Continuing on my previous post about that NYTimes article on female sexuality...
Does arousal imply desire? And is the source of arousal necessarily the object of desire?
The article raises this question in response to an unusual finding of Chivers' experiment on sexual desire: that, while reporting no emotional arousal, women displayed physical arousal to a video of bonobo monkeys having sex.
"Physiological arousal reveals little about desire. Otherwise... I would have to believe that women want to have sex with bonobos.”
While it may well be true that we need to make a distinction between physiological arousal (which is merely an unconscious physical reaction) from real emotional arousal, it seems overly simplistic to conclude that if a woman is truly aroused by monkeys having sex, then she actually wants to have sex with one.
I mean seriously. It's this simplistic black-and-white view of sexuality that makes women so confused about what they want and how they feel. No, I don't think women want to bed bonobo monkeys, but if seeing them mate makes them think of sex and consequently become aroused, then by all means lust away.
