Sex and The Numbers

What is the average number of sexual partners for a 25 year old? Well that depends on who you are asking of course.

I was sitting around with a large group of guys in their 20’s and this question popped up. Before gleaning the proper estimate, they added the wrinkle that this “average” person was of the somewhat good looking and popular nature to create a stable sampling. No bookish types messing the numbers up.

After a bit of back and forth they came up with this: Guys 20-25. Girls 4-7.

I asked “Since the numbers aren’t balanced then are these guys sleeping with their parent’s friends or other guys?”

This started a melee that I will save you the tedium of but essentially what we have on display is hubris, or to put it another way...the male ego. Guys want their numbers high and they want to believe a girl’s are low.

What I tried to explain, mostly in vain, was the numbers have to be the same for both genders. The ledger has to balance. The only way to skew guys so much higher would be if the vast majority of his sex was with girls that were 26+ years old “at the time of the encounter”.

The average good looking 25 year old guy has been having sex for roughly a decade and chances are most of that sex has been with girls well under the age of 26 at that time. If he lost his virginity at 16, chances are she was 16. If he got laid at Prom, he probably wasn’t taking a 27 year old.

Every time a guy has sex, it counts for him and her. “Tick” on his side of the ledger. “Tick” on her side of the ledger.

At this point most of my twenty-something friends were looking at me as if they had paws and I was wailing on a Dog Whistle.

Finally one proffered this nugget. “A minority of slutty girls are putting up big numbers and affecting the average.”

Really?

Let’s say there were two girls called “Rosie Rotten-Crotch” and “Suzy Nice-n-Tight” and they were banging the world and cranked up numbers of 100+ each. A guy can bang them both all he wants but it still only counts for 2 on his side of the ledger. He still has to go out and bang another 20 freshies to get in the proposed range. And those 20 “hits”, if they are roughly his age, will have to count on all those “nice girl” ledgers.

Averages are averages and the math doesn’t lie.

So where does this leave us and what is the truth? My guess is there is a little fibbing going on, on both sides.

To bring the guys numbers down or a girls up, you would have to rule on “Just the Tip”. Guys count it and girls usually don’t. Guys also have a tendency toward “Fish Stories”. You don’t see women in a bar regaling people with a story that has the line “It was 10 feet long if it was a foot”.

Now when it comes to malfeasance girls have us guys licked. For they know most guys covet a virginal girl so they fight like hell to keep that number down. They accomplish this by playing the "It Doesn't Count Game".

For example; “It was on vacation”, “I was drunk”, “He was drunk”, “It wasn’t long enough” (that can be used two different ways of course). “I don’t remember”, “It was hate sex”, “It was pity sex”, “My bf pissed me off that day”, "I didn't get off", "He didn't get off", "Justin Timberlake promised it'd be our secret" and the list goes on and on.

The end result is guys count everything and then some, while girls have a more selective memory.

So instead of worrying about the fact that girls are having exactly as much sex as you fellas, try and enjoy the sex you are having ;)