{"id":4901,"date":"2025-10-18T10:53:34","date_gmt":"2025-10-18T10:53:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.soham.de\/women-need-a-reason-to-have-sex-men-only-need-a-place\/"},"modified":"2026-05-01T18:28:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-01T18:28:11","slug":"women-need-a-reason-to-have-sex-men-only-need-a-place","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.soham.de\/en\/women-need-a-reason-to-have-sex-men-only-need-a-place\/","title":{"rendered":"Women need a reason to have sex. Men only need a place."},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Women need a reason to have sex. Men just need a place.\" The latest book on sexuality that I have just read begins with this provocative statement. Michael Bader, US psychoanalyst and expert on male sexuality, tells us in his book \"Male Sexuality\"<\/em> what men really often think and feel about women during sex: \"Deep down, most men don't see women as objects or conquests. They actually worry about them - even worry too much. They're not too selfish, they're too guilty. They are not predatory, but lonely.\"<\/p>\n

This statement can be off-putting for some readers. That's how I felt when I read the first few pages of this book. However, the explanations and interpretations of sexual fantasies and practices that came later gave me a new perspective on some sexual behavior. This new interpretation convinced me. It's about fantasies and behaviors that men often have towards women and that we women don't approve of.<\/p>\n

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In this article, I summarize the most important aspects described in Bader's book on this topic.<\/p>\n

Sexual desire: not just a simple reflex<\/h2>\n

For all people, sexual desire is not simply the consequence of an innate and involuntary arousal reflex. Sexual desire arises much more from the meaning we attach to certain events - for example, a fleeting touch, an intense gaze. Our mind constructs this meaning, not our erogenous zones!<\/p>\n

Between our innate sexual potential and the particular individual manifestations of pleasure lies a psychological system that either allows sexual arousal to flourish or suppresses it completely. This system<\/i> is unconscious and can be a minefield for our pleasure.<\/p>\n

Too much responsibility cools the desire<\/h2>\n

Suffice it to say that humans are wired in such a way that we cannot achieve maximum arousal when we feel overly responsible for others. Nor when we are worried about their well-being, sensitive to shame and rejection, or depressed about ourselves. Fortunately, the same mind that creates a problem for sexual arousal also provides us with a possible solution. We see such solutions all around us: these are our sexual fantasies and sexual preferences. Sexual fantasies and preferences are the means to counteract the chilling effect of guilt, worry, shame, rejection and helplessness.<\/p>\n

Male projections and sexual fantasies<\/h2>\n

Many men, for example, grow up with the unconscious assumption that the sensitivity they observed in their mother lies dormant beneath the surface in all women. This can give rise to the secret belief that women tend to be disappointed by men and by life.<\/p>\n

The result, according to the author, is a sensitive and not particularly well-disposed attitude towards male sexual advances. This conviction can lead to weakened sexual self-confidence in adulthood.<\/p>\n

The antidote to this is often the fantasy of a cheerful, confident and sexy woman who wants nothing more than to please her man. There is no danger of being insulted or rejected by her. This fantasy scenario temporarily negates the feelings of guilt that men often have when they act sexually confident and demanding and live out their passion.<\/p>\n

Unconscious feelings of guilt and objectification of women<\/h2>\n

As they grow up, men develop a particular form of guilt towards women that impairs their ability to let themselves go <\/i>sexually. They solve<\/i> this problem by, for example, objectifying women and separating sex from intimacy. Men who grow up with women who were depressed or very overwhelmed in their role as mothers often develop a deep - if unspoken - conviction that they are unlovable. They believe that their need for love and care burdens other people.<\/p>\n

Sex workers offer the solution to this conflict. With a sex worker, a man<\/em> can be the center of her attention. He doesn't have to do anything special, but he can do what he wants and she doesn't mind. Paying for sex is often intriguing because it solves a problem and counteracts irrational feelings of guilt and worry about others.<\/p>\n

Deep down, a man who has grown up under these conditions desperately longs for love. However, he unconsciously believes that he can only receive it if he sacrifices himself instead of expressing his own needs and desires.<\/p>\n

Caregiver<\/em> or lover?<\/h2>\n

An overwhelming sense of responsibility has a paralyzing effect on the libido. In long-term relationships, the relationship with one's mother is practically re-established. The man begins to feel and behave as a caregiver rather than a lover towards his partner.<\/p>\n

If we look beneath the simple surface of sexual arousal, we find a complicated psychological process that most of us are completely unaware of. People only become sexually aroused when their imagination finds a way to temporarily negate or overcome their inner blocks.<\/p>\n

The value of this author's explanatory approach to sex lies not only in its ability to explain the meaning of a person's particular fantasies and behaviors, but also in revealing their key emotional conflicts. When sexual fantasies and desires emerge as solutions to psychological problems, and when these problems are linked to underlying anxieties and conflicts, then sexuality becomes a powerful window through which we can view the workings of the psyche.<\/p>\n

Since sexual arousal can only arise when a psychological problem has been temporarily solved<\/i> by a fantasy, the study of fantasies is really a study of the twists and turns of the deepest levels of the psyche.<\/p>\n

Pathogenic beliefs<\/h2>\n

Pathogenic beliefs describe feelings and attitudes that affect not only sexual pleasure but also general happiness. All children usually develop pathogenic beliefs that often last a lifetime and are a reaction to their family environment. A pathogenic belief usually develops in childhood. It is based on the assumption that the relationship with parents is somehow compromised when people pursue a normal goal or pleasure - for example, sexual passion, emotional independence or the pride of being the center of attention.<\/p>\n

Pathogenic beliefs are not conscious abstract theories about the world, but emotionally charged and mostly unconscious thought patterns that children naturally develop in order to understand the world around them. If their mother appears unhappy, children automatically take responsibility and do everything they can to help her, even if they hurt themselves in the process.<\/p>\n

Pathogenic beliefs feel less like a conscious choice and more like an inherent part of the world. As long as the child takes responsibility for the trauma and holds both the actual trauma and their reaction to it unconsciously, they do not have to deal with reality.<\/p>\n

Due to the vital need to maintain a secure attachment to their parents, it is safer for children to assume that they can influence their caregivers than to assume that they cannot.<\/p>\n

Deciphering sexual fantasies<\/h2>\n

All different forms of male sexuality reflect strategies to circumvent or overcome unconscious pathogenic beliefs that dampen erotic desire - beliefs associated with feelings of worry, guilt, rejection, shame, loneliness and helplessness.<\/p>\n

According to Michael Bader, if we can understand sexual behavior as an imaginary solution to underlying problems, then the distinction between sexually conventional and bizarre<\/em> behavior breaks down.<\/p>\n

The meaning of sex is often characterized by opposites.<\/h2>\n

While some men like to be dominated in order not to feel guilty and responsible, we encounter other men who like to dominate in order to overcome feelings of helplessness. As soon as we accept - according to Bader - that sexual preferences are actually psychological strategies for solving problems and not biological or moral deviations, we can stop feeling ashamed of them. Our subconscious has an enormous ability to perceive psychological dangers and develop creative solutions quickly and efficiently.<\/p>\n

This is a universal problem, but it takes different forms for boys and girls. While both genders have to detach themselves from their mothers, boys have the additional task of identifying with a completely different gender. Boys not only have to become individuals separate from their mothers, but also male individuals.<\/p>\n

The boy's path into the world of masculinity<\/h2>\n

Reinforced by certain gender stereotypes in our culture, boys often fulfill this dual task of leaving the nest and becoming masculine by turning masculinity into a negation or rejection of femininity.<\/p>\n

This need to more actively deny the mother's gender gives the developmental process of boys a special twist in three respects:<\/p>\n