To end conversion therapy, we must understand what it actually means

By Travis Salway On Monday, Calgary City Council voted, nearly unanimously, to pass a municipal ban of advertising around conversion therapy, which the city defined as “practice, treatment, or service designed to change, repress, or discourage a person’s sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression, or to repress or reduce non-heterosexual attraction or sexual behaviour.” …

A very, very beginner’s guide to understanding BDSM

By Mary Grace Garis Even as BDSM comes to popular light via media portrayals and increased openness about intimate habits and preferences, much about the sexual practice remains misunderstood and incorrectly presumed to be negative and abusive—especially in those media portrayals. This is perhaps most recently depicted in that degrading scene in Hulu’s Normal People, …

17 Totally Normal Things to Experience in Your Relationship Right Now

The good, the bad, and the irritating. By Anna Borges It doesn’t take a scientist to know that the coronavirus crisis is rife with stressors and challenges that would shake up even the healthiest of relationships. Maybe the pandemic is acting as a pressure cooker for relationship problems you already had or maybe it’s serving …

It took us long enough, but we’re finally paying attention to women’s pleasure

By Erin Magner While the history of women and pleasure is fraught with stigma, it appears we’re in the midst of a pleasure revolution. Now, female-identifying founders are creating pornography, sex toys, sex-education platforms, and erotica, all of which normalizes and celebrates a woman’s right to get off. Not only are consumers turned on by …

Xs & Os:

Couples Who Regularly Show Physical Affection Have Happier Relationships by John Anderer Cuddling, hugging, and touching that doesn’t lead to sex can help build a stronger and happier relationship and marriage, according to a new study conducted at Binghamton University. The research team examined the effect of non-sexual physical intimacy on relationship satisfaction across a …

How not to destroy your relationship during lockdown

By Melody Thomas Humans don’t deal all that well with uncertainty – not knowing what’s about to happen causes us more stress than knowing for certain something bad is. In the face of a global pandemic, where the outcomes are largely unknown, many romantic relationships will experience an increase in tension and conflict. Uncertainty breeds …

I Spent Five Years Talking to Women Across the U.S. About Pleasure and Desire.

Here’s What I Learned About Inequality in the Bedroom By Katherine Rowland In the fall of 2014, I stood in a crowded auditorium as a parade of women described to regulators at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration how their libidos had been whittled down to a fraction of their former power. For some it …

(Almost) Everything You Know About the Invention of the Vibrator Is Wrong

A Victorian doctor created the “vibratode,” but it was our great-great- grandmothers who saw its real potential. By Hallie Lieberman There’s a longstanding myth that still seems to hold about where vibrators first came from. It goes something like this: Cut to Victorian England. A mutton-chopped, bow-tie-clad doctor stands in an operating theater, where the …

The Tech Innovator Fighting to Give Women Better Orgasms:

‘It’s About Helping People Understand Themselves’ By Aurora Snow Lora DiCarlo won the 2019 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) Robotics Innovation Award for Osé, the company’s premiere product—“a robotic massager for hands-free blended orgasms.” A few months later, CES parent company Consumer Technology Association took the award back, calling it a mistake due to the nature …

10 Things Your Vibrator Can Help With That You Wouldn’t Expect

by Cassandra Corrado I’m officially dubbing 2020 the year of the vibrator. They’re just having a bit of a moment, you know? I’m not talking about the created-from-jelly-latex, transparent pink, rabbit vibrators that many of us still think of when you read the word “vibrator.” Nope — I’m talking about way more than just those. …