I was sent the NRL Penrith Panthers sex-tapes and after viewing the videos, my sympathy is with the women.

I don’t judge individuals who participate in group sex activities. Nor do I judge women who enjoy screwing sports teams.

Both are legitimate sexual fantasies but the buzzword is consent. The sex in these videos was consensual. But the filming and dissemination of the footage was not.

Sadly the only time group-sex makes headlines in Australia — is when a group of alpha males trip over their dicks and act like cretinous pigs.

Penrith officials suspect a former player leaked the videos in a bid to ruin the Panthers season. Well, they’ve ruined more than that — they’ve destroyed these women’s lives.

Sexually liberated women are entitled to get their kicks anyway they please, just like the blokes — it’s called sexual equality. But as per usual, it will be the women who are left blemished.

God forbid if any Australian woman has the audacity to live a sexually liberated life. After all, aren’t women only built for breeding and being receptacles for men’s semen?

That may sound harsh. But that’s what one learns from viewing the four scandalous videos.

It’s obvious to any viewer that these women are just props — a mere set of orifices to be filled. They are treated in a derogatory manner by the Panthers and one girl has her head held down by various rugby players’ feet.

The misogynistic sexual shenanigans that appear to be rife throughout Australian men’s sport does not mirror the beliefs or sexual actions of any of the men I know.

In the wider sex-positive community of Australia, men and women participate regularly in safe consensual and respectful gangbangs.

I state this fact because when people read scandalous stories such as these, they make the assumption that women lack sexual agency and men are always the instigators. But I know for a fact that this isn’t true.

Women are regularly the instigators of group-sex dynamics. One just doesn’t hear about it — because it contradicts the feminist-fuelled victim narrative.

I hate the term “toxic masculinity” with every cell of my being. Not only is it clichéd and overused. But it tars all men with the same brush — which I am vehemently against. But what I viewed in those four videos was toxic masculinity personified.

Having a brief look over the other side of the fence. Sadly, no woman has ever owned her decision after being ousted for having sex with an Aussie athletic team.

And is it any wonder, when women get stigmatised while men get hero status?

Conveniently, in every sex scandal, women seem to have such terrible regrets after the fact.

Which pins women to victim status whilst automatically making men the scapegoat.

In the future, how powerful would it be for a woman involved in a sex scandal to proudly stand by her actions instead of clinging to victimhood?

It would send a message that women are sexual beings and that we write our own narrative.

It would send a message that we are not some secondary offshoot of male sexuality and desire.

Wanting to fuck lots of guys is not inherently degrading to women. We need to own that.

Perhaps today, would be a good day to start?

Vanessa de Largie is a freelance journalist and sex columnist who divides her time between London and Melbourne. You can find more of her work here.

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