Lesbian eroticism lacks the dizzying estrangement but also the hostility of heterosexual coupling

Evidence

Eroticism often has only a very small part in these unions; sexual pleasure has a less striking character, less dizzying than between man and woman, it does not lead to such overwhelming metamorphoses; but when male and female lovers have separated into their individual flesh, they become strangers again; and even the male body is repulsive to the woman; and the man sometimes feels a kind of bland distaste for the woman’s body; between women, carnal tenderness is more equal, continuous, they are not transported in frenetic ecstasy, but they never fall into hostile indifference; seeing and touching each other are calm pleasures discreetly prolonging those of the bed. — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1076

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Lesbian relationships resist neat virile-feminine role divisions and mirror heterosexual pairings in their variety — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1075; Heterosexual interdependence makes both sexes invested in sexist arrangements; Lesbians suffer psychological malaise from being neither complete woman nor virile man — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1045 (+1 more)

Broader Connections

• Heterosexual interdependence makes both sexes invested in sexist arrangements #contradicts (0.75)