By Marged Richards
The Victorians
Stuffy: that's the word to describe the Victorians' attitude to sex. They obviously did it, but they certainly didn't want to talk about it. Double standards abounded. Men were deemed inherently sexual, women asexual. You were either a Madonna or a whore.
Queen Victoria thought male homosexuality was wrong, but when asked to approve a law against lesbianism she couldn't comprehend why any woman would do such a thing. As a result, lesbianism was never criminalised. 'Women could spend lots of time alone together, holding hands, and write very passionate letters to each other under the guise of friendship. Lesbianism was both taboo and undetected,' says sex and relationship psychologist Dr Petra Boynton.
A hundred years on, what's the position? Homosexuality is no longer illegal, lesbianism has become culturally accepted, and women's sexuality and their freedom to express it is now fully recognised. But such a shift didn't happen overnight...
World War I (1914-18)
World War I shattered the Victorian norms. Mobility increased: men went to battle; women went into factories, earning their own money and gaining new social freedom. Their role in the war effort made their right to vote - gained in 1918 - inevitable. In spite of this emancipation, there was still no recognition of women's sexuality. Women's movements concentrated on getting men to control their own behaviour. 'Overall, their idea of liberation wasn't that women are sexual and can enjoy their sexuality, but that a woman's purity needed to be protected,' explains Dr Petra.
The roaring '20s and Hollywood '30s
In the years that followed World War I people wanted to have fun. Women's role in society opened up. Fashions became less formal; the corset was thrown away, and women began to show off their legs. The more flamboyant Charleston replaced the waltz. Cinemagoing increased and women began to idolise screen icons like Rudolph Valentino. Condoms became available to married women from the first Marie Stopes clinics. More and more massage devices (vibrators) were being bought - there was even one you could fit on your Hoover! Vibrators were originally developed in the early 1880s so that doctors could bring women to 'hysterical paroxsym'(orgasm) more quickly - too much time was being spent giving sex-starved women orgasms with manual stimulation, which was then regarded as a medical necessity. Going to a doctor's office to get an orgasm was a fairly normal practice until people could buy vibrators! But the upsurge in naughty behaviour wasn't to last. By the '40s, the tide had begun to turn; morality was fighting back.
World War II (1939-45)
Social mobility led to more opportunities for sexual experiences. Condoms were issued to soldiers. Uniformed American GIs stationed around the country proved a strong temptation to Britain's women. 'However, sex was still frowned upon if you weren't doing it with your partner. Women could experience passion, but only with their husbands. Once you had babies, sex stopped anyway,' says Dr Petra.
The '50s domestic goddess
The war was over, the heroes came home, and yet again, a woman's place returned to being in the home. The ideal of womanhood was to be a passive household goddess complying with your husband's wishes - including in the bedroom. By the end of the decade though, Elvis and rock 'n' roll appeared on the scene: 'Women had idolised film stars before now and experienced desire, but not in the seat-wetting frenzy that Elvis brought on. Women started feeling aroused, but didn't know what to do about it. Sexual excitement was often expressed as whipping yourself into a frenzy and fainting,' says Dr Petra.
The sexual liberation of the swinging '60s
In 1961 came the pill, which changed women's attitudes towards sex forever. For the first time sex could be about pleasure, not procreation. Morals rapidly changed; suddenly it was free love. You could have sex when you wanted. The McKinsey Report dispelled many sexual myths. Women began to think like men; sex was for enjoyment. Women's orgasms were being talked about for the first time. Author and 'masturbation guru' Betty Dobson ran workshops on female masturbation. 'Feminism was very much something naughty girls did,' says Dr Petra. 'Risqué, subversive and progressive, it was something a lot of women were drawn to.'
The Joy Of Sex in the '70s
In this decade Cosmopolitan published its first male centre-spread and the erotic magazine for women, Suck, was launched. The first Ann Summers opened. The openly bisexual David Bowie inspired women and men to explore the more hedonistic side of their sexuality. In 1972, couples queued to watch the porn movie Deep Throat, starring Linda Lovelace. In the same year, the groundbreaking sex manual The Joy Of Sex was published. 'The young saw monogamy as very conservative. Instead they sought an idealised view of relationships, with multiple partners from different races and backgrounds,' says Dr Petra.
The feminist '80s>
By the '80s, porn had become widespread through videos as well as top-shelf magazines, but women began to question what was happening. Feminist groups began to see indiscriminate sex as another form of abuse by men; an attitude summed up in the feminist soundbite: 'All sex is rape.' By the mid '80s, the worldwide AIDS epidemic made people aware of the consequences and dangers of sexual promiscuity.
The ladette '90s
In the '90s, women started to behave socially as well as sexually like men. The typical ladette and watchers of Channel 4's groundbreaking The Girly Show played hard, drank hard, and slept around. 'Women's sexuality was all over the place,' argues Dr Petra. 'At the start of the decade, Cosmo ran an anti-porn survey. By the end of the '90s it was instructing readers how to make their own porn film.'
The naughty noughties
Today the Internet allows us unlimited private access to porn. Vibrators are so normalised you can buy them with your shampoo in Boots. Sexual orientation is worn as a label.
But are we having second thoughts? The backlash has already started in America, where virginity is fashionable. Survey after survey reveals the depressing truth that British women are going off sex. 'We talk about it all the time, magazines and TV shows are telling us how to do it all the time, yet women aren't enjoying sex. Instead of freedom, all we have is loads of bad sex,' says TV agony aunt Denise Roberts. 'I'm hoping we'll wake up to the fact that some good sex is much better than lots of cheap sex.'
