What Men Think About Your Sexual History

No guy wants to date a whore. No guy likes the fact that his girlfriend (or potential girlfriend) has slept with a lot of other guys. Most guys want women who are sexually comfortable and have some experience, but the same men simultaneously prefer a woman who hasn't been sexually intimate with other men. Consider an excerpt from the post Don't Fuck On the First Date:

...when it comes to a potential spouse, guys don’t like the idea of a sexual relationship being “easy” any more than girls. We want to know that our date, or girlfriend, or spouse is a woman who is unobtainable to most if not all of the other men in her league. We don’t want to work for it per se, but we do want the kind of girl that guys of our caliber need to work for. We know that the best things in life never come easily, so if a girl let us have sex with her on the first date, it shatters the perception that she is someone unobtainable to other men.

The reality, of course, is that it is extremely rare to find a woman who is (a) a virgin, but also (b) open-minded in bed, confident with her naked body, knows what a guy likes in bed, etc. For better or worse, the latter qualities are the product of experience, and therefore preclude the former as a real possibility. Men know this, and are therefore willing to accept some degree of a girl's sexual history in exchange for some degree of her experience: we actually prefer a girl that has had sex with X number of guys because it means she will have A, B, and C qualities in bed.

The idea trade-off will be different for every guy, but the extremes - wanting a virgin or a whore - are rare enough that they aren't worth striving for - at least not if you want to attract a typical American guy. If you want a very religious man, he will probably prefer a virgin and you should plan accordingly; and there are even guys out there that will actually prefer a girl whose legs have been perpetually open. The thing to remember is that your typical American man wants a girl with some experience, but less than most girls in her demographic. So when it comes to choosing how many men to sleep with, always lag what is deemed "acceptable."

While I don't claim that my taste in women is representative of the average American (I do think it is reasonably close), I can tell you that my preference is a girl who has had sex with between 2 and 6 guys. Ideally, one of these would have been a drunken one-night stand, and another would be with a guy that took her on a few dates, had sex with her, and then bailed (so that she would have these experiences to better understand men - even if only to pass the lesson on to our daughters if we were to marry). The rest would hopefully have been men that she was dating seriously. Remember, these sexual encounters are good in spite of not because of what they imply about the girl (i.e. because of the lessons learned and experience). And remember that this is only my preference; the bolded sentence above is the generalized truth.

Now, all of this being said, there are a few interesting things to note:

1. Promiscuous men will be lenient in their expectations. You may have encountered men who claim to have sex with lots of women, but in their next breath demand virginity from girls they will actually respect. This attitude is not the norm. Most guys project their own standards onto women, in the same way that women project their own standards onto men. While a guy who has slept with 30 women won't prefer the same number from the girls he dates, he will identify and empathize with her decision to sleep around, and will therefore not mind as much.

2. You can't change your number, but you can change your attitude. Men know that although being a whore is more or less defined by how promiscuous a girl has been, what really makes being a whore troublesome (STDs aside) is the attitude that accompanies it. This is the attitude that says "I don't place any value on my physical or emotional health" and/or "I am insecure and need to be shown frequent affection from men, or constantly prove to myself how attractive they find me." This attitude can be changed. If you are reading this and are getting worried that the kind of guys you want will be disgusted by the number of guys you've slept with, you probably have the necessary motivation.

3.  Don't tell him how many guys you've slept with. Some guys will ask and others won't, for various reasons ranging from interest to insecurity. If he asks, I suggest you leave him in the dark. If your number is low, tell him it is "low," but don't give him a number. If it is high, just don't tell him. It does no good whatsoever to share this kind of information, aside from being slightly more open with him - but the same openness can be affected in other ways. However, the bad it does is two-fold:

• It makes more real and concrete in his mind the sexual experiences you've had with other men. Instead of being some vague, notional set of guys you've rolled around in the sheets with, it becomes X distinct sexual encounters with real men, to whom you felt some physical or emotional connection, either of which may have been better than the connection you have with him.
• If you have changed your attitude as described above, telling him your number only serves to connect your new self more strongly to the old self that slept around. Keeping that tie severed works in your favor.

I suggest saying something along these lines if you are questioned:

"Really? You actually want to know? Weird. I am not going to tell you anyway, but why would you care? No good can come from that conversation. Think about it."

And then if it is appropriate, explain the reasoning I give above. Most guy won't freak out if you don't tell them, but you should emphasize the reasoning given here as your motivation for silence, rather than letting his imagination wander and concluding that you must have a number so high that it can't be spoken.


Related Posts
1. How to Look Good During Sex
2. The Analogy Between Sex and Commitment
3. Never Tell a Guy When You'll Have Sex with Him
4. How to Turn a Guy Down for Sex