An Advice Columnist Who Obviously Never Knew Me Back in the Day

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“Another flaw in the [friends with benefits] scenario is that the older generations haven’t learned how to have casual sex. For people in their 40’s and older, the standard for relationships has been monogamous marriage. While that may not be the right thing for everyone to do, it’s what we’ve been taught. So when a person wants to try something different, they’re navigating uncharted territory.”
— Johanna Lyman

This startling assertion was enough to get a reaction from Professor Glenn Reynolds, who is about the same age as me and who, I guess, was doing more than studying law all the time back in the day. My temptation to start telling stories about the 1970s and ’80s is tempered by the suspicion that Ms. Lyman would never believe half of it.

However, it never occurred to me that “how to have casual sex” was some sort of arcane skill that had to be learned, as if practicioners thereof were teachers instructing novices in the grand mystery. 

We were just young and restless and bored. Livin’ by the sword . . .

UPDATE: Welcome, Instapundit readers!

UPDATE II: Linked by Moe Lane and Bill Quick — both of whom are probably old enough to remember when “friends with benefits” was known simply as fornication.


47 comments

  2. Didn’t she ever see Austin Powers?  That was you and Reynolds in the day, correct?   Well without the bad teeth and British accents. 

  3. Dear God, Stacy, don’t tell Johanna about college.   The poor thing’s head would explode.  My high school had enough casual sex to make Hugh Hefner blush.  And I graduated in 1975.

    The younger generation always think they invented sex.  I know that my generation thought that……until we grew and realized the truth.

  5. Heck, don’t tell Johanna Lyman about Genesis.  I hate to break the news to her, but there are a lot of wild things written about in that book. 

  8.  I suppose the only thing roaring about the 1920s was bootlegging. When I was in high school (Washington&Lee in Arlington VA) we thought we were “trailblazers”. A history of the county came out in 71 the nickname for W&L in the twenties was “maternity prep”.

  10. I was in high school in the ’70s, college in the early ’80s. Yes, Virginia, they did have sex back in those days!

    Casual sex is the emptiest, least satisfying experience I’ve ever had. Sex with the one I love, on the other hand–after 27 years, there’s still multiple O’s and sh!t-eating grins afterwards.

  11. O/T: I know Jim Hoft hasn’t exactly been a fan of Herman Cain, but apparently it’s come to this among Republicans.

    I think I’m getting close to being done with caucusing with Conservatives.   Enjoy the Mitt Sandwich, people, it looks like that’s what’s on the cram-down-your-throat menu.

  18. I believe Philip Larkin established the precise moment of the invention of sex and no, it did not begin when this wee lassie says:

    Sexual intercourse began
    In nineteen sixty-three
    (which was rather late for me) –
    Between the end of the Chatterley ban
    And the Beatles’ first LP.

    Up to then there’d only been
    A sort of bargaining,
    A wrangle for the ring,
    A shame that started at sixteen
    And spread to everything.

    Then all at once the quarrel sank:
    Everyone felt the same,
    And every life became
    A brilliant breaking of the bank,
    A quite unlosable game.

    So life was never better than
    In nineteen sixty-three
    (Though just too late for me) –
    Between the end of the Chatterley ban
    And the Beatles’ first LP.

  19. There was unmarried sex even before the pill and even in high school. Band trips were especially dangerous. More than one poor girl had “to go visit a sick aunt” and lose class time back then.  Despite the risks of shotgun weddings people still would ride bareback, condoms would break,  cars would get steamed up and rock at the drive ins.  Dad would ask Junior why were there foot prints in the head liner of the car? Mom would ask what are all those white spots in the back seat?  And yet not doing it with your intended until after marriage lent life a certain piquancy and humor that seems to be missing today.  One guy said he loved his wive but that he had to deal with a crying bride as she revealed that her breasts where mostly kleenx and padding.   Today’s generation seem to know all about the technical aspects of sex but nothing about the work it takes to love. 

  20. LOL. I was lucky to get anything done in the 70’s and early 80’s. Glad I made  it out of those years without piles of child support or social diseases. BUt I do treasure the memories. Just don’t tell the missus.

  23. F. Scott Fitzgerald said something to the effect that every generation thinks that it invented sex and nostalgia.

  37. What’s with the Alan Grayson add (yeah, I know you don’t choose them)?
    Do you get money from him if I click on it?

  38. There was a guy that tried for one on a similar basis in the early 20th century and he got shot down. Besides, if you love the girl the cup size is a secondary thing anyway.

  39. “However, it never occurred to me that ”how to have casual sex” was some sort of arcane skill that had to be learned”

    Not all of us are as suave as you, Stacy.  For us, that ‘arcane skill’ was learning the proper mixture of groveling and attentive flattery.  If you could’ve bottled that mojo, you’d have been a wealthy man 😉

  42. Medved had some show where he explained old marriage and church records from the American Colonial period showed a large percentage (20-30%) couples getting married when they were 16 and 17 and having kids six, seven and eight months later.  It was common on the frontier (they knew about sex, they worked on farms with live stock and knew exactly how things worked) and so long as you did the right thing, no big deal.  Where do you think those tales of “farmer’s daughters” came from? 

  44. http://linesthataregood.com/what.html

    These pick up lines completely suck!  Do they work?  If they do, that is a pretty damning statement for American women today. 

    I did watch Crazy Stupid Love the other day.  I do not want to give it away, but there was some pretty funny stuff on pick up culture.  Gosling had a pretty good “big move” that was a hell of a lot better than those lame lines above. 

  46. Wow.  You’ve demonstrated how much of a superstud you are (were).  Congrats. Asshole.

    For the record, I wasn’t having casual sex (or any sex) with anyone (except myself) in the whole 80s and until the very last few months of the 90s.  So I’m a little sick to death of the chest thumping going on.  You can all go fuck yourselves.

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