place, I’d say that it’s out of necessity. It would seem that God cannot tolerate sin, like the way that you cannot draw a round square. Sin that has not been atoned for and the sinner that bears it are thus booted.

The “second death” is referred to as eternal in every version that I’ve read.
What’s the second set of passages that you’re referring to?

No problem for me. I love it

@Nullo – I think I grasp your definition of death of being disconnected from God. What I meant by death is total loss of consciusness and self-awareness. So, the definitions of death that we were using are a little different, and we were comparing apples to oranges in a manner of speaking.

As for your explanation that God cannot tolerate sin. That sounds to me like you’re saying that there’s some aspects of God or His creation that He has no control over…as if to say He didn’t decide for Himself what is, and isn’t, sin…the rules are what they are, and God is bound by them just as we are. Correct? You’re not saying that there’s something in authority over God (I would have disagreed if you had), only that God is bound by certain fundamental laws, just as we are bound by the laws of physics that God created for us. Am I correct?

I’ll still have to track down passages about death. It’s been a while since I sat down to read the Bible from start to end. But I recall distinctions between first death (the death of your earthly body) and second death (what happens to you after Judgment if you’re not saved…you simply cease to exist). But I could be wrong…it is easy to misinterpret things out of context.

NSFW answer:

I do not have a problem with other people doing it but that is one bodily substance that I cannot deal with. I just steer clear of any sexual activity during that time of the month that has risk of me coming in contact with it. Penetrative vaginal sex wearing a condom is not good enough because, well, yuck. The stuff just, well, goes all over the place. I have no problem with anything that does not bring me in contact with it, including pleasuring her orally if she has a fresh tampon in and has washed really well right before or anal sex (if she likes that sort of thing) with a fresh tampon.

I cannot get past the “sloughed off old tissue being discarded by the body” aspect of menstrual blood. It has nothing to do with women on their cycle, it just has to do with my personal “yuck” factor.

Non NSFW answer:

Oh it also depends on culture.

In Rromani Gypsy culture, menstruation is marime (that is a bad thing). A woman is not supposed to be touched during that time of the month… period (pardon the pun). I know that I was told why this marime Romaniya came to be but I do not remember it clearly. I wish my father was alive for me to ask because there was some small kernel of “logic” as to why. Of course, it is completely wrong but there was a reason why.

I would think that specific cultures having such a negative view of menstruation could be traced back to some time in their history where some origin of the negativity can be found. Now religions, on the other hand, I cannot make heads nor tails of their logic.

I was not raised in many of the traditions so the only problem I have with it is the “yuck” factor.

@Nullo – Here’s a video that explains in a better way that I can why some people believe that Hell cannot exist: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XaL7CkQaQpU

@Arisztid – I have a hunch it can be traced back to the old Hebrew prohibitions from the OT, such as that women who where menstrating were not permitted to enter the Holy of Holies (though how anyone knew whether or not a particular woman was menstrating had to be a guess).

@HungryGuy From what I know, we have no link to the OT from back in the ‘day. I think ours came out of the Black Plague days somehow. My knowledge is lacking here though.

@Arisztid – I agree. I have a hunch that the OT has been corrupted and mangled from the original text—and by “original text” I mean before what we currently have on record as the “original” Greek and Hebrew. Not to sound like a religious fanatic, but I find it incredulous that a kind and loving God could have committed the cruelties attribted to Him in the OT.