The French View on Love and Sex

Of all the countries in the Western World, France is probably the one that North Americans love to love or hate the most. One of the reasons for this ambivalence is the attitude of the French themselves towards romantic relationships and sex. The citizens of France find passion fascinating. Indeed, as their literature, art and films emphasize, it is the most exhilarating of experiences. However, while being committed to romance, they insist on remaining realistic about its ability to survive the vicissitudes of time and circumstances.

This insistence on being realistic can often be construed by non-French as flippancy and cynicism. When a North American overhears a sardonically lucid comment on the short-lived nature of passion, he/she is likely to remark: “Oh, that’s a typically French reaction!” Often the French will go overboard in mocking the self-righteous seriousness associated with so many conceptions of love. I’ll never forget the pungent line in the movie La Cage aux folles, the French version, of course. One of the partners in a homosexual couple seeks out his former wife with whom he has had a child. Their son is a young adult now and engaged to a lovely girl. The girl’s parents, however, are up-tight, middle-class puritans. It is important that they swallow the illusion that the young man’s father, an openly gay man, is married to a decent, virtuous woman. So the father entreats his former wife to agree to play the role of a respectable, loving mother and preside over a dinner in honour of their son’s future in-laws. To convince her, he invokes the passion they once felt for each other, and ends by saying “You whom I loved for fifteen long minutes.”

Now I will hasten to add that the French people I know are capable of loving as deeply as any of us in North America. Their marriages could even serve as models. But they understand the weaknesses inherent in our human nature and refuse to condemn sexual attraction as being intrinsically wrong or sinful. On the contrary: they view it as being an integral part of life and something to be enjoyed to the full. No neuroses of guilt and repression for them! This is why my colleagues and friends in Perpignan, France, were absolutely aghast when a Canadian professor back in the 80s was crucified for having had an affair with one of his female students. The student in question was a hysterical virgin of 28. She was pursuing the man energetically, determined to harpoon him. In fact, she thoroughly enjoyed the experience of being initiated by him into the labyrinth of sex. She turned on him only when he gave her a B grade for the course. She probably felt that she deserved an A+ for her extra-curricular activities!

My French friends were astounded by what they viewed as Canadian self-righteous, neurotic, sex-obsessed Puritanism. One lady in the town who was a feminist before the word was invented—she ran her own driving school—said to me: “If he deflowered her at 28 she should have thanked him for it!” Another friend in Paris had a similar reaction. Although an orthodox Jew, he still had the wicked French sense of humour. “He deflowered her at 28,” he exclaimed? “The poor man, he probably had to blast through her with dynamite.”

I think we in North America could use a good dose of the lady and gentleman’s realism and sense of humour. We can work ourselves up into paroxysms of self-righteous indignation over the sexual misdemeanours of stars like Tiger Woods, yet we tend to forget that the pornographic industry here is worth billions of dollars. A little more common sense and much less hypocrisy would be most welcome.