If you had to choose between toe-curling foreplay and a creamy brie, which would you pick? This hilarious—and heated—debate sparked some fascinating research at Columbia University.
Columbia’s online edition of The Blue and White magazine has an annual tradition of interviewing graduating students for their Senior Wisdoms feature. Every year, they ask the question, “Would you rather give up oral sex or cheese?” This year, a student reviewed 222 responses to that question from 2006 to 2012 and found that overall, more people were willing to give up oral sex than cheese—and women were even more likely to prefer fromage. (The student didn’t analyze whether this is a trend that’s increased over time or not.)
We get that it would be practically painful to swear off macaroni and cheese forever, but how can that number of people be so willing to toss oral sex aside? Here’s the full breakdown from Columbia: Out of 103 women, 46 percent would rather give up oral sex, while 26 percent would give up cheese and the remaining 28 percent avoided the question. Out of 119 men, 36 percent would rather give up oral sex, compared with 32 percent who would give up cheese and 32 percent who didn’t answer. Exactly what kind of cheese are they serving over at Columbia?
While we admire this student body’s curiosity, you have to wonder if the results would be different if Columbia polled seniors in a more anonymous way, rather than asking them for a response that will live online with their picture. To settle the debate, we polled Women’s Health and Men’s Health readers on the subject. According to our survey, the majority of Men’s Health readers (80.5 percent) would give up cheese before they would give up oral sex, compared with 56 percent of Women’s Health readers. While that sounds much more realistic, it’s still surprising that women are pretty evenly split on this one.
So which would you give up? To make things more interesting, we’ve beefed up the arguments for both sides.
Three reasons you should NOT give up oral sex:
The Best Oral Sex Positions
How to Have More Oral Sex
Have More Fun With Foreplay
Three reasons you should NOT give up cheese:
The Grown-Up Guide to Grilled Cheese
Healthy Pizza Recipes
Butternut Squash Macaroni and Cheese
Where do you stand on this one? Tell us in the comments!
More from Women’s Health:
Sex Quiz: Have You Ever?
Dating Quiz
Are You “Normal” About Sex?