Yep. You just described my parents' marriage, till they couldn't stand being each other's tormentor/scapegoat anymore and finally separated in their senior years.

My parents too, unfortunately. I guess that's part of why I wrote: does LW really want to drag this out into years, decades, marriage, children, etc.? Life is hard enough. When you're a person of goodwill but there's no goodwill on the other side of the relationship to match your own, it's time to go. You can't change your partner; you can only leave the relationship, or join the game like our folks did.

It is a truly lousy way to live.

Indeed it is. Indeed it is. I hope LW does not continue to submit herself to it; she sounds like a wonderful, vibrant person who can do OH SO MUCH BETTER.

he is assuming that women will put up with as much crap from men, even though they have some of their own money now, as men will put up with from women for sex, or to have some connection with their kids and a life. A stupid, but understandable, mistake.

First of all, 50's is a common way of abbreviating the decade. It kind of bugs me for the reason you mentioned, but it's not wrong.

Now, I might be crazy, but I kind of want to defend the point I think he is trying to make. I think he is trying to point out the irony that men (including himself) would like to have more opportunities to have sex, but that it is difficult to meet women and be successful in getting them into bed. In his mind, however, a moderately good-looking woman, if she were so inclined, could walk into a bar and find probably multiple men ready and willing to sleep with her. So, it is frustrating that women have plenty of chances to get laid but don't take them, while men would love to have the chance but it doesn't come along as often.

A male friend of mine has made the same point to me-- he's a relatively good looking man with a nice personality, but he estimates that his success rate in getting a woman to go out with him (I'm not talking about sex here) is maybe 1 in 10. Then, you go out, and maybe the date goes well and maybe it doesn't, maybe you go out again and maybe you don't, maybe you eventually end up sleeping with the woman, maybe you don't. Whereas, he says (and I think he's right) that I could go to a bar and find someone to go home with that night if I felt like I needed to get laid. But, it's something that I wouldn't do unless I was seriously, seriously sex deprived, and so from his point of view, there's all this wasted opportunity that he wishes he had.

Whether this has to do with differing sex drives in men and women at different stages in their lives, or is culturally conditioned, or whatever, it must be kind of frustrating from the point of view of a man who hasn't been laid in a while.

Although, men, I have to say, seeming kind of desperate to have sex isn't going to win you point with most women I know.

Simply because so many have been touting more numbers = more experience.

Not in my viewpoint, I figure the person that has slept with one person 100 times is likely to have more experience than the person that has slept with 50 people once or twice.

I think the numbers game is just a false gauge point.

Someone could have had one partner for 10 years and had more adventurous and varied sex than someone who's been barhopping/clubbing trying to get a different person in bed every weekend, because usually that new girl or guy isn't going to break out the vibrators or wigs with someone they've just met a few hours, days, or weeks ago.

it's the fact that many women subconscioulsy, and sometimes consciously, use the fact of these differences in situation to suggest that they are "better" than men (more socialy skillfull, more "balanced" in their approach etc. etc.) while at the same time denying, when it is politically convenient, the fact that these differences exist at all. BTW I am genuinely curious: has any women ever had a guy try to pick them up by opening up a conversation on this subject? I find it difficult to believe anyone would do that, unless they were blind drunk.

Thing is, anon, I think you're making a false assumption here: that women can get laid any time they want. If that were true, then the basis of just about every romantic comedy would be shattered. For that matter, there'd be no such thing as an unpopular hooker.

I'm a pretty good looking woman, but in my days of going out and getting laid (and sometimes that was indeed all I was doing) I still got turned down from time to time because the guy wasn't interested or wanted someone else. Maybe I could get laid whenever I wanted if I had no standards whatsoever, but so far I've drawn the line at standing at the street corner and yelling "Hey! Free sex here!" Even doing that, I think most men would avoid me. Most men have standards, too.

To quote Heinlein in I Will Fear No Evil, pretty girls get asked [for sex] more often than homely boys. But Heinlein's character--the once-homely boy--goes on to note that he managed to lead a pretty varied life even with that relative disadvantage. And I'd be willing to bet that pretty boys get asked more often than homely girls.

One more thing: IME girls don't often ask, not because they don't want to or because they're superior (not most of them, anyway) but because women are generally socially conditioned to be approached for sex, not to do the approaching. This has led to an amusing phenomenon in queer female culture: the "lesbian sheep". A gay woman who approaches other women has a decent chance just because she's asking. Otherwise, all the women hang out and wait for someone else to make the first move.