Women in New York City have slightly — very slightly — more sex than their counterparts in major cities around the country.
So found an online survey of 1,639 women conducted to coincide with the imminent release of Elexa, a new line of sexual health products for ladies made by the condom brand Trojan.
For the editors of the Times and Newsday, not surprisingly, the survey wasn’t news. Nor was it for the Daily News.
And as for the city’s other tabloid, the New York Post? Well, it went bananas, pouncing on the findings with what can only be described as unbridled enthusiasm.
A teaser of Kim Cattrall of “Sex in the City” fame claims nearly a quarter of today’s front page — while the story itself and assorted graphic add-ons takes up all of page three. “THE SEX QUEENS” blares the top headline; “NYC women doin’ it more than rest in U.S.” reads the subhead.
So what’s really going on here? Well, apparently 23 percent of female New Yorkers claim to be “regularly steaming up the sheets,” the story says, compared to 18 percent in Los Angeles and 17 percent in Dallas, Miami and Chicago.
Frankly, when only 23 percent of any group reports having sex more often than once a week, we’re underwhelmed. (After all, that means 77 percent don’t.) But, then, we’re not the Post. If we were, we would have compounded the hype by adding a salacious woman-on-the-street featurette entitled “How often do you do it?” — complete with respondents’ names, ages, occupations, number of sexual encounters per week, and a quote.
Score one, we guess, for the reporter-photographer duo that convinced these six women to have their sex lives — and pictures — aired in public.
But us, we’re gonna file this one under TMI — Too Much Information.
–Edward B. Colby
Edward B. Colby was a writer at CJR Daily.