How to Talk to Your Partner About Getting Tested With Minimal Weirdness

It’s possible! (And smart.) By Kasandra Brabaw You’re pressed against the wall of a new date’s apartment as they kiss your neck and reach to undo your pants. Every atom in your body is ready for more, but then your brain kicks in: Shit. We haven’t talked about STIs yet. Or perhaps it happens when …

5 Surprising Facts About Vaginas From The ‘Gynae Geek’

By Esther Newman From advice about popping jade eggs down there to steaming our lady parts, we’re inundated with information about what to do with our vaginas. Unfortunately, much of this – the supposed merits of jade eggs and steam baths included – is false, headline-grabbing nonsense. Someone who knows the importance of women truly …

Not That Kind of Girl

In her influential 1959 Atlantic article, “Sex and the College Girl,” Nora Johnson predicted that young, educated women pursuing expansive new opportunities would likely end up disappointed. She spent the rest of her life finding out what could happen instead. By Annika Neklason Every few years, new concerns bloom about the changing ways young people …

When Brooklyn was queer: telling the story of the borough’s LGBT past

In a new book, Hugh Ryan explores the untold history of queer life in Brooklyn from the 1850s forward, revealing some unlikely truths By Dominic Rushe  For five years Hugh Ryan has been hunting queer ghosts through the streets of Brooklyn, amid the racks of New York’s public libraries, among its court records and yellow …

What’s So ‘Indecent’ About Female Pleasure?

A consumer technology innovation award was revoked from a company that makes a hands-free sex toy. The reason, some believe, is that the product is made for women. By Valeriya Safronova A personal massager, a sperm counter, virtual-reality pornography, something described as “the world’s first ebook-driven sex toy”: All of these products have been exhibited …

Why Tumblr’s ban on adult content is bad for LGBTQ youth

By Stefanie Duguay As of Dec. 17, Tumblr will no longer allow “adult content,” defined as that which shows “real-life human genitals or female-presenting nipples, and any content — including photos, videos, GIFs and illustrations — that depicts sex acts.” Before this, the platform’s lenient policies contrasted significantly with those of Facebook and Instagram, which …

Gender Identity in Weimar Germany

Remembering an early academic effort to define sexual orientation and gender identity as variable natural phenomena, rather than moral matters. By: Livia Gershon As the already precarious legal rights of trangender Americans come under renewed threat, it’s worth looking back at the first political movement around gender identity in the modern West. As German Studies …

What it really means to be in a dominant/submissive relationship

Real D/s relationships go beyond ‘Fifty Shades.’ By Tiffany Diane Tso When it comes to understanding BDSM, non-practitioners generally equate the kinky lifestyle with the chains, ropes, whips, and handcuffs found in Christian Grey’s “red room of pain” in Fifty Shades of Grey. And among the different elements included in the BDSM portmanteau (bondage and …