Louise Perry: The Pill Quietly Rewrote Sex Against Women

Perry argues that being alone with an unfamiliar man is inherently more dangerous for women due to large strength differences and higher risk of sexual violence. Even with reliable contraception, pregnancy risk and abortion burdens fall overwhelmingly on women. Psychologically, women have lower disgust thresholds and stronger bonding responses (e.g., via oxytocin), so unwanted-but-consensual encounters and one-night stands more often leave women feeling disgusted, used, or emotionally attached to men who are not invested in them.

Drawing on rape crisis work, Perry notes the modal victim age (~15) and offender age (teens–20s) mirror female peak fertility and male peak testosterone. The age curve of sexual and other violent crime tracks testosterone rather than purely social power hierarchies. She argues mainstream feminist claims that rape is “about power not sex” ignore a strong biological driver, and that societies must frankly acknowledge male physical and hormonal differences to design effective protections for young women.

Cross-cultural data show men are more interested in casual sex, porn, and paid sex in every studied society; women on average prefer more commitment and monogamy. The sexual revolution shifted norms toward the preferences of ‘Hugh Hefner’–type high-status men: lots of partners, little commitment, low pregnancy risk. Attractive men can cycle through multiple women; many women ‘go along’ with sex they don’t really want; and a large subset of lower-status men get no sexual access at all, breeding resentment.

Anthropologically, about 80% of cultures permit polygamy when left to ‘natural’ preferences, which allows dominant men to accumulate partners while many men remain unmated—fueling instability and violence. Monogamous norms force high-status men to commit to one woman, ‘removing’ them from the pool and equalizing access. Marriage also aligns fathers’ economic support with mothers’ reproductive vulnerability, giving women a reliable partner during pregnancy, breastfeeding, and childrearing instead of relying on the state or step-parents, which data link to far higher abuse risk (the ‘Cinderella effect’).

Perry presents porn as highly addictive and ethically exploitative, associated with high rates of mental illness, addiction, and murder for performers. For users, she cites ‘death grip syndrome’ and erectile dysfunction improvements reported when quitting porn, and coins ‘cultural death grip syndrome’ for the way endless on-demand novelty blunts real-world motivation for relationships and achievement. She links porn to the normalization of rough sex (choking, slapping, spitting), especially among young people, with millions of women reporting unwanted violent acts that often trace back to porn-influenced sexual scripts.