A unified explanation for sex differences in submissive sexual fantasies

How evolved long-term mate preferences shape submissive sexual fantasies in sex-specific ways. These sex differences find a unified explanation in the evolutionary theory of masochism.

Nov 26, 2024

This is part of a series of essays on masochism. Find the Table of contents here.

Masochism occurs in both sexes, but it does not take the same forms. When the phenomenon of submissive sexual fantasies was first studied in the late 19th century, scientific inquiry had more success peering into the hidden submissive desires of men than into those of women. Custom made women’s sexuality much more taboo than men’s. Today, we have a much better understanding of the submissive sexual fantasies of both sexes.

From this knowledge, it has become clear that some of the themes underlying these fantasies occur in both men and women while other themes appear to occur exclusively in only one sex. Yet the question of sex differences in masochism continues to be a mystery that no past answer has satisfactorily solved. In this essay, I show that a unified explanation for these sex differences can be found in my own evolutionary theory of masochism.

Sex differences in masochism

Those in the past who studied the sex differences in submissive fantasies were perplexed by the subject. Among them, the American social psychologist Roy F. Baumeister studied masochism as a social phenomenon and published important work on the topic in the late 20th century. Some of his work shed light on the glaring differences in “masochistic scripts” between men and women.1

In his research, Baumeister relied on erotic letters sent to a sex magazine by its readers. He examined these letters for submissive sexual fantasies and came to the conclusion that there were, indeed, important differences in how men and women fantasized about their submission.

When men fantasized about their humiliation, they seemed to degrade the traditional stereotypes of masculinity. Some of their fantasies even went into feminization. But when women fantasized about their humiliation, they seemed to exaggerate the gender stereotypes of femininity, not reverse them like men did. Baumeister came to the following conclusion:

In an important sense, then, female masochism is simply an exaggeration of normal stereotypes of femininity. One could even call it a caricature. This is quite different from [male] masochism, which appears to contradict and repudiate many features of normal stereotypes of masculinity.2

Looking at masochism purely as a social phenomenon, Baumeister faced the impossible task of producing a unified explanation for these sex differences. In the end, this divergence could not be reconciled and Baumeister arrived at somewhat different explanations for male and female masochism.

What if we refrained from looking at submissive sexual fantasies as a social or cultural phenomenon, and considered instead the possibility that masochism is deeply rooted in the evolved sexual psychology of humans? What if, instead of cultural gender stereotypes, we looked to evolved mate preferences?

Evolved mate preferences

Men and women have preferences for long-term mates. These preferences are the sets of traits and attributes that men and women look for in each other in mate selection. According to the evolutionary psychologists, mate preferences are believed to be the product of evolution since they have shown remarkable stability across cultural variation.3

These psychologists believe that evolutionary pressures in the past have shaped our mate preferences over time, with natural selection guiding the development of preferences for mates who maximize our chances of survival and successful reproduction in the ancestral environment. Mate preferences are therefore thought to be evolved adaptations. Since men and women faced different evolutionary pressures, they have evolved different preferences for long-term mates.

Women place a high premium on status and resources when selecting a long-term mate. These are the attributes in men that secure the protection and investment necessary for women in gestation and child-rearing. Status and resources in a man favor the success of a woman’s long-term reproductive strategy. Women who selected men with low status and poor resources had fewer chances of survival and successful reproduction.

Men place a high premium on chastity when selecting a long-term female mate. A woman’s sexual purity is a strong signal of her future fidelity, which is primordial for men to ensure their fatherhood of the offspring they will raise with her. Chastity in a woman favors the success of a man’s long-term reproductive strategy. Men who selected promiscuous women faced a higher likelihood of cuckoldry, which reduced their chances of successful reproduction.

These evolutionary pressures are thought to have shaped mate preferences through natural selection. The mate preferences of men and women are also concerned with other traits and attributes as well, but these are the most important qualities that the sexes seek in each other when selecting a long-term mate to ensure successful reproduction and propagation of genes.

If we put these mate preferences on a scale, we can imagine the following caricatural—although reasonable—approximation based on these qualities.

Female preferences

At the lower end of female mate preferences for men, we find the caricature of the “beta loser” who severely lacks resources and has a very low status in society. Women would never consider the “beta loser” as an option. They instinctually run away in disgust at the idea of dating him.

At the higher end of the scale of female mate preferences, we find the caricature of the “successful alpha” that all women run after. The “successful alpha” is the man who is rich in resources and enjoys a high status in the male dominance hierarchy, the holy grail for women in the game of reproduction.

Male preferences

At the lower end of the male preferences for long-term female mates, we find the caricature of the “promiscuous slut” who easily gives up access to her sexuality and has slept with many men in the past. Men are instinctually repulsed by the idea of selecting the “promiscuous slut” as a long-term mate.

At the higher end of the male preferences, we find the caricature of the “virtuous virgin”, the woman who has never been touched by a man in the past and who will offer her sexuality exclusively to her husband.

Verbal humiliation fantasies

There is a remarkable correspondence between the evolved mate preferences of men and women and the ways in which they desire to be humiliated in their submissive sexual fantasies.

In a nutshell, men like to be verbally humiliated for being losers; women, for being sluts. These names—and similar ones in connotation—can be potent stimuli in the erotic imagination of masochists. The thought of being called these names can cause or enhance sexual arousal because of the connotations of failure for the man and promiscuity for the woman.

The converse, however, does not hold. You will be hard-pressed to find a man who likes to be humiliated for having sex with too many women, just as you will be to find a woman who likes to be humiliated for her failure in acquiring resources or status. Indeed, these masochistic fantasies of verbal humiliation are strongly sex-specific.

In light of this, it becomes clear that this verbal humiliation in masochism is fundamentally about the degradation of the evolved preferences for long-term mates. The sex differences in mate preferences perfectly explain the sex differences in masochistic fantasies of verbal humiliation.

These fantasies of “sluts” and “losers” eroticize the failure of one sex to meet the evolved long-term mate preferences of the other. For men, this is the failure to acquire resources and achieve status. For women, it is the failure to preserve sexual purity.

In masochistic fantasies, these states of failure are pushed to the limits of the opposite poles of mate preferences. Thus, the man is not only imagined to lack resources and status, but he becomes a complete loser. Likewise, the unchaste woman becomes a total slut.

Evolutionary theory of masochism

The reflection of mate preferences in masochism is but a manifestation of a wider phenomenon. When one surveys, within an evolutionary framework, the recurrent themes in the submissive sexual fantasies of men and women, one finds a striking correspondence between those themes and the risks of failure of long-term reproductive strategy.

My evolutionary theory of masochism posits that submissive sexual fantasies fundamentally eroticize those risks and potential dangers to the success of long-term reproductive strategy. The scenarios of its failure become the sources of erotic stimulation in masochists. Since men and women differ in their reproductive strategies, the ways in which these strategies can fail also differ between the sexes. This, in turn, is reflected in the wider sex differences in masochistic fantasies.

My research aims to survey, in a comprehensive manner, the numerous themes that form the structure of male and female submissive sexual fantasies. Then, I aim to show how these themes, in accordance with the evolutionary theory of masochism, eroticize the failure of long-term reproductive strategy. It is an ambitious project that will take some time to complete. But by the end, I aim to establish the evolutionary theory of masochism as the most compelling explanation for the fascinating phenomenon of submissive sexual fantasies.

The line art in this essay’s card is by Georgian artist Dorian Chelios.

Baumeister, Roy F. (1988). Gender differences in masochistic scripts. Journal of Sex Research, 25(4), 478–499.

Baumeister, Roy F. (1989). Masochism and the Self. Psychology Press. p. 171.

For an overview of evolved mate preferences, see Buss, David M. (2016). The Evolution of Desire: Strategies of Human Mating. Fourth edition (revised and updated). Basic Books.