Olivia: We’re told today’s young women are the most sexually empowered generation in history. But what if the data shows the opposite? That for many, the price of this so-called freedom is engaging in sex they don’t even want, four times more often than boys do. Jackson: Whoa, hold on. Four times more often? That completely flips the script on everything we hear about progress and liberation. Where does a statistic like that even come from? Olivia: It comes from some incredibly deep and, frankly, courageous journalism. Today we are diving into Girls & Sex: Navigating the Complicated New Landscape by Peggy Orenstein. And this isn't just a book of opinions; Orenstein is a New York Times bestselling author who built this work on extensive, in-depth interviews with over seventy young women. She went right to the source. Jackson: So this is straight from the front lines. I can already tell this is going to be an intense conversation. Where does this pressure on girls even begin? It feels so pervasive. Olivia: It starts so much earlier than we think, and it begins with a performance. A performance of being "sexy" that our culture demands, which traps girls in an impossible double bind.

Jackson: A double bind? What do you mean by that? Olivia: I mean they’re shamed if they’re seen as too sexual, and they’re shamed if they’re not sexual enough. Orenstein shares this perfect, and infuriating, story about a high school senior named Camila. She’s at a "welcome back" assembly, and the male dean of students gets up and addresses only the girls. Jackson: Oh, I have a bad feeling about this. Olivia: You should. He tells them, "Ladies, when you go out you need to dress to respect yourself... You need to ask yourself: if your grandmother looks at you, will she be happy with what you’re wearing?" Jackson: Wow. So the school's official policy is basically 'cover up so the boys and male teachers can concentrate'? He’s putting the responsibility for other people's reactions entirely on the girls. Olivia: Exactly. And Camila, who is wonderfully outspoken, actually interrupts him in front of everyone. She stands up and says, "If I want to wear a tank top and shorts because it’s hot, I should be able to do that and that has no correlation to how much ‘respect’ I hold for myself. What you’re saying is just continuing this cycle of blaming the victim." Jackson: Good for her! But I can't imagine that went over well with the administration. Olivia: It didn't. Later, a female dean pulls her aside and tells her that her clothing is distracting to male teachers. Camila’s response was brilliant: "Then you shouldn't hire teachers who stare at my breasts." But the whole experience left her feeling dehumanized. She told Orenstein something heartbreaking. She said, "The truth is, it doesn’t matter what I wear... Four out of five days going to school I will be catcalled, I will be stared at... You just accept it as part of going to school." Jackson: That's just awful. It sounds like she’s being treated like an object, not a person. Olivia: And that is the perfect word for it. This is the core of what psychologists call "self-objectification." It’s when you start to internalize this outside view and see your own worth primarily through your physical appearance and sex appeal. You become a thing to be looked at. Jackson: Can you break that down a bit more? What does that actually look like in a teenager's daily life, beyond dress codes? Olivia: It looks like a group of boys at that same high school creating an Instagram account to "expose" the campus "THOTs"—That Ho Over There. They’d post pictures of girls with captions about their supposed sexual history. It also looks like what happened at an elite summer journalism program, where the boys created a "slut draft," ranking their female peers by "who they wanted to fuck." Jackson: A slut draft? That's horrifying. It’s like a fantasy football league for sexual assault. How do the girls even react to something so degrading? Olivia: That’s the insidious part of the double bind. They were furious, but they felt they couldn't complain. If your name was on the list, complaining made you a prude. If your name wasn't on the list, complaining meant you were just mad you weren't considered desirable. Either way, you lose. You're trapped. Jackson: But isn't there an argument for empowerment in all this? I mean, you see pop stars like Miley Cyrus around the time this book was written, with her Bangerz tour, being very provocative and seemingly in control of her own image. Isn't that a form of taking power back? Olivia: That's such an important question, and Orenstein tackles it head-on. She actually went to the Bangerz tour. And while on the surface it looked like a woman defiantly owning her sexuality, Orenstein concluded that Cyrus was still operating within a system that demands women present their bodies in a particular way to be heard. It blurs the line between liberation and just a different kind of exploitation. As one psychologist in the book puts it, "Objects don’t object." When you're taught your value is in being an object, it becomes harder to fight back. Jackson: So this performance of being 'sexy' is less about personal expression and more about conforming to a really narrow, and often dangerous, script. Olivia: Precisely. And this performance doesn't just stop at clothes and Instagram. It follows them right into the bedroom, which leads to this massive, unspoken problem: the pleasure gap.

Jackson: The pleasure gap. That sounds... significant. What exactly is it? Olivia: It’s the huge disparity in physical pleasure between young men and young women in casual sexual encounters. The data Orenstein presents is staggering. In hookups involving intercourse, about 80% of men have an orgasm. For women? It’s only 40%. And in hookups that are just oral sex, it’s even worse. Only 17% of women report an orgasm. Jackson: Seventeen percent? That’s barely more than a rounding error. That's not an intimate experience; that's a service job. Olivia: That is exactly how many of the girls in the book describe it. Oral sex, specifically, has become a kind of currency. It's a way to gain social status, to please a partner without going "all the way," or, as one girl named Anna put it, it's what you do at the end of the night because you don't want to have sex with a guy, but he "expects to be satisfied." Jackson: He expects to be satisfied. That phrase says everything. There’s no mention of her satisfaction. It’s a one-way street. Olivia: It’s a cultural expectation. Orenstein quotes a popular saying among teens that perfectly captures it: "A hand job is a man job. A blow job is yo' job." It’s deeply gendered. And this is reinforced by the fact that many girls are taught to be disconnected from their own bodies. They’re uncomfortable with their own genitals, they lack basic knowledge about their own anatomy—like the clitoris—and so they learn to measure their own satisfaction by their partner's. Jackson: I remember you mentioning a quote earlier that really stuck with me. Olivia: "If he's satisfied, then I'm sexually satisfied." A young woman actually said that. It’s the mantra of the pleasure gap. This isn't about a lack of desire on the part of girls. It’s about a culture that systematically prioritizes male pleasure and teaches girls that their role is to provide it, not necessarily to experience it themselves. Jackson: And this is all happening within this context of "hookup culture," which is supposed to be so liberating and free. Olivia: Right. The idea is that it’s sex without strings, but for many girls, it comes with the heavy strings of obligation, performance, and dissatisfaction. One Ivy League lacrosse player, who came from a family of "strong women," told Orenstein that her sexual experiences just followed this unspoken script: make out, get felt up, give head. Reciprocity wasn't even part of the equation. Jackson: And when it’s not just a lack of pleasure, it can cross the line into something much darker, right? The book talks about coercion. Olivia: Absolutely. The book is filled with stories of the "shoulder push"—where a guy physically tries to push a girl's head down during a hookup. It’s this gray area of coercion that isn't quite violent assault, but it is absolutely not consent. It’s a physical manifestation of that expectation: "you owe me this." Jackson: Okay, this is all incredibly grim. The pressure to be an object, the pleasure gap, the coercion... it feels like a system designed for girls to fail. Is there any hope? What's the solution here? Olivia: There is. And according to Orenstein, the solution is radical, but simple. It’s about finally deciding to tell them the truth.

Jackson: Tell them the truth. What does that look like in practice? Because it sounds like the "truth" they're getting now is a mess of contradictions. Olivia: It is. And a big part of the problem is the formal education they receive. Orenstein highlights the absurdity of most American sex-ed. She tells the story of a professor, Alice Dreger, who live-tweeted her son's abstinence-based health class. The instructors were teaching that condoms are wildly unreliable. Jackson: How unreliable? Olivia: They held up a box of condoms and claimed every single one had a hole. Then, they made the students play a game. They told them to pretend their condom failed, and then handed out paper babies to everyone. The whole class was "pregnant." Jackson: You're kidding me. They're literally using paper dolls as a scare tactic? That's not education; that's propaganda. Olivia: It’s fear-based. It’s designed to create shame. Now, let's step into a different kind of classroom. Orenstein introduces us to a youth advocate named Charis Denison, who teaches a very different kind of sex-ed. Jackson: I'm ready for some hope. What does her class look like? Olivia: It’s vibrant. It’s honest. On the first day, she pulls out a large, plush, anatomically correct vulva puppet. She points to the clitoris and explains that its sole function in the human body is for pleasure. She tells the girls, "I talk to so many girls where the first person to actually touch their clitoris is somebody else," and encourages them to get to know their own bodies. Jackson: Wow. One class is about shame and fear, and the other is about knowledge and respect. It's night and day. Olivia: Completely. Denison’s whole philosophy is, "My job is to help you make as many decisions as possible that end in joy and honor rather than regret, guilt, or shame." She talks about consent, communication, and pleasure, alongside the risks. She creates a space where kids can ask anonymous questions about anything, and she answers them honestly. Jackson: That sounds amazing, but is it scalable? Is this just one great teacher, or is there a model for this that works on a larger scale? Olivia: There is. Orenstein points to the Netherlands. In the late '60s, they faced the same sexual revolution we did. But where American culture responded with panic and a focus on crisis, the Dutch consciously decided to embrace teen sexuality as natural, though requiring guidance. They provide free, accessible contraception and their sex education is comprehensive. It covers pleasure, respect, and communication skills—like how to tell a partner what feels good and how to set boundaries. Jackson: And what are the results of that approach? Olivia: The results are stunning. The teen birth rate in the U.S. is eight times higher than in the Netherlands. And by 2005, over 85% of Dutch youth said their first sexual experiences were well-timed, within their control, and fun. They were "equally eager." Jackson: Equally eager. That phrase alone feels revolutionary compared to everything else we've discussed. It's not about currency or obligation; it's about mutuality. Olivia: Exactly. It proves that a different world is possible. A world where sexuality is framed not as a source of danger and shame, but as a potential source of self-knowledge, communication, and joy.

Olivia: When you put it all together, you see this clear, tragic line. The culture of performance and self-objectification creates the pleasure gap in the bedroom. And that pleasure gap is a direct result of an education system built on fear and ignorance, rather than honesty and respect. Jackson: It really all comes back to that powerful question Orenstein asks in the book. Olivia: It does. She asks, "Can there be true equality in the classroom and the boardroom if there isn’t in the bedroom?" And that just reframes the entire issue. This isn't just about sex. It's about power, agency, and a fundamental form of justice. Jackson: That question really lands with a thud. It connects a private, intimate struggle to the entire public project of feminism and equality. You can't separate them. The battle for respect doesn't stop at the bedroom door. Olivia: It’s what she calls "intimate justice." And achieving it requires a cultural shift, starting with the stories we tell and the education we provide. It makes me think, and maybe our listeners can reflect on this too: What's one message about sexuality you wish you'd received when you were younger? Jackson: That’s a powerful question. I think for so many of us, the message was silence, or fear. The idea of getting a message of "joy and honor" feels like it's from another planet. We'd love to hear what our listeners think. Share your reflections with us on our social channels. Let's continue this vital conversation. Olivia: Because knowledge, as Charis Denison says, is power. Jackson: This is Aibrary, signing off.