Questions about (female) orgasm

[Mellonhead]

I have a couple of questions about orgasm.

1. How does a woman know she is having an orgasm, when she has never had an orgasm before?
2. How are vocalizations during orgasm different from vocalizations before orgasm?
3. Is the main point of pornographic sex to reach orgasm? This seems to be a common motif in pornography. All that stimulation may be pleasurable and lead up to an orgasm.
4. What does an orgasm look like? I may have seen it before in porn, so a description would be nice and may help me articulate what I've seen in porn.

[Eddie C]

Is really hard -- if not impossible -- to give a solid answer to a question like this. Sex is something that is going to be so different for everyone, just like a finger print. It could even be different for the same people in different times. There's people who are very loud when they have sex, before and after orgasm. There's people who are very quiet and people who do not orgasm. What does an orgasm looks like? Seriously, we can't answer that. People have sex in all different kinds of ways so, the results of those sexual activities are going to depend solely in the people involved.

As far as I am concerned, the main point of porn is to sell. Orgasms included or not. So I wouldn't base my education about sex on that.

[Mellonhead]

Is really hard -- if not impossible -- to give a solid answer to a question like this. Sex is something that is going to be so different for everyone, just like a finger print. It could even be different for the same people in different times. There's people who are very loud when they have sex, before and after orgasm. There's people who are very quiet and people who do not orgasm. What does an orgasm looks like? Seriously, we can't answer that. People have sex in all different kinds of ways so, the results of those sexual activities are going to depend solely in the people involved.

As far as I am concerned, the main point of porn is to sell. Orgasms included or not. So I wouldn't base my education about sex on that.

Very well. Can you share your personal experience with having an orgasm, assuming that you identify as female and your body functions like a female? If not, I think I may be able to find orgasm narratives online somewhere.

As for porn, Internet pornography seems to be free. The websites probably earn money through advertisements and a network of adult entertainment services. Honestly, I have not watched porn for months, but the memory still lingers strongly in my mind because of the intense, provoking imagery.

[Karyn]

Given the number of questions you've been asking, Mellonhead, have you taken any time at all to go through the articles and advice answers on the main site? There's so much information there that you might find it a quicker way of getting your questions answered. For example, this piece on sexual response describes what generally happens in the lead up to and during orgasm: Sexual Response & Orgasm: A Users Guide

[Mellonhead]

Given the number of questions you've been asking, Mellonhead, have you taken any time at all to go through the articles and advice answers on the main site? There's so much information there that you might find it a quicker way of getting your questions answered. For example, this piece on sexual response describes what generally happens in the lead up to and during orgasm: Sexual Response & Orgasm: A Users Guide

Thank you for providing the link. It answered my questions, and what's more, gave me a definition of what sex means on this website.

Apparently, sex, as expressed on that webpage, means any sexual activity that gives sexual pleasure to an individual voluntarily as a way to deal with one's sexual desires (which stems from the desire to reproduce). Given the complex nature of human sexuality, I presume humans take advantage of these desires to reproduce and seek to prolong and/or repeat the sexual pleasure aspect of reproduction.

I suppose there are many ways to think of sex, but the two ways that come to mind are:

1. Sex, as in sexual pleasure, is the main incentive for sexual activity, and this may or may not lead to offspring, depending on various conditions during the sex act (including having functional male and female organs needed to produce offspring).

2. Sex, as in sexual pleasure, is the byproduct of reproduction and an evolutionary mechanism that facilitates reproduction or pair bonding. Some people may think that they can completely sever the connection between sex and reproduction, but given the existence of unplanned pregnancies (even among married couples), this viewpoint does not really eliminate the fact that there is a connection between having sexual pleasure during intercourse and having offspring.

I can definitely see how 1 and 2 are both true, assuming different frames of reference. The first one assumes the viewpoint of the participant; the latter assumes the viewpoint of the outside observer. Although I recognize the importance of number 1, I think keeping number 2 in mind is important as well, because you would never know when contraceptives would fail, and it is always good to prepare for the birth of the baby. Besides contraceptives, abortion and infanticide may be good ways to prevent yourself from having to deal with an unplanned birth or the responsibility of raising another human being but those may get a bit controversial depending on where you live and when you live.