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Arch Sex Behav (2012) 41:261270

DOI 10.1007/s10508-011-9851-0

ORIGINAL PAPER

Constructing Masculinity in Response to Womens Sexual Advances


Jennifer Lara Fagen Peter B. Anderson

Received: 24 October 2007 / Revised: 10 December 2010 / Accepted: 27 July 2011 / Published online: 24 September 2011
 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2011

Abstract Drawing on 20 in-depth interviews with men who


reported unwanted sexual experiences with women as adults,
this article addresses how masculinity informs their lived experiences of this type of contact. One of the main themes that
emerged from this research was that participants constructed
masculinity by engaging in sexual gatekeeping or setting limits
on womens sexual advances. Whereas sexual gatekeeping has
been perceived as a passive role for women, it may be entirely
agentic for men. That is, sexual gatekeeping played a vital role in
preserving the gender dichotomy that informed the traditional
sexual script for our participants. Since it is consistent with masculinity to take a proactive role in heterosexual sex, a mans
perceived sexual objectification by an initiative woman can be
experienced as a violation. In order to regain their proactive role,
male participants set limitations on womens sexual advances.
Keywords Unwanted sexual experiences 
Sexual gatekeeper  Sexual script

Introduction
Researchershavenotedmensreportsofhavingunwantedsexual
experiences with women. Felton, Gumm, and Pittengers (2001)
sample of 146 college students (81 female, 65 male) gleaned that
12.3% of the men (compared with 11.1% of the women) had
J. L. Fagen (&)
Department of Sociology, Social Work, and Criminal Justice,
Faculty of Sociology, Lamar University, Beaumont,
TX 77710, USA
e-mail: jfagen@my.lamar.edu
P. B. Anderson
Faculty of College of Health Sciences, Walden University,
Minneapolis, MN, USA

experienced unwanted heterosexual intercourse when they were


in college and that these results could be replicated across different college environments. Larimer, Lydum, Anderson, and
Turner (1999) surveyed 296 male and female pledge class members at a large state college. Approximately 21% of the men and
28%ofthewomenreportedexperiencingsometypeofunwanted
sexual contact. In Russell and Oswalds (2001) sample of 285
college-age women reporting heterosexual dating relationships,
18.2% of the participants reported engaging in some type of verbal or physically coercive behavior to obtain sexual intercourse
from men. Twenty-three percent of participants reported obtaining sexual intercourse by saying things they did not mean, 10.4%
reported obtaining sexual intercourse through continual arguments,and2.6%indicatedtheyhadusedphysicalforcetoobtain
sex play (e.g., kissing, petting)from men.
TheseresearchersusedtheSexualExperiencesSurvey(SES),
developed by Koss and Oros (1982), to investigate the sexual
victimizationofmen.TheSESisthemostcommonlyusedsurvey
insexualcoercionandrapeinvestigations.Itdefinessexualcoercionasunwanted completed sexual intercourse subsequent to
the use of overwhelming verbal pressure or misuse of authority.
The version of the SES used in the cited studies was modified to
make it possible to ask questions about men as victims as the
original SES was informed solely by womens experiences.
Sexual victimization is one of the few examples of scientific
inquiry that has neglected men as the objects of investigation.
That is, women are posited as the norm and surveys informed by
womens experiences are extrapolated to men. If the systematic
omissionofwomenslivedexperiencesinmostareasofscientific
inquiry has led to a limited understanding of social life, perhaps
the dearth of research on adult male victims of womens sexual
aggressionprovidesonlyapartialunderstandingofthistopic.Put
another way, mens lack of participation in investigations of
unwanted sexual experiences has prevented researchers not only
from understanding mens experiences, but it prevents us from

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gaining a true understanding of the complexities of this phenomenon as it affects both sexes.
The current research fills this gap in the literature by ascertaining how men describe unwanted sexual experiences with
women in their own words. Instead of attempting todegender
women, this research reconceptualizes men as embodiedor
genderedsubjects whose experiences are contingent upon
their social location. Embodiment indicates that humans experience and perceive the world through the body or, as Harstock
(2006) stated,bodies tell stories(p. 182). Once men are viewed
as embodied subjects, the ways in which masculinity informs
mens perception of unwanted sexual experiences can be elucidated. We know of no study of womens initiation of sexual contact that allowed men to frame and define their experiences of
that contact through in-depth interviews.
The traditional sexual script, which was first defined by
Gagnon and Simon (1973), guides thesequencing of sexual
behavior leading to intercourse(Frith & Kitzinger, 2001). There
are manylayersto the traditional sexual script. The sexual
behaviors that are informed by social norms regardingproper
masculine and feminine gender roles, such as which sex should
initiate each type of sexual contact, is referred to as the cultural
scenario. The cultural scenario only works at a theoretical level,
as it may not coincide with the interpersonal script, which is the
behavior that actually occurs during a sexual encounter. The intrapsychic script refers to ones own sexual desires, which may conflict with the cultural and/or interpersonal scripts (Gagnon &
Simon, 1973; Simon & Gagnon, 1987, 2003). For instance,
although the cultural script dictates that a man should always be
willing and ready to engage in a sexual encounter with a woman,
he may not feel comfortable doing so when the moment arises.
Further, he may desire being in a submissive sexual role (intrapersonal script), which may contradict his cultural script. The
interpretation of these violations is foreground in our research.
The possibility that men may interpret a cultural scenario violation as sexual aggression is a prospect worthy of exploration.
Once again, the traditional sexual script dictates that men are
supposedtobetheinitiators,whichrelegateswomentotheroleof
sexual gatekeeper,the one who sets limits on a mans sexual
advances. Researchers have argued in support of several reasons
why women become sexual gatekeepers. First, parental investment theory, which draws from both social and evolutionary
explanationstoaccountformensandwomensdifferentsexual
strategies, posits that women are more likely to refuse mens
sexualinitiativessincewomenhavemoreatstakeiftheybecome
pregnant (e.g., time, financial resources) (Bjorklund & Shackelford, 1999; Buss, 1994). Other researchers claim that womens
sexual gatekeeping preserves the assumption that women do not
enjoy sex as much as men (the male sex drive discourse), which
leads to an inhibition of womens sexual expression (Albino
Gilbert,Walker,McKinney,&Snell,1999).Moreover,sincesex
with many partners lowers a womans worth while enhancing a
mans (Littleton & Axsom, 2003; Milhausen & Herold, 1999), a

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womans initial refusal of a mans sexual advances will decrease


the likelihood that she will be perceived as promiscuous, which
would prevent her from beingrelationship material(Murnen,
Wright, & Kaluzny, 2002). According to Lottes (1993), sexually
experienced women are considered to be undesirable as wives
and girlfriends due to mens anxieties that their sexual competence will be compared with previous partners.
Finally, under the rubric ofthe traditional sexual script, women
should appearinterested, sexy, and concerned about the mans
needs while they are resisting mens advances (Murnen et al.,
2002). For women, then, gatekeeping is a performance enacted
for the benefit of men. This performance prevents women from
taking on the positive responsibility for sexuality on their own
terms(Lottes, 1993). Sexual gatekeeping plays a vital role in preserving the gender dichotomy that informs the traditional sexual
script.
Some researchers claim that the traditional sexual script is
being reinvented. For instance, Anderson and Aymami (1993)
used a26-item questionnairethat included itemsfrom theSexual
Experiences Survey (Koss & Oros, 1982) and the Rape Myth
Acceptance Scale (Burt, 1980) to assess the difference between
college mens and womens reports of womens sexual initiation. The 212 female and 128 male (non-paired) participants
showed significant gender differences in perception of womens
sexual initiation on 15 questionnaire items. For instance,
although only 14.7% of female participants reported that they
had gotten a man drunk or high in order to have sexual contact
withhim,44.9% ofmaleparticipantsreportedthatawomanused
this tactic with them. Most relevant to the current research,
95.2% of male participants indicated that they had been the
recipients of female sexual initiation and 92.6% of the women
indicated that they had initiated sex with a man. This study was
replicated by Anderson and Sorenson (1999) with similar
results. Of the 163 women and 82 men in college-level sexuality
classes who participated in this study, male participants reported
significantly more aggression by women than women selfreported on a majority of the questionnaire items. As in the 1993
study, there was a shared perception of womens sexual initiation: 89.4% of female participants indicated that they had initiated sexual contact with a man and 93.8% of male participants indicated that they had been the recipients of womens
sexual initiation. This appears to reflect the deconstruction of the
traditional sexual script.

Method
Participants
This study involved in-depth, face-to-face interviews with 20
men, most of whom were students at a large university in the
northeastern U.S. Only one of the participants was married at the
time of the study (none of the other participants had ever been

Arch Sex Behav (2012) 41:261270

married) and one participant indicated that he was living with a


girlfriend. All participants had either graduated from, or were
currently attending, college. All participants were middle to
upper-middle class. Two participants were Latino/Hispanic, one
was Asian, and the remaining 18 were Caucasian (non-Hispanic
whites). The age range was from 18 to 39, with a median age of
19.5. One of the participants was homosexual (although he did
not identify as such during his unwanted sexual experience).

Measures
A schedule of nine interview questions (see Appendix) was
followed during each interview. The questions were simply used
as prompts to elicit feedback from participants. Pre-topical
discussions were also used as a tool to elicit definitions from
participants that were consistent with their experiences, as
opposed to using terms (i.e., sexual coercion, rape, sexual victimization) with which they may not associate. Participants were
told that they should treat the interview as an informal conversation and were encouraged to discuss their experiences openly.

Procedure
After the IRB approved the investigation, participants were
recruited via posters placed around theuniversity anddistributed
to several sociology and criminal justice classes. The recruitment posters read: Male participants needed for a study on
unwanted sexual experiences with women. Would you be
willing to contribute to a study that raises awareness that this
happens to adult men? Your input will be confidential and
greatly appreciated. Participants were not compensated for
their participation and interviews were conducted with only
one participant at a time.
Interviews were conducted over a period ranging from the
summer of 2004 to the summer of 2005 as it took approximately
a year to recruit 20 men for this investigation. The average
length of each interview was 75 min, during which time a semistructured conversation took place in a private office in the
universitys sociology department. Interviews were audiotaped
and fully transcribed by the primary investigator. Each subject
was given a written consent form, which was approved by the
Human Subjects Committee, to read and sign prior to commencing the interview. Each participant was then reminded of
his right to terminate the interview at any time and for any
reason. None of the subjects chose to terminate the interview
process. Subjects were also provided with a list of psychologists
and rape counselors (including counselors on campus) whom
they could contact with any issues regarding their sexual
experiences. All counselors and psychologists on the list were
called in advance of the investigation to ensure that they would
be willing to see participants/take on new clients if necessary.

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A Demographic questionnaire asking subjects age, marital status, living situation, socioeconomic status, religious affiliation,
and sexual orientation were completed by subjects immediately
following the interview.
The interview process was informed by Devaults (1990,
1999) and Kaufmans (1991) methodological guidelines. The
primary goal was to transform the interviewee from a mere
subject into an integral part of the investigation. Men typically
do not have the opportunity to discuss unwanted sexual experiences. Therefore, they might not have access to words that
adequately describe their experiences. Since the purpose of
the current investigation was to ascertain mens experiences
through their eyes,unwanted sexual experienceswas defined
by participants during the interview processnot by using preexisting definitions that have yet to be informed by mens experiences. This process allowed men to construct their own meanings of their experiences.
As delineated below, although Devaults (1999, 1990) work
informed our research, we were most concerned with participants subjective perceptions of their unwanted sexual experiences. That is, we did not want participants to be limited by
structured questions that reflected ouror societysgendered
assumptions. As Mayer, Kosmin, and Keysar (2001) explain,
The discovery of the social boundaries is determined as much
by the questions asked as by the subjective meaning associated
with those questions on the part of the respondent (p. 17).
Therefore, interviews were purposefully unstructured in order
to allow men to speak in their own voices. This technique, to
which Kaufman (1991) refers as structured conversations or
loosely structured interviews,allowed men to be the subjects
rather than the objects of our research.
Attentiontoprocessesoftranslationwasappliedtotheediting
process. Linguisticquirkswere left intact in the transcription
process. These linguistic quirks include hesitations, self-corrections, and contradictory speech (Devault, 1990). Although
some of theumshave been deleted in order to draw attention to
the content of the narratives, it was important to preserve participants speech in order to reveal the gendered nature of their
experiences.AsDevault(1999)explains,thepurposeoffeminist
research is to recover gendered meanings that have yet to be
unearthed since traditional language does not allow for its
expression. The linguistic quirks reveal these gendered meanings and cannot be edited without obfuscating the gendered
nature of mens experiences. An example of a self-correction is
evident in the following participants narrative: I have been
forced, like, ah, when I went to a private school. I wasnt forced,
uhMost importantly, since this was an exploratory study, we
looked for common themes that emerged throughout the narratives, rather than constructing our analytic framework a priori.
Finally, when writing about an investigation, the labeling
process is essential. Labels can validate or invalidate experiences. Hence, the analysis of narratives reflects the labels participants used to describe their experiences during the interview

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process (rather than the investigators labels). The following is


an example of a participant labeling his own experiences:
Interviewer: What would you name the experience that
the high school woman didand the college woman did
what would you name that?
Craig: Umthey just kind of like solicited you almost,
like
Interviewer: Solicited you, okay.
Craig: Yeah, they, um, or like recruited. III dont
knowI dont really know. I dont know if you could put
one word to it.
Results
Most participants experiences did not fall under the rubric of
what is traditionally defined as sexual aggression. Even in those
cases where some level of force was used by women to obtain
sexual contact, a majority of participants described feeling powerful duringtheirsexual encounters.However,onemayconsider
thefactthatthesemensinterpersonalscriptsmaybeatoddswith
cultural scenarios. That is, the cultural scenario that dictates men
should be receptive to any sexual contact with a woman does not
coincide with the discomfort they actually felt when confronted
withthissituation.Thus,mostparticipantsseemedtofeelambivalentabouttheirsexualexperiencesandhaddifficultydiscerning
between feelings of pride and victimization. The following quotations are organized around masculinity discourses, with some
men adhering more closely to their masculine identity as expressed through their sexuality. In some cases, men used their sexuality to toy with women. Put another way, they used their
sexuality to draw a womans sexual interest without the intent of
reciprocatingsexually.Inothercases,menusedtheirsexualityas
a weapon toput women in their place.They seemed to feel that
their masculinity was fleeting and their focus was on solidifying
this identity in the face of a perceived threat by sexually initiative
women. In this case, the role of gatekeeper was essential for the
iteration of a masculine identity as indicated by the hostility
throughout mens narratives, during which they castigated initiative women for beingslutty.Next, some men felt that they
were assaulted, so to speak, by womens beauty, rendering participants helpless against their sexual initiatives. Lastly, some
narratives revealed that women had taken drastic measures to
assert their power over men. Despite the fact that, in these cases,
feelings of victimization were most salient, participants still had
some trouble extricating feelings of pride from feelings of degradation. To illustrate each theme, a few participants were chosen from our total sample.
Playful Masculinity
Some participants played the sexual gatekeeper role for their
ownamusement. They enjoyedthepowerandcontrolassociated

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with knowing that women would provide sexual favors for them
while refusing to sexually gratify these women in return. These
men seemed to feel comfortable with their masculinity as they
were able to be flexible in this identity; they could play the traditionally feminine role of sexual object and then reassert their
control (and hence their masculinity) seamlessly.
Carl was 20 years old at the time of the interview and stated
that he was sexually coerced by his 21-year-old woman
friend. One night, after drinking a lot of alcohol, his friends
flirtation became increasingly bold, which amused Carl as he
could get her to perform any sexual favors he requested:
She just basically made a move and at that point I was still
like,Maybe not, maybe not.Im, you know, being hard
to get and seeing what I could get her to do. And shes
doin everything and anything that I could ask her to. At
this point, I was having a blast, um, but still not committing to doing anything.
Despite the fact that the woman was being sexually initiative,
this situation was consistent with the traditional sexual script
in that Carl was orchestrating her every move. The situation
went from being perceived as a blast to being perceived as
coercivewhen she suggested that she wanted to have sex for
her own pleasure. Despite Carls redefinition of this situation,
he eventually gave in and had sexual intercourse with her,
claiming that she got him tothe point of no return:
If shes physically, you know, doing things to turn me on,
or shes doing things, saying things, she really, really
getting me into the moment, into the mooda lot of other
things that I might be thinking about may be totally forgottenshe set a pretty good trap.
Aidan is an Asian, Catholic man who was 21 and single at the
time of the interview. He described an incident that occurred
when he was at a fraternity party about 3 years prior to the
interview that he labeled sexually coercive. Aidan claimed
that an 18-year-old woman had been trying to get him drunk in
order to manipulate him into having a one-night-stand. Like
Carl, he found this womans interest in him amusing and decided to play hard to get in order to see how far she would go in her
attempts to get him to have intercourse with her:
I just played along cause I can hold my liquor pretty well
so I just played along with herI think she just wanted a
one night thing, you knowI knew she wanted to get in
bed with me and I didnt want to do anything. The whole
night we were there I just knew it. I was just like playing
her game. I just tried playing it as long as possible until she
likeuntil she gave up, which she basically did.
This woman was not benefiting from her efforts to seduce
Aidan. As soon as she got to the point at which there might have
been sexual contact that benefitted her, Aidan put an end to the
game,as the following excerpt indicates:

Arch Sex Behav (2012) 41:261270

I just kinda stopped flirting with her. I just stood around


and talked. She just, shes like,you know what? Youre
so gayand Im likeI just laughed at her. I just stopped
flirting. I didnt feel like having the whole game.

Angry Men and Slutty Women


Thefollowingnarrativesindicatethatparticipantsfeltthatwomen
whotransgressedthetraditionalsexualscriptbywantingtohave
sexwithoutacommitmentoremotionalattachmentweretaking
aim at their masculinity. It is interesting that these women were
referred to asslutswho were degrading themselves rather than
sexual women attempting to degrade men. Thestupidorvulnerableslut narrative allowed men to put themselves in the
traditional masculine role of protector rather than expressing the
more salient feelings of vulnerability and objectification. Another
commonality between these participants, which points to their
aversion to sexually agentic women was that, although they
appeared to object to promiscuous sex on moral grounds, they
expressedawillingnesstohaveone-nightstandsaslongasthey
weretheinitiators.Thisensuredthatthetraditionalsexualscript
and their masculine rolesremained intact during the sexual
encounter.
Sean is a white, Catholic, heterosexual male who was 19
years old and single at the time of the interview. Sean claimed
that he was sexually coerced by a woman after football practice the year prior to the interview, but he prevented intercourse
from occurring. He said that the woman wouldnt leave him
alone until she got what she wanted. Although Sean thought
that this woman was very beautiful, he appeared to be turned off
by the fact that she asked him if he had a condom, as the following excerpt indicates:
Like they dont just say straight out do you have a condom,I mean, but maybe this girl was just like a total slut.
Other girls sorta let me approach them and wait until I go
therelike sexually. Its just way too slutty for a girl to be
the one whos like hey, you got a condom. Like you
dont know where shes been, you know what I mean?
Sean described these experiences as totally cool yet coercive, perhaps reflecting inconsistencies between his cultural
scenario and interpersonal script. Further, this womans sexual
agency (and, ironically, concern for her health) was perceived
asslutty.
Justin was 19 years old and single at the time of the interview.
He is a white, agnostic, heterosexual male who said that his
experience with an ex-girlfriend waskind of coercive.Justin
had broken up with his girlfriend with whom he continued to
have sex. He perceived the sexual intimacy as something his exgirlfriend used to preserve the relationship, despite his disinterest. Justin said his ex-girlfriend would use her little pouty
face(to which he referred asemotional aggression) in order

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to persuade him to have sex. Since Justin and his girlfriend broke
up, he had never let their sexual intimacy lead to sexual intercourse. He recounted pushing her off of him at times in order to
prevent sexual intercourse from occurring.
Justin explains the stupidity of aggressive girls. Of particular interest is that Justin asserted that women render themselves powerless and vulnerable when they are sexually aggressive. He then contradicted himself by claiming that his ex-girlfriend used sexual assertiveness to gain power over him. This
contradiction lends itself to the interpretation that the participants obvious irritation with women who put out may be
attributed to his perception that this behavior is used to exert
control over him (and men in general), as he suggested in the
following excerpt:
Oh [laughter]. Wellguys are assholes on the whole like
and even if there is a nicelike Im a nice guy, I really
am, like Im still an idiot when it comes to some things like
Im still an asshole, but, and not to offend you in any
wayI hope I dontbut girls are stupid. Girls are really
stupid [laughter]! They just shouldnt put themselves in
the situation like ififespecially this girlshe knows
whats going on and I said it to her face so many times and
just drilled it into her brain, she shouldnt be lying in my
bed naked like looking for this like she should know that
Im taking advantage of herher control over me was her
having sex with meher having sexual acts with me or
whatever. But, in the long run, it just proved that I kind of
got annoyed with it. It wasnt any fun anymore; like I
knew that I could just go have sex with this girl. Ilike I
could do whatever I want with her and wheres the fun in
that? Id rather have a girl whos a lot more liketheres
more of a pursuit, I guess.
Although Justin cited his ex-girlfriends emotional attachment as the primary reason why he did not want to have intercourse with her, his real reason was revealed when he contrasted
the ex-girlfriend (who initiated sex) with the new girlfriend who
allowed him to retain power in their intimate relationship:
Shes like my friend fromone of my best friends from
back homethis is like her first like relatlike in high
school she was really, really reserved. She never had like a
boyfriend, I dont think she like got kissed in high school.
She was always really, really pretty girlshes an awesome, awesome girl, but shes also very innocent, very,
um, stillshe still is reserved, so itsits a lot more of
like a pursuit, trying toeven likeits like Im the
aggressor now kind of instead of having to deal with this
girl whos always all over me
The issue that Justin had with women who tried to exert
control over him by not allowing him to be the sexual initiator
also extended to women he did not know. Again, Justin constructed his masculinity by equating womens manipulation/

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sexual power over him with womens vulnerability and


stupidity,as the following passage indicates:
I dont know if youve ever hung around here [the university] on Friday or Saturday nightespecially a Thursday night. The girlswhat they go out in is, I dont know,
kind of humiliating in a way to them. Very demeaning.
Like why wouldyou would never see a guy go around in
something that wouldnt leave anything to the imaginationLike theyre like yelling at you, like talking to you,
likeand like its fine, like its fine to go just talk to like
random girls, especially when theyre scantily clad at
some point, like its fine, like its not like Im complaining,
but like, um, at the same time its liketheres no pursuit,
like theyre just drunk girls that youand you know that
thats when theyre acting stupid. Thats when there isnt a
real fun pursuit is when theyretheyre dressed like sluts
and acting like sluts, basically.
It is clear from this quote that Justin was disgusted with
women who did not let him retain his masculine role in the
traditional sexual script. Whereas Justin initially expressed
antipathy toward stupid, vulnerable girls who think that sex
will lead to an emotional attachment, this excerpt revealed that
Justin is actually disgusted by women who do not want sex to
lead to an emotional attachment. Clearly, Justin did not believe
that theslutty bar girlswanted a relationship with him. When
women only want to have sex for the sake of pleasure, they are
adopting a traditionally male understanding of sexuality. When
women adopted this masculine role, it intimidated Justin. Instead
of expressing his feelings of vulnerability, he constructed masculinity by using rhetoric that suggests that thesesluttywomen
are degrading themselves. Clearly, Justins narrative reflects the
traditional notion (which informs the traditional sexual script)
that women are diminished by sexual expression.

Uncontrollable Masculinity and Irresistible Women


Another theme that arose from mens narratives was their perceived sexual vulnerability when confronted by an attractive
woman. Mens vulnerability was not attributed to womens
actions or words, but to their beauty. Although it may appear that
male sexual vulnerability runs counter to traditional notions of
strong and invulnerable masculinity, this type of vulnerability is
directly linked to assumption that men are unable to control their
sex drives. Women are therefore held responsible for igniting
mensuncontrollablesexual urges. Male sexual vulnerability
at the hands of a beautiful woman falls squarely under the rubric
of hypermasculinityor an exaggerated form of masculinity
which accounts for the open and repeated expression of this
theme by participants.
Joe was 32 years old and married at the time of the interview.
He is a white, protestant, heterosexual male. He describes an

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incident that occurred when he was about 18 years old with a


woman who was 34 years his senior. At the time of the incident,
Joe had been involved in an exclusive relationship with another
woman for approximately 3 years. One night, Joe was partying
at a house on campus when a woman invited him back to her
sorority house. When they arrived, sheripped offJoes pants
and performed fellatio. Although Joe asserts that this wassexually coercive,he said that it was not forceful (he referred to her
initiatives quick and blunt). The coercion was blamed, in
part, on the fact that she was beautiful, older and popular and that
she used this beauty to seduce him andget what she wanted.
Joe reported that he could not refuse this womans initiatives,
despite the fact that he had an exclusive girlfriend whom he did
not want to betray (a betrayal that ended the relationship).
I definitely think that she didnt have a boyfriend and
she was beautiful, she was older and, you know, she sees
something she wants and shell try to get it, you know, and
she did [laughter] she sort ofused her sexual attraction, um, and herwho she washer stature, so to speak.
Again, I know it sounds kind of vain and stuff like that and
shallow, but um, yeah, to get what she wanted.
Joe even blames (albeit indirectly) this woman for the suffering
incurred by his girlfriend due to his infidelity. He contrasts the
beautiful, promiscuous, sexually agentic woman with his innocent, vulnerable, loyal girlfriend. He also insists that the coercion was not only physical, but mental, since he had to deal with
the psychological ramifications of betraying his girlfrienda
betrayal over which he felt he had no control:
I was so guilted [sic] by it that I told her and we ended it.
Thats how guilty I was by it, you know. Maybe thats part
of the indirect kind of coercion about what, you know,
mentally what it did to me, you know, I just did something
so wrong to this poor, innocent girl that didnt deserve to
beyou know, she did nothing wrong.
Marc is a white, heterosexual male who was an 18 year old
college freshman at the time of the interview. He discusses an
incident of unwanted sexual contact that occurred when he
was in high school. A girl with whom he had previous sexual
contact performed oral sex on him in an empty classroom. She
then wanted to have sex with him in the girls locker room, but
Marc initially refused because he was not very adventurous
and he didnt want any of the other girls to see him. However,
Marc insists that this girl made itimpossiblefor him to refuse
due to her beauty:
It was uncomfortable because I didnt want to get caught
but she was not making it easy for me to say noI wanted
to but not in that situation. I wanted to, like I said, to be
safer, a little easier place for me to deal with, but she
wasnt making it easy to say noShe was a little older and

Arch Sex Behav (2012) 41:261270

attractive to me, but part of me was saying stop being a


little girl about it and do something risky.
Marc doesnt appear to be too disturbed by this situation. In
fact, when asked how he felt about it, he states:I was kind of
walking around with a little strut cause [sic] I did something
that I had never done before. However, Marc was unsure
whether this incident would fall under the rubric of forced sex
(although his initial inclination was to refer to it asforced), as
he indicates in the following statement: I have been forced,
like, ah, when I went to a private school. I wasnt forced, uh, I
guess theres.well, Iyou can decide whether I was forced
or not.
Marcs analysis of this situation is certainly gendered in that
what he perceives to be forced sex (although he eventually expresses some ambivalence regarding this label) did not involve
physical force or even verbal pressure. Marc associatesforce
with the fact that he couldnt resist a beautiful woman. In other
words, Marcs inability to control his arousal is what he equates
with forced sex. The only portion of the incident that Marc
found at all uncomfortable was the fact that the sex occurred in a
public place. However, this was also something that gave him a
sense of pride and heightened masculinity, as he suggests when
he refers towalking around with a little strut.
Marc felt that if he did not take some risk by having sex with
this woman (particularly since she wanted to have sex in a public
place), he wouldnt be fulfilling his masculine gender role as is
evident in the following statement:but part of me was saying
stop being a little girl about itBeing perceived (by oneself or
others) as a woman or girl has serious implications for men who
have been taught that the most important aspect of being a man is
the suppression and denigration of the feminine. Since masculinity is associated with overt heterosexuality, engaging in adventurous and risky behavior, and the willingness (and desire) to
have heterosexual sex at any time, Marcs refusal of this womans
proposal to have sex in a public place would have left him feeling
emasculated. Marc felt as if his masculinity, rather than his body,
was at risk during the sexuallyforcefulincident.
Victimized Masculinity
Feelings of victimization are most salient in the following narratives. Despite the fact that these narratives are most closely
associated with current definitions of sexual victimization, coercion, and even rape, such feelings are still tempered by societal expectations of masculinity as expressed through sexuality.
That is, in some cases these men attempted to reciprocate sexually, rather than passively experience what seems to have been
an extremely disquieting situation. Yet others appeared to have
difficulty extricating their feelings of victimization as a result of
a sexual violation from feelings of anger associated with the fact
that their role in the traditional sexual scriptthat of sexual
initiatorhad been denied them.

267

Noah was 39 years old and single at the time of the interview.
He is a white, Roman Catholic, heterosexual male. When he was
18 years old, Noah was picked up by a woman while hitchhiking. He was not drinking, although it is unclear as to whether or
not the driver was sober. Once Noah was in the car, the woman,
who he said was approximately a year or two younger than he,
pulled over to the side of the road in a desolate area, reached
over, unzipped his pants, and began to perform oral sex on him.
This experience was described by Noah ascoercive.He stated:
I think what bugged me about thatclearly the coercive nature
of it it was definitely coerciveUh, yeah. The whole thing
was creepy. Despite the fact that Noah initially described this
situation as coercive, he was not only complicit in the womans
initiatives, but he also sought to regain control over the situation by attempting to touch her sexually. However, the woman
repeatedly refused these attempts, which made Noah feel disempowered:
So then she, uh, you know, just leaned across the seat and
went at it and I reached out to the back of her and started
using my hands and she said No, no, no, just you, just
you The situation was not in my control. She was
completelyliterally and figuratively in the drivers seat.
When asked how he felt about this incident, Noah indicated
that he felt ashamed and empty. However, his feelings were
not associated with the sexual act itself. Instead, he attributed
feelings of shame and emptiness to the womans aggression
and coldness. After the woman performed oral sex, she
expected him to get out of the car and walk the rest of the way
home:
Horrified may be an overstatement. How empty I felt
after. Like when a woman describes having a one-nighter
on campus and then walking home the next day feeling
ashamed, like thats how I felt getting out of the car. I dont
think I was necessarily ashamed by what happened. It was
almost like totally like shocked at her coldness and her
aggression, you know? So thats what I remember thinkingThis girlshe was a girlwas like an aggressiveand I want to put it in quotesquote unquote like
an aggressive man and, you know, and thats, uhI think
thats surprising and, like at the same time, my reaction
was that I was used, which sounds crazy.
Noah described another situation when he had sexual intercourse with a complete stranger that he did not labelcoercive.
One night, when he was 19 years old, Noah was walking on a
boardwalk by a beach. He noticed that the woman walking in
front of him kept turning around to look at him. Noah thought
that this woman was interested in asexual liaison,so he asked
her if she wanted to go to the beach, where they had sexual
intercourse. Since a conversation hadnt preceded their sexual
contact (Noah claimed they spoke no more thanthree wordsto

123

268

Arch Sex Behav (2012) 41:261270

one another), Noah wasnt aware of the womans age or whether


she had been drinking.
Although this woman initiated the sexual contact with Noah
(eye contact, slowing down so that he would approach her), she
was not transgressing her role in the traditional sexual script
since she allowed Noah to feel as if he made the first move. In
other words, since her flirtation was passive and subtle, she
allowed Noah to assume the masculine role of initiating the
sexual contact by asking her to go to the beach, which he claims
was a euphemism for fooling around. Noah said that he
remembers feeling that this experience was very exciting. When
asked what made the beach incident exciting whereas the car
incident was horrifying and coercive, he provided the following explanation:

and the next thing I remember is that [his friend] left the
room cause he just wasnt interested in going that farhe
was a virginso he wouldnt go that far and he left, and
she came back later and realized that I was passed out and
basically just did what she wanted to, so, and, I, uh, the
only conscious action I remember having at the time was
that later on that morning, like probably a couple of hours
later when I kinda realized what happened, I just like
crawled in the shower like cause I didnt know this girl
[laughter]Im trying to scrub my skin off, do you know
what Im saying? I didnt know where this girl had been,
but I knew she had a kid and thats it. I didnt know her
name, I never met her before or anything, so, and thats
pretty much the whole story.

No, I didnt feel coerced with her. You know in a way I


was kind of in pursuit in that situation, so maybemaybe
thats what was so uncomfortable with that car situation. I
was not in pursuit. Like Im more comfortable pursuing.
Im not comfortable when Im being pursuedthat night
[in the car] for sure I was pursued and that was a weird
feeling.

Other than concern about diseases, Tyler said that he wasnt


feeling anything after the incident occurred. In fact, if no one
told him about it, he wouldnt have known that it happened. He
said that its hard to have feelings about something that you
didnt know happened. Tyler also said that he was not a very
emotional person and that this incident is not something he
really thinks about. However, as the interview progressed, he
described feelingpissed off.Interestingly, his anger was associated with the fact that he was not the one who (directly or indirectly) initiated the sexual contact:

Noah felt as if he was not in control of the sexual contact during


the car incident since the woman assumed the masculine role of
being direct in expressing her sexual desire. On the other hand,
the woman on the beach wasfeminineand indirect. Although
it was clear to Noah that the woman on the beach wanted to have
sexual contact, she expressed her desire in a way that allowed
him to maintain his dominant position in the traditional sexual
script.
Tyler is different from the participants described above since
he was too intoxicated to use sexual gatekeeping to prevent
intercourse. Tyler is a white, heterosexual, Christian male who
was 32 years old and single at the time of the interview. The
incident occurred when he was 20 years old and the woman was
in her early twenties. He was at a friends cabin, where everyone
had been drinking. Tyler described being so drunk that he fell
down the stairs and hallucinated. The next morning, Tylers
friend told him about the sexual contact:
How was [womans name] last night? And Im like
Whos [womans name]?Hes like,The girl you were
with last night.And Im like,Dude, I dont know what
youre talking about. Who the hells [womans name]?
So, hes describing the situation to me and I didnt know
anythingwhat the hell hes talking about, until I like
remembered it later on.
As the morning progressed, Tyler recalled some of the things
that happened to him the preceding night:
And basically, from what I remember now, I was on a floor
passed out in the room and I remember [his friends name]
coming in with her, and she was like making out with him

123

I dont like anything happening that Im not in control of.


You know what I mean, II race, and just the things I
doI mean, in extreme sports, you have to be just like in
complete control all the time, so I think it more of the fact
that something happened that I wasnt in complete control
of, you knowis what pissed me offI mean, I was out
of it and I was not in any way initiating anything
Tyler proceeded to explain that the situation would not have
angered him very much if he had initiated the interaction with
this woman earlier in the evening: I dont think it would have
been so bad if it was somebody I was interested inI might have
shown interest in her earlier in the evening, and maybe that
would have provoked it, you know what I mean? Tyler intimated that the incident could have been viewed asrapewhen
he stated:
I dont know what the hell youd call it except just taking
advantage of someone. I mean, I guess ifit all depends
on how you look at itwhat you name things, you know
what I mean? Like if a guy did it to a girl theyd probably
call it a rape.
Discussion
Our study reveals that, for some men, perceptions of womens
sexual initiation were constructed within the context of the
normative heterosexual paradigm within which men are initiative

Arch Sex Behav (2012) 41:261270

and women are denied sexual agency. Since a woman who initiates sex is transgressing her gender role, she can be perceived
as being aggressive or manipulative. In addition, since it is
consistent with masculinity to take a proactive role in heterosexual sex, a mans objectification by an initiative woman can be
experienced as a violation. That is, the experience of womens
perceived sexual aggression violates every assumption of masculinity. Since men are socialized to believe that masculinity is
contingent upon the rejection and devaluation of the feminine,
being put in thefeminineposition in a sexual encounter could
be perceived as a thoroughly gendered experience. In order to
regain their proactive role in the traditional sexual script, male
participants set limitations on and, in some cases, vehemently
refused, womens sexual advances. Hence, in our research, male
sexual gatekeeping can be reinterpreted as a new form of masculinization.
According to McIntosh (1988), it is imperative that data
gleaned from studies of mens sexual coercion be explained in
terms of the institutionalized and embedded forms of male
privilege. In this study, mainstream discourses of unwanted sexual experiences, which are framed by womens experiences,
were inadequate in describing mens lived experiences.
This research adds to the vocabulary of sexual coercion and
points to a need to reframe sexual coercion as a gender-specific,
embodied experience. The ubiquity of gender tends to make
it difficult to elucidate precisely how, and under what conditions, it is constructed. The construction of gender (and gender
inequality) is most visible when gender roles are violated. The
current research was able to reveal how masculinity was constructed through heterosexual sex at the moment when this gender role was transgressed. Participants reportedly felt violated,
or diminished, when put into the traditional female role. These
men constructed gender through their narratives of sexual victimization. As Purvis and Hunt (1993) state, what makes
some discourses ideological is their connection with systems of
domination. Ideological discourses contain forms of signification that are incorporated into lived experience(p. 497).

Appendix
Interview Questions
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.

What prompted you to share your experiences with me?


What type of sexual contact occurred?
What was your relationship with the other person?
How long had you known this person prior to the sexual
experience?
How old were you and the other person at the time of the
experience?
What did she look like?
Were you or the other person drunk during the sexual
experience?

269

8.
9.

If you were drunk, who provided the alcohol?


How did you feel before, during, and after the experience?

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