“Four Sluts in the City”
When I was 19 years old, the topic of Sex and the City came up during a Human Sexuality class in college, and one outspoken young man of similar age to me said, “It should be called Four Sluts in the City,” in a tone of disgust. I was so enraged by his comment that I nearly fell out of my desk, and it still upsets me almost 20 years later. At the time, I was not as outspoken as he was or as confident as I am now at 37, but I was just as opinionated. The difference between then and now is that I am eloquent enough to disagree gracefully. If that had happened today, I would not have sat there silently but raised my hand to dispute his view.
For starters, what qualifies someone to be a slut? The Oxford Language Dictionary defines “slut” as an offensive term for a woman who has several sexual partners. Three of the main characters on Sex and the City usually date the men they sleep with, while only one primarily engages in strictly sexual relationships. What exactly is the problem with either situation? Is there an equally offensive term for a man who has several sexual partners? A man like that might be called a stud, which has a clear positive connotation. While promiscuous men are often revered by their male counterparts, women might see them as being more of a catch for having had more “experience”.
So what, on the other hand, happens to a man’s perception of a woman when they learn they’ve had several different partners? A good female friend once told me that when her husband found out how many men she had been with before him, he told her that if he had known that, he would have never married her. I have another good male friend who was promiscuous in college. If men could be sluts, he would have been one. Then he started dating a girl who had never had sex, and he told me that he valued her more for that. He wanted to marry a girl who had never had sex before him and wouldn’t have sex with anyone else besides him. He saw her inactivity with men before him as an asset.
For me, my husband doesn’t want to hear about the details of my dating life before I met him. When my son starts dating, I hope that he sees a woman who dates as a positive. When he’s old enough, I’ll tell him that dating is healthy, whether male or female, because dating is simply looking for the best fit for you rather than settling for anything that doesn’t feel right. That’s what Sex and the City is really about anyway: figuring out what’s right for you in all aspects of your life, not just sex.
Growing up, I needed a show like Sex and the City. Even among my female friends, sex wasn’t always something they were comfortable discussing. The show became an ally to me in this way, a resource for learning about dating and being sexually active. While I have the whole series on DVD, its recent addition to Netflix has made it more convenient to watch while I’m eating lunch during a work day or winding down before bed… by myself. In rewatching it, I’ve noticed two things: I prefer to watch it alone, and when my husband is in the room, he makes a lot of negative facial expressions. When I picked up on this, I thought of that classmate from college and asked my husband, “What’s the problem?” Reluctantly, he said, “All they do is gossip about the guys they’re dating.”
Image by Mia Feitel
The 4 characters, after all, date and sleep with over 100 men over the course of 6 seasons. But that isn’t the issue: my husband explained that he didn’t like the idea of himself being spoken about that way. That’s when I finally understood why the show might make some men uncomfortable. That outspoken classmate from college probably also didn’t like the idea of women talking about him - at all - even though he felt comfortable saying that the women on the show were sluts in the middle of a formal college discussion.
There’s no way that men aren’t having their own conversations about sex and the women they’re sleeping with. So, once again, what’s with the double standard? In a society where it’s difficult for women to speak up for themselves - against harassment, the status quo, lower pay, sexual misconduct, or outdated parenting roles - how dare we have and then talk about lots and lots of sex and make men uncomfortable? When it comes to sex itself, consensual sex is enjoyable for both parties because it’s designed to be that way. But maybe the boldest act a woman can commit is to pursue, enjoy, and not feel bad about having sex.
The series finale of Sex and the City aired 20 years ago, but how far as a society have we come since then? Watching the show today made me realize that, in many ways, we have regressed, and our culture has become more conservative than not. When I was in college two decades ago, I could have had an abortion if I chose to; now, I could not. That’s why the addition of Sex and the City to Netflix might be coming at a time more critical than ever. The show may serve as an ally to younger generations of women by discussing dating and being sexually active, just as it was for me when I was younger.