Do people innately know how to have sex?

r/

If a man and woman who had never heard of sex or had any exposure to the whole carry on, if they were in each others company and attracted, would they feel a compulsion to sex? Would they instinctively know the mechanics?

I feel humans knew once obviously when we were way further back and more animalistic, but have we conditioned ourselves out of it, or would we figure it out with zero instructions?

Comments

  1. Bobbob34 Avatar

    Yes. You’re nothing but a species of ape.

  2. goddessofjanuary Avatar

    I don’t think so. There were certain things I didn’t know or understand how to do. I had to see how it’s actually done before I knew how lmao

    Edit: why are y’all downvoting me? This was just my experience😭

  3. xyanon36 Avatar

    They definitely figure it out, albeit sometimes first sticking it in the wrong hole. Or the wrong hole according to at least one of the two.

  4. Striking-Artist8347 Avatar

    No, I didn’t know how it worked until I watched porn

  5. Alh84001-1984 Avatar

    You should watch the movie Blue Lagoon.

  6. catefeu Avatar

    I would imagine so. Far more primitive species know how to mate/produce offspring. We’re just fancy primates.

    Kids exhibit sexual behavior sometimes. Not as a trauma response but just figuring out that touching certain body parts feels nice, or that other kids of the opposite sex have different bits.

    Anyway, if mice can figure out how to fuck, humans can probably too.

  7. Cheeseburgermafia Avatar

    Not in my experience.

  8. AgreeableSandwich190 Avatar

    how do you think you exist today if it wasnt for the innate sex drive that is mainly stronger in men

    how do you think other animals have sex? its in the dna

  9. Joe-C_137 Avatar

    You just pull the user manual out of your ass. It’s harder to do though because it’s written in stone.

  10. JJohnston015 Avatar

    You would think so, but then you hear about those couples (often ultra-religious, so no instruction) who have trouble conceiving, and it turns out that they’re doing only anal, or that he’s just rubbing on her lower belly, so….?

  11. Informal_Yoghurt9107 Avatar

    I mean, I’d guess at a certain point in your life if you never get taught and went to have sex, you’d just know. Like, how’d they know in the first place.. they just did. I’m guessing you know you just have to put it in the hole

  12. CharacterOnly8670 Avatar

    For most people, yes, it is a basic natural instinct to want to reproduce. They might not be good at it it, but the natural instinct to reproduce develops when they reach puberty

  13. noticer626 Avatar

    Yes. Humans see other animals having sex all the time. 

  14. OnceMoreOntoTheBrie Avatar

    Yes. That wasn’t a hard question

  15. Anaevya Avatar

    I think some would figure it out and some wouldn’t. 

  16. imuniqueaf Avatar

    “if it fits, I sticks”

  17. Klutzy_Internet_4716 Avatar

    The last time this was asked, one woman commented that sex isn’t that far from cuddling, so if a horny man and a horny woman are cuddling, they’ll probably figure out how to have sex at some point.

  18. nekosaigai Avatar

    Anecdotally from my own experience, no.

    I had extremely shitty abstinence only sex ed, so when I had sex for the first time I didn’t know anything and had to be taught and guided. Good thing it was as a unicorn for two patient friends lol.

  19. jambro4real Avatar

    Functionally I’d say so, but do it well, that’s another story

  20. anonymasonteddiy Avatar

    Some psychologists argue that all humans including children are sexual beings… sooooo probably?

  21. PaleontologistNo2625 Avatar

    You know what feels good. The rest will fall into place, no pun intended

  22. Less_Agent4244 Avatar

    How do you think we are here lol

  23. Octothorpe17 Avatar

    yes, but not how to do it well

  24. Ultimate_Sneezer Avatar

    Yes , some things are coded in your genes. Urge to reproduce is one of it

  25. Mugincoffe Avatar

    I really don’t think so. Some believe that our instincts would lead to sex, but we are not that primitive, and our social norms would get in the way. Sure, there might be arousal, but basics understanding of etiquette and embarrassment wouldn’t even allow for being naked together, let alone trying to stick genitals in one another. 

    On the other hand, if you raise people in the wilderness, they might figure it out without much issue.

  26. Wild-Spare4672 Avatar

    Imagine you’re a caveman. It’s a cold night. For some reason, you and a cavewoman are attracted to each other. You sleep together to stay warm. You each notice parts of your body start to feel good when in contact with the other person’s body. You get hard, she gets wet. Rubbing feels good to both of you, and before you know it, whoops, you’re inside.

  27. Super-Kirby Avatar

    I don’t think so because my dog looks at me funny when I do

  28. Ivy1974 Avatar

    Took me awhile to find the hole with my penis.

  29. gamergabe85 Avatar

    As a male that hasn’t had sex in about ten years I’m not sure that I know how anymore.

  30. everyothenamegone69 Avatar

    I don’t know, the first time I tried I kept hitting the girl’s pelvic bone.

  31. hEarwig Avatar

    Yes, and this is why “playing doctor” is often a thing among unsupervised kids

  32. JakeJascob Avatar

    Kind of human genitals usually give off pheromones that attract mates like most other animals, and there’s also genetic memory. Also theres evidence suggesting men are subconsciously attracted to viscera that looks similar to vaginas, which could be a part of the genetic memory thing.

  33. nonsequitur__ Avatar

    What do you think we all did before the internet?!

  34. juminokart Avatar

    idk but when i was a kid putting it THERE was the literal last idea i woulda come up with

  35. SynonymForAnonymous Avatar

    Yes because you and me baby ain’t nothing but mammals

  36. nuclearhydrazin Avatar

    There is the case of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI and that they didn’t have sex for seven years after their wedding. They were only 14 and 15 at that time, so maybe that’s understandable at first. There are speculations that their privileged upbringing never introduced sex talks and them not doing it was the talk of town since they were supposed to produce offspring. Apparently, Marie’s brother eventually visited to talk Louis into how it’s done.

    There is an ongoing discussion of them not knowing vs. the ongoing pressure since they were permanently accompanied by others and they would have only a few opportunities for real privacy. Historians speculate that they sometimes penetrated but then basically enjoyed that state and waited and he didn’t seem to have thrusted and reached a climax.

    I would think that two virgins wouldn’t necessarily figure it out without education, after all, we are a social species and none of us would survive in isolation anyways.

  37. DrunkMonkBusiness Avatar

    Interesting question, I guess biologically yes, but emotionally no

  38. dmn228 Avatar

    Yes. That is all.

  39. DocEastTV Avatar

    Yeah your body kinda gives you a lot of hints on how it works

  40. AddisonFlowstate Avatar

    I don’t think that deeper sensuality or understanding can be taught or learned. But speaking for myself, I have taught women how to have better sex and achieve more than one orgasm.

  41. infinitenothing Avatar

    Usually, yes but I’m imagining there might be gay or asexual people that wouldn’t go through the more typical process of figuring out that particular way to have fun with their genitals.

  42. final_will_yona Avatar

    Well don’t know abt sex….. But i started masturbating instinctively

  43. cmasonw0070 Avatar

    Think of the genuinely stupidest people you know. Like, wouldn’t know how to breathe if it wasn’t automatic.

    Now, do they have kids?

    (Most of the time they do)

  44. kcasper Avatar

    >Do people innately know how to have sex?

    Not Really, people believing otherwise is why we have the myth that women bleeding was proof of virginity. If a woman could learn how to relax the muscles in that area, they would have a lot less problems the first few times around. Instead they typically learn the hard way. Some get lucky, some have painful sex because they clamped down at the wrong time. And it isn’t all on the women. Men need to learn when to back off and when to respond as well.

    >  if they were in each others company and attracted, would they feel a compulsion to sex?

    Hormones do get the best of men and women. Being hurt during sex is more survivable, less noticeable, if the woman is in the correct mood, has the correct hormones circulating.

    I’m not certain how to take your last few lines. The further you go back in history the more conflict there is over the subject. Women in European based societies were expected to just put up with it no matter how bad. Telling yourself that we were more animalistic is just cover for not respecting your partner.

    The more knowledgeable you are, the better it gets.

  45. Flamin_Jesus Avatar

    There are stories about couples trying for a baby and failing until being told that they’re using the wrong hole, but I don’t know if there’s any evidence that this actually ever happened or if this is just a case of a joke about religious fundamentalists mutating into an alleged anecdote over time.

    Given that even the most repressed people usually figure out how their equipment works eventually, I’m going to guess that instinct generally wins out over stupidity on that one.

  46. Strife3dx Avatar

    Put stick in hole seems pretty self explanatory

  47. roly_poly_of_death Avatar

    Enough to get the job done but actually pleasing your partner takes experience with them. All are different, kinda.

  48. Desspina Avatar

    I haven’t met or heard of a person in life who didn’t know how to do it intuitively after the first couple of times..have you?

  49. PsychologicalCan8267 Avatar

    I think a lot of it is instinct from the old caveman times

  50. Ensiferal Avatar

    No. These days we all have some idea even at a young age, even if we never had any kind of talk because there’s so much sex in media, but that wasn’t always the case. I’ve read and been told stories by boomers and the silent generation about their first times, and some of them had literally no idea what to do.

    One that story that pops into my mind was one I read a long time ago by a guy who would’ve been silent generation. He mentioned that neither he nor his girlfriend (who would later be his wife) had any idea what to do. They snuck off together one night as teenagers to “have sex”, but didnt know what to do. She took her top off and then he just spent a while laying on top of her, and eventually they decided that must be it. She put her shirt back on and they got up and left.

  51. Ill_Humor_6201 Avatar

    Definitely. And even if the man struggled to locate the vagina, (in the missionary position that’s actually pretty easy to do) the woman would easily just reach down and guide him where she wants it.

    I don’t think it’s possible to “condition” instincts regarding breeding, eating/drinking & sleeping out of any species. Outside of some sci-fi tier, whacko gene manipulation or something.

    100% they’d figure it out and probably start doing it very quickly, especially if they weren’t raised in any kind of society that made them self conscious about lust.

  52. Dismal-Mushroom-6367 Avatar

    ….have you never seen Blue Lagoon…?

  53. KlM-J0NG-UN Avatar

    Animals do at least. Why wouldn’t we?

  54. Fickle_Warrior Avatar

    Not good sex but yeah. Thats how animarls typically work

  55. PoochiGee Avatar

    Short answer , fuck yes we do .

  56. Cautious-Lecture-153 Avatar

    I grew up farming. I saw dogs mating, sheep mating, goats mating… The only surprise to me was that my skin didn’t peel back to reveal a red rocket.

  57. The_gray_area_ Avatar

    Not really, it takes good communication and trust with your partner to truly be good at it. But just have it? Yeah probably

  58. sterling_mallory Avatar

    Yes. I had never watched porn before my first time, it comes naturally. I mean, the basic mechanics at least.

  59. RamboRider123 Avatar

    Not all the time.

    There was a married couple in India who were trying to have a child, but after several attempts, nothing happened.

    They went to a doctor and got tests done, and everything seemed normal; despite this, after months of trying, they didn’t have a child.

    Then the doctor got suspicious and asked them how they have intercourse. They told the doctor that the husband inserts his dick in his wife’s belly button.

  60. Then_Kaleidoscope_10 Avatar

    Yes, just like other animals (tigers, rabbits, emus, &c.) human animals are heterosexually reproducing and the majority of them will have their genitalia gravitate towards those of the opposite sex once they move past the juvenile stage (post-pubescent).

  61. _totalannihilation Avatar

    I think it’s safe to say that people have an idea on how the basics work (In and out) But moving and all the extra things that you can do like positions and maybe using mouth comes with experience.

  62. DreamingTooLong Avatar

    Think about it just for 10 seconds.

    Since the beginning of time, different species of everything in nature have witnessed reproduction being done and it’s a similar procedure with all living creatures across the entire animal kingdom. The instructions have always been available for anyone and anything willing or wanting to learn.

  63. pingwing Avatar

    Animals do, people do. Yes. This is how we have evolved.

  64. it777777 Avatar

    No. There was a story about a Mormon (?) couple who wanted to do it and they just lied in bed above each other and wondered why nothing happens…

  65. Technical_Goose_8160 Avatar

    Sorta. But knowing anything, a person will hump till they find something that feels Good. Both people doing that will eventually over time lead to sex. Though, aligning genitals can’t be challenging. Aka, it takes a few tries to get it in.

  66. xensiz Avatar

    I mean nobody taught me how to be gay, I just went along with a friend and bam!

  67. Tuncunmun38 Avatar

    most likley

    most interestingly they would think they are the first to figure it out lol

  68. LINDMATT Avatar

    Not sure. My original theory as a kid on how to get a chick pregnant was not correct lol

  69. limbodog Avatar

    Nope. I used to be friends with this guy ages ago. His mother was in medicine, and she had a married couple come in complaining that they couldn’t conceive. They had been sleeping together for more than a month!

    Turns out they had literally just been sleeping together. In the same bed. They had no clue there was more to it. Strict religious upbringing.

  70. spankedmonkeysteak Avatar

    That’s beauty of evolution…. those cant figure it out will be removed from the gene pool. Regretfully, some have it down too well!!

  71. chosimba83 Avatar

    There’s a great documentary I saw a while ago called Blue Lagoon and those kids figured it out.

  72. Beezelbub_is_me Avatar

    Pretty basic. It’s like the toy when we were kids where you had to put certain shapes in the right hole.

  73. Ok-Conversation4933 Avatar

    I don’t know. My dad had the birds, and bees talk with me, and I had that with my son. Thankfully my wife at the time had that talk with my daughters.

  74. Various_Hope_9038 Avatar

    Define sex. Oral? Fingering? Mutual masterbation? Rape? if sex is defined as consentual penis in vag strictly, my answer is no. People will do what feels good and often is dangerous. That’s why we need sex education.

  75. Antique-Aardvark-184 Avatar

    Even if no one was “taught” to be hungry and the desire to eat food, we all do. It’s just human nature

  76. barefootbeast Avatar

    I never got the “talk” from my parents. At the time, it was the early 80s and the US was in Reagan’s moral turpitude phase. I just knew I was getting those random erections and had to hide them in school. In the summer of 84, I was swimming at the pond with a neighbor, and one of those randoms hit. She asked me to show it to her, and reciprocated with hers. As we were getting on the ground, I thought “I’ve got ‘tab A’ between my legs. She has ‘slot B.’ I wonder….”

    Thirty seconds later, I was panting and the biology talk I never got was playing itself out lol.

  77. EntWarwick Avatar

    Yes.

    When I was a child and sex was a new word I was curious about, I made a guess that the guy sticks his pp into her hole, and then asked my dad what sex was. He told me what it was and I was like, “I knew it.”

  78. problyurdad_ Avatar

    I found my Dads Playboy’s when I was like 6, and got a boner so hard it hurt.

    With exactly zero idea what sex was or what was going on somehow I knew

  79. MrDrSirLord Avatar

    as someone that unfortunately started experimenting far too early as a result of trauma but still not understanding what to actually do yeah it is relatively intuitive if you are both being intimate.

    it’s essentially just advancing cuddling, missionary is a pretty natural position to fall into if two people are embracing each other closely.

    I remember my first consensual intimate moment very clearly and we’ll but I’m not going into details or writing fanfic because of the nature of this topic so don’t any fucking weirdos waste time DM me I wouldn’t even open your chat.

    But anyway sexual content warning >!yeah it stated with just looking at each other wondering why parts were different between us, I already had an “idea” that it could feel good but didn’t know how to make anything work with the opposite gender, at some point the poking and prodding from curiosity of our differences turned to more holding and touching because of the sensitivity, which in a teen gets all the brain fog and hormones running, that want to be closer and hold them to your chest, and when you hug that naturally brings your sensitive parts closer to the other person’s sensitive parts, and because you’re hands are occupied cuddling so naturally you rub your sensitive parts together so they stay sensitive, and after awhile you figure out it can go inside.!< and that’s pretty much that lol.

    So I think even without any prior experience or sexual education at all, just an awareness that “touch here feels good” (which most boys will work out within a year of their first erecton) if you put two hormonal people together they’d probably work it out within a few hours if they were both comfortable letting the other person touch them.

  80. Crazyjacketfruit Avatar

    I assumed we just humped everything because it feels good, and eventually, it happens. Kinda like how dogs just hump everything until it happens.

  81. Stargazer5781 Avatar

    Sort of.

    This part feels good for me when touched. That part feels good for you when touched.

    What woukd happen if we touched them together?!

    If you want to call that “instinct,” I guess you can.

  82. Hopeful-Winter9642 Avatar

    I’ve personally never had sex, but I know the basics just like anyone else. Thing gets hard, thing goes in hole, etc. I never got “the talk”, nor did I watch that video in bio class. My parents were very strict about sex.

  83. thehighepopt Avatar

    Insert tab A into slot B. Doesn’t get easier than that. Now, pleasing your partner and self, that takes practice.

  84. BlueShift42 Avatar

    Yep. Instinctually driven. Same reason I don’t question other people’s sexuality. As a straight man, I find women and their equipment attractive. Never chose to. Always found women pretty even as a young child, then one day I started noticing that breasts are really nice and continued to discover more about them that I liked. Logic wasn’t involved in any of this, pure feels.

  85. NachoBuddy71 Avatar

    Having sex, yes…. doing it well? That’s a toughie

  86. Gracinhas Avatar

    Yes. Yes they do.

  87. ChemistBig9349 Avatar

    When I was in 6th grade watching porno on a half day alone in my parents room I started instinctually beating my warmonger until completion. I’d never masterbated and haven’t stopped since

  88. 42retired Avatar

    All animals do.

  89. celestialsexgoddess Avatar

    I never had exposure to the whole carry on when I was underaged, but in hindsight I remember having hard wired sexual instincts developing well before hitting adolescence.

    I would have been in preschool when I first noticed that boys have a different anatomy, and that I’m interested in the penis in ways I cannot explain. My parents never said much other than they’re “private parts,” implying that I’d be bad to instinctively want to check a boy out, say, when he’s changing his clothes.

    When I was 8, I’d close my bedroom door, take the clothes off my Barbie and Ken dolls and imagine them doing things to each other naked. It bugged me that Ken dolls don’t come with penises. I had no idea what I was doing other than I felt this isn’t something I should be doing with company.

    When I was 10, I’d draw naked men and women and hide my drawings.

    I had my proper first puppy love crush at 13, but I’d have started liking boys way earlier. I don’t remember how it started because I grew up in a culture that made fun of and policed opposite sex kids that liked each other, so for a long time I repressed my natural instincts to be drawn to age appropriate boys.

    I didn’t understand what I wanted when I wanted to be with my crush at 13. I craved being in his presence and it was a very strong pull I couldn’t fight back. I made excuses to talk to him, and when in person wasn’t possible I’d call him on the landline phone and brave asking his parents to speak to him. I imagined holding his hand, holding his body, maybe kissing him but that made me shy–not that any of these happened.

    Next thing I know he was moving out of town at the end of the year. I brought a “keep in touch” book to the end of the year school party and asked people going away to write how to keep in touch with them. My crush refused to write in it and looked at me coldly wanting to be left alone. I was, well, crushed. When I got home I cried myself to sleep and that was my first experience of romantic heartbreak.

    My sexual urges started kicking in around 15. I wasn’t exposed to porn at this age and actively avoided it. But I’ve had other ways of finding out that penises get erections and I wanted one in me. I also discovered that sexy thoughts made me wet down there, and touching myself made me think about guys I like.

    It also made me angry that sex makes girls pregnant and that my religion taught me that sex is bad unless the people having it are married. It infuriated me to think, am I supposed to wait another decade before having this sinfully beautiful thing with a real man.

    I graduated from high school a virgin, dated an older classmate in my first year of university. Refused him sex and got raped instead. I tried to reach out to my community for support and instead they shamed me for having a boyfriend in the first place and getting what I deserved as a sinner.

    That was traumatic in ways I’m not done healing from 20+ years later. So I had a few years of a dry spell throughout university, but soon found myself secretly thirsting after other young men even if I did not choose to pursue them.

    I started masturbating again, and the more I did it, the more visual I craved my experience to be. So I started watching porn, and bought toys as soon as I could afford them. I think that was a good call to wait until I was an adult because by then I understood my desires better and how to normalise them within what I believed was ethical.

    The first time I had consensual sex was in my twenties, with a male co-worker. I’ll spare the details but it felt good to finally cross that threshold and find that I’m still me, and he’s still him, and to give our bodies permission to experience something so pleasurable and intimate together.

    Today I am fiercely against abstinence-only sex ed. It infuriates me when politicians want to take away our rights to contraception and family planning. It infuriates me when they want to take away our children’s and teenagers’ rights to learn about their bodies in age appropriate safe spaces with the guidance of trusted adults–and make them rely on ethically questionable internet porn and peer pressure for answers their young bodies are naturally demanding.

    So yes to answer your question I think people innately know how to have sex. Looking back to my own experience as someone who wasn’t graphically exposed to it before coming of age, it was a long fumble in the dark, but my vagina always knew what she (eventually) wanted.

    Even if I figured sex out instinctively, I wish I didn’t fumble in the dark for so long, beating myself up for having “bad” sexual desires. Nobody should be left fumbling in the dark like I did. I don’t wish I’d watched porn or had sex younger, but I did wish that I had safe spaces that normalised how my body works as a sexual being, and normalised my desires and emotions around them too.

    Things were hard enough for me as a cis-het woman/girl, I can’t imagine what navigating sexuality must be like for my LGBTQIA+ loved ones in a heteronormative world that treats them differently. But I’ve learnt that no matter how you’re oriented, sex is an integral part of who we are, and there’s no escaping it.

  90. PossibleConclusion1 Avatar

    Sex for procreation, yes

    Sex for pleasure, not even close

  91. Doogiesham Avatar

    Absolutely. I remember being a 12-13 year old and humping my pillow before ever actually learning how sex works. Two horny teenagers attracted to each other would figure it out without having ever heard of sex

  92. NiceTuBeNice Avatar

    It doesn’t take much to figure it out.