← Rena Malik, MD Podcast
Rena Malik, MD Podcast
Moment: Sex Researcher Explains Why Men Enjoy C*ckolding! ft. Dr. Justin Lehmiller
00:15:53
In this intriguing episode, Dr. Rena Malik is joined by Dr. Justin Lehmiller to unravel the intricacies of sexual kinks and fantasies, particularly focusing on cuckolding. The discussion highlights the significant gender differences in this fantasy's appeal and delves into related aspects such as humiliation and masochism. Dr. Lehmiller stresses the critical need for comprehensive sex education and porn literacy, pointing out how the absence of proper education leads adolescents to learn about sex through media like pornography and social platforms.
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- [00:00]
A
There's another fantasy that I think people talk about often that's not discussed often enough, but it's cuckolding. So let's describe what is cuckolding and how common is that fantasy?
- [00:09]
B
So cuckolding is basically where you're turned on by the idea of watching your partner have sex with somebody else, right? And there's also a flip side to that where you could be turned on by the idea of having sex with somebody else while your partner watches. So there's kind of like exhibitionistic cuckolding where you're putting on a show for your partner, and then there's voyeuristic cuckolding where you're interested in watching your partner put on a show. And I find that cuckolding is a very popular fantasy. A majority of men, I believe around 55 or so percent, say that they fantasized about it before. A minority of women have had this fantasy too, but it's much more common among men. And if you start to break it down by roles, women are more into the exhibitionistic cuckolding where their partner's watching them, and men are more into the voyeuristic side of things and watching their partner.
- [00:56]
A
You know, it's so interesting. I've spoken to some men who are considered, like, aspirational by other men, and they've told me that they don't get. So as a. As a social media personality, I will get propositioned right in my DMs. They don't get propositioned by women. They get propositioned by other men to have sex with their partners. So I didn't realize it was such a common, not only fantasy, but desire by men to. To see this or. Or have this happen with someone that they see as aspirational. Why do you think this is so common? Or not so common, but common enough that it happens?
- [01:28]
B
As with any fantasy, different people can be into it for different reasons. And, you know, there is a variant of cuckolding. It's often referred to as hot wifing if it's, you know, male, female, couple, where the appeal of it for the man watching his partner have sex with another woman and being desired by other men is that he's kind of getting off on the idea that he's with a partner who is just so hot and that other people want to be with her. And it's kind of like a status and ego thing in that way. For a lot of cuckolds, the appeal for them is that there's kind of like a BDSM element to it where the idea of watching their partner be with somebody else is humiliating or it's an act of masochism. You know, sometimes these guys, if you watch cuckolding porn, and I've watched some of this porn for research purposes because I had to. I actually wrote an article for Playboy about this a while back that went viral. And, you know, I needed to understand the fantasy, so I watched some of the porn. And in a lot of this pornography, guys are wearing, you know, cock cages, you know, these chastity devices while they're watching their partner have sex. And sometimes he's being humiliated for having a small penis in the process, too. So there's that BDSM element that is a big part of the appeal for some folks, but there's also, for some guys, a conversion element where they take pleasure in their partner's pleasure. And so seeing their partner be fully satisfied is what gets them off. So it could be some or all of those things. It kind of depends on the person.
- [03:04]
A
Let's dive into that humiliation factor because I. I've understood the dominance factor, right? Where you maybe want to let go of control. A lot of times we see a lot of people who are very dominant in life wanting to be submissive in the bedroom because they finally get a chance to be submissive. But tell me about humiliation. Why people enjoying that aspect?
- [03:26]
B
So humiliation is a form of masochism, right? It's painful to be humiliated, and some people are just turned on by pain, whether it's physical or psychological. There's something that is uniquely arousing about it to them. And part of what is appealing to folks about masochism in general is that it changes your headspace and it creates this kind of escape from self awareness and allows you to kind of like, be more present and in the moment. You know, there's something that is centering about pain that makes you forget about the outside world and everything else that's going on in life. So some people in the kink community will refer to this as subspace. You know, when you're engaging in submissive or masochistic activities, there's just that change in headspace, escape from self awareness that is part of the appeal. Again, different people can be into it for different reasons, but that's one of them.
- [04:23]
A
Interesting. And then the chastity belt or any sort of chastity device, I get a lot of questions like, is it safe? Is it safe? And I think as long as you're not, like, having prolonged erections and like, they're forced down with any sort of device. It's probably safe. I've also been curious, from a psychological standpoint, why do people find that appealing?
- [04:42]
B
So it's sort of the orgasm denial piece is. Is often of it, but it's also kind of about the humiliation and the masochism. And again, it's different for different people in terms of what is appealing to them about it. But there can also be a pain element associated with wanting to. You're turned on and your penis wants to get erect, but you're not allowing it to. And so, yeah, there's a lot of things that are going on there and why it might be appealing to some folks.
- [05:11]
A
Interesting. You wrote an article called Gen Z is the Kinkiest generation yet. So we've heard things about Gen Z. They're not having as much sex, but now they're the kinkiest generation. Why do you think that is?
- [05:25]
B
We see this in a lot of different data sources. So in my own data on sexual fantasies, I see that young adults report the most kinky fantasies. And I've actually plotted this out by people at different decades of life. And you see that kink fantasies are highest for people in their late teens through their 20s, and then they sort of decrease over the lifespan. Just as an interesting aside, fantasies seem to change in a lot of different directions as we age. And so while kink seems to go down in older age, people actually become more interested in non monogamy and threesomes as they get older. Right. There's kind of this stereotype of young adults as being wild and crazy and they're all having threesomes and kinky sex. But no, it's mostly just the kink. We also see this in a project I did with the dating app field where we surveyed members of that particular app and we find that they were the most likely to report that they've discovered a new kink since using that app. And we also see this in research by Dr. Debbie Herbenik and colleagues where there's this rise in sexual choking among young adults along with other kink behaviors. And in fact, one in three young women report that they were choked during their most recent sexual encounter.
- [06:37]
A
Yeah, Debbie Herbinek was on the podcast with me and I was so surprised. I had no idea how common it was. It was as common as like kissing, for example, in foreplay. And you know, she had discussed as likely due to the exposure to these sorts of things in pornography. Would you agree with that?
- [06:54]
B
I think porn is part of the explanation, but we have to Step back and say, well, why are they getting this information from porn? And it's because we're not giving them sex education. Right. So porn has become the default form of sex ed for a lot of adolescents and young adults. So it shouldn't be any surprise that they're learning from porn because. Because they're not learning about it anywhere else. And it's unfortunate. And I think it's part of the reason why we not only need better sex ed, but we also need porn literacy and sex ed to help young people contextualize what they're seeing on screen. And that porn sex isn't the same.
- [07:29]
A
As real sex 100%. I try my best to advocate for teaching your kids about sex, teaching your kids about pornography, and hopefully someday I will make a free sex ed course on YouTube. I have not done that yet, but I just feel like this is so needed. I mean, it's not the school's fault. They only have so much time to teach kids everything they need to teach in the curriculum. So they teach them, you know, safe sex, using a condom, consent. Those are all basic pillars of sexual education. But they don't get into knowing their anatomy. What's normal? What's, you know, is it normal to have even nocturnal emissions or wet dreams? Right. Like, I was like, oh, I haven't talked to my kids about that yet. I better start thinking about that, because they're getting older. And so, you know, I think it's an evolving thing that we have to take on as parents, and we can't bury our heads in the sand and just say, someone else will take care of it because that's someone else's pornography.
- [08:23]
B
Parents do have a responsibility here because, you know, the schools aren't teaching it, and where else are the kids going to learn about it? And if they're not going to learn about it from school, that means they're probably going to learn about it either from their friends or through porn. And their friends might know even less than they do.
- [08:40]
A
Yeah.
- [08:40]
B
And their friends just might also be regurgitating things that they've learned through porn, but also through social media. You know, I. I think part of the rise in rough sex among young adults is just kind of the normalization of rough sex on social media, where you see memes that say things like choke me, daddy, and so forth. And so when it's presented in this way that's normalized across multiple contexts, I think it leads a lot of folks to think that, you know, this is just the way that people have sex. And for some people it is. And if they enjoy it and it's all consensual and they're practicing it safely and in a risk aware way, that's fine, you know, no judgment. But for people who are coming at this without really knowing anything about safety practices, and that's where it starts to get problematic. And also when they don't ask their partner first before they engage in this behavior, that's very problematic as well.
- [09:28]
A
Yes, absolutely. And especially with choking, right? I mean, you could really harm somebody or cause brain damage if too long, too forceful. So those things are really important to get consent for and to understand that if it's a man doing it to a woman, which is more common, you're stronger and bigger by, you know, by nature. For the most part. For most, you know, that's always most likely going to be the case in most relationships. And so it's something to be really.
- [09:53]
B
Careful about and related to that when it comes to porn, like, I often liken porn to watching a cooking show where you're kind of like just seeing the highlight reel, right? And you're not seeing all of the behind the scenes action that happened. You're just kind of seeing a little bit that went into it and then the finished product and that's it, right? So in porn, you're not seeing the advanced negotiation that went on between the partners where they talked about their boundaries and what they were comfortable with. You don't see where they stopped to take breaks and where they reapplied lube and checked in with one another to make sure that everything was fine. And when people don't see all of that, they just sort of lose the context for this. And that's where things can kind of go awry and why porn is a terrible way of learning about how to.
- [10:39]
A
Have sex, or used AIDS to maintain their erection for longer than usual or even had a penile implant. You know, I mean, this is, this is real stuff that happens in pornography. And they're creating a product by all means, they're doing what they, you know, people are willing to go watch and pay with their eyeballs for watching ads. And, you know, they're making money at the back end of it. So it is, you know, if we stopped watching porn, there'd be no, like, you have nothing to complain about. Right? But people are watching it, so clearly there's a desire for it and there's an appetite for it and we have to have porn literacy. I want to switch gears a little bit. You talked about novelty as a Fantasy. And I think novelty is really, really important, especially in long term relationships or even, you know, shorter. But, you know, you're getting sort of into a sexual script that you follow with your partner. So what are some tips you have for people who want to incorporate novelty.
- [11:28]
B
Into their sex life if you've never really done this before with your partner? I think a good starting point is first by kind of like normalizing sexual communication. Right. And just get used to kind of talking about sex first before you start bringing new things into the bedroom. Because anytime you're trying new things, it can be a little bit stressful and there's potential for things to go wrong depending on what kind of new thing you actually want to try. So start first by working on the sexual communication piece. And then in terms of introducing novelty into the relationship, be careful in terms of how you bring this up to your partner. Because if you're telling your partner you want to try something new, sometimes that gets interpreted as you're not happy with the sex that we're having, or you're no longer attracted to me, or I'm inadequate or insufficient in some way. So I think a good way to introduce the idea of saying you want to try something new is to start first by complimenting your partner and saying, you know, I love the sex that we're having and I find you really hot and attractive and so forth. And I was thinking maybe it could be fun to try this new thing. And I think we'd both enjoy it and it'd be a lot of fun. And so when you sort of pitch it in that way, it reduces the risk that your partner is going to take it personally and that it's going to devolve into a conflict discussion. But then when it comes to actually trying it, I think it's important to kind of start low and go slow. So if you and your partner want to try sex toys for the first time, maybe don't buy the biggest dildo you can find. Right. As I often say, sometimes your eyes are bigger than your holes. Right. And so, you know, kind of start with baby steps, you know, in including if you want to explore kink in bdsm, like it's baby steps, the whips and chains. Right. Maybe just start with a blindfold. Just, just try one little new thing and get some practice with that. Because when you're trying new stuff, you just kind of need a little time to build up trust and intimacy and so forth.
- [13:25]
A
Yeah. And I think the other big thing is just like it's play, right it's supposed to be playful and fun and, like, things will go wrong, inevitably something weird will happen. You won't like a stimulation. You'll be turned off or you. Whatever. Right. Something may happen, laugh it off, move on. Like, try again the next time. Everything that you want to try takes a little bit of practice. Right. So. And it doesn't have to be crazy, right? I don't think you have to bring out whips and chains. It can be as simple as you mentioned as, like doing it in a different location. Maybe not in a public setting, but, you know, in, you know, in the kitchen or in a different room.
- [13:58]
B
Yeah. Any room in the house can potentially be a sex room. And anything is a sex toy, if you're brave enough.
- [14:03]
A
Well, I would argue I've taken too many things out of urethra, so please don't use anything as a sex toy. Just things that are meant to go in those orifices that have. Have flared bases. Please.
- [14:15]
B
I agree.
- [14:17]
A
And if you like that clip of The Rena Malik, M.D. podcast with Dr. Justin Lehmiller, make sure you check out the full episode right here.