So, treat the queer, queer-adjacent or curious bookworm in your life to one of these books by trans, including non-binary, authors.
Juno Roche – Trans Power
Juno’s last book, Queer Sex, was a landmark exploration into queer and trans people’s sexuality. A series of intimate interviews that delved into, well, intimacy in the trans community, and how gender identity and sexuality feed into our experiences of that.
For their latest book, Trans Power, Juno used a similar technique – a series of warm, nuanced conversations between them and other people in the trans community. Some of these were conversations with our most prominent thinkers and activists – like Travis Alabanza and Amrou Al-Kadhi – and all of them contained revelations about how gender is constructed, layers of identity and being trans.
Juno’s also breathtakingly honest about their own feelings towards their gender, an insight that is rare in an era of hot-takes and carefully crafted narratives about ‘the trans experience’.
Dr Meg-John Barker – Gender: A Graphic Guide
Author of too many books on gender, relationships and sex to name, Meg-John’s latest is a very accessible and beautifully illustrated guide to gender.
It’s perfect both for family members in need of a little education and queers wanting to learn more about how our current conversation on trans issues fits into a wider context. Written from a staunchly feminist, anti-racist and intersectional perspective, Meg-John goes deep into gender non-conformity and trans history, without assuming the reader has prior knowledge of any of those things – truly a gift.
Buy it online here or head to your local bookshop.
Glamrou – Unicorn: The Memoir of a Muslim Drag Queen
A mandatory read for anyone on the queer and/or gender spectrum who’s had a less-than-perfect coming out.
Amrou tells all our queer stories of self-acceptance and learning to celebrate every part of ourselves in some of the most heart-breaking and heart-warming pages of the year. Readers will be finding immense affinity with Unicorn and thanking Amrou for sharing their story for many years to come. – Charlie Leslau
Non-binary, Muslim drag queen Amrou Al-Kadhi sees queerness as a part of their faith.
Andrea Long Chu – Females
Short, unconventional debut book/essay/investigation from a New York Times-published writer on what it is to be female.
Chu spends this essay trying to defend the statement that “everyone is female, and everyone hates it”. She draws guidance and inspiration from the SCUM Manifesto (1967) and its author, Valerie Solanas – the radical feminist best known for shooting Andy Warhol.
In a similar style, Females is also an uncompromising and at times intense read, but rewarding.
Buy it online here or head to your local bookshop.
Samantha Allen – Real Queer America
If you buy one book on this list – and you made it this far – make it this one. We hear so much about homophobia and transphobia in the States, but that masks a truer (and better!) story about queer resistance in small towns and cities, away from the national media.
Samantha is a trans journalist, and Real Queer America weaves her own personal story of coming out, finding love and creating family with the stories of other trans people who she meets.
In a road trip across the country, she talks to activists, old friends, legislators and – most compellingly – with young trans people who are staying put in the places they were born, rather than moving to the nearest big city when they turn 18.
This book is a way of getting outside the bubble, for city queers, and it’s a non-patronising lesson in hope and resilience for all.
For 45 years, Deborah Roffman has let students’ curiosities guide her lessons on sexuality and relationships.
Deborah Roffman
About 25 years ago, a public school in the Baltimore suburbs invited Deborah Roffman to teach a class on puberty to fifth graders. Roffman, who was known as the “Sex Lady” at the private Park School of Baltimore, where she had been teaching for two decades, was flattered. But she was troubled by the restrictions that the public school’s vice principal had given her: She couldn’t use the words fertilization, intercourse, or sex. And she couldn’t answer any student questions related to those subjects. That wasn’t going to work for the Sex Lady.
Eventually, Roffman reached a compromise with the public school: Students would get parental permission to attend her talk, and Roffman could answer any question they asked, even if it meant using the S-word.
Roffman’s title of human-sexuality educator has not changed since she arrived at the Park School in 1975, but the dimensions of her role there have steadily grown. So, too, has her outside work in consulting and teacher training: Over the years, she has advised at nearly 400 schools, most of them private.
Initially, Roffman taught elective classes in sexuality to the juniors and seniors at Park, but within two years, she had expanded to seventh and eighth graders. In the 1980s, she added fourth and fifth graders to her roster. She also meets annually with the parents of students as young as kindergartners, to coach them on how to talk with their children about sexuality, and she leads summer training for the Park’s elementary-school teachers on incorporating sexuality instruction into their classrooms. “There is this knowledge that we keep in a box about sexuality, waiting until kids are ‘old enough,’” Roffman told me. “My job is to change that.”
During her 45 years of teaching, Roffman has witnessed the evolution of the nation’s attitude toward sex education and, as her experience at the public school shows, how uneven that education can be.
Perhaps more than any other subject, sex education highlights the country’s fierce loyalty to local control of schools. Twenty-nine states require public schools to stress abstinence if they teach about sex, according to the latest count by the Guttmacher Institute, a think tank based in Washington, D.C., and New York that promotes reproductive rights. Some of the more outrageous abstinence lessons employ troubling metaphors, such as comparing sexually active, unmarried women to an old piece of tape: useless and unable to bond. Only 17 states require sex education to be medically accurate.
Most research has found that sex education for adolescents in the United States has declined in the past 20 years. Like art and music, the subject is typically not included on state standardized exams and, as the saying goes, “what gets tested gets taught.” In the case of sex education, waning fear about the spread of HIV and AIDS among heterosexual youths has contributed to the decline in instruction, says John Santelli, a professor at Columbia’s Mailman School of Public Health.
But some bright spots do exist, says Jennifer Driver, the vice president of policy and strategic partnerships at the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States. For example, in some parts of Mississippi and Texas, there has been a shift away from “abstinence only” to “abstinence plus” curricula, with the latter permitting at least some information about contraception.
Roffman remembers her own sex education while growing up in Baltimore as being limited to a short film in fifth grade about periods and puberty. She began working in sex ed in 1971—when access to birth control was rapidly expanding amid the sexual revolution—helping Planned Parenthood train health-care professionals who were setting up family-planning clinics in the region, and doing broader community outreach.
Four years later, she followed her Planned Parenthood supervisor to the progressive Park School, where students often address teachers by their first name and current tuition runs about $30,000 a year. When she arrived that spring, she heard that the senior-class adviser had recently rushed into the upper-school principal’s office, exclaiming that something had to be done before the seniors’ graduation, because “we forgot to talk to them about sex.”
During the next several years, Roffman not only made sure the school remembered to talk to students about sex but steadily built up the curriculum. At Park, students learn about standard fare like birth control and sexually transmitted diseases but also delve into issues such as the history of abortion rights, changing conceptions of gender roles, and how to build respectful, intimate relationships.
Students start by learning about the reproductive systems, the importance of open communication, and the fundamentals of puberty in their first classes with Roffman, in the fourth and fifth grades. In seventh grade, they take a deep-dive course on human sexuality, covering everything from pornography to the use of sex in advertising to gender identity and sexual orientation. They see her again for a shorter, related course in eighth grade. During the 2016 presidential campaign, Roffman’s seventh graders spent most of a semester researching the candidates’ differing views on sex, gender, and reproduction. “In the process of doing that, I got to teach about every topic I wanted to teach about,” she said.
In high school, students take a required sexuality-studies seminar. The specific content varies year to year, but it’s always based on what Roffman calls the “eight characteristics of a sexually healthy adult,” which include staying healthy, enjoying pleasure, and relating to others in caring, nonexploitative ways.
The through line of her approach, at any age, is letting students’ queries guide her instruction. So she asks her students to submit anonymous questions at the start of the semester, and makes sure that she answers them as the course progresses.
Regardless of whether they grew up in the ’80s or the aughts, kids of certain ages always ask versions of the same questions, Roffman has found. For instance, middle-school students, she said, want to know if their bodies and behaviors are “normal.” Many older students ask her at what age it’s normal to start masturbating.
High schoolers routinely ask about romantic communication, relationships, and the right time for intimacy: “Who makes the first move?” “How do you know if you or the other person is ready for the ‘next level’?” “How can you let someone down easy when you want to break up?”
But some contemporary questions, Roffman said, are very different from those she heard earlier in her career. Sometimes the questions change when the news does. (More than 30 years ago, Roffman started reading two newspapers a day to keep up with the rapid pace of news about HIV and AIDS; she’s maintained the habit since.)
She said she received a flood of questions about sexual harassment after the Senate confirmation hearings for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, in the early 1990s. The same decade ended with a spike in student interest in oral sex and behaviors that had previously been considered more taboo, such as anal sex.
Sometimes changing student questions signal broader cultural shifts, like the recent surge in student queries about gender identities. “There would have been questions 20 years ago about sexual orientation, but not about gender diversity,” Roffman said. But one recent eighth-grade cohort submitted questions like “How many genders are there?” “What does ‘gender roles’ mean?” “What is the plus sign for in LGBTQIA+?” and “Why is ‘gay’ called ‘gay’?” She finds a way to answer them all.
Roffman’s students appreciate her blunt and holistic approach. As a sixth grader at a charter school several years ago, Maeve Thistel took a brief unit in sex education. The teacher seemed uncomfortable and nervous, she remembers. The condoms the teacher brought for a demonstration were expired, and split when she took them out of the package. Thistel came away from the class with the impression that sex was both “icky and disturbing.”
Thistel, now a college freshman, transferred to Park for high school, where she found that Roffman presented some of the same material quite differently: Her very first step in the lesson on condoms was to point out that all of them have an expiration date that should be noted and heeded.
Under Roffman’s guidance, sexuality at Park has come to be treated as something closer to social studies, science, or other core subjects. Sex ed is “just another part of the curriculum, not carved out as its own special thing,” says David Sachs, a 1988 graduate who studied with Roffman and whose son, Sebastian, is now in 11th grade at the school and has her as a teacher as well.
Like all Park students, Sebastian Sachs had to complete an eighth-grade project wherein he examined the root cause of a social-justice issue. His team picked sexual assault and, with Roffman as their adviser, focused on consent education and how to introduce it in the youngest grades. Sachs and his teammates created a curriculum for preschoolers that, among other things, encourages them to ask permission before hugging a classmate, borrowing a pencil, or swooping in for a high five.
In Roffman’s ideal world, the school would implement lessons like these, and other age-appropriate sex and relationship education, from the earliest grades. Several of her co-workers agree. “Fourth grade might be too late for us” to begin this kind of education, says Alejandro Hurtado, Park’s Spanish teacher for the lower grades. Last summer, Hurtado participated in a voluntary two-week workshop led by Roffman that aimed to create a sexuality-education curriculum for Park’s elementary-age kids. “It will be subtly woven in,” he says, noting that he plans to talk more explicitly about traditional gender roles and expectations in some Latino cultures as part of his own class.
In her teacher training, Roffman encourages colleagues to be scientifically accurate and use age-appropriate language when answering even the youngest children’s questions. Four-year-olds are beginning to understand place and geography, so they will frequently ask where they came from. “The proper answer is that there’s a place inside a female body called the uterus, and that’s where they grew,” Roffman said.
Sarah Shelton, a Park third-grade teacher who also participated in the summer workshop, says Roffman inspired her to not dodge students’ questions about bodies and sex. In the past she’s deflected sex-related inquiries, such as when a student asked about birth control last year.
“I told her, ‘Great question. Ask your parents,’” Shelton recalls. “If that were to occur again, I would say something like ‘When reproduction happens in the body, there is medication that you can take to stop it so you can have sexual intercourse without creating a baby.’”
Sarah Huss, the director of human development and parent education at the private Campbell Hall school in Los Angeles, says Roffman helped her rethink her school’s sexuality education. Huss reached out to Roffman after reading her book Talk to Me First: Everything You Need to Know to Become Your Kids’ “Go-To” Person About Sex. The ensuing dialogue prompted Campbell Hall to begin sexuality education in third grade and to significantly shore up its middle-school programming. Prior to meeting Roffman, “I had taught sex education as ‘Don’t get hurt, don’t get pregnant, don’t get a disease,’” Huss says. “That wasn’t a hopeful message for the kids.”
Huss admires her colleague’s patient tenacity. “She’s walking into schools where there is so much emotional baggage around a subject,” Huss says. “To suggest doing it differently, you have to confront years and years and years of thinking that talking with young kids about sex is dangerous.”
After decades of striving for change both within and beyond Park’s walls, Roffman is optimistic about the future of sexuality education at progressive private schools like Campbell Hall and Park. “I’ve always believed that independent schools have the responsibility to give back to the larger educational community,” she told me. “It’s up to us to demonstrate that, yes, this can be done well and successfully.”
By contrast, “I see very limited movement in the public sector,” she said. And in a country where only a minority of states require medically accurate sex-education classes, her dream of seamlessly integrating the subject from kindergarten up may be a long way off. But Roffman has lived through one sexual revolution, and she holds out hope for a second in education.
Given that sex has existed as long as the human race has, you’d think our scientists, doctors, and psychologists would have collectively figured out all there is to know about sex by now. But the truth is, there are still many, many aspects of human sexuality that are a big, unexplored, confusing question mark. The good news is, 2019 has been quite the year in the world of sex research. Here are a few of the most fascinating findings we’ve made this year:
1. Women are still struggling to talk about what they want in bed.
In 2019, more than half of American women were still struggling to talk about what they want sexually. A study published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior found 55% of women in the U.S. reported experiencing situations in which they had wanted to communicate with a partner about how they wanted to be touched and what sexually turned them on but decided not to say anything. About one in five women didn’t feel comfortable talking about her sexual desires at all, and one in 10 had never experienced sex in which she felt like her partner valued her sexual pleasure.
2. Just saying the word “clitoris” out loud is linked to better sex for women.
Yes, it really matters that much. As we’ve known for a while, the clitoris is the key to sexual pleasure for people who have them—but mainstream narratives and norms around sex prioritize P-in-V penetration as the main act of sex, despite the fact that the majority of clit owners can’t get off from that alone. Further proving how important the clit is, the same study cited above found that just being comfortable using the word “clitoris” is associated with greater sexual satisfaction and being less likely to fake orgasms. The researchers said their findings indicate why it’s so important for us as a society and as individuals to start talking openly about our sex lives. When you’re comfortable talking about sex—including the specific body parts where you like to get touched—you’re way more likely to convey that to your partners and then get the type of stimulation that actually feels good for you.
3. Not all orgasms are good.
Orgasms are not the definitive marker of good sex, as it turns out. In another study published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior, researchers found 55% of people had experienced a “bad orgasm,” including orgasms that physically hurt, orgasms that didn’t feel as pleasurable as past orgasms, or orgasms that happened in sexually coercive contexts, such that having the orgasm led to intense psychological turmoil.
4. People in relationships really are having less sex.
Experts have been talking about a so-called sex recession for the last year or so, in which several different data reports have been showing people are having less sex these days than in generations prior. One multiyear study published in the BMJ this year found the majority of the dip is happening among married people and cohabiting couples. Some of their key findings: In 2001, 38% of women and 30% of men in serious relationships had no sex in the past month. In 2012, that number jumped to 51% for women and 66% for men in serious relationships. What’s more, even sexually active couples were having less sex than usual: In 2012, just 48% of women and 50% of men in serious relationships reported having sex at least four times in the last month, meaning about half of couples are having sex less than once a week.
5. But millennials don’t think they’re in a sex recession.
Cosmopolitan conducted a nationally representative survey on over 1,000 people. Their findings showed 71% of millennials feel “personally satisfied” with how much sex they’re having, and 62% of millennials think their friends are having “plenty of sex” too. So maybe it’s all relative?
6. Commitment and better sex are linked.
Researchers surveyed hundreds of couples in several weeks of couples’ therapy to ask about their commitment levels and sex lives each week. Published in the Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy, their study found commitment and good sex were definitely linked: Having good sex one week was associated with couples feeling more committed to each other the following week. The reverse was also true. Feeling more committed to each other one week was associated with the couple having better sex the following week. The two seem to feed off each other.
7. People who love casual sex are more committed to their relationships when those relationships are consensually non-monogamous.
If you think people who love casual sex are inherently less committed in their relationships, think again. A study published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior found that, in consensually non-monogamous relationships, enjoying casual sex (i.e., “sociosexuality”) was associated with being more committed to your relationship.
8. Childhood trauma is associated with less sexual satisfaction in adulthood.
People with more traumatic experiences in childhood tend to have less satisfying sex lives in adulthood, according to a study published in the Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy. Why? Experiencing trauma as a kid is associated with experiencing more daily psychological distress and with being less mindful, two qualities that may affect one’s ability to engage and feel pleasure during sex.
9. More than half of seniors are unhappy with their sex lives.
You know what you hear about people having less sex as they get older? That might be true, but it might not be because seniors want less sex. A study published in the journal PLOS ONE found 58% of men and women between ages 55 and 74 are not satisfied with their sex lives. In another study published in the journal Menopause, 78% of the more than 4,000 postmenopausal women surveyed were sexually inactive. Of these sexually inactive women, the top reasons for not having sex were not having a partner to have sex with, having a partner with a medical condition making sex out of the question, and having a partner dealing with sexual dysfunction.
10. These three key factors reliably turn women on.
A study of 662 straight women identified three factors that made women more likely to experience sexual desire for someone: intimacy (i.e., feelings of closeness and deep affection), celebrated otherness (i.e., seeing yourself as a separate entity from your partner instead of seeing yourselves together as a single unit), and object-of-desire affirmation (i.e., being told you are desirable).
This is an oft-repeated myth, but findings published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences have officially disproved the idea that men are “more visual” than women are when it comes to sex. The researchers reanalyzed over 60 studies, each of which had hooked up men and women to fMRI machines while showing them porn to try to see how their brains reacted. Gender was the least predictive factor in determining how activated a person’s brain was while viewing the erotic material.
12. One in four women experienced pain during their most recent sexual experience.
In a study of over 2,000 women published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine, researchers found nearly a quarter of women had experienced pain the last time they’d had sex. Of those who’d experienced pain, 49% didn’t tell their partner about it. Those who’d experienced little to no pleasure during the sexual experience were also three times more likely to not tell their partner about the pain.
13. Vaginal dryness and atrophy begin in perimenopause.
During and after menopause, hormonal shifts tend to cause the vaginal walls to become thinner and lubricate less. Known as vaginal atrophy, these changes tend to cause vaginal dryness, which predictably leads to more difficulties having sex. (Nothing that a little lube can’t fix, of course.) However, a new study published in the journal Menopause has found that these symptoms of vaginal atrophy, vaginal dryness, and the sexual pain that comes with them may actually begin in perimenopause—the period of time right before menopause hits, around ages 40 to 55.
14. Better sex ed improves LGBTQ kids’ mental health.
Sex ed is important for supporting people’s sexual health and helping people navigate sex safely. But it also has important mental health benefits for people in the LGBTQ community, according to new research in the American Journal of Sexuality Education. The study found kids who received sex ed that was inclusive of people with diverse genders and sexual orientations tended to have less anxiety, less depression, and fewer suicidal tendencies.
15. Open-minded people are more likely to cheat.
A study published in the Personality and Individual Differences journal found the personality trait most associated with cheating was open-mindedness. In other words, people who are more open to new experiences and people tend to be more likely to cheat as well. Seems obvious, but open-mindedness is also correlated with being more welcoming, more creative, more sexually liberated, and more extroverted. So…uh-oh?
16. There are at least some psychological components to why some people struggle with their sex drive.
Researchers interviewed about 100 couples where one partner struggles with sexual desire and about 100 couples with no such struggles. Published in the Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy, the study identified a few common traits among the partners who struggled with desire: They were more likely to pursue sex simply to avoid negative consequences (like a disappointed partner) and less likely to pursue sex to experience positive outcomes (like orgasms and connection). The findings also suggested they may “have difficulties recognizing and responding to their partners’ sexual needs due to having fewer sexual needs themselves.”
You can’t make this stuff up! A study published in the journal Sex Education found female students who had taken a sexuality class that discussed the orgasm gap tended to have more orgasms and better orgasms after they took the class than before.
18. Parents have better sex when they like each other.
Yes, researchers talked to 93 couples and found those who complimented each other more and had higher opinions of each other tended to have higher levels of sexual satisfaction in the relationship. It might seem obvious, but many long-term couples (especially parents) will readily admit that just because they’re married and in love does not mean that they always like each other. That means couples should never dismiss the importance of making sure actual feelings of affection and positivity still live on in their relationship.
19. Postcoital dysphoria affects men too.
Postcoital dysphoria refers to inexplicable feelings of sadness, frustration, or distress after having otherwise pleasurable sex. Some people assume that women are more likely to be emotional after having sex, but a study published in the Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy found 41% of men have experienced PCD, and 20% experienced it in the last four weeks.
20. How you feel about your genitalia affects your sex life.
Feeling self-conscious about your vulva or penis might actually affect how much pleasure you’re experiencing during sex. A study published in the Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy found people who felt more confident about their genitalia tend to have less stress about their “performance” during sex and better sexual functioning, which includes getting turned on easily, having more vaginal lubrication, and being able to orgasm with ease.
21. Sexual desire is buildable.
For couples, experiencing sexual desire today makes you more likely to experience sexual desire tomorrow and have sex tomorrow, according to a study published in the Archives of Sexual Desire. That means couples who want to improve their sex lives should consider starting small: Just adding a few moments of heat and turn-on daily, even without having sex, will build up sexual desire over time.
Sex toys have cautiously been allowed into this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas
Sex toys are for relaxation. For education. For healing after childbirth. For long-term or long-distance relationships. For women’s emancipation.
And also… for pleasure.
But manufacturers aiming for respectability tend to save this argument for last.
“Sex toys have an extremely negative connotation,” said Jerome Bensimon, president of Satisfyer. “So we’ve rebranded ourselves as a ‘sexual wellbeing company.'”
The company has gained attention for its pressure wave technology used for clitoral stimulation, and has plans to launch a smart phone app for controlling sex toys, in particular by using voice commands.
At its booth at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, vibrators and Ben Wa balls sit alongside mini vibrators shaped like ice cream cones.
After some ups and downs, “sex tech” is testing the waters this year.
As recently as last year the display likely would have been banned.
At the 2019 show, the Consumer Technology Association, which runs the expo, stripped the Ose massager of an award for innovation, saying it was disqualified for being “immoral,” “obscene” and “profane.”
After an uproar, the CTA reversed itself and returned the prize to Lora DiCarlo, the company which manufactures the Ose.
Sex toys “are consumer electronics just like any other but are not treated like that,” said Janet Lieberman-Lu, co-founder of Dame Products, which manufactures small devices for clitoral stimulation.
Given their widespread use, “sex toys are by definition mainstream…. They’re more adopted than a lot of products at CES.”
Her company has taken New York City’s public transportation system to court, complaining that it allows advertisements for erectile dysfunction medications and ads that contain humorous references to sex — but not for sex devices.
Crave shows its wearable vibrators at the 2020 Consumer Electronics Show
“When you say that male sexual function is healthy and necessary but vibrators for women are obscene, you’re saying that men are supposed to be able to have sex and women aren’t supposed to be able to enjoy it,” said Lieberman-Lu.
“That’s what leads to rape culture.”
– Starting the conversation –
Entrepreneurs in this industry, many of whom started out in conventional consumer electronics, medicine or cosmetics, say pleasure and health go hand-in-hand.
Given that school textbooks only recently began including information on the shape and size of the clitoris, they say they are on a mission to educate the public.
It is often “much easier to talk about health than pure pleasure, which can involve fear of rejection,” said Soumyadip Rakshit, CEO of Mystery Vibe, which develops vibrators that deal with both erectile difficulties in men and postpartum vaginal scarring in women.
To open up, people often need a catalyst.
“Everyone is keen to talk about it but no one wants to be the first,” he said.
“If someone does that for them, a company, an article, a doctor… it makes that so much easier.”
Ergo-Fit presents its sex toys at the 2020 Consumer Electronics Show
Elsewhere on the showroom floor, Gerard Escaler, chief marketing officer at Lovense, explains how a male “masturbator” works.
The tubular objects have internal sleeves and are pink when intended for straight users and translucent for gay users.
The Hong Kong-based company offers several internet apps for use in long-distance relations — with a partner or with online erotic performers like “cam girls” who sell access to live web video.
Lovense also is developing a virtual reality game for the male sex toy with female characters. Visitors have to imagine the contents, however, since the imagery, even if artificial, is not allowed during the consumer expo.
But the “sexual wellbeing” industry, which could swell to nearly $40 billion by 2024, according to a forecast from market research firm Aritzon, may have good reason to maintain an air of mystery and controversy.
Without the storm it created last year, the $300 Ose vibrator might not have taken off quite the way it did, said Lora Haddock DiCarlo, founder of the eponymous company which produces it.
“When we did our presale with Ose, after its long-awaited release at the end of November, we hit our yearly sales goal in five hours,” she said, as she road aboard a transparent mobile showroom plying the streets of Las Vegas during the show.
The roving booth, like a fishbowl on wheels, displayed the catch phrase: “The pleasure is all yours.”
Teenagers and young men still don’t have the right vocabulary. Can we help them get there?
By Peggy Orenstein
A while back, during a discussion I was having with a group of high school students about sexual ethics, a boy raised his hand to ask me, “Can you have sex without feelings?” The other guys in the room nodded, leaned forward, curious, maybe a little challenging. Strictly speaking, of course, even indifference is a feeling, but I knew what they meant: They wanted to know if they could have sex without caring: devoid of vulnerability, even with disregard for a partner. To put it in teenage parlance, they wanted to know whether it was truly possible to “hit it and quit it.”
I thought about those boys this week as I watched Harvey Weinstein, in an Oscar-worthy performance of abject harmlessness, hobble on his walker into the New York Supreme Court in Manhattan. The #MeToo movement has exposed sexual misconduct, coercion and harassment across every sector of society. But shining light on a problem won’t, in itself, solve it, not even if Mr. Weinstein ends up with (fingers crossed) the longest prison sentence in history. To make real change we need to tackle something larger and more systemic: the pervasive culture that urges boys toward disrespect and detachment in their intimate encounters.
Despite a new imperative to be scrupulous about affirmative consent, young men are still subject to incessant messages that sexual conquest — being always down for sex, racking up their “body count,” regardless of how they or their partner may feel about it — remains the measure of a “real” man, and a reliable path to social status. As one high school junior explained: “Guys need to prove themselves to their guys. So to do that, you’re going to be dominating. You’re going to maybe push. Because, it’s like the girl is just there as a means for him to get off and a means for him to brag.”
I never intended to write about boys. As a journalist, I have spent over a quarter of a century chronicling girls’ lives — that has been my calling and my passion. But four years ago, after publishing a book about the contradictions young women still face in their intimate encounters, I realized, perhaps inevitably, that if I truly wanted to promote safer, more enjoyable, more egalitarian sexual relationships among young people, I needed to have the other half of the conversation. So I began interviewing young men — dozens, of different backgrounds, in their early teens and 20s — about sex and love, hookup culture and relationships, masculinity and media, sexual consent and misconduct. #MeToo wasn’t the impetus for my work (I began well before the Weinstein story broke) but it quickly underscored the urgency.
Few of the boys had previously had such conversations. Certainly not with their parents, most of whom would rather poke themselves in the eye with a fork than speak frankly to their sons about sex. I can’t say that I blame them: It’s excruciating, and it’s not like our own parents offered a template.
Yet that silence has troubling implications. According to a 2017 national survey of 3,000 high school students and young adults by the Making Caring Common Project, a large majority of boys never had a single conversation with their parents about, for instance, how to be sure that your partner “wants to be — and is comfortable — having sex with you,” or about what it meant to be a “a caring and respectful sexual partner.” About two-thirds had never heard from their parents that they shouldn’t have sex with someone who is too intoxicated to consent. Most had never been told by parents not to catcall girls or use degrading terms such as “bitches” or “hoes” — this despite the fact that nearly 90 percent of the girls in the survey reported having been sexually harassed.
Adults may assume those ideas are self-evident, beyond the need for comment, but given the rates of coercion, misconduct and assault among men both young and old, boys are clearly not getting the message by osmosis. The vast majority of teenagers, though, who did have conversations like these with their parents — and boys even more than girls — described them as at least somewhat influential on their thinking.
Nor will schools pick up the slack. Most states still require sex education to stress abstinence (a legit option, for sure, as long as it’s one among many: not a mandate that equates sexually active teens with, say, chewed pieces of gum). But many more progressive, supposedly comprehensive classes aren’t much better, often focused predominantly on risk and danger: avoiding pregnancy and preventing disease. Increasingly, sexual consent is being added to that cautionary to-do list, as it should be. Too often, though, that question of yes or no becomes a stand-in for all conversation about sexual decision-making: another way to dodge more nuanced discussions of personal responsibility, open communication, establishing relationships, understanding gender dynamics and — the third rail of sex ed classes — reciprocal pleasure and the L.G.B.T.Q.+ perspective.
I found gay boys, by the way, to be notably more willing and able than others to negotiate the terms of a sexual encounter — they had to be, since who was going to do what with whom could not be assumed. They often seemed puzzled by heterosexuals’ reticence. “I don’t know why straight guys see consent as a mood-killer,” one college sophomore said. “I’m like, ‘if we’re talking, that means we’re going to have sex — this is great!’”
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Dan Savage, the syndicated sex advice columnist, refers to “the four magic words” gay guys will use during a sexual encounter: What are you into?” That’s a very different perspective than that of straight boys, who usually aim for one-word assent to options they define. I do fear, though, that since girls, as I’d previously found, are so often disconnected from their bodies’ desires and responses, their answer to an authentic conversation-starter might well be, “I have no idea.” What might happen, though, if teenagers learned to start talking to each other that way early on?
Absent guidance from trusted adults, boys look to the media as a default sex educator, where they are bombarded by images of female sexual availability and male sexual entitlement. With the rise of the internet, smartphones and video-sharing sites like Pornhub, parents worry about the potential impact of pornography on teens’ sexual expectations. Let me be clear: Curiosity about sex is natural. Masturbation? Great! What’s more, there is all kinds of porn — ethical porn, feminist porn, queer porn. But the most readily available, free content portrays a distorted vision of sex: as something men do to rather than with a partner and women’s pleasure as a performance for male satisfaction.
Boys frequently expressed ambivalence to me about their porn habits. “I think porn affects your ability to be innocent in a sexual relationship,” a high school senior commented. “The whole idea of exploring sex without any preconceived ideas of what it is, you know?”
Even if parents could block all the triple-X sites (and good luck with that), the reality is that exposure to sexual content in media consumption of any kind — TV, movies, games, social media, music videos — is associated with greater tolerance for sexual harassment, belief in rape myths and the objectification of women. “I think music has some of the biggest impact on how guys treat girls,” another high school senior told me. “In the car, my friends and I listen to all this stuff that’s just” — he rattled off several oh-so-unprintable lines about women and sex. “When you hear that, like, five, six, 10 times a day, it makes it hard to escape having that mind-set.”
The promise of hot sex with a cold heart animates college (and increasingly high school) hookup culture — which is why, according to Lisa Wade, a professor of sociology at Occidental College, getting wasted beforehand is so crucial: Alcohol girds young people against the near-fanatic generational fear of the awkward while creating what Ms. Wade calls the “compulsory carelessness” necessary for a possible one-off. Most of the guys I met knew that sex with an incapacitated person is assault. Yet because, in their minds, you need to be hammered in order to hook up, the trick became being (and finding someone who is) drunk enough to want to do it but sober enough to be able to express a credible “yes.” And who is to be the judge of that?
Drunk boys, as it turns out, tend to vastly overperceive a girl’s interest in sex, often interpreting expressions of friendliness as It’s on. Alcohol has also been shown to diminish their ability to hear “no” or notice a partner’s hesitation. Wasted young men are more likely than they would be sober to use coercion or force to get what they want and — still looking at you, Brett Kavanaugh — they are less aware of their victim’s distress.
In consensual drunken hookups, the sex still tends to be meh. It “can feel like two people having two very distinct experiences,” a second-semester college freshman who’d had multiple partners told me. “There’s not much eye contact. Sometimes you don’t even say anything. And it’s weird to be so open with a stranger. It’s like you’re acting vulnerable, but not actually being vulnerable with someone you don’t know and don’t care very much about. It’s not a problem for me. It’s just — odd. Odd, and not even really fun.”
According to Andrew Smiler, a psychologist specializing in adolescent male behavior who surveyed over a hundred teen boys about dating and sex, most guys, in fact, prefer physical intimacy with someone they know, trust and with whom they feel comfortable. I found that to be true, too, though they seemed to view it as their personal quirk, not shared by their peers. Mr. Smiler suggests, then, that adults can ask boys what kind of sexual experience they want. “Not just whether they are looking to have an orgasm,” he said, “but about the context and quality of that orgasm. If we’re willing to be more vulgar and pointed, we might even ask, ‘Do you want a partner who’s more than just someone to masturbate into?’”
It occurs to me, after a quarter-century of talking to teens, that the activism on behalf of girls could offer a model to better guide boys. Back in the 1990s, when I first began writing about young women’s quandaries in a changing world — loss of confidence, stunted ambition, negative body image, sexual shaming — there was both a desire for and an apprehension about change: Some parents worried, not irrationally, that raising a daughter to be outspoken or sexually empowered would come at a social cost, that she would be labeled a bitch or a slut. Others raged that girls were being pushed, against their nature, to become “more like boys.”
But years of attention to girls’ experience, of work by parents and professionals, has reduced some of those fears, eased constraint, expanded girls’ roles and opportunities: Things aren’t perfect, not by a long shot, but they are better. Nonetheless, I found myself wishing, in my conversations with girls, that their early sexual experiences did not have to be, as they so often were, something they had to get over. That will require reducing the harm boys cause, whether out of monstrous venality, entitlement, heedlessness or even (maybe especially) ignorance.
For their own well-being, as well as their partners’, they need a counternarrative to the one that elevates the transactional over the connected, the sensual, the kind; boys need to value mutual gratification in their sexual encounters, whether with one-offs or long-term partners. That won’t be accomplished in a single “sex talk,” nor, really, any one easy fix, any more than you could teach your child table manners in one sitting. But at the very least, listening to their struggles is a start. I think about a guy I talked to early on, a rising college junior who’d equated a girl’s invitation back to her room with sexual consent. “I want to do the right thing,” he told me, “but I don’t know what the right thing is. I just know what I know, which is a lot of really confusing and wrong” stuff. He pressed forward unthinkingly, one might say manfully — or as he described it, “boom, boom, boom, boom” — until she put a hand on his chest, saying, “Whoa! I don’t want to do that.”
“And in that moment,” he said, “I could see just how wrong it was. The utter lack of communication that took place in those five to 10 minutes. And even realizing that I didn’t feel great myself about what we were doing. I just…” He shook his head regretfully. “I thought that was the only option. I thought that was the way things were supposed to be.”
How did you learn about sex? Were you taught that it’s a natural part of life or that it’s a sin? Did you receive medically accurate information that prepared you to make safe and responsible decisions regarding your sexual activity? Or were you told that all sexual activity is bad and that having sex makes you unwanted and dirty, like chewed gum?
As odd as that metaphor may sound, it’s just one of several used by abstinence-only and sexual risk-avoidance programs to shame students, instead of providing reliable, accurate information. Now, condom brand Trojan and Advocates for Youth are raising awareness of such unethical strategies by turning chewed pieces of gum into protest symbols with their #Not ChewedGum campaign (NotChewed Gum.org or SRAisAbstinenceOnly.org). On October 30 the two organizations coordinated a billboard-sized exhibit in front of the Capitol in Washington, DC, with the message “You Are Not Chewed Gum. Information Is the Best Protection” crafted entirely from chewed gum.
Other insulting examples used to shame students include:
The used piece of tape: Students stick a piece of tape on their own arm then take it off and pass it to another student, who does the same. The teacher notes that the tape isn’t sticky anymore, concluding that when you have sex with multiple people you ruin your ability to experience emotional intimacy.
The cup of spit: Multiple students spit into one cup and the teacher asks if anyone wants to drink it. When no one does, the teacher explains that the cup of spit symbolizes someone who has had sex with multiple partners; “no one will want you.”
The dice roll and paper doll: Students roll dice and are handed a paper baby based on the roll. The lesson is that sex is risky and can always result in pregnancy, no matter if contraception is used.
The shredded heart: After students write their hopes and dreams for the future on a paper heart the teacher selects a student’s heart to tear into pieces. The teacher tells the class that once they have sex their hopes and dreams are destroyed.
The toothbrush: The teacher shows the class a used toothbrush and asks the boys if they would like to use it. When they say no, the teacher then turns to the girls and says that once they’ve had sex, they’re like the used toothbrush; “who would want you?”
The unwrapped candy: The teacher unwraps a piece of candy, has the students pass it around the class, and then asks if they’d rather have the candy that everyone touched or a wrapped candy. The lesson is that once you’ve had sex you’re like unwanted unwrapped candy. People will choose the untouched candy instead of the “dirty” one.
The crockpot and the microwave: Teachers explain that girls are like crock pots because they “heat up” slowly, while boys are like microwaves because they “get hot” quickly. Girls are also taught to be responsible for making sure boys don’t heat up too quickly.
“We need to counter harmful and shameful programs, and give people resources and tools so they can gain as much knowledge as possible,” said Bukky (pictured here), a nineteen-year-old representative of the Advocates for Youth International Youth Leadership Council and a current Howard University student who was present at the October 30 event in DC. She’s interested in working on global reproductive justice because she had a very “don’t ask, don’t tell” understanding of sex as a direct result of growing up in Idaho and attending the Church of Latter Day Saints’ schools. “If you talked about consent and birth control, you were shamed.”
Abstinence-only lessons are especially cruel to girls by claiming that they—unlike boys—are less valuable after having sex “whether they wanted to or not,” implying that sexual abuse is a female’s responsibility to avoid. This inequity is reinforced by the societal protection of girls’ virginity and the simultaneous celebration of boys’ promiscuity. Recently, rapper T.I. boasted in an interview that he takes his eighteen-year-old daughter to get an annual “hymen check,” but is fine with his fifteen-year-old son having sex. In response to that interview, feminist writer and Humanist Heroine awardee Jessica Valenti reminds us that there’s no medical definition of virginity. “There is no physical marker on men or women’s bodies that demonstrate virginity (not even hymens), and sex means something a lot broader than heterosexual intercourse.” However, seven states require only negative information be provided on homosexuality as part of sex education and several states aren’t even required to provide medically accurate information.
While the #NotChewedGum campaign focuses on the gross and backwards lessons of abstinence-only programs, the #ThxBirthControl campaign by Power to Decide celebrates the unlimited possibilities contraception gives individuals, couples, and families. People are encouraged to learn more about birth control and related legislation, share their stories, and ask questions, providing the comprehensive sexual education that should be in every classroom.
Almost 1 in 18 women and 1 in 40 men have experienced sexual harassment in and related to the workplace, according to a U.S. study.
That represents almost 7 million women and 3 million men who have reported assault, unwanted sexual contact or verbal harassment by a boss, supervisor, coworker, customer or client, the study authors report in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.
“Sexual violence is a prevalent issue and is also preventable,” said Kathleen Basile of the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia, the study’s lead author.
The term “sexual violence” is defined as unwanted penetration through the use of force, alcohol or drug facilitation; pressured or coerced sex; unwanted sexual contact, such as groping; unwanted experiences, such as exposure of sexual body parts and sexual remarks.
“Given the recent media attention to this issue and the re-emergence of the #metoo movement, the time seemed right to focus on it,” Basile told Reuters Health by email.
The researchers analyzed 2010-2012 data from the National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey, which included about 23,000 women and 19,000 men. Basile’s team studied the prevalence of several types of sexual violence by a workplace-related perpetrator, including both authority figures and non-authority figures. They also looked at the numerous after-effects of these experiences, such as psychological problems, safety concerns and absence from work or school.
The study specifically focused on sexual violence by a workplace-related person but couldn’t determine whether the actions occurred at the workplace itself, the authors note.
(Reuters Health) – Almost 1 in 18 women and 1 in 40 men have experienced sexual harassment in and related to the workplace, according to a U.S. study.
That represents almost 7 million women and 3 million men who have reported assault, unwanted sexual contact or verbal harassment by a boss, supervisor, coworker, customer or client, the study authors report in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.
“Sexual violence is a prevalent issue and is also preventable,” said Kathleen Basile of the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia, the study’s lead author.
The term “sexual violence” is defined as unwanted penetration through the use of force, alcohol or drug facilitation; pressured or coerced sex; unwanted sexual contact, such as groping; unwanted experiences, such as exposure of sexual body parts and sexual remarks.
“Given the recent media attention to this issue and the re-emergence of the #metoo movement, the time seemed right to focus on it,” Basile told Reuters Health by email.
The researchers analyzed 2010-2012 data from the National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey, which included about 23,000 women and 19,000 men. Basile’s team studied the prevalence of several types of sexual violence by a workplace-related perpetrator, including both authority figures and non-authority figures. They also looked at the numerous after-effects of these experiences, such as psychological problems, safety concerns and absence from work or school.
The study specifically focused on sexual violence by a workplace-related person but couldn’t determine whether the actions occurred at the workplace itself, the authors note.
The research team found that 5.6% of women and 2.5% of men reported some type of sexual violence by a workplace-related perpetrator. About 4% of women reported harassment by non-authority figures and 2% reported harassment by authority figures. About 2% of men reported harassment by non-authority figures and about 0.6% reported harassment by authority figures.
For women, the most commonly reported sexual act was unwanted sexual contact, and for men, it was unwanted sexual experiences such as sexual remarks.
About 1 million women, or 0.8%, have been raped by a coworker, who was more likely to be a non-authority figure. About 400,000 men, or 0.4%, have been sexually coerced by a coworker and 184,000 were forced to penetrate another person.
“The typical public perception of sexual violence in the workplace is that it is mostly verbal harassment or creating a hostile work environment,” Basile said. “Sexual violence involving physical contact, including forced penetration, while not the most common type, was still reported as having been committed.”
For both men and women, fear was the most commonly reported effect of sexual violence.
“Much of the perpetration is being done not by bosses, as is often the assumption, but from co-workers and, importantly, clients and customers,” said Adrienne O’Neil of Deakin University in Geelong, Australia, who wasn’t involved in the study.
“I hear this a lot from nurses, psychiatrists and emergency workers, where they’ve been made to feel that they are to put up with unwanted sexual advances and assault because their priority is to treat patients above all else,” she told Reuters Health by email. “We’ve known for a long time that these factors put you at risk of heart attack.”
Workplace-related sexual harassment also affects co-workers who witness the behavior, the victim’s loved ones and the victim’s children, said James Campbell Quick of the University of Texas at Arlington, who wasn’t involved in the study.
Company policies should include stricter enforcement around sexual harassment, he said, which includes providing high-risk employees with help before they act. Workplaces should “become obsessed with deviant behavior,” he added, and socialize everyone with proper training, starting with first-line supervisors.
“The greatest tragedy is that this is not a workplace accident,” Quick told Reuters Health by email. “It is a preventable form of malicious, motivated behavior. One act of sexual violence in the workplace raises the threat level for the entire workplace.”
It’s Not a Dirty Word and I Think Kids Should Know What It Is
By Jackie Gillard
It may seem shocking and vulgar to some, but teaching appropriately aged children of all genders about a body part existing only for a woman’s sexual pleasure isn’t just about a woman’s pleasure.
Almost all Canadian school sex-ed curricula avoid discussions on pleasure and focus on reproduction or risks, in either clinical information or warnings to our kids against all the “bad” things that can happen from having sex.
Even naming body parts often excludes the clitoris — it’s labelled in only a few suggested curricula. Yet sexuality educator Nadine Thornhill, PhD., emphasizes, “A child’s knowledge of all sexual body parts — including the clitoris — and understanding what feels good physically versus what doesn’t, are vital components of ensuring children truly comprehend what consent is all about.”
It’s a concept that can be difficult to grasp if you belong to the school of thought that heterosexual sex is about a man “doing” something to a woman; it’s not, and never should be classified as such.
A man asking if he can “do” those things is only one facet of consent.
If a woman doesn’t understand what feels good to her, is her agreement truly consent? Does she actually care or even know she’s not obligated to participate in any kind of sexual interaction that is not pleasurable for her as well? These concepts apply to men, too.
In the age of #MeToo and #TimesUp, men need to comprehend that a woman’s body does not exist simply for their pleasure or reproduction.
The idea that only men are sexual and women are reproductive is incorrect. Both genders are reproductive and both are sexual. The taboos around sexual enjoyment only perpetuate a disservice to both — women grow up feeling shame for bodily agency and sexual enjoyment, while men grow up not fully understanding the sexuality of their partners or how to satisfy them sexually.
We can’t possibly continue to uphold a secretive cover to women’s bodies and their pleasures. Our kids shouldn’t grow up believing anatomy like the clitoris and its functions are dirty, gross or simply a mystery they may go looking to potentially dangerous sources like the internet to have explained.
As parents, it’s our job to ensure we instill in our families a healthy sexual education based on gender equality and fact.
A few years ago, the creation of three-dimensional models of both the inner and outer clitoris taught me — at the ripe old age of 46 — what this integral part of my anatomy looked like inside.
I was born in the sexual liberation decade of the ’70s, yet didn’t even know the correct name or function of a clitoris until my early twenties. Interestingly, I had full comprehension of what my reproductive system looked like, as well as the inner and outer anatomy of mens’ sexual parts, when I was a teenager.
For those unaware, the clitoris actually is formed during gestation from the same tissues that becomes a penis in men. In fact, scientific studies have confirmed that the penis and clitoris have many similarities; enough to have some refer to the clitoris as the “female penis.”
Sadly, the penis and the clitoris are treated very differently by society. Modern culture still blushes at the mention of the clitoris and is generally lacking in even the most basic information about it. I consider myself a feminist, yet I too failed to name and describe this integral part of a woman’s sexuality with both my kids during every one of our open and honest discussions of sexuality.
Only a few Canadian provinces list the clitoris in the curriculum for naming genitalia, and it seems only Quebec discusses the concept of sexual pleasure with high school teens, at the interpretation and comfort level of the teacher leading the classes. My own daughter had a teacher in Grade 4 who only discussed girls having vaginas and didn’t even name the vulva, let alone the clitoris.
Contrary to what I believe to be the erroneous fear that teaching kids about the clitoris will somehow push them towards premature sexual activity, studies have shown honest discussions about sex actually have the opposite effect.
Curiosity is often what motivates youth to experiment sexually, and coupled with a lack of knowledge, can lead to unsatisfying, unpleasurable or even painful or negative sexual experiences for both genders. In the Netherlands, the sex-ed curriculum includes topics like sexual communication and differences between porn sex and real sex. Pleasure is discussed in the context of comfort with one’s own body and communicating personal sexual desires to a partner. The outcome? The Netherlands reports three times less sexual violence than America and has a lower teen pregnancy and STI rate.
At the bare minimum, those with a clitoris should know its name in the event of clitoral health issues. Like any other part of the body, the clitoris can require medical attention. Sadly, bodily shame about problems “down there” prevents some women from discussing issues of concern with even their own doctors.
Last month, the writer, activist, and sex worker Rachel Rabbit White published her debut book of poetry and threw a costume party in New York to celebrate. (Earlier this month, she threw another in Los Angeles.) While Porn Carnivalis White’s first full-length poetry publication, she’s been writing — for Playboy and Vice, among other outlets — about sex, desire, consumption, capitalism, and the uncomfortable meeting place of all these themes for years. On the occasion of her book’s publication, we spoke about the innate pressures of heterosexuality, the similarities between writing and desire, and whether she thinks today’s young people have a new relationship to gratification.
I want to know what your thoughts are on the words associated with sex — how their meanings are so determined by context.
I was recently having a conversation where someone said they hate the word pleasure, and I was like, oh, I love the word pleasure. It’s almost the opposite of the word desire, and yet the two are so close.
In many ways Porn Carnival is a book about romance. It’s about the hope for joy outside the work life but it’s also about the agony of love and the simultaneous hope of love. In between laboring, there is a constant search for community, for orgy, for romance while still knowing that in romance is always a lack, a trap. A lot of people have focused on the despair about work in the book but there’s a maybe more pleasurable despair about pleasure itself.
I am a pessimist about romance and yet, like maybe all of us, romance still has a grip on me. I do think that romance, like all things is tainted by capitalism. And that second wave feminists were right to criticize romance as the site of women’s subordination. But it’s not necessary to defend romance in order to understand its pleasures, the euphoria of falling in love.
Where is the line between experiencing eroticism and performing it? Does that line disintegrate at times?
It can be pleasurable to perform pleasure. Everyone has a different persona tactic when it comes to sex work (the girlfriend, the therapist, the good girl who shouldn’t be here, the party girl, the guys’ girl), but I’ve always done best playing the femme fatale. It’s a role that requires a glamorized distance — tease and denial — and because of that a dominant physicality (I use strip-club moves mixed with with light femme domme energy in order to keep the session in my control). I get pleasure from the routine of femme fatale, from successfully building a fantasy that works for someone, which also allows me to keep my boundaries. But the lines between performing pleasure and experiencing pleasure get blurred in any sex. Because sex and romance are always mediated by capitalism, we are all actors, and it often takes acting to summon up a belief in romance, even if we don’t realize it.
As a side note, though: Plenty of women do the work of sex work without trading sex for money or capital. The work of sexual entertaining, as well as the many emotional labors of sex work. Every woman is expected or pressured in heterosexuality to do the labor that sex workers do, but not every woman is a sex worker. I think sex workers are strangely more equipped, though, to ponder the problem of romance, because we sell sex and love as our job, and have this strange distance and closeness with the theater of gender relations.
Your poetry, too, has a seductive relationship with the reader. As a writer, do you employ fictional identities?
Some art, in order for it to be truly full, requires a persona. My favorite artists are the ones who recognize this and play with persona, making their life blur with their art. I am guilty of this! And sometimes, being self-deprecating, I say that it’s because I lack imagination, the imagination to create completely fictional narratives and not write about my own life — but if I am being honest, not living my life as though I were its protagonist, and then not writing about my experiences, just strikes me as boring.
You seem to be sort of a pleasure mentor for some. What kind of advice could you give someone who might have a fraught relationship with sex or self-discovery?
Sex can be a vehicle for self-expression and it can be a theater; sex doesn’t have to be serious, and sex can be anything. The most important thing I’ve learned is how to make boundaries a part of your seduction, your flirtation, an inherent part of your sex. I think that the first thing to realize to have a good relationship with pleasure is that enjoyment (the consumption of pleasure as a commodity) is not everything, that pleasure is not everything, that our sexuality and sexiness is not all that there is. It’s one of the reasons why I have worked very hard to have a place for writing in my life, this very cruel practice that requires loneliness, concentration, and deferment of pleasures and gratification. And poetry especially comes with very little perks: it doesn’t bring money, it rarely brings fame, and it is even less read than most genres. But to me that doesn’t matter; that’s my space where I gratuitously spend myself and my love for the word and other poets, expecting nothing in return.
What is better, enacting someone else’s fantasy, or having someone enact one of your own?
The best is to find where your fantasy crosses with someone else’s. You make sex from where you overlap.
Do you think that younger generations have very different understandings of gratification (meaning your generation compared to older ones, and also the generation younger than you)?
I don’t think it’s really that different. The habits and the knowledge with which we approach pleasure might have changed, but the underlying attitudes towards it I believe are largely unchanged. Sex fascinates and scares the younger generations in the same way it did the older generations. In the same ways, we want to protect ourselves and those we love from the dangers that come with it. We see our openness to gratification and the practices that requires shrink the more we age into complex life situations with responsibilities, duties, and long term plans. To deal with satisfaction is not an easy task, and it requires freedom, time, and especially money. It is an expenditure, and as such it is not something — unfortunately — that is available for everyone, or at least not to everyone all of the time, or even often.
So, it is understandable that with this inequality of access also comes a whole lot of different approaches and opinions about desire. Varying attitudes are there in every generation, and honestly, I think when people say that today’s younger generations are excessively prudish, or excessively libertine, they’re just projecting their own politics. Young people are young people: eager to grow up and scared of what it means, naive and yet savvy, open and idealistic and reticent and sarcastic. They are moving their first steps into the unknown waters of an autonomous life with all the uncertainties and ambiguities that come with this newly found independence.
The term “sex positive” is used to describe an attitude towards sex that’s well, positive, and judgment-free. Contrary to what you might think, being sex positive doesn’t necessarily mean you’re kinky AF (although you can be), but is more of an umbrella term used to describe an open attitude when it comes to all things sexual.
“Sex-positivity can be defined in many different ways but generally refers to an attitude and approach to sex that prioritizes personal agency and preferences and minimizes moral judgments,” says Jess O’Reilly, PhD, and resident sexologist for Astroglide.
One of the most important factors about sex-positivity is the idea that sex can be used for pleasure and not just procreation, explains Robert Thomas, a sexologist and co-founder of Sextopedia.
Another important aspect of sex-positivity is the ability to talk freely about sex, without shame or judgment towards yourself or others. “Sex positivity views sex as one of the best things in life and doesn’t demonize it in any way or attempt to make anyone feel guilty for their urges and desires,” explains Alex Miller, sexologist at Orchid Toys. A sex-positive person doesn’t judge others for their sexual desires or fetishes, and instead keeps an open mind.
And yes, you can be totally sex-positive if you identify as vanilla and personally don’t engage in kinky sex. “You, or other adults around you, can choose if, when, how, and with whom they want to have sex, and not be judged about their decisions,” adds Thomas. As long as you’re not judging other people for their proclivities between consenting adults, you’re sex-positive.
You can also be sex-positive without even having had sex, says O’Reilly. As long as you acknowledge that sexuality evolves and exists on a spectrum. This spectrum can include anything ranging from consensual non-monogamy to abstinence and everything in between.
It might also help to think of sex-positivity as similar to freedom of speech. Someone who believes in freedom of speech may not personally hold every contentious opinion in the land, but their underlying belief that others should be able to have clashing opinions or beliefs that don’t align with theirs is key.
“The sex positivity movement is very closely related to the sentiment of Voltaire…’I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it,'” adds Tami Rose, owner of Romantic Adventures.
Translated for a sex-positive crowd, their version would be something like: “I may not enjoy what you do, but as long as it is going on between consenting adults and is not damaging or endangering anyone… rock on,” explains Rose.
In short, think of sex-positivity as the celebration of freedom of choice, as O’Reilly calls it. Being sex-positive is an attitude that embraces personal agency and choice and respects the sexual decisions made between consenting adults.
Of all the New Year’s resolutions you could make — better overall health, learning something new daily, practicing gratitude, etc. — arguably some of the best are those that involve improving your close relationships. And that includes your more (ahem) intimate ones. Regardless of whether your current sex life is stagnant or sizzling, there’s always room for improvement. That said, if one of your 2020 goals is mastering just how to have the best sex ever, you might be curious to know how the most satisfied people are behaving in the bedroom (and beyond).
Recently Pure Romance conducted a survey of 2,000 sexually active Americans, and the results might just surprise you. Overwhelmingly, the participants seem to genuinely be enjoying their sex lives, with 79 percent reporting that they were “happy” with how things were going in that department and 44 percent rating 2019 as their best year for sex yet.
Before digging into what these people may or may not have been practicing that kept them feeling satisfied, it’s also helpful to examine the factors that lead to a healthy sex life, according to the experts. “The elements that are essential for a healthy sex life include feeling good about your body, sexual thoughts, fantasies, feelings, and your overall well-being,” says Dr. Carolina Pataky, a certified sex therapist with Love Discovery Institute in Miami. “Healthy sex also requires comfort in sharing your sexual and emotional world with your partner. It means knowing what you want to do and what turns you on, but also what you don’t want to do and doesn’t feel good.”
Dr. Pataky also attributes the rise in sexual confidence and satisfaction to the fact that American culture has come so far in terms of being able to express certain desires — which includes preferences and orientation as well as fantasies. “The last three generations have grown up with hearing and learning about sex in ways that were previously unavailable,” she says. “Sexual expression and experimentation is not limited to the sexual revolution of the 60s and 70s, but new generations have now also grown up with it.”
Sexual openness seemed to be an ongoing themes in the studies findings — whether that means communicating better with your partner, experimenting with more toys (including a ton of women-designed ones), and switching up styles, time of day, and frequency. For more specifics, read ahead for the four main things to consider for an even better sex life in 2020, based on Pure Romance’s findings as well as Dr. Pataky’s advice.
Branch Out
With a reduction in stigma around sex, it seems that more and more people feel comfortable trying new things in the bedroom. This is reflected in the study’s data, with 38 percent saying they’d been more adventurous this year. More specifically, one in six tried phone sex and 29 percent tried a toy for the first time in 2019. But experimenting can mean different things for each and some may find it a bit harder than others.
If you’re open to expanding your horizons but are feelings a bit shy or unsure about just how, Dr. Pataky has some advice. “Exploring doesn’t mean doing it but it means giving yourself permission to reflect on what they are. Write out what [your fantasies] are and let yourself notice what you are telling yourself about them. You can also try talking about it with a partner letting them know what you are wanting. You can also join an internet forum or a sub-Reddit that gives you the privacy to share your fantasies and fears with others that feel the same and share the same fantasy.”
Do Some Research
To go along with the above, it might also benefit you to utilize the wide variety of resources available. “For those individuals that are still affected by taboos, I’d suggest reading books that help them understand their sexuality, desires, and fantasies as a natural part to the human component,” says Dr. Pataky. “One book I’d recommend for starters would be Tell Me What You Want by Justin J. Lehmiller. This book brings to light the commonalities we share regarding our sexual desires and fantasies.”
Make More Time For Intimacy
According to the survey, the biggest complaint about sex was not having enough of it, with 42 percent saying it was what they regretted most about their sex lives this year. While it may seem easier said than done, Dr. Pataky claims that if you want more intimacy for 2020, you’ve just got to carve out the time. “If you are wanting to have more sex, you need to prioritize it,” she says. To do this, the sex therapist explains there’s no better way than to just make it a part of your schedule. If you’ve got a partner, that might involve being open about your desire for more sex and coordinating your schedules and set aside some special alone time.
Keep Talking
Nearly half of those surveyed said they were able to communicate more with their partner about their likes and dislikes, while another 44 percent claimed this year they learned more about what makes their partner feel good. And while Dr. Patasky notes that having an open discourse about your desires is certainly beneficial, it’s important to keep the communication going even outside the bedroom. “One of the problems I’ve been seeing is that some people are open to positively discussing what’s going on between the sheets, but what’s going on in their relationships?” she asks. “While many of my clients do have plenty of sex, they sometimes erroneously use it as metric to measure how well their relationship is going.” That said, for those who are in a relationship, it’s important to focus on more than just that quality and quantity of getting busy. Chances are, having a healthy relationship overall will improve your sex life, too.
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. All kinds of vibrators: Bullet vibes, pendant vibes, wand vibes, penis vibes, dual stimulation vibes, g-spot vibes, vibrating plugs, vibrators that defy any definition other than “non-internal vibrator.”
The sex toy industry is growing faster than most of us can make room in our nightstands, but it’s not just because we’re talking about orgasm equality and sexual pleasure in a way that we never have before. It’s because sex toys (and first among them, vibrators) are touted as the remedy to everything from low self-esteem to insomnia, menstrual cramps to chronic dryness.
Vibrators are officially a wellness commodity.
That isn’t (necessarily) a bad thing. Orgasms are tied to all sorts of positive health outcomes, including more restful night’s sleep (thanks, prolactin) and pain relief (thanks to you, too, endorphins). Orgasms have more benefits than we currently even know, and if most people with clitorises are only having orgasms when their clits are stimulated, it stands to reason that we’re going to turn to tools (like vibrators) to help out.
Globally, the sex toy market is predicted to grow by 9.92 billion USD by 2023. A big contributor to that growth is a shift in our belief system from “sex toys are dirty” to “sex toys are healthy” and toy companies are investing heavily in that messaging.
So, here are 10 of the benefits that I’ve seen sex toy companies advertise — and if vibrators actually can help with them in a meaningful way.
Insomnia
There are nights where you’re happy to be up until dawn and then there are the nights where you’re asking yourself “how the hell did I get here?” If you find yourself in that second group more often than not, you might experience insomnia, a sleep disorder characterized by the inability to fall (or stay) asleep.
Orgasms lower your level of cortisol (a hormone related to stress) and also release prolactin. The combination of the two hormonal shifts can help you feel much more relaxed, which in turn can actually help you fall asleep and actually stay asleep.
The verdict: Yes, as long as you’re having orgasms with your vibrator, it can help you with sleep.
The caveat: If you control your vibrator using an app on your cellphone, the blue light’s waking influence on your brain may counteract the drowsiness brought on by your cuddly hormones.
Chronic Dryness
Which came first, the chicken or the egg? (The answer is always ‘no one cares’, btw). Chronic vaginal dryness is uncomfortable AF, and it’s not something that just affects people going through menopause.
You might experience chronic vaginal dryness if you’re taking antidepressants or allergy medication, as a result of chronic yeast infections or using harsh soaps on your vulva, if you’re taking hormonal birth control or are on testosterone therapy, if you’re simply dehydrated, or…for a lot of other reasons. In short, your vagina might be persistently dry at some point — even when you’re feeling thirsty.
One 2016 study of 70 (cisgender) women found that two-thirds of participants experienced increased vaginal lubrication after using a vibrator for three months.
The verdict: Using a vibrator could help your vagina produce more lubrication on its own.
The caveat: You should always use a lubricant when you use a vibrator, otherwise you risk creating tiny tears in your skin, which could actually lead to more irritation longterm. So, stock up on a good-quality lube first.
Anorgasmia
If you feel like orgasms always elude you, then you may be experiencing anorgasmia — or simply put, a lack of orgasms. Anorgasmia can be caused my oodles of things, from stress and a history of trauma to reduced nerve response and you or your partners simply not knowing how to help you reach orgasm.
Vibrators provide intense stimulation, so if you’ve struggled to reach orgasm (and you want to have one), adding a vibrator to your sexual toolkit can help.
The verdict: A vibrator might help with this, but it’s not as simple as it seems.
The caveat: Depending on what the root cause is, a vibrator might not help you reach orgasm. It’s worth a shot, but if it doesn’t help you, that’s okay too.
Healing from Sexual Trauma
Sexual violence isn’t an uncommon experience, and even though we’ve made strides in talking about it, we still don’t talk much about its after-effects. After experiencing sexual trauma, many people experience a range of sexual difficulties, including — but certainly not only — sexual avoidance.
As a sex educator who has also worked as a victim’s advocate, sex toys are something that my students often ask me about, so let’s jump right to the answer here.
The verdict: Vibrators and other sex toys can be helpful tools if you’re healing from sexual trauma, helping you to regain a sense of control and autonomy over your body.
The caveat: This is just one part of healing from sexual trauma, and I wouldn’t identify it as a starting point (though maybe you would). You deserve to address all of the parts of your healing journey. Resources like RAINN can help you connect to support systems local to you.
Menstrual Cramps
Ugh. Ibuprofen, heating pads, and epsom salt baths can only take us so far, so it would be pretty awesome if vibrators could help with menstrual cramps. And, thanks to a combination of pelvic floor contractions and endorphins released during orgasm, they can!
The verdict: Yes, if you have orgasms with your vibrator, it might help relieve period cramps.
The caveat: If you typically experience cramping or slight pain during or after orgasm, then using a vibrator during your period might make you feel even more uncomfortable.
Headaches
Whether your headaches are caused by your kids, a stressful job, or both, you’re probably in the market for something that can help relieve that annoying pain. You’re probably familiar with the “not tonight dear, I have a headache” trope, but is it actually backwards? Can sex help headaches? Maybe. But literally just maybe.
The verdict: Maybe. Some people say that having orgasms relieves their headaches, and you could be one of them.
The caveat: Some people say that having orgasms makes their headaches worse, and some people often experience headaches after orgasm. So, proceed with caution — and if you’re part of that second group, it’s worth talking to a doctor.
Vaginal Atrophy
No, not giving your vagina a trophy (though it deserves one, tbh). Vaginal atrophy is “thinning, drying and inflammation of the vaginal walls that may occur when your body has less estrogen” according to the Mayo Clinic’s definition. It often happens when you begin menopause, but can also happen to people with vaginas who are on a testosterone therapy regiment.
Vaginal atrophy can make penetrative sex painful (or even impossible), but can vibes actually help?
The verdict: Sex and orgasms stimulate blood flow to the pelvis, increase lubrication, and can help with the symptoms of atrophy. But…
The caveat: You shouldn’t use vibrators without lube, and if you’re already experiencing severe symptoms of atrophy, I wouldn’t recommend jumping straight to an internal vibrator. Talk with your doctor about complementary treatments you can try, too.
Self-Confidence
Sure, you could do a power pose, but why not also bring some confident vibes into your life? Many sex toy companies have updated their websites, packaging, and advertising to include messages of self-love and self-confidence. But can you actually unbox self-confidence when you unbox a toy? Sort of.
Masturbation is positively linked to higher rates of self-esteem and sexual satisfaction, which are two big components of self-confidence. So, you could make the leap and say that using a vibrator can improve your self-confidence.
The verdict: Taking control of your sexual satisfaction can be confidence-inspiring, at least in the bedroom.
The caveat: Your new vibrator might help you reach orgasm in 90 seconds or less, but self-confidence doesn’t come so quickly. It’s a mindset and environment shift that can take time — so don’t expect an instant fix.
Leaving a Bad Relationship
Some pleasure-positive influencers will say that the key to not staying in bad relationships is having a good, fully-charged vibrator in your nightstand. But, uh…it’s a lot more complicated than that. People stay in unhealthy relationships for a lot of reasons, and your vibrator probably isn’t going to help you leave one.
The verdict: A vibrator probably won’t help you leave a bad relationship.
The caveat: A vibrator might help you make more balanced decisions about who you want to have sex with, which in turn might leave you feeling more physically and emotionally satisfied.
Depression
Whether it’s seasonal or here all year, depression is that pesky cloud that can interrupt your sex life and pretty much everything else. So, if you’re experiencing depression, can vibrators and other sex toys actually help clear the clouds?
Orgasms release a jumble of hormones that cause positive feelings — oxytocin, dopamine, and endorphins. That means that they can cause an elevated mood. But, as we know, depression isn’t a mood — it’s a mental health illness that is more pervasive than grumpiness.
The verdict: Vibrators can help you reach orgasm, which can boost your mood.
The caveat: Orgasms and vibrators aren’t a magic cure for depression, but the mood boost can help make moving through your day a bit easier (in combination with therapy and potentially medication).
So, no, your vibrator isn’t going to cure every possible ailment you might develop. But also, it doesn’t really matter. Vibrators can help you have orgasms, and orgasms can make you feel good. Invest in one for its health benefits or just because you want to give your hand a break — it’s your life, so you do you.
Whether you’re worried it means your partner doesn’t find you attractive anymore, would rather wank than have sex with you, or they have a sexual desire that’s not being met in your sex life, please know masturbation – even in a relationship – is perfectly healthy and normal. What’s more, it can also be really, really hot. Still not convinced? Read on.
Why do people masturbate?
Despite the stigma and misconceptions surrounding masturbation – where a person stimulates themselves sexually, whether by hand or using sex toys – masturbation is normal for people of all ages, gender identities and sexualities. ‘Not only is it totally normal for your partner to masturbate, it’s good for them. And it can be good for you both as a couple, too,’ says sex educator for Tenga, writer, and broadcaster Alix Fox.
Whether you’re single, casually dating or in a long-term monogamous relationship, masturbation should be a healthy part of your life. There are many reasons why people masturbate, including:
‘Masturbation is a form of self pleasure and self-care and in some ways can offer us different elements to having sex with another person,’ says psychosexual therapist and sex therapist for LELO, Kate Moyle. ‘Like sex, there can be many reason for why we might masturbate, and sometimes partners can jump to assumptions that aren’t helpful for either of you.’
We shouldn’t naturally feel threatened when a partner masturbates. But if you notice a change in your sex life and are unhappy with it, or if you feel your partner isn’t engaging in couple sex as much, Moyle says it’s worth discussing this with them.
Is it normal for your partner to masturbate?
Thanks to stigma, shame and misinformation, masturbation has a bad rep. A global survey of over 10,000 people by Tenga found just 17 per cent of British women learned about masturbation during sex education lessons. ‘As a result, many associate it with shame, dirtiness and taboo – negative messages that are unfortunately frequently delivered by religious and cultural influences, and often not corrected by teachers or media,’ Fox explains.
Some of us may also worry that if our partner masturbates, they aren’t fulfilled by partnered sex with us.
Some of us may also worry that if our partner masturbates, it’s a sign they don’t want (or aren’t fulfilled by) partnered sex with us, but this is usually not the case. ‘Some folks see it as a judgment, rejection, or a signal that something’s wrong with the relationship,’ Fox says.
This may be why so many of us aren’t truthful about how often we masturbate when our partners ask. According to the Tenga research, 38 per cent of men and 34 per cent of women have lied about their masturbatory habits, while 37 per cent have avoided talking to their partner about it at all.
Will masturbation impact your relationship?
If your partner still enjoys solo sex on occasion, it’s unlikely to be a sign that they’re no longer attracted to you. They might have a high sex drive or simply enjoy the release. But why would they choose to masturbate instead of having sex with you?
‘Sometimes they might simply fancy a solo session because it’s generally a faster way of getting a little sweet relief than coupled sex,’ Fox says.
‘They might not want to impose on you if they suspect you may be busy or not in the mood. They might feel tired and want to relax, but worry they don’t have the energy to “perform” and please you.’
The benefits of your partner masturbating
While it might make you feel left out or confused, if your partner still masturbates regularly alongside enjoying sex with you, it actually comes with a number of health benefits:
• Masturbation makes you better at sex
Masturbating can make someone better at partnered sex, and make them enjoy sex in a couple more, too. ‘I am a huge advocate for masturbation as a means of exploring and discovering your own intimate likes and dislikes, and what particular moves, motions, sex toys and tricks make you feel great,’ Fox says. ‘Once you figure out how to enjoy yourself, by yourself, for yourself, it’s so much easier to have satisfying, scintillating sexual experiences with a partner if you wish.’
A common misconception is that people should only masturbate when they’re younger and before they’re in a healthy, fulfilling sexual relationship. But as Fox explains, ‘that exploratory process shouldn’t just be something that happens when you’re younger, or when you’re single.’ She says there are many factors that affect your sexual response throughout your life: pregnancy, birth, menopause, hormonal fluctuations, what point you’re at in your menstrual cycle, stress, tiredness, HRT, and contraceptives. Medications increasingly prescribed to treat depression such as Selective Serotonin Re-uptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) are known to lower sexual desire and cause absent or delayed orgasm in many people.
‘Something that legitimately felt good a year ago may not tickle your pickle or excite your hot spots so much today, and vice versa,’ Fox adds. ‘So masturbating – and switching up the style in which you do so – is essential throughout the decades to keep you literally in touch with your own body.’
• Masturbation is good for mental health
Tenga’s research found an increasing number of people are beginning to view masturbation as an important part of looking after themselves. 64 per cent of people said they used it as a form of self-care. 52 per cent said it improved their wellbeing by helping them unwind, improving their connection to their own bodies, bettering their self-image (‘if your body makes you feel good, you’re more likely to feel good about your body,’ Fox says), and assisting with peaceful sleep.
‘British respondents ranked masturbation as just below sleep but above listening to music or taking a hot bath as most effective in relieving stress,’ Fox says. ‘And a chilled out, confident person is more likely to make a happier, healthier partner.’
• Masturbation improves your confidence
The more you engage in physical stimulation, the more you train your body to want it and anticipate it, says Dr Shirin Lakhani, women’s intimate health expert and founder of Elite Aesthetics. ‘Your body essentially learns how to feel sexual pleasure and have an orgasm which can in turn have a significant impact on relationships and a person’s self-esteem and confidence.’
• Masturbation relieves pain
Masturbation ultimately leads to the release of neurotransmitters like serotonin, endorphins, and oxytocin which bring a feeling of calm as well as offering pain relief. Dr Lakhani says, ‘The resulting blood flow to the genitals is beneficial to the physical health too, and can have a positive impact on the tissue in the area.’
• Masturbation is really hot
Many people find the idea of their partner masturbating sexually arousing. Whether that’s when their partner is alone (and they then tell you about it), or in front of them, or while they also masturbate (known as mutual masturbation), it can be a really fun and sexy way to be intimate.
‘Masturbating next to each other is a joyfully hot part of mine and my partner’s sex life, and before we lived together we’d send each other videos and elaborate text descriptions of our wanks,’ says Jane*.
‘In addition to the erotic visual/aural thrill, it’s exciting to know I have my partner’s trust; that they feel sufficiently safe with me to embrace the inherent vulnerability intensifies the turn-on,’ says Aisha*.
‘Watching your partner masturbate is a great way to find out what they like,’ says Susannah*.
‘You get to really concentrate on the expression on their face as they lose control and THAT IS SO HOT!,’ says Eric*.
‘For me it’s about seeing someone get pleasure just the way they want it. I basically can’t get my partner to orgasm because of my disability, and sometimes that’s disheartening. When they jerk off it’s almost a more intimate experience because it feels more vulnerable,’ Ruth* says.
‘If I’m not feeling horny and my husband starts to masturbate, it’s not long before my juices are flowing and I’m ready to go,’ says Kate*.
How to enjoy mutual masturbation
you’ve previously been worried about your partner masturbating, but want to accept this is a good and healthy thing for them to do, it’s worth trying mutual masturbation. ‘Masturbating together, or in front of one another, can be a great way of learning about your partner’s sexual preferences, so you’re more likely to know how to deliver personalised pleasure to them in future,’ Fox says.
Here are two of Fox’s simple ways to masturbate together, one’s for the extroverts and one for the shyer among you:
1. Show ‘n’ tell
‘Masturbate in front of your partner, so they can learn precisely where and how you prefer to be stimulated from the ultimate expert – you! As well as being an educational exercise, this can be deeply erotic,’ says Fox. Here’s how:
✔️ Command your lover to sit on a chair facing the bed, then tell them that you’re going to put on a show – and you demand their close attention.
✔️ If dirty talk turns you both on, describe each move you make to give extra details: the spot you’re touching, the speed you’re going, whether you’re moving your fingers in circles or stroking up and down.
✔️ Get them to say out loud what they see, too. In addition to sounding seriously sexy, vocalising what you’re doing and what they’re viewing will help them learn more and commit it to memory, so they can put their lessons into action later.
2. Hide ‘n’ peek
Feeling nervous while masturbating together is totally natural, so if you’re feeling timid, ask them to watch you through a half-open door. ‘This helps some folks feel like they’re the only person in the room, so it’s easier to shrug off their inhibitions, and many “watchers” find the voyeurism of “spying” on their partner’s “private moment” hugely hot,’ Fox says.
Alternatively, have your partner sit behind you so you can’t see them watching. ‘Place their hands over yours, so they can feel exactly how you massage and caress yourself.’
While you’re plotting out all your New Year’s resolutions for the coming year, why not add in one for your sex life?
We can sometimes forget to consider sex when thinking about what we want from our lives, but sex is an important part of our overall well-being. As individuals, our sexuality is one of the most powerful ways we can connect with our own bodies, understand them, and celebrate them; many studies have shown that positive body image and sexual satisfaction are deeply linked. And for couples? Research from clinical psychologist Barry McCarthy, Ph.D., has found happy couples say sex only plays a 15 to 20% role in their relationship, but unhappy couples say up to 75% of the trouble is related to sex. So yes, sex is always worth a little investment!
Here are a few ideas for sex resolutions you might want to make this year, whether for yourself or as a couple:
1. Make sex a priority again.
Just a simple mindset shift can go a long way. If sexual wellness hasn’t been a big priority for you in the last year or so, consider bumping it back up to be top of mind. Sometimes when you’ve been in the same relationship for a long time or when you haven’t been dating for a while, sex just becomes less important than everything else going on in your life. That’s totally cool—life ebbs and flows, and sometimes your family, or your career, or some other exciting project is what needs your attention. But if you feel like your sex life could use a little TLC, then commit to giving it the same amount of time, energy, and prioritization that you’ve been giving to other parts of your life. Your sex life won’t change until you invest in it.
What does that look like? When you’re choosing between working late and going on that date, pick the date. When you and your partner are deciding how to spend an upcoming free weekend, put sex on the menu of options. Decide that the chores and deadlines and social obligations can wait. When there’s an opportunity for sex, go for it!
2. Invest in your own pleasure.
Whether you’re in a relationship or not, you deserve to have sexual pleasure in your life. If that’s an unfamiliar idea for you, you can even just make your resolution to recite that mantra to yourself each morning: I deserve to have sexual pleasure in my life.
There are so many ways to invest in your pleasure: It could mean making more time for masturbation or figuring out what the heck actually turns you on, or it could mean buying yourself a few new sex toys or some lingerie that makes you feel like a goddess. Or maybe it’s about opening a conversation with your partner about making your favorite parts of sex more of the go-to thing. (For example, you shouldn’t have to be quietly hoping to yourself that your partner is gonna go down on you—just ask!)
3. Learn about sex.
Did you know just learning about the orgasm gap is associated with women having more orgasms during sex? Knowledge can go such a long way in terms of improving your sex life. You might think you know everything you need to know about sex, but here’s what I’ll tell you: I’m a sex educator, and I write about sex for a living. I’ve written literally hundreds of stories about sex, learned from countless sex therapists and couples’ counselors, read hundreds of scientific papers about sex—and I’m still learning new things about sex every day. There’s always more to learn. Especially considering how little sex education Americans receive, you can bet you’ll find a whole lot of new information and ideas from just one book, class, or podcast about sex. Commit to listening to one new podcast about sex, reading one well-reviewed book about sex, or taking a class about sex either online or in person.
4. Address your sexual blocks.
If you know you have a block related to sex, commit to spending this year trying to really figure it out, address it, and heal. That could mean finally seeking out a specialist to figure out why you’re experiencing sexual pain, or going to a sex therapist to talk through your experiences with sexual trauma, or just spending some dedicated time doing the inner work to learn about what’s been holding you back sexually.
5. Commit to variety.
If you’ve fallen into a rut sexually, make this year a year of exploration and experimentation. Maybe that means trying out new positions with your partner and agreeing to, say, making sure every time you have sex includes one position or sexual act that you don’t usually break out. Or maybe it means exploring something truly new and novel for you—something like pegging, going to a sex party, BDSM, role-playing, consensual nonmonogamy, watching porn with your partner, or whatever else you’ve had a little inkling of interest in.
6. Tap into your sexual energy, even when you’re not having sex.
Sex isn’t all about having sex. Weird, I know. One of the best ways to improve your overall sex life is to build more sexual energy into your day. A 2019 study published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior found sexual desire is actually buildable: that is, experiencing sexual desire today increases your odds of having sexual desire and sex tomorrow. Moreover, feeling turned on isn’t just about getting in the mood to have sex. Being able to access that state of mind regularly can be incredibly empowering on its own: Sexual energy can make you feel more confident, outgoing, and flirtatious. Here are a few ways to build more sexual energy into your day.
7. Have more sex.
Hey, when it comes to resolutions, sometimes simple is best! Put sex on the calendar, often. Boom. Happy New Year!
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