# Why do sexual utopias always fail? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 1, 2007, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360 "2007-06-01T16:09:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/1 "2007-06-01T16:09:40Z")
It’s got to be the oldest “new” idea in human history: “why don’t we just toss out our hangups about sex and form a society where people can have sex all they want all the time?” From hippie communes of the 60s & 70s to the Free Love movement of the 19th century avant-garde and the Oneida Community to as far back as some communalistic heresies in the Middle Ages, and presumably even older. Yet obviously none have endured. So something must be fundamentally wrong with the concept. Why exactly do attempts at such societies always fall apart? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/2 "2007-06-01T16:12:51Z")
Sexual jealousy and possessiveness seems to be hard-wired into both sexes’ psyches. Something to do with [sociobiology.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sociobiology) Also, “free love” doesn’t sound so appealing any more when you’re a single mom whose baby might have been fathered by any of a dozen men whose full names you never learned and whom you have no idea how to find. ---
**Author:** ![Mosier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ea924/32.png) [@Mosier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mosier)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/3 "2007-06-01T16:13:27Z")
Because sex is yucky. And the movements are never about just the sex. They’re about using sex as a weapon against the establishment. Or something. ---
**Author:** ![Huerta88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/82dd89/32.png) [@Huerta88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Huerta88)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/4 "2007-06-01T16:16:14Z")
And the part about having “all the sex you want all the time” could be over-optimism on the part of the people (I suspect usually male people) who may have over-estimated others’ desires to just have a lot of sex all the time (given that I’ve met very few women who want this, as such, but lots of guys who would). ---
**Author:** ![Don\_t\_fight\_the\_hypothetical](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/59ef9b/32.png) [@Don\_t\_fight\_the\_hypothetical](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Don_t_fight_the_hypothetical)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/5 "2007-06-01T16:16:29Z")
I would guess that it’s more attractive if you _don’t_ have it. Honestly, I bet it would get old quick. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/6 "2007-06-01T16:23:28Z")
[QUOTE=Don’t fight the hypothetical] I would guess that it’s more attractive if you _don’t_ have it. Honestly, I bet it would get old quick. [/QUOTE] I dunno about that. Rulers with harems seem to have made a lot of use of them. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/7 "2007-06-01T16:23:39Z")
Venereal disease? ---
**Author:** ![Eureka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/74df32/32.png) [@Eureka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eureka)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/8 "2007-06-01T16:31:56Z")
Swiped from a recent IMHO thread on [Making Peace with Being Single](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=422225&page=1) > [@DianaG](#): > > There is, IMO, ONE feeling that comes from being firmly partnered, that most people don’t think about until they aren’t anymore, and then miss it terribly. It’s the feeling that you’re the most important person in the world to someone. It’s a simple but powerful affirmation, and when it’s gone, it’s hard. I ended a ten year relationship last year, and every day I’m glad that I did. I like being single, and on the whole I’m a pretty happy person, but I’m nobody’s Most Important Person, and that feeling sneaks up on you every once in a while and sucks out loud. That’s what your friend is going through right now, and no one can really help her with that. It’s something you just accept and live with. > > Like others have mentioned, the key to being a happy single person is to be a happy person. Have stuff in your life that you care about and enjoy. And realize that every once in a while, you’re still going to be lonely, and feel unsure about your personal worth and your place in the scheme of things. Of course, in my experience, being in a relationship doesn’t really make any of those feelings go away, either. But when you’re single, it’s easy to forget that. It’s not _quite_ on topic, but on the other hand, I think there may be a sense in which a sexual utopia is “just like being alone only with lots of theoretical sex”. Add in some jealousy, some possesiveness, some wanting to be somebody’s Most Important Person, some frustration when what was supposed to be the child with half a dozen fathers instead appears to be the child with half a dozen deadbeat dads–all pointing fingers at each other, and I think you have situation more or less doomed to be unstable. ---
**Author:** ![Hilarity\_N.Suze](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hilarity_n.suze/32/6223_2.png) [@Hilarity\_N.Suze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hilarity_N.Suze)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/9 "2007-06-01T16:33:37Z")
And of course the other side of this, the much more common side, is a society where monogamy supposedly rules and adultery is looked down upon, to the point where it is punished (often quite severely). Yet has there ever in history been a society where adultery didn’t happen? ---
**Author:** ![plnnr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7ea924/32.png) [@plnnr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/plnnr)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/10 "2007-06-01T16:38:44Z")
The Oneida Community didn’t succeed? Maybe not at being a free love commune, but it did succeed in that the businesses started as the financial underpinning of the community are still in existence. The Oneida Silverware company is, IIRC, the largest in the world. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/11 "2007-06-01T16:49:22Z")
[Swinging](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swinging) and [polyamory](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polyamory) do, at any rate, persist as alternative lifestyles practiced by a minority of the general population. I doubt we will ever see them die out or be suppressed by the government. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/12 "2007-06-01T17:37:48Z")
So besides the fact that it apparently runs against basic human wiring, and the fact that having sex all you want may mean hardly at all, and not at all with that guy or gal, which conflicts with that guy or gal having all the sex that they want, what else? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Mosier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ea924/32.png) [@Mosier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mosier)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/13 "2007-06-01T17:40:16Z")
[QUOTE=DSeid] So besides the fact that it apparently runs against basic human wiring, and the fact that having sex all you want may mean hardly at all, and not at all with that guy or gal, which conflicts with that guy or gal having all the sex that they want, what else? 🙂 [/QUOTE] You’re exhausting. Oh yeah, don’t forget venereal disease, mentioned earlier. ---
**Author:** ![An\_Arky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/87869e/32.png) [@An\_Arky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/An_Arky)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/14 "2007-06-01T17:40:36Z")
I think sexual stuff’s been covered; I’d like to add that the vast majority of any kind of utopias fail, anyway, or if they succeed, they aren’t actually utopias anymore, due to what it took to succeed. ---
**Author:** ![mswas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e99b99/32.png) [@mswas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mswas)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/15 "2007-06-01T18:18:56Z")
There is a lot of instinctual jealousy as has been covered. It’s very stressful to fight against neurologically imprinted social norms. Also in a lot of these situations there is an overarching idea of sexual fairness, where it is frowned upon that you turn down sex, or have sex more often with certain people leading to those who are not desired and not getting laid. Being the loser who can’t get laid in a sex commune is probably devastating to the psyche. When it becomes ‘the point’ it’s overdone. Most of the polyamorous people I know are successful at it because it’s not the main focus of their lives. They have sex with people when they find someone they want to have sex with, not as some sort of social experiment. ---
**Author:** ![LonesomePolecat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a88e57/32.png) [@LonesomePolecat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LonesomePolecat)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/16 "2007-06-01T19:27:17Z")
[QUOTE=Hilarity N. Suze] Yet has there ever in history been a society where adultery didn’t happen? [/QUOTE] No. But does the fact of theft discredit the concept of rightful ownership? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/17 "2007-06-01T20:43:17Z")
Envision a sexual utopia where everyone can have sex freely with anyone they want to. All the men decide they want to have sex with Angelina Jolie. All the women decide they want to have sex with Brad Pitt. The result of this is that Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt have sex with each other and the rest of us are right back where we are now. ---
**Author:** ![Huerta88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/82dd89/32.png) [@Huerta88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Huerta88)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/18 "2007-06-01T20:55:15Z")
[QUOTE=Little Nemo] Envision a sexual utopia where everyone can have sex freely with anyone they want to. All the men decide they want to have sex with Angelina Jolie. All the women decide they want to have sex with Brad Pitt. The result of this is that Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt have sex with each other and the rest of us are right back where we are now. [/QUOTE] It’s worse than that. All the men want to have sex with Angelina Jolie six times a day. Most of the women want to have long walks on the beach with Brad Pitt before snuggling in front of the television and Discussing The Relationship. Check out the respective volume of posts for: [http://chicago.craigslist.org/search/cas/?query=w4m](http://chicago.craigslist.org/search/cas/?query=w4m) and [http://chicago.craigslist.org/search/cas/?query=m4w](http://chicago.craigslist.org/search/cas/?query=m4w) (and disregard that scuttlebutt on CL has it that many of the “w4m” posts are fake). It strikes me that the reason most sexual utopias don’t get off the ground is the shortage of women interested in random sexual hookups (and the ones that do get off the ground are probably the ones founded by the most persuasive and magnetic of the horndog guys who would envision such a utopia). ---
**Author:** ![lekatt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lekatt/32/7269_2.png) [@lekatt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lekatt)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/19 "2007-06-01T21:01:57Z")
[QUOTE=Lumpy] It’s got to be the oldest “new” idea in human history: “why don’t we just toss out our hangups about sex and form a society where people can have sex all they want all the time?” From hippie communes of the 60s & 70s to the Free Love movement of the 19th century avant-garde and the Oneida Community to as far back as some communalistic heresies in the Middle Ages, and presumably even older. Yet obviously none have endured. So something must be fundamentally wrong with the concept. Why exactly do attempts at such societies always fall apart? [/QUOTE] Using sex for recreation is much like using drugs, or alcohol. The high gets to be less and less until it just don’t mean anything anymore. It becomes boring. Then the real human nature sets in with squabbles and fights and break-up. Anything founded on less than unconditional love is temporary. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2007, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360/20 "2007-06-01T21:42:36Z")
[QUOTE=lekatt] Anything founded on less than unconditional love is temporary. [/QUOTE] Incorrect, since some people have lifelong relationships. And no sane person feels unconditional love, so relationships that last that long are seldom if ever built on that. Put me in the “we just aren’t made for it” camp. Also, such a utopia is built on the assumption that everyone has the same taste in sexual culture; as children are born or outsiders enter that “utopia”, there will be more and more people who don’t want a sexual free for all. A **true** sexual utopia ( or as near as human nature allows ), IMHO, would be one where everyone is free to pick his or her preferred sexual lifesyle. Orgies for some, lifelong exclusive relationships for other, and so on. A “utopia” built on some ideological view of sex isn’t much of a utopia at all. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-sexual-utopias-always-fail/406360.md?page=2)