We all have an idea of what’s a womanizer. Most would say that Casanova, Warren Beatty, Howard Hughes, Elvis Presley, Marlon Brando, Frank Sinatra, Tiger Woods, Simon Cowell and Hugh Hefner fit the bill. The list is very long. The core of the definition deals with a) the volume of women and b) the majority of women find these men highly attractive- in one way or another. One is “not” a womanizer if he, for example, has only bedded 3 women and there are little feelings by the women for him. To be sure both factors, volume and degree of attractiveness, are difficult to calculate and quantify but they are the essential ingredients of the definition.
But what about a “manizer,” a woman who does to men what womanizers do to women both in volume and in feelings?
Awhile back, I was having a drink with my friend, G, and we were wondering about the paucity of manizers. After all women do enjoy sex and it’s much, much easier for them to capture a man to make whoopee than the other way around. So what’s the story? Well, in the past the Big Kahuna for sexual exploratory women undoubtedly was the fear of pregnancy. But then about a half a century ago came oral contraceptives, antibiotics, safe surgical abortion procedures and, more recently, diminished social sexual restrictions- all widely opening the doors for a potential era of wild manizerism. These happenings have resulted in a surge in man-woman copulations, femmes’ fatales and succumbing men. But where are the lady Casanovas and Brandos? Why are they not brandishing their sexual swords?
G and I called a few of our worldly male friends. None could name a single manizer though we had no problems identifying women who, such as Ava Gardner and Lana Turner, succeeded in breaking men’s hearts but in small numbers. Blaze Starr, the great striptease artist on an interview after her heyday, claimed she made love to lots of men including President Kennedy, and was sorry she didn’t bed with more. But where’s the evidence? Bottom line, there is no documented female Tiger Woods and has not been since maybe Catherine the Great of Russia who is believed to periodically line-up her palace guard.
I’m now going to make a few observations from my personal experiences, which are just those of curiosity and not yet-if ever- of fact. I knew three women who had more than one man on the hook at the same time. One had two and the others three. I attended separate cocktail parties held by them where all their men were invited but who were not aware of the others existence until that night. But all three ladies, by their words and actions, unabashedly let them know that they were dating the others and apparently enjoying their revelations without apparent concern for their feelings. I had never observed this type of behavior with men and their lady friends.
Many years ago, when I first became interested in heterosexual versus homosexual behavior, I was surprised to learn that homosexual men can have up to hundreds of sexual partners in a lifetime while lesbians usually have a handful. Scientifically, I cannot assume that heterosexual women are the same as homosexual ones, but will take the chance and assume so when it comes to sexual partners. Women, unlike men, aren’t by nature, volume oriented particularly as they enter their late twenties. Despite what modern propagandists and thought controllers are telling us, women are more private than men and prefer limited sexual relationships where they can be comfortable and can control situations, as exemplified (though maybe a bit of a stretch) by my unscientific observations of the three aforementioned women. They were in total control, comfortable and even enjoying it, which in my opinion, is a form of fantasy.
But another puzzling question entered my mind. The word, “womanizer “has virtually disappeared from the American vocabulary and I wonder why. Let’s not forget that this word was established by women and has an angry pejorative, anti-male meaning to it. Could it be that many of them have now become manizers and have joined the womanizers fearing to be exposed as hypocrites if they attack these womanizing men? Have the Don Juans now been joined by the Don Juanas?
First published in Baccalà’s blog on October 2, 2013.
Lorenzo Baccalà is an Italian American physician, author and social philosopher. Over the years he has witnessed our changing cultural and religious values including the mighty impact of the sexual revolution on individual, family and national values.
The Man Who Made Love to More Women than Casanova And the Apocalyptic Aphrodisiac is a book about his friend, G’s, sexual encounters with 300 women. Baccalà writes about the broader subject of the sexual revolution on his blog and Twitter.
