No sex please. We're French?: "This spring, we are being told that France is turning off sex. This may just be media trend-making, but thanks to a recent survey and new books, we are being told by television, radio and the press that younger French men and women are increasingly doing without sex and that many prefer it that way. To be precise, the survey by Ipsos, carried out in 2004, showed that 25 percent of women and 15 percent of men live in "sexual solitude". Over a quarter of these said that they felt happy abstaining. The thesis of the supposedly new French abstinence is being pushed by Jean-Philippe de Tonnac, author of La R,volution Asexuelle, and by David Fontaine, whose book is called No Sex last year -- la vie sans sexe. The pair, whose works are full of case studies, are making the points that we have been hearing for years from the trend-trackers of the Anglo-Saxon world: People are retreating from the over-sexualisation of society and the pressure to perform. De Tonnac, who starred on last weekend's talk shows says: "Asexuality is a defensive reaction to the terrorism of le tout-sexuel". But France being France, the explanation is more abstract and part of the blame falls on capitalism...."