I want to talk about low libido. I know how frustrating it can be when you want to want it, but you just don't. It can feel energy-sapping, relationship-ruining, like you're the only person in the world who isn't shaggin'. I know how easy it is to feel like something is wrong with you.

And it's easy to feel that way when "low libido" shows up in medical journals and diagnostic manuals like the DSM, while your Instagram feed is subtly serving you ads for pills and lubes promising the sexual prowess of Rasputin.

But none of that necessarily means there's something inherently wrong with your body or brain. What's more problematic is why we're so quick to pathologise not being interested in sex, and how the market rushes to fill that gap. Because it seems to me, the easiest way to sell someone a solution is to first convince them they have a problem.

Libido fluctuations are real.. but so is cultural framing

People absolutely do experience a lack of desire. Libido is influenced by heaps of things: stress, hormones, moods, meds, relationship dynamics, boredom, novelty. So I'm not here to say low libido doesn't exist but calling it a disorder? I mean.. maybe?

Most of the time, to be diagnosed with low libido, one of the key criteria is: "the person is distressed by their symptoms." Which tells us a lot. It's not the "low" part that makes it a problem, instead it's the feeling that something's wrong with you.

And what makes someone feel like they're broken for not wanting sex?

Cultural framing. YEP!

So What Shapes That Culture? Biopower baby!

Quick detour into philosophy, stay with me.

Biopower is a concept from French philosopher Michel Foucault, a big wig in the sexological game. His theory was that institutions like medicine, government, religion and media don't just describe what's "normal" and "healthy" - they produce it! Through cultural messaging, they shape what we value, how we act, and even what we're supposed to want, especially when it comes to sex. And they do it so well that we, the sheeple, end up policing ourselves without anyone having to do it for us.

To get a glimpse of this in action, you should watch Orgasm Inc. It blew my mind. It follows how a failed antidepressant was rebranded as a libido booster for women. They essentially invented Female Hypoactive Desire Disorder as a part of their marketing scheme. The documentary is wild, mildly infuriating, and shows how culture, capitalism, and medicine can shape what gets labeled a problem in the first place.

Institutions Have a History of Screwing With the Sexuality of Women and Marginalised Groups

A few examples of how this has played out:

• There's never really been a right way for a woman to be sexual. Historically, women who enjoyed sex too much were labelled hysterical. And if you wanted sex too little? Also wrong. Hysteria, by the way, was once "treated" with vibrators - which is part of how vibrators ended up going mainstream. Thank you, medical misogyny, for getting us there when men couldn't.
• Homosexuality was listed in the DSM in 1952 as a diagnosable "sociopathic personality disturbance." Later reclassified as a "sexual deviation." Then as a contributor to "Ego-Dystonic Homosexuality" - a diagnosis for people who were distressed by their same-sex desires (which, call me crazy, but it seems like a natural reaction when society tells you being gay is wrong). It wasn't until 1987 that homosexuality was fully removed from diagnostic criteria.
• Black and brown bodies have been hyper-sexualised or desexualised in harmful, dehumanising ways, a disturbing trend spanning from slavery-era myths used to justify medical experimentation, to assumptions still baked into how pain and consent get treated in clinics today. Queer and trans people have been pathologised for simply existing, and honestly, what's changed?
• Asexuality has barely been recognised as an identity at all. Or when it is acknowledged, it's usually reframed as a symptom: of trauma, hormones, repression, "not having met the right person." Rarely is it treated as just... an orientation.
• Disabled people often don't even enter the conversation. Historically deemed unfit for sex or reproduction by the same institutions meant to care for them, disabled people today are still treated as either asexual by default or undeserving of a sex life.

So while the cultural ideal of sexuality might centre on straight, white, able-bodied, cis men and women, anyone outside of that framework has long been seen as broken, dangerous, or invisible.

Sex sells and so does sexual insecurity

Now, I am absolutely for people incorporating whatever they want into their sex life. Especially when it's done with the intention of bringing you more enjoyment, fun and pleasure.

But think about how many products exist purely to "fix" you and make you more sexually viable:

• Viagra and desensitising sprays to keep you hard.
• Libido boosters (like horny goat weed, maca root, the works).
• Yoni steaming (to cleanse), yoni eggs (to strengthen).
• Creams to tighten, washes to scent, suppositories to make you taste like watermelon (followed by a second serve of thrush).

These products aren't sold to confident people, they're aimed at the insecure. Along with the message that there’s a right way to be sexual and if you don't live up to it, that's a very profitable problem to have.

So… is low libido a real problem?

Sure! If it's bothering you, that's valid. I'm not saying the research behind 'low libido' isn't credible, I just think it's more complex than we're made to believe.

If culture shapes medicine, and culture is shaped by trends that serve those in power, then just because some of your experience matches something in a medical manual that doesn't mean the issue starts with you.

Maybe you're not desiring sex because you're stressed, burnt out, having bad sex, or have no time to unwind. Maybe you're having a totally normal amount, but you've been told you should want more. Or maybe, sex just isn't appealing to you and that is not a problem to be solved.

Whatever it is, when you feel a chasm form between who you are and who you think you should be, it's worth asking: where did that "should" come from?

Mack Out

xx