Clothing Line Exposes the Gender Orgasm Gap
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A t-shirt line created by a 25-year-old clothing designer in Athens, Greece, is sparking a conversation about the gender orgasm gap.
Sofia Metsoviti told Mic that the taboo around female orgasms isn't limited to conservative circles and that even her "extremely forward-thinking" friends seemed reluctant to talk about the fact that women's sexual pleasure is often overlooked. That inspired Metsoviti to start her "It's Not Done If I Don't Come" clothing line.
Georgios Athanasiou/Sofia Metsoviti - sofiametsoviti.com
Georgios Athanasiou/Sofia Metsoviti - sofiametsoviti.com
"It's very narrow-minded to define sex as penetration," Metsoviti said. "For me, sex is pleasure and orgasms and there are many ways to get there."
The point of the t-shirts is to open up the conversation and eliminate the stigma associated with female orgasms, Metsoviti says. And there's data to back her up, too. A 2009 report from the National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior found that 91 percent of men reported climaxing during their last sexual encounter while women only climaxed 64 percent of the time.
As FiveThirtyEight reports, the survey also revealed a "perception gap" among men:
"Eighty-five percent of men said their partners in that recent sexual encounter had reached climax, far higher than the percentage of women who said they orgasmed. That can’t simply be explained away by saying that the men were referring to different sexual partners. Most of these sexual encounters were heterosexual — 92 percent of men and 98 percent of women said their last sexual encounter was with someone of the opposite sex."
Metsoviti hopes her t-shirts will narrow that perception gap and lead to greater gender equality in the bedroom.
"To wear a statement like that is just being confident," she told Mic. "[I'm] unashamed to say very clearly that the female orgasm can't be taboo or a 'special treat' for women. I wanted it [the slogan] to be empowering to women because they deserve nothing less."
[h/t Mic]
