A huge new study of sexuality in France has just been released, with a shocking conclusion: French women like sex. They are becoming more like men in the age they first have sex (17-ish), the number of sexual partners, and the length of their sex lives—90% of women over 50 say they're still getting laid, versus a mere 50% in 1970. But more surprising than that is a worrying trend among young French men: they're just not that interested in this whole sex business, thank you very much!

According to the study, one-fifth of all French men between the ages of 18-24 have "no interest in sexual or romantic activity whatever." This is presented without any real explanation. And I can think of none, except some unrelated stock jokes about the French being punks. They totally chickened out in WW2!

That number is baffling. Without having a detailed comprehensive study of American sexuality sitting in front of me, I'd be astounded if that number in the US was even 10%. The report also found that the rate of abstinence among French men 18-35 is more than 6%, versus only 3.5% for women. The study has been presented in the press, generally, as "French women are totally sex fiends and French men are not!" Which has a grain of truth. But the figures also say that women there report an average of 5 sex partners over the course of their lives, while men have an average of 13. So the weird "disinterest" among a large portion of younger men is just...weird.

Will this lead to a brisk business in virile young men traveling to France to serve as paid concubines for young women whose male counterparts have no interest in satisfying them, in a strange reversed version of the 2005 Charlotte Rampling sex tourism film Heading South? It's impossible to rule out.

Send an email to Hamilton Nolan, the author of this post, at Hamilton@gawker.com.