Author: Richard Wagner

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9 Tips to Help You and Your Partner Reconnect After a Relationship Break

— Getting back together isn’t always easy, but these tips may help

By Kendra Cherry, MSEd

When we think of a “break” in a relationship, what comes to mind is generally some kind of temporary separation. Such breaks can serve a variety of purposes. For some couples, it can be a way to get some breathing room if the relationship has reached a boiling point.

Time apart can help people calm down and return to the situation with a cooler head. In other cases, these breaks are meant to help people sort out how they feel about the relationship and how they want to move forward.

A lot of people assume that taking a break means the relationship is on the course toward an actual breakup, but this isn’t always the case. The key is what comes next when you press play again. How do you reconnect after a break and move forward with the relationship? It might seem daunting, but with the right approach, it can be a learning experience that strengthens your bond.

Reconnecting after a break is critical for the future health of the relationship. If done right, it allows you to move forward with a better understanding of yourself and your partner. Let’s take a closer look at whether your relationship can withstand a break and what steps you should follow to reconnect.

Can a Relationship Come Back from a Break?

Reconnecting after a relationship breakup isn’t all that uncommon. Research has found that around half of young adults report breaking up and later reconciling. In many cases, this can be a way to learn more about yourself so you can come back to the relationship with greater self-awareness and a stronger sense of commitment.1

Katie Engler, LMFT

The break itself can be useful for reducing intensity, but if the partners don’t take time to reflect and heal, it is highly unlikely that the issues that caused the break in the first place will change.
— Katie Engler, LMFT

For some, however, breaking up and getting back together can become a pattern that might negatively affect future relationships. If you fall into the sort of “relationship churn,” as researchers call it, you might be more likely to break up again–and repeat that pattern in future relationships.

So, if you’re wondering, “Can we really come back again after a break?,” the answer to that question really depends on you and your partner. If you are both committed to trying again, then there’s a strong chance you can successfully reconnect. Here’s how to do it.

Tips to Reconnect

If you think reconnecting is in the cards, there are some important steps to take before you begin and once you start to reforge that connection. Kate Engler, LMFT, CST, a licensed couples and sex therapist at Three Points Relationships, recommends asking yourself some of the following questions to assess your readiness and to prepare for a reconnection:

  • “How has the relationship contributed to the person I am today?”
  • “What kind of person do I want to be now and in five years?’
  • “What is my ideal way to handle disputes and resentments?”
  • “What are my partner’s biggest concerns about the relationship, and what truths in those concerns can I acknowledge?”
  • “What fears do I have about staying together versus staying apart?”
  • “What will working on the relationship look like for us?”
  • “What do I need to hear or see from my partner to show that they understand what hurts me in a relationship?”

Take Time to Reflect and Heal

When you are apart, it’s essential to use the time to reflect on the relationship and work on healing before you decide to try to reconnect after a relationship break.

“The break itself can be useful for reducing intensity, but if the partners don’t take time to reflect and heal, it is highly unlikely that the issues that caused the break in the first place will change,” says Engler.

When working with couples, Engler recommends people spend time reflecting on their own role in relationship issues, their reactive patterns, and any resentments they might be holding onto. It’s all-too-easy to focus on what our partners have done wrong, she says. While relationships are co-created, you only have control over yourselves, so Engler says you should focus your time and energy on that.

Think about how you feel, your intentions, and whether you are truly ready to jump back into the relationship. Understanding what led to the break in the first place is important since it is that self-awareness that will allow you to move forward and rebuild a more meaningful connection with your partner.

Address Individual Issues That Are Affecting Your Relationship

“The most important work the two people can do to help the relationship at any stage is their own individual work, and this is particularly important during a break,” says integrative therapist Renée Zavislak, MS, MA, LMFT. “When we are in the active conflict that tends to precipitate a relationship break, it’s easy to stay focused on the other person: what they are doing that we dislike or not doing that we want, how they “make” us feel, etc.”

Zavislak explains that many of our reactions in relationships are based on earlier attachment relationships–patterns we learned from parents, caregivers, and past romantic partners. Focusing on resolving these individual issues can help us return to the relationship, heal past traumas, and be more present in the relationship.

Acknowledge the Past

Rekindling a connection after a relationship break requires acknowledging past mistakes. Holding onto emotional wounds increases the likelihood that those same issues will rear their heads again in the future.

It’s important to remember that ignoring previous problems will not make them disappear, but acknowledging them does not mean you condone them.

The key is to recognize what happened, practice forgiveness, and reaffirm your commitment to work together once you reconnect. This can help restore the intimacy and connection you once shared.

Acknowledging mistakes and hurts is important, but Engler cautions, don’t forget to also reflect on the good parts of the relationship.

“This isn’t to gloss over issues, especially those that are problematic or toxic, but looking at both the good and the bad allows for a more comprehensive exploration and positions us to make clear-minded choices about if and how we want to reconnect,” she explains.

Check Your Ego

Our egos can have a significant, and sometimes damaging, impact on our relationship, yet Zavislak says that most of us don’t understand exactly how this works.

“The ego is not inherently good or bad, and no one has a “big” ego compared to anyone else. Rather, the ego is a voice that forms in childhood based on what we are told about ourselves and the world. The ego’s job is to protect us from hurtful truths about ourselves,” she explains.

However, that can be a problem if we hold inaccurate or untruthful beliefs. If we believe that we are unloveable based on our earlier experiences, any criticism from our partners might be interpreted as “proof” of what we already (inaccurately) believe is true.

“There can be no repair without accountability,” Zavislak says. Taking that break to understand your own reactions and gain those insights is crucial to healing and supporting a healthier relationship.

Avoid Projection

As you reconnect after a relationship break, Zavislak also suggests checking for projection, a classic defense mechanism that often comes into play when people are experiencing relationship discord.2

“Projection happens when an individual has an urge or belief or quality about which they feel shame, so they project it onto another,” she explains. “This belief can become a lens through which we mistakenly interpret slights in relationships as proof of something much harsher.

Learning to temper this tendency and develop healthier coping mechanisms can prevent projection from derailing your relationship as you reconnect.

Try Not to Be Defensive

Defensiveness is another defense mechanism that leads to breakups and makes reconnecting much more challenging. “By the time a couple finds themselves on a break or breakup, they have likely been immersed in blame and defensiveness,” Zavislak says.

Being on a break is a great opportunity to work through this tendency and rebuild the relationship without making the same missteps. Journaling, role-playing conversations with a trusted friend, and talking to a therapist can be great ways to work through such issues.

Talk About It

Reconnecting after a relationship break can be a complex process, so open and honest communication is critical. You should discuss why you took a break in the first place, what getting back together means, and how you want to move forward.

Everyone brings their own unique experiences, intentions, and expectations to a relationship. When you talk about these factors openly, you can reconnect in a way that establishes greater trust, which can ultimately put your relationship on a more positive path as you move forward.

Once each person has had time to reflect and gain insight, the next step toward reconnecting is to start moving back toward one another by initiating a conversation.

Zavislak suggests visualizing this conversation and practicing it in your head first. She also says that this conversation should be had in person and not through text, email, or voicemail.

What happens if this conversation becomes an airing of past grievances? Zavislak recommends using the Gottman strategy for processing unfortunate incidents. This method utilizes “I feel” statements that minimize defensiveness and allow you to talk about the problem without getting dragged back into the same arguments.

Zavislak says such conversations might sound something like this:

  • Jill: When you criticize me, I feel like a child.
  • Jack: I hear that when I criticize you, you feel like a child.
  • Jill: Something you can do in the future to help me is to tell me what you need without judging me.
  • Jack: I heard that; I can help you by asking for what I need without judging you.

“That’s it! No editorializing! It’s awkward, but it works. And even if a couple doesn’t want to use the script strictly, the spirit remains important,” she explains.

Keep Communicating

Reconnecting after a break in a relationship also requires having difficult conversations. To do this, it’s vital that you both feel safe sharing your feelings and your fears.

Engler suggests that the following questions can be helpful to build understanding and empathy as you reconnect:

  • “I’m not sure I fully understand where you are coming from, can you say more?”
  • “That’s hard for me to hear, but I’m glad you told me. Is there anything else you want me to know?”
  • “What was the hardest part of the break for you?”
  • “What are your biggest fears/worries about reconnecting?”
  • “How would you like me to bring up hard topics in the future??

“When in doubt, reflect back what you hear from your partner and give them plenty of time to share their thoughts/feelings/emotions and be understood before you bring your own issues to the table,” says Engler.

As you have such conversations, listen actively and validate each other’s feelings. By being patient and using empathic listening, you’ll see things from each other’s perspective more clearly—and look for ways to align your goals and plans as a couple as you reconnect.

But remember that this isn’t a one-time discussion. Communication is one of the cornerstones of a healthy relationship, so keep having these conversations to help each person feels heard and understood.

Respect Boundaries

As you start this process of reconnecting after a relationship break, remember that you don’t want to rush things. If you jump right back in where you left off, you run the risk of also jumping right back to the same mistakes and problems that drove you apart in the first place.

Through this process, it’s vital to respect one another’s boundaries. First, you need to figure out what those boundaries are, Engler says. Without doing this, you’ll only recognize them when they’ve been crossed. Plus, you can’t tell your partner about your boundaries unless you identify them first.

But how do you communicate your boundaries once you’ve identified them? “Clear and kind is the name of the game on this part,” Engler says. “Framing boundaries as demands is not helpful and sets partners up as adversaries.”

She recommends framing your boundaries from the position of your needs rather than focusing on what the other person should or should not do.

She offers the following example: You might say, “I know that it’s important for us to spend time together while we are reconnecting. I want to do that, but for me, moving slowly is really important so that I can manage my emotions well and not fall into old habits” rather than, “I get that you want to spend time together, but you need to back off!”

How Long Is Our Break Supposed to Last?

There is no single answer that is right for every situation. In many cases, it really depends on the couple, the problem, and each person’s unique needs.

For some couples, having a few days or a week apart can be enough to get some perspective and come back with greater clarity. Other couples may need a few weeks or even months apart to heal before they think about reconnecting.

The important thing is to establish some time limits and ground rules at the start of the break. Create a tentative timeframe for how long you think you’ll need to be apart. Be aware that some flexibility is needed, but agree on a time when you might start talking about reassessing your needs and reconnecting as a couple.

How much time apart is too much?

When it comes to taking a break, it all boils down to the reasons behind it. For some couples, a lengthy break might signal the end of the road, a slow fade into a permanent breakup. That’s why it’s crucial to have open discussions, set some loose timeframes, and then regroup to figure out whether to reconcile or part ways for good.

Dos and Don’ts When You’re on a Break

What should you do when you’re on a break?

  • Do set ground rules: When you decide to take a break, be clear about what the rules, expectations, and boundaries are. Can you date other people when you are on a break? If you plan for the break to be brief, dating other people should probably be off the table.
  • Do communicate: Check in with each other periodically to keep the lines of communication open and ensure that you are both still on the same page.
  • Do focus on self-care: Now is the time to take care of yourself and prioritize your mental health. This time of self-discovery can help you learn more about yourself and what’s important to you in a relationship.

>What shouldn’t you do during a break?

  • Don’t act impulsively: Avoid making sudden decisions that might endanger the relationship’s future.
  • Don’t ignore the issues: A break can be a chance to focus on your own concerns, evaluate what you want, and come back with a fresh perspective. The issues with your relationship won’t go away on their own, so now is the time to work through them and address them.
  • Don’t rush the decision: Even if you’ve agreed on a timeline at the beginning of the break, don’t feel rushed to make a decision if you aren’t ready. Reconnecting after a break can only be successful if you’ve done the work and prepared yourself to begin again.

Finally, don’t skip out on talking to a therapist if you think you need extra support processing your emotions, dealing with issues that are affecting your relationship, or determining how to approach the process of reconnecting with your partner.

Keep in Mind

No matter your past, keeping an open mind as you reconnect can help you see the relationship with fresh eyes. As you rediscover each other, you’ll be better able to notice the nuances and layers you might have missed before.

Approach the relationship with an open heart and a willingness to let go of past mistakes. By embracing the possibility of renewal, you can shed your preconceived ideas about how your relationship is and focus more on creating a more dynamic, positive, and empathetic partnership.

Reconnecting after a breakup isn’t always smooth or easy. However, you can start again on the right foot and foster a healthier, happier relationship.

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What Is Post-Sex Aftercare

— And Why Should We All Be Practicing It?

By <

For some of us, no matter how comfortable we are talking about sex, the word intimacy induces a uniquely un-fun strain of nausea. For a while, I assumed this was a personal problem — but, talking to sex and relationship experts and consulting with, what else, TikTok, I once again remembered that I am, in fact, not special. There are a lot of us intimacy-fearing folks out there wondering why our needs are not being met!<

Turns out, it could be because we’re not practicing aftercare, as in, actually tending to the emotions that arise post-sex instead of avoiding or wallowing in them alone — who knew?! It’s an important act of self-love that can help us transition outside of a sexual space and back into who we are as humans.

>The bottom line: It’s doing whatever it takes for you and your partner to feel safe, attended to, and comfortable after intercourse. The term originated in the BDSM community as a way to make sure everyone was taken care of post-sex (i.e., removing restraints and blindfolds, providing reassurance, tending to marks and bruises). Particularly for those who are submissives, as psychologist and sex therapist Dr. Kate Balestrieri, points out, “aftercare plays a huge role in helping someone commute from that subspace into their everyday life.”

Think of it as making room to come back into one’s body immediately following a sexual encounter, an opportunity to regulate not just emotions but the neurochemicals that come along with orgasm and sex. Or as sexuality doula, author, and host of the podcast Sensual Self, Ev’Yan Whitney, puts it, “Honestly, it’s the bare minimum.” So, while aftercare may be the norm within the community where the term itself originated, the practice is much more widespread. In fact, a lot of us already participate in aftercare, even if we don’t know it. And if we’re not, we should maybe reconsider.

There’s actually a science-backed reason why we should all partake in post-sex aftercare. During sex, oxytocin, otherwise known as the love hormone, and dopamine are released. Fun! Until they’re spent. Aftercare is a way of helping your body and mind adjust while those chemicals fade away— not to mention a great tactic to help avoid postcoital dysphoria (PCD), otherwise known as the “post-sex blues,” or the sad or irritable feelings that may arise after having consensual sex. “It’s a comedown, if you will,” says Balestrieri. “Skin-to-skin as well as eye contact are huge catalysts of increased experiences of oxytocin, dopamine, serotonin, and norepinephrine in the body,” she continues. “All of these neurochemicals are known to create big emotional shifts.” 

While PCD is typically most common in women (a 2015 study showed 46 percent of women surveyed expressed feeling sad after sex at some point in their lifetime), 41 percent of men surveyed in a 2019 study conducted by The Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy also reiterated similar sentiments.

Whether you head straight for the shower, order takeout, talk about the experience, or want to cuddle with your partner in total silence, aftercare is a chance to connect and create a space of ease and safety. “As somebody who is autistic, has ADHD, and is a trauma survivor, aftercare is super-important for me,” says content creator Hayley Eigenfeldt in one TikTok on the subject. “Because neurodivergent folks tend to be more susceptible to a fear of rejection, aftercare is specifically super-important for us.”

Picture this: You’ve just had amazing sex (congrats to both and all parties involved), and, whether you like it or not, you are experiencing an array of emotions. But then your partner quickly puts their clothes on, pats you on the head, and walks out. An unfortunate and disrespectful (consciously or not) situation — but not uncommon. Even if the experience is not that mortifying, feeling as though we’re being dismissed in any capacity is hurtful, let alone after such an intimate experience like sex.

“I think we all could do to raise our standards to what we’re truly worth when it comes to the sexual interactions we have with people,” Whitney says. “Particularly for folks who identify as women. It’s inherent in our bodies to defer to other people’s wants, needs, and desires … we have been socialized that way.” “Ruining the mood” or “being a burden” are two threats we, mainly women, know all too well. So, naturally, it makes sense that we might not speak up even when the urge arises.

“Taking care of the person you just had an intimate experience with should be a prerequisite,” Whitney says. Irrespective of what kind of relationship you have — be it a long-term partnership or a one-night stand — aftercare is a practice that, when appropriate, should be tightly weaved into the sexual experience. “When you’re going into sex, it’s an agreement of ‘I’ll take care of you and you’ll take care of me,’’’ notes Dr. Maria Uloko, board-certified urologist and comprehensive sex expert. An agreement that should not be conflated with asking for something more serious from a partner. “It doesn’t have to mean anything about your relationship status,” Balestrieri emphasizes. “Just because you’re asking for nurturing and care in the moment does not mean you’re asking for a commitment.”

Unlike a lot of sexual experiences, aftercare tends to come with a level of intimacy many of us are uncomfortable confronting, particularly when we’re not in a relationship relationship. Asking to have our needs met in a nonsexual way broaches a level of vulnerability we don’t often tread toward. “In Western culture,” Balestrieri highlights, “we have often overcoupled our sense of worthiness with a sense of production. It can be really hard for people to feel deserving of receiving until they feel they’ve earned it.” Moreover, she clarifies, “aftercare doesn’t have to be a giant romance … it’s about doing what you need to regroup in your body together or on your own.”

“I wanted to remind folks that it isn’t exclusive to relationships, so even if they are experiencing casual sex, they too still deserve tenderness and care,” says trauma-informed, inclusive sex educator Jeneka Jool of her viral video addressing aftercare.

While there is no one-size-fits-all in the aftercare department, there is one standard that should remain top of mind: Approaching the practice without judgment or shame. “Neurochemicals are awesome,” says Balestrieri, laughing, “but they can also give us a run for our money emotionally.”

Like any other sexual or intimate practice, consent is always at the top of the list. In the aftercare department, that can look like simply asking your partner if it’s something they’re comfortable with and which types of acts are preferred and which are off-limits. Whitney recommends “yes, no, maybe” lists as a jumping-off point. Some ideas: talking about your partner’s body, your partner touching you without asking first, or even just direct eye contact.

Jool emphasizes that “most of us weren’t taught this, so doing it for the first time can feel terrifying.” She notes “cultivating a safe space with partner(s), where compassion and curiosity are leading the charge, can make it a lot easier. Existing in nonjudgmental relationships allows us to lean into vulnerability, which is ultimately how we build our arsenal of healthy, sensual language and desire articulation.”

f this sounds terrifying, try reframing the conversation surrounding aftercare as an act of self-love. “It can give you a kind of bravery that you need in order to have these intimate conversations that might seem challenging,” Uloko says.

Additionally, Jool suggests you begin by practicing on yourself through a tried-and-true game of trial and error. Then, approach your partner (preferably outside of the bedroom) and ask them what aftercare looks like to them. And if they’re unfamiliar as well, resources like Jool’s videos or a round of the Cool to Connect Intimacy deck are a perfect place to start.

A valuable addition to note, however, is that aftercare does not always need to be reliant on another individual helping you meet your needs. It can be done solo. In fact, some prefer it. Plus, it’s definitely not uncommon for you and your partner to have a difference in aftercare preferences, which could involve some alone time post-sex. In that case, Uloko explains, “it all comes down to communication. Part of self-regulating is figuring out what your tolerance is and making a decision from there.” Should the (common) case be that you and your partner have differing desires, Balestrieri recommends alternating as a go-to compromise. “Every other sexual experience, one person gets their go first … you have to be really clear on how you want to prioritize everyone’s needs so that you all feel understood and valued in the process.”

So, while all of the above can serve as valuable tools to hopefully improve your sex life, it’s important to note that afterplay and the conversation that comes along with it may not always feel right, and that’s okay, too. “In some situations, it’ll feel appropriate, and in others, it really may just be like ‘get the fuck out of my bedroom,’” quips Whitney. “Aftercare is so much more than the acts themselves; it’s about the intention behind them,” she reiterates. “The point is to be present.” Regardless of where you stand, speaking up should always be your best friend. “The best sex toy you will ever own is your throat,” Jool says. ”You have to open it (and communicate) to get what you need.” A superpower we often forget we have.

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What it’s like to think about and want sex all the time

— And the consequences

By Kellie Scott

Veronica thinks about sex all the time.

She says while being constantly horny can be “lovely”, it’s often exhausting — and distracting.

While the stereotype of men always wanting sex and women doing what they can to avoid it might ring true for some, there are women like Veronica (who asked we don’t use her real name) who feel ruled by sexual desire.

That can be tricky to navigate at times, according to sex educator Emily Nagoski, especially because there is a long history of telling women that pursuing sexual pleasure is reserved only for men.

So what happens when women are horny — really horny — all the time? ABC podcast Ladies We Need to Talk spoke to Ms Nagoski and a few sexually charged women to find out.

Understanding high sexual desire

There’s not much research into why some women have higher sexual appetites than others, but Ms Nagoski says sexual response is the product of a balance between excitatory and inhibitory processes.

“The first part is the sexual excitation system — or the gas pedal.

“It noticed all the sex-related information and in the environment. That’s everything you see, hear, smell, touch or taste.

“It notices all your internal bodily sensations and it notices everything you think, believe or imagine — anything it codes as being sex-related, and it sends that turn-on signal that many of us are familiar with.”

She says fortunately, we also have the “brakes”, which notice “all the good reasons” not to be turned on right now.

We all have different things that turn us on and off, and some people have more sensitive accelerators or brakes than others.

“Women with low sensitivity brakes tend to be the ones who engage in higher risk behaviours … that they know intellectually, have a higher risk of unwanted consequences,” Ms Nagoski says.

How high sexual desire can impact relationships

Veronica’s constant thoughts around sex have caused her feelings of shame.

She says her impulses mean she hasn’t always practised safe sex, and some of her choices have ruined relationships.

“And I have ended up making some terrible mistakes with other people and hurting people; hurting my friends because of things I’ve done.”

Veronica’s high sexual desire also leads to awkward moments with strangers.

“I have ended up coming out with … a dirty joke or something … when obviously that’s a very inappropriate thing to be saying to someone who I’m hiring to put gyprock on my walls.”

In the early days of new relationships with men, Veronica says they’re happy to “keep up”. But it doesn’t last.

It’s something Sarah can relate to, who says she’d like to be having sex with her boyfriend once or twice a day. Instead, it’s once or twice a week.

“It’s really shitty on my self-esteem,” says Sarah, who we’ve given a pseudonym.

“That is mainly due to … the stereotype that all men want it all the time.

“And so then I look at my boyfriend and think, why doesn’t he want it all the time? Is there something wrong with him, or is there something wrong with me?”

Communicating about desire with your sexual partner

Talking about sex is typically more difficult than having it, says Ms Nagoski.

Communicating with our sexual partners about our desires is key to meeting one another’s needs, she says.

“If your partner just isn’t under any circumstances interested in having as much sex as you would like to have — you have a lot of options.

“Are there non-sex ways to get some of those needs met for high desire women?”

She for some people, sex is a powerful and efficient way to experience connection, but there are “a lot” of other ways to experience that.

Looking to Sarah as an example, Ms Nagoski says her partner may feel pressured to perform or obligated to have sex all the time — which is more often a brake as opposed to an accelerator.

Taking away the expectation or pressure around sex can for some people create room for desire to build, she says.

Although the mismatched sex drive with her partner sometimes makes Sarah feel rejected, she also calls it her superpower.

“I realise that I really love my capacity for pleasure … and I actually wouldn’t trade that for the world.”

Finding a sexual match

Jade, who also asked we keep her name confidential, didn’t discover her high sexual desire until later in life.

She was in a heterosexual relationship with a sex life she described as “OK”.

Jade began questioning her sexuality and eventually left the marriage. Sex with a woman for the first time was her sexual awakening.

“It was all-consuming to begin with … I couldn’t really think of anything else.”

When Jade met her now wife, they were having sex about seven times a day.

Four years later it happens about once most days. Jade says she’s pleased their desires are evenly matched.

“I would be really disappointed if I was with someone who didn’t have a sex drive like mine.”

While we might feel sexually compatible with someone, Ms Nagoski says our interest in sex can fluctuate throughout life.

“It’s really about how you feel about this moment in your life and the changes that are happening in your body, and what’s going on with all of your relationships and your overall situation in life.”

While high sexual desire “took over most of her life” for a long time, Veronica says she’s more comfortable with it today and makes better decisions.

“It would have been nice if I could control it more, but I don’t think I would change it.”

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Women aren’t orgasming through penetrative sex

– Men need to have a long, hard think why

Sex is more than just a race to the finish line – and straight women suffer most

By Kate Lister

I once saw Joan Rivers talking about the prospect of women achieving multiple orgasms. “I’m lucky if both sides of my toaster pop,’” she quipped. Multiple orgasms may be a tall order, but we have become so used to the idea of women not orgasming at all, or faking orgasms, that it has become a stock comedy staple. How have we ended up like this? Why have we allowed this to happen, and, perhaps most importantly, is there anything that can be done to change it?

The orgasm gap is very real, and if you don’t believe Joan, it is well documented in the scientific research. In heterosexual sex, 95 per cent of men report usually or always experience an orgasm, compared to only 65 per cent of women. If orgasming was an A-Level, men are riding high on an A*, while women are scraping through with a C. What on earth is going on?

Things become even more confusing when you pan away from heterosexual sex. For a start, the orgasm gap all but disappears when we masturbate. Pretty much all of us can get ourselves there, so it’s not a biological issue.

What’s more, lesbians, or women who have sex with women, report always, or almost always, orgasming (86 per cent of the time). Gay men, or men who have sex with men, are clocking in at an impressive 89 per cent orgasm rate.

In study after study, it’s heterosexual women who are bringing up the rear, so to speak. Bisexual women are just ahead of straight women with an orgasm frequency rate of 66 per cent, which researchers believe is because sex with men is pulling their orgasm frequency down.

So, if women can almost always get there when flying solo or when they are with another woman (and men can do likewise), why does sex with a man seriously bring down a straight woman’s orgasming average?

It can’t be because men are just bad at sex, or are incapable of learning what a partner wants, because gay men are having a marvellous time of it.

This very issue was the subject of a recent research paper to come out of Rutgers University, published in the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science. A team of psychologists conducted two online questionnaires, one for heterosexual women and lesbians and another for bisexual women.

The first study asked 476 participants a series of questions around orgasming and how important it was to them. They were also asked about the kinds of sex they were having, how often they have sex, the duration, and levels of experimentation.

What they found was that orgasming was equally important to both lesbians and straight women, but lesbians not only achieved orgasm more frequently, they also had a higher expectation of orgasming than straight women.

Lesbians were also more willing to pursue having an orgasm than straight women were. Crucially, the research also found that lesbian sex involved significantly more clitoral stimulation than heterosexual sex does.

The second study revealed that orgasms were equally as important to bisexual women as they are to straight and lesbian women, but that they had far lower expectations of having one when they were with a male partner.

The physiological reason lesbians are having more orgasms than straight women do is because they focus much more on clitoral stimulation with their partners than straight men, and they do that for significantly longer too. I don’t think that will come as a huge surprise to anyone, but what isn’t so obvious is why this should be the case.

If the orgasm gap is largely down to clitoral stimulation, why aren’t heterosexual couples closing that gap by giving the mighty bean its dues? Why aren’t straight women enjoying the same levels of clitoral attentiveness that their lesbian sisters are?

Looking at the data, the researchers suggested that “sexual scripts associated with partner gender play a key role in the orgasm gap for women who have sex with men”. For me, this was something of a lightbulb moment.

The issue is not physical, it’s social. The script for most heterosexual intercourse is a bit of foreplay, then some penetration, and then when he has come, the whole thing is over. This is a message shaped and formed all around us; in films, in pornography, even in the basics of sex ed, and it’s nonsense! Where was it written that “thou shalt not come once thy partner has?”

That one has always made me rage. Why does sex have to finish just because he does? Would you leave a dinner date just because you finished your meal first? No! That would be insanely rude. You would stay until your date had finished.

When I think of all the straight sexual encounters I have had where I just didn’t get an orgasm because he got his, and then rolled over to go to sleep, it fills me with a deep, feminist rage. Not with him, but with myself.

Why didn’t I advocate for my own pleasure? Why did I allow that to happen? I think it’s because I too don’t really expect to come when I’m with a man. It’s sad but true, that’s the script, and I think it’s got a lot to do with our obsession with penetration.

Scripts around heterosexual sex are very focused on penile penetration, even though this is the sex act that is least likely to make a woman climax. Only 21 per cent of women can come through penile penetration alone, and yet we have hoodwinked ourselves into believing this is somehow the main event.

Even the word “foreplay” is part of this script because it frames all sex acts other than penetration as some kind of warm up act for the headliner of penetration. By prioritising penile penetration, alternative sex acts that actually bring women to orgasm have been pushed down the bill. Is it any wonder that straight women aren’t getting theirs?

You might think that regularly achieving orgasm with a partner is a trivial issue, but it really isn’t. Orgasming is directly linked to sexual satisfaction, so why have we straight women normalised just going without? Is heterosexual sex just for men to enjoy? Is that what we are saying?

The fact that women aren’t orgasming as much as men is a serious issue for the simple reason that heterosexual sex is still framed as being something men enjoy, and women endure. The old “lie back and think of England, ladies”. But we must not accept this as the natural state of things, because it’s not.

As this latest piece of research has shown, when we change the script and stop prioritising the act of penile penetration, women experience significantly higher levels of sexual satisfaction.

Changing heterosexual scripts is not an easy thing to do, especially for women, because it requires a lot of internal work to unpick them, not to mention the confidence required to say what you want in bed. We have all been influenced by the script that tells us women just don’t enjoy sex as much as men do, and that is bullshit. We all need to stop viewing a man’s orgasm as a foregone conclusion and a woman’s as a nice bonus.

Ladies, we all need to stop faking orgasms because you want him to think he’s doing well. If you’re not going to come, you need to be brave enough to just say that or tell him what will get you there.

Men, you need to stop thinking of penile penetration as the main course of sex; it isn’t. It might be your favourite dish, but it probably isn’t hers and if that’s all you are serving up, she’s going to be left hungry.

Lesbians are having significantly better sex than straight women, not because they are two women together, but because they are not being dictated to by sexual scripts that view clitoral stimulation as a polite courtsey. Their sex also doesn’t stop because one partner has come. It stops when they are both satisfied, and that is where we all need to get to.

Complete Article ↪HERE↩!

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This AI chatbot was trained on drag queens

— And it wants to help protect your sexual health

By Mohana Ravindranath

A few months ago, a young Black gay patient in a southern state tapped out a message on his phone that he might not have been comfortable raising in-person at his local sexual health clinic. “I’m struggling with my relationship with sex,” he wrote, knowing there’d be an immediate response, and no judgment. “I feel like sometimes it’s an impulse action and I end up doing sexual things that I don’t really want to do.”

“Oh, honey,” came a swift response, capped with a pink heart and a sparkle emoji. “You’re not alone in feeling this way, and it takes courage to speak up about it.” After directing him to a professional, it added, “while I’m here to strut the runway of health information and support, I’m not equipped to deep dive into the emotional oceans.”

That’s among thousands of delicate issues patients have shared confidentially with an artificial intelligence-powered chatbot from AIDS Healthcare Foundation, a nonprofit offering sexual health and HIV care at clinics in 15 states. The tool can dispense educational information about sexually-transmitted infections, or STIs in real time, but is also designed to manage appointments, deliver test results and support patients, especially those vulnerable to infections like HIV but who are historically underserved. And as part of a provocative new patient engagement strategy, the foundation chose to deliver those services with the voice of a drag queen.

“Drag queens are about acceptance and taking you as you are,” said the foundation’s vice president for public health, Whitney Engeran-Cordova, who told STAT that he came up with the drag queen persona concept. “You’re getting the unvarnished, non-judgmental, empathetic truth.”

For several months, the foundation has offered the “conversational AI” care navigation service based on OpenAI’s GPT-4 large language model, and thousands of patients across the country have opted in to using it to supplement their in-person care. While they can select a “standard” AI that’s more direct, early data from a pilot at seven clinics in four states suggests the majority — almost 80 percent — prefer the drag queen persona.

The model, developers told STAT, was fine-tuned using vocabulary from interviews with drag performers, popular shows like RuPaul’s Drag Race, and input from staff familiar with drag culture. Health care workers, patients and performers are regularly invited to test it out and improve it.

It’s an early case study on the vast potential, and limitations, of AI tools that reach patients directly without immediate human oversight. Fearing hallucination, bias or errors, health care providers have so far largely avoided deploying AI-powered tools directly to patients until their risks are better understood. Instead, they mostly use AI to draft emails or help with back-office workflow.

But the foundation and Healthvana, the Los Angeles-based tech company that built the tool, said they are comfortable with the technology. They say they adhere to rigorous testing, strictly avoid giving medical advice, and constantly calibrate the model to help clinics safely field more patients than in-person staff could otherwise manage. By the time patients get to their appointments, they often have already received basic sexual health information through the chatbot, which can serve as a friendly, conversational source for potentially life-saving tips, like using condoms or PrEP.

Patients can consult the bot at any time, meaning they can also ask about precautions right before having sex, Engeran-Cordova added. “We’ve never been able to get this close to the moment of action, as a prevention provider” in a way that’s “comfortable, not stalker-y.”

It’s not perfect — sometimes the chatbot uses the wrong word or tone — but its creators assert that the benefits of reaching more patients outweigh the risks. Its missteps have also been minor, they say: An early version of the bot was overzealous, and congratulated a patient when she disclosed a pregnancy that might have been unwanted, for instance.

“What is [the] cost of a wrong answer here, versus what is the benefit of tens of thousands of people who suddenly have access to care? It’s a no-brainer,” said Nirav Shah, a senior scholar within Stanford Medicine’s Clinical Excellence Research Center and an advisor to Healthvana.

Engeran-Cordova said he also has pressure-tested the technology to ensure it doesn’t repeat or reflect back harmful or offensive questions about sexual health or sexuality.

“We would intentionally have yucky conversations that somebody might say, and I even felt creepy typing them in,” he said. The tool, he recalled, “would come back around and say, ‘We don’t talk about people that way, that’s not really a productive way for us to discuss your health care.’”   

Having staff scrutinize the bot and routinely evaluate its responses after they’re sent helps it come across as human and empathetic, Engeran-Cordova said. “There’s an emotional intelligence that you can’t program.”

The chatbot also saves clinical staff time, according to Engeran-Cordova. “Our interactions with people get fairly limited in time — we’re talking about a 10-minute, a 15-minute amount,” he said. If a patient has already asked the tool basic questions, it “moves the conversation down the road” during the appointment, allowing the provider to focus on more immediately pressing issues.

Some outside experts agree that humans don’t necessarily need to review each message before it’s sent. If the tool isn’t giving medical advice, but rather information about scheduling or STIs, “the fact that they are overseeing the interaction [at all] is a lot more than what consumers get when they use Dr. Google (Internet search),” Isaac Kohane, a Harvard biomedical informaticist and editor-in-chief of the New England Journal of Medicine’s AI publication NEJIM AI, said in an email. “At least in this instance which information they see first will not be influenced by paid sponsorships and other intentional search engine optimizations.”

Healthvana has an agreement with OpenAI to protect patients’ health information under the  federal privacy rule HIPAA. Any identifiable information was stripped from conversations shared with STAT.

The creators of the drag queen model and its evaluation process hope to detail their findings in an upcoming research paper, which hasn’t yet been accepted by a medical journal. Part of the goal is to demonstrate to other public health groups that rigorously tested AI tools might not always need the so-called “human-in-the-loop” in real time — as long as they’re evaluating the communication after the fact, Healthvana founder Ramin Bastani said.

The health industry hasn’t yet established standards for benchmarking patient-facing tools; one of Healthvana’s executives sits on a generative AI workgroup within the Coalition for Health AI — the industry body working with federal regulators to set evaluation and safety standards — to begin tackling these questions.

While deploying the technology too early could certainly harm patients, “if there’s no access for communities of color…then we’re going to be left behind,” said Harold Phillips, formerly director for the White House Office of National AIDS Policy, who co-authored the unpublished paper on the pilot.

Seventy-percent of messages sent to the chatbot during the pilot were from people of color. If tested carefully, chatbots won’t necessarily propagate medical discrimination, stigma and bias, Phillips said, adding, “many health care providers today are still really uncomfortable talking about sexual health or answering questions, and some patients are uncomfortable asking questions.”

It’s too early to tell whether the bot has actually made people measurably healthier. But Engeran-Cordova said he plans to work with an epidemiologist and research staff to monitor how interacting with the bot impacts patients’ STI testing patterns and their adherence to medication, for instance.

While the tool is meant to be lighthearted, it has the potential to draw the ire of conservative politicians at a time when sexual and reproductive rights have been increasingly restricted.

But it’s designed to foster especially difficult conversations — about, say, a positive STI result — with sensitivity and empathy, Engeran-Cordova said. And if a patient feels playful, like the millennial male who asked if he “should be worried about it raining men,” it can match their tone. “Honey, if it’s raining men, grab your most fabulous umbrella and let the blessings shower over you!” it said, before reminding him, “in the world of health and wellness, always make informed choices that keep you sparkling like the star you are!”

And what’s the bot called? During an evaluation session, Engeran-Cordova said, it named itself. “I asked her what her drag name would be, and she said ‘Glitter Byte.’”

Complete Article ↪HERE↩!

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‘A Dick’s Day Off’

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A little after 8 p.m. on a Monday night in June, I find myself running down a quiet street in Prospect–Lefferts Gardens looking for the dungeon where Mistress Red says men turn into sluts. The heat dome has briefly let up, and outside a neighboring townhouse, three men in cotton shirts drink flat beers and watch me fuss with Google Maps. “Down there,” one says, pointing to a set of ivy-lined concrete steps. I follow an alien-shaped fuschia sign downstairs and wait on a wooden bench alongside two eager subs and somebody’s pet’s Chewy box. Pegfest is about to begin.

Founded in 2016 by sex-workers’ rights activist and dominatrix Charlotte Taillor, the Taillor Group is a Brooklyn-based kink collective that teaches BDSM practices to the kink curious. After short-lived stints in a number of other neighborhoods, the collective moved to a basement apartment last September and offers workshops exploring every niche fetish, from good-old foot worship to bondage and roleplay.

But one of the collective’s most popular offerings is the pegging workshops, one-hour sessions in which experienced dommes teach and facilitate the penetration of newbie submissives. The workshop is so in demand that it runs three times a month, and couples and single men frequently request private classes. Pegfest is usually attended by women looking to hone their skills with a strap-on, straight men looking to dip their toes in, and repeat customers with fully realized kinks. Some subs enjoy the exhibitionism of group classes; others wear masks to obscure their identity. For many attendees, pegging is a novel way to subvert gendered dynamics in the bedroom. Whether you’re into BDSM or just want to explore dildos, pegfest is a safe space to learn how to do it comfortably.

“Pegging is a dick’s day off,” says Taillor, dressed in a “Ceasefire” T-shirt and denim shorts, to a few subs as they take their seats on the dungeon’s black velvet couch. The dimly lit living room spills over into a kitchen where a few other subs stand or sit on stools around an island. Four subs would like to be used as bottoms, the other two are here to watch and learn. I eye the cart of colorful curved dildos next to Taillor. “You can relax and be a hole,” she tells us.

This time, no other dommes have signed up to learn, and Taillor and two other collective-affiliated dommes are here to help Mistress Red, a leather-clad dominatrix with waist-length red hair who’s heading up the workshop. Mistress Red has taught here for the past two years, and while pegging isn’t her favorite workshop to lead — it’s not as kinky or creative as the straight men doing it may like to think, she tells me — she enjoys helping them dispel their shame about enjoying penetration. She’s tired of taboos suggesting “that you’re gay or weak or not a man if you want to get fucked in your ass. It’s like, no, it’s just a normal thing to want to feel,” she says. “There’s this sort of very fun gender switch that happens. It’s crazy, the physical and mental transformation putting in a dildo will do. You have totally changed as a person.”

Mistress Red sits opposite the sofa on an ornate wooden throne backed by a red curtain, a few paces away from a fridge covered in tiny yellow magnets, each plastered with the words “hot girl shit.” Taillor grabs a grape Poppi from the fridge while the crowd of mostly cis-het male newbies go around the room to share what brought them here. Agewise, the subs range from their 20s to their 60s. There’s a college student who “loves to be filled up”; a regular submissive who loves the collective so much he cleans the dungeon and has a fresh tattoo of a dominatrix on his back; two divorced men who arrive wearing butt plugs and say they discovered pegging after leaving their vanilla relationships behind; a 29-year-old finance guy curious to see traditional male-female roles reversed; and a married-with-adult-kids 60-something kinkster from the Midwest who had a painful experience with pegging and wants to correct that. “A man is never more submissive than when getting pegged,” he tells me. “It’s pure giving up of control and power. Plus it just looks so sexy, a cock on a woman,” he says, adding that he would kneel for me anytime.

After a brief on anal hygiene and how to locate your prostate, Mistress Red starts looking for a wicker basket. “Where’s the picnic basket of dildos?” she asks Taillor, but it’s missing today so she straps on a modest member, sliding a condom over it and slipping her fingers into a pair of black gloves. She’ll peg the regular first. Is he fine with slap marks on his ass? Yes, Mistress. Any injuries or conditions to take note of? Any anal fissures? IBS? No, Mistress. Triggers or traumas? No slurs, Mistress, though bitch, slut, and dumb anal slut are all fine. He strips down under faint green neon lights and apologizes as he tosses his underwear on my sandal; it’s a tight space. Then he’s down on all fours, the dominatrix tattoo raw and pink around the edges. “I won’t spank or scratch that,” Mistress Red assures him. She inserts one gloved finger inside his anus, then another. It’s awkward to penetrate in silence, so a domme turns on instrumental dance music. “See, he’s loose,” Mistress Red tells the room, and switches to using the strap-on. “Now I have my hand on his hip.”

We need different music. “Let’s play Britney Spears. I’m old,” Taillor says. Another domme puts on “Soda Pop,” which I haven’t heard since 1999. Mistress Red pegs the regular to the bubblegum beat. To my left, the finance spectator asks me how my article is coming and invites me to cover an art show.

When Mistress Red decides she’s finished with the regular, he’s on cleanup duty, wiping the mat for the next participant. After cleaning himself up, he sits back down on his stool as the two divorcés head to the bathroom and remove their plugs. We’re strapped for time so they take to the mat together, facing in different directions, and Taillor and Mistress Red repeat the process with both of them, chatting with each other as their fingers assess the laxity of the opposing anuses. The men are disappointed — they’re not ready for dildos — but having an expert assess the muscle is part of the experience. “This is literally why people do anal training,” Mistress Red explains. “It’s a muscle you have to work at. You can’t just be sticking big things in your ass.”

Last up is the college student, who appears to have been scrolling on his cell phone for the majority of the pegging demonstrations. He too isn’t ready for a dildo, but the dommes think up an alternative proposition.

“Want to Eiffel Tower?” Taillor asks him, strapping on an extremely girthy cherry-red member covered in a banana-split-scented condom. Mistress Red’s finger is one side of the tower equation; Taillor’s strap-on is the other. “Have you ever sucked a dildo?” Taillor asks the student. He hasn’t, but this space is so nonjudgmental he’ll try it. The dommes praise his finesse and enthusiasm. “A prodigy,” one says.

After class, we go around the room with our reflections and revelations. Many of the men thank the dommes. The college student says he never realized how much he likes sucking dick. When we catch up over email later, he’s more expansive: Choking on the dildo reminded him of a girlfriend he used to deep-throat with. “I never knew it was choking her like that,” he says. “I’m feeling more vague about the barrier between males and females.” The blurring, he says, helps him allow himself to be more open to love and vulnerability. He’ll definitely be back.

The regular, meanwhile, never left. “He stayed afterwards for hours and cleaned the whole dungeon,” says Mistress Red.

Pegging Class Is in Session

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How food (almost) replaced sex in my life

— When the kitchen threatens to become more alluring than the bedroom, beware…

Food became my link to the sensual world, writes Chesterton

BY George Chesterton

Admitting you’ve got a problem is the first step. About the time I became regrettably middle-aged, some vague moment a few years ago, I also became obsessed with food. Preparing it, cooking it and eating it. The troublesome thing about this obsession was not so much that, if left unattended, it would make me unhealthy (though it surely did that too) but that food became my link to the sensual world. It was so easy. And so much fun. It being essential to life was just a bonus. As food took over, the rest of life’s experiences began to shrink back. For a while, it even replaced the thing that is supposed to bind a relationship together (and I’m not talking about Netflix). My wife is an alluring, beautiful woman, just not – at my weakest moments – as alluring as paella.

There is a need for delicacy when discussing marital relations, so it must be said that the weakness lay not in the bedroom but in my expanding stomach. If I’m going to compare eating to sex I will need, as Laurence Olivier says in Spartacus, to “tread the ridge between truth and insult with the skill of a mountain goat.” It’s not that eating literally replaced sex, but that taste became – by some distance – the dominant sense, the way through which I experienced pleasure most keenly.

I lost my sense of smell and taste in the first wave of Covid and it took ages to get it back. I’m not certain I ever got it back the way it used to be. Rather than put me off food, the desperation to taste again, to know the craven thrill of a bouillabaisse and a Basque cheesecake – or even just a cottage pie – became overwhelming. And as my wife’s business became busier and more demanding, I became the unchallenged official family cook.

Gradually, my love of food and cooking crept closer to infatuation than was good for me. I thought about food all the time: in the morning I thought about lunch, in the afternoon I wondered what I would cook for dinner. By Thursday I was planning the entire weekend’s menu. When anyone asked me what I wanted for Christmas or a birthday, my requests for Pyrex jugs, a conical sieve or a potato ricer were met with puzzlement and suspicion.

Instagram is a terrible influence – chefs from around the world demonstrating this or that genius shortcut recipe for ravioli or curries and the endless drool-scrolling of cheeseburgers and ribs. I tap through videos of giant sandwiches the way other men do PornHub. I don’t think the sight of oozing steak and stringy cheese is literally sexual – a vibe especially easy to associate with American-style food – but it does stand in for sex in that it is an immediate physical experience. Sting once boasted that his tantric sex lasted for days. Instagram food is more akin to a quickie behind the pub bins.

I even planned a podcast about crisps called “Crunch Time with George Chesterton” – with taste tests and reviews of new brands and flavours, debates over classic crisps of the past, and in-depth analysis of the role of crisps in culture and the arts.

If you catch me in repose, I won’t be daydreaming about swinging parties (or the Roman Empire, for that matter). I’ll be thinking about that Le Creuset skillet I want and whether I should buy a really good mixing bowl. Food provides a reliable and daily gratification in a way nothing else does. Whereas when married relations – how can I put it – level out a little, sex tends to be less reliable and rarely daily.

I’ve always been a bit greedy. But cooking and eating became all-encompassing. It was like I was having an affair with food. My wife began to tut and raise her eyebrows, though where derision met sheer disappointment is hard to say. Finding time for intimacy with a partner – especially with pesky children around all the time – is a challenge, but stuffing your face is as easy as, well, stuffing your face. Food was my catnip, with much the same effect on me as hearing Chaka Khan’s Ain’t Nobody has on a 50-year-old woman in an Essex nightclub.

The importance of food to family life is often considered its greatest quality, (though probably less so in Britain than anywhere else in the world). Some treasure it most as the fuel of their social scene; for others food is the raw material of pure gluttony. To me it was simply life-affirming. When I fasted, the day lay before me like a featureless desert.

Most of my time is spent reading and writing. I don’t make anything practical with my hands. I don’t ski. I don’t like gardening and, since my knee went south I can’t jog. My relationship with music has been deteriorating for the past 20 years from the be-all and end-all to background noise to now just music to cook to. But at least I “make” food and then I taste it. Food is the main empirical counterweight to the work of the mind and spirit. I’m never too tired to cook, whereas I’m sometimes too tired to do “other things”.

The sensory overload of youth can become sensory deprivation as you get older. Food – preparing, cooking and eating it – picked up the slack. To the surprise of no one, all those carefully curated, extravagantly flavoured paninis and bowls of Malaysian noodles left me out of shape and listless. The terrible truth is food hadn’t replaced sex, it had replaced everything. With that came the necessity of admitting I was in danger of no longer being attractive to my wife. She was fit and youthful; I was tubby and prone to food comas. That was an unpleasant but necessary admission.

There are probably worse things to become obsessed with than food: heroin, breeding dangerous dogs, local politics – but I was not operating at optimum level. I was not the “best George I could be”. Though I was the fullest George I could be. It’s easy to joke about drugs, but that’s exactly what food had become. Like all addictions, this was essentially selfish. But now it’s time to refocus, before it’s too late. I want my wife to think of me as a fit, attractive man who looks after himself. I want her to think “Darling, I’m home” means “get upstairs and get your kit off” not “dinner will be ready in half an hour”. Having said that, she’d probably just settle for the dinner, to be honest. I am quite good at it.

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Deborah Bright’s Art Puts the Sex Back in Sexuality

— “My desires are pretty fluid and I openly embrace the different erotic subjectivities that inhabit my brain,” the artist said in an interview with Hyperallergic.

Deborah Bright in her studio

by Natalie Haddad

When Deborah Bright began work on her Dream Girls series in 1989, only four years after she came out, she wasn’t just asserting a queer voice in the art world. The photography series, in which she inserts herself into classic film stills alongside leading women and men — her sleek, androgynous image imbuing the stills with queer sexual tension — plays with sexuality, desire, gender roles, and Hollywood’s unspoken queer histories. As the conservative backlash against LGBTQ+ and women’s rights gained ground in United States politics, Bright’s art laid bare a universe of queer desire beneath a facade of heteronormative love in popular culture.

At the center of sexuality in Bright’s visual and conceptual sphere is the allure of sex. The artist has never shied away from the steamy physical side of desire: libidinous energy permeates her imagery and gives it an exciting immediacy. She has followed this brazen path throughout her impressive career as a visual artist, educator, and writer. In addition to publishing numerous essays, she edited the acclaimed anthology The Passionate Camera: Photography and Bodies of Desire (1998), which examines how bodies are represented in photography through a queer lens. And she’s influenced countless younger artists across her decades as a professor at Harvard University, the Rhode Island School of Art and Design, and Pratt University, among other institutions.

Since Bright retired from her position as Pratt’s Chair of Fine Art in 2017, she’s returned to her painting and drawing roots, with pop-colored compositions that seem to manifest free-flowing desire through abstract forms. Look closely, though, and those abstract forms start to look a lot like sex toys. It was a pleasure to talk to Bright by email about queer desire, sex positivity, and what’s next in the latest phase of her wonderfully vibrant and irreverent art.

Deborah Bright, “Little Red Rabbit” (2020), oil on canvas, 30 x 24 inches

Hyperallergic: You came out during the AIDS crisis. What made you choose that moment and what was it like coming out then?

Deborah Bright: Did I choose the time or did the time choose me? I was raised in a conservative Christian home during the postwar 1950s–’60s. Yet I knew as a young girl that I had special feelings for particular girlfriends and older women, but like 99.9% of girls my age, I assumed I’d marry a man because there was no visible alternative. The boys I dated were friends more than objects of desire and that continued through college even though I had several intense, nonsexual relationships with women. In 1980, I married a man I’d been living with but five years later, fell into the arms of an out lesbian. Finally! A different outcome! No more marriage, but for the first time I felt like a whole person and it was exhilarating. And yes, I came out right smack dab into the AIDS crisis, but as a newly minted, out-and-proud lesbian, I was more than ready to fight against the social, medical, and religious bigotry that was killing so many.

H: In 1998 you edited the anthology The Passionate Camera. How did that come about and what was the response to it?

DB: In 1994, I edited an issue of Exposure, the journal of the Society for Photographic Education, on sex-radical photography. This inspired me to want to create a more comprehensive record of sex-radical image-making and writing in the decade after the AIDS crisis transformed queer activism and the NEA scandals caused institutional retrenchment. I also wanted to account for the role of the feminist culture war over pornography that pitted women, both queer and straight, against each other, a war egged on by religious and cultural conservatives who wanted to ban all images of sexual subjects they didn’t approve of, especially queer subjects.

I took note, too, of how quickly the pushback on the achievements of second-wave feminism was mobilized by the same constituencies that elected Ronald Reagan. I wasn’t at all sure that the limited gains in public visibility and agency that we had achieved by the mid-1990s would be sustained so I wanted to put a book in classrooms and libraries that would ensure those stories were told.

The Passionate Camera was nominated for a Lambda Literary Award in Visual Art and widely welcomed. Though it’s been 26 years since it was published, people still come up to me at museum talks and conferences and thank me for the book, telling me how much it informed and inspired them. Mission accomplished!

Deborah Bright, “She Bang” (2019), colored pencil, 12 x 9 inches

H: You spent years as an educator. Have you seen a lot of changes in younger generations?

DB: Sexual and gender diversity and the capacity to act on the truth of one’s lived experience (for those with social and economic agency) have expanded exponentially over the years since I was doing my best to “make good trouble” as a teacher of photography and critical studies. Social media and the internet have changed everything. … The White conservative backlash against “wokeness” is as much a campaign to roll back the gains of women and racial minorities as it is against equality for queer/trans people. While it echoes what we experienced 35 years ago with the opportunistic attacks on PWAs (People with AIDS) and “Feminazis,” today’s reactionaries have much more political power and are financed by corporate billionaires, the likes of which have already corrupted the Supreme Court. And worse may be yet to come.

H: I love the sex positivity of your work, and it’s focused not just on women’s desire, but also on men (Cool Hand drawing series) and free-flowing desire. Can you talk a bit about this aspect of your art?

DB: Though the new work in drawing and painting seems very different from what interested me as a photographer, there were earlier projects that directly anticipated what I’m doing now. In the early 1990s I began to reexamine certain childhood memories of queer desire before it could be named: watching movies (Dream Girls); playing with toy horses (Being & Riding); and the Cool Hand drawings that you asked about that are on my website but have never been shown publicly. Also, my time as a board member at the Leslie-Lohman Museum deepened my familiarity with queer visual work across all media and genres. I also credit my time at Pratt with putting me back in touch with how much I had always loved drawing and the elemental alchemy of making a mark that is also a symbol.

Deborah Bright, “When Ed Met Betty #11” (2023), watercolor pencil on paper, 9.5 x 9.4 inches

And what motivates my mark-making? Feelings, desires, wanting to bring something that matters to me into visible form. And yes, my desires are pretty fluid and I openly embrace the different erotic subjectivities that inhabit my brain, from Hothead Paisan to gay cowboys and androgynous comic book heroes. Humor is always important — not taking myself too seriously and letting the playfulness come through. About the sex toys: they are so widely used yet fraught with such heavy social and psychic baggage in Puritan America. Doesn’t everybody have a vibrator? Why does the world act as though we don’t? Some sex toys are works of art in themselves with the prices to match. Why not celebrate objects that can add so much zest and pleasure to life? One of the best things about being older is that you give less of a shit about what other people might think. You just barrel on through with your truth and let the chips fall where they may.

H: What’s next for you? Are you working on anything specific now?

DB: For the past year I’ve been making a series of drawings that are whimsical mashups of Ed Paschke and Betty Parsons. Paschke was a celebrated Chicago Imagist who was a straight man with a very queer and camp sensibility. Parsons was a semi-closeted lesbian who was an abstract painter and sculptor as well as a famous art dealer in the 1950s. Paschke’s upbringing was Polish Catholic working-class while Parsons was from East Coast aristocracy (though her family disinherited her for getting divorced from her alcoholic socialite husband). The two artists were of distinctly different generations and from completely different planets in every respect, including their aesthetics. But it pleases me to marry them in my works. The creative task for me is integrating aspects of such opposing sensibilities into new compositions that still work. I’m not always on the money but the challenge keeps me going!

H: How are you celebrating Pride Month?

DB: My partner, Liz, and I will join a group of good friends at the Dyke March and for a celebratory dinner afterwards. I love wearing my “DYKE” T-shirt, courtesy of the excellent publication WMN: Lesbian Art and Poetry, which just celebrated its fifth anniversary.

Complete Article ↪HERE↩!

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Welcome to the world of radical authenticity

— How the internet is bringing sexual and gender diversity to the fore

The ability to ask questions, learn and find community online is transforming the way people identify, particularly Gen Z.

By Robyn Schelenz

Pride month in June commemorates the 1969 Stonewall uprising, when over the course of six days, LGBTQ people clashed with police over the raid of a New York gay bar, demanding the right to peacefully assemble. Since that time, many legal victories have been won, from the repeal of sodomy laws to the right to wed, adopt and even hold a job.

But Pride has always been about more than rights.

It has also been about self-expression — and that’s what UC Santa Cruz psychology professor Phil Hammack studies. His work seeks to understand the latest trends in LGBTQ identity, particularly among today’s teens, who are identifying as LGBTQ+ in greater numbers than any generation prior, and with greater diversity in labels around gender and sexuality. They are leading what he calls the next sexual revolution — a revolution of radical authenticity.

The times they are a’changing

The world of sexual and gender identity is rapidly changing. In a Gallup poll released in March 2024, 7.6 percent of respondents identified as LGBTQ+, up from 3.5 percent in Gallup’s inaugural 2012 poll. This increase in self-identification has been met with alarm in some quarters, as some states and school districts attempt to ban books or restrict teaching on gender and sexuality.

That backlash is doomed to fail: The rise of the internet means people today have never-before-realized opportunities to ask questions about identity, learn and connect. So, it’s not too surprising that while each generation shows an increase in LGBTQ+ identification, the greatest surge comes from Generation Z (born between 1997 and 2012), who have had access to the internet almost their entire lives.

A graph of U.S. Adults' Self-Identification as LGBTQ+ by Generation, with significant increases generation by generation
View more data, graphs and information from Gallup on this poll here.

“I’m a member of Generation X, and a key difference between Gen X and subsequent generations is that Gen X had the internet in college, while millennials tended to have the internet in high school, and Gen Z can’t remember life without it,” Hammack says.

Hammack’s passion for his work comes from his own experiences of same-sex desire in high school, when depictions of gay life “centered around death, disease, and extraordinary stigma” in mainstream media, fueled by the AIDS crisis.

A collage of Newsweek covers about the AIDS crisis, courtesy Newsweek
Newsweek covers about the AIDS crisis.

Before coming out as gay, Hammack initially came out as a bisexual, which was met with its own stigma in the 90s (it even got its own Newsweek cover in 1995). Over the past three decades, the journey of coming out has changed dramatically.

Phil Hammack, man with short hair, closely shaved sides of head, beard, arms crossed
Phil Hammack

“Social technologies, whether it’s the early internet and chat rooms that millennials tended to experience in adolescence, or social media, like TikTok, that we think of now, have been the key driver in social and cultural change around our understandings of sexuality and gender,” Hammack says.

These changes, which Hammack has described as the “radical authenticity revolution,” don’t necessarily take the same shape as the sexual revolutions that date all the way back to the 19th Century and the feminist movement’s first wave, which advocated for numerous rights, including the right to vote. The gay rights movement of the 20th century likewise focused on inclusion in existing institutions. What’s both radical and authentic in this new revolution, according to Hammack, is the willingness to overturn categories that inclusion entrenched — man, woman, gay, straight — and the ability to look outside of traditional authority figures or information sources for language and validation, thanks to the internet. In a new paper authored with UC Santa Cruz psychology professor and social media expert Adriana Manago, Hammack articulates these new waves of internet-driven change, including the rise of subcultures of highly misogynistic straight men, whose use of online forums to affirm a cisgender, heterosexual male-dominated world order draws from the same access and technology as LGBTQ youth, just to different ends.

“Our big argument is that to understand what’s happening in this century, which is very different from what happened the prior century, we really have to look at social technologies and understand the significance of their roles,” Hammack explains. “I see marriage equality, for example, as essentially the grand finale of the prior sexual revolution when it comes to minoritized sexual identities. It expresses this strong desire for primarily gay and lesbian people, same-sex couples, to share the social benefits of existing institutions.

“But a different sexual revolution is going on today, which is not about inclusion in cultural institutions like marriage. It’s about radically reformulating cultural institutions and breaking the myth of binary thinking around gender and sexuality.

“That was not something that I think my generation was necessarily focused on. It’s really been Gen Z that has pushed us to think much more expansively about gender and sexuality and argue for total change of institutions, whether it’s how we think about organized sports or bathrooms or pronouns, things conservative circles have been rebelling against pretty strongly.”

One identity not typically mentioned in hot-tempered political discussions of gender and sexual identify is that of asexuality, Hammack says.

“When I was first getting trained in professional psychology, we were trained it was a diagnosable sexual condition,” Hammack notes. “This is an example of where internet activism can literally change the way people think.”

An illustration of a crowd of people in outline, with asexuality flag colors (purple, gray, and white) on some of their clothes, and purple hearts visible on some
The asexuality flag features gray, white and purple as its colors.

An (a)sexual revolution

If you are aware of asexuality, or any identity that encompasses a persistent lack of sexual attraction, you likely have the work of activists like David Jay to thank. Jay founded asexuality.org, or AVEN (the Asexual Visibility and Education Network) in 2001 after years of struggle with his own identity and the lack of information on what he felt to be his authentic self.

Newsweek cover with a woman and two men in shadow with the headline Bisexuality Not Gay. Not Straight. A New Sexual Identity Emerges
July 17, 1995 Newsweek cover.

Like most other self-identifying asexuals, Jay wanted human intimacy, but didn’t experience a desire for sex as a means of necessarily experiencing that. Pre-Google search engines continually pointed him to a paper about plant reproduction when he input “asexual” into his browser. When he visited Stanford, where Google was in its earliest incarnation, he tried again on this new search engine, and found someone else who identified as asexual.

“Finding another person, or just any mention of asexuality at all, really collapsed my fears about whether I was allowed to be this way. There weren’t people telling me to be ashamed, but there were a lot of people telling me I’d be alone forever. And so, that was a really sort of pivotal, emotional moment,” Jay says. “It inspired me to make my own website to try to help other people because I found this one article, but the article was just one story. There wasn’t a place for people to talk to one another, and that’s what I wanted.”

As AVEN was beginning to grow, sex researchers were also beginning to explore the idea that this identity could in fact be a healthy one, and not a pathology. But at the time, the major handbook for human psychiatry practitioners, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 4th edition, categorically defined a lack of sexual desire as a problem (hypoactive sexual desire disorder) that ought to be treated — an echo of past editions that had similarly pathologized same-sex desires and relationships.

“I was vaguely aware when I was younger that I did not trust mental health professionals to understand queerness,” Jay says. “I was struggling a lot but therapy didn’t feel like an option because I knew that therapists had taken way too long to accept homosexuality. And I had enough of a pop culture understanding of Freud to think, ‘they probably are not going to trust a lack of sexuality and probably not because it’s actually a problem.’”

In 2008, Jay and other activists from AVEN formed a task force to provide qualitative and quantitative data from their network and experiences to the medical team working on revising the DSM for its 5th edition. The top policy priority of AVEN’s community was better psychiatric care and understanding — to advocate for a model of care that understood what positive development for an asexual-identifying youth looks like.

AVEN was not alone in this journey, garnering support from scientists like Anthony Bogaert, who put the identity on the research map. His 2004 paper launched the field of asexuality studies, finding about 1 percent (or around 580,000 people) of the British population could be defined as asexual. The 5th edition of the DSM, released in 2013, now accepts low or nonexistent sexual attraction as normal when it occurs for a person identifying as asexual, while making room for those experiencing distress over a lack of sexual attraction to seek help.

A safer internet

AVEN has continued to grow, with 143,000 members as of 2022, and is now a major resource for those studying asexuality. Jay remains involved with AVEN as a board member, but his work has also taken him to the Integrity Institute and Fairplay, both organizations that seek to put up safeguards for young people searching — as he once did — for real information on the internet.

The internet is a powerful tool for exploring identity — an oft-overlooked aspect of Gen Z’s relationship with the online world, Hammack says, is that a human sitting in front of a computer inputs the queries.

“They are an active agent who’s driving the process that ultimately leads to an algorithm that they’re exposed to,” Hammack says. That’s the piece that gets de-emphasized, he notes, which goes against the notion, in some conservative circles, that the internet is the active agent making kids identify as one way or another.

“In the research I’ve done with queer teens when they talk about social media, they talk about going there and looking for things,” Hammack says, “not, ‘I had no idea what was going on and all of a sudden this thing came at me online.’ What gets lost in debates is that labels are linked to real experiences people have of desire and the self, and the pain that people experience from not being able to put a name to that. Underneath all of the aspects of social change that may irritate some people is someone who is thinking, ‘oh my God, I can’t believe I finally have a name for how I feel.’”

White man in green shirt looking at camera
David Jay

But rising visibility also means rising vulnerability, or what Hammack calls the paradox of the present. “When you dig deep into the psychological struggle queer kids experience, it’s not because they feel awful about being pansexual, for example — totally the opposite. Queer communities and friends are a source of strength. But there is a really despondent reaction to schools, or a lack of mainstream education or acceptance, even in what we would think of as progressive communities. People diverse in genders and sexuality don’t feel like they have that kind of institutional support.”

Teen distress comes from discrimination, cyberbullying, emotionally manipulative algorithms and misinformation. Jay, now a parent of two children, is working to mitigate this for the next generation through organizations driven to provide guardrails for teen mental health.

“I want to see places where queer teens can receive authoritative information and ideally wind up in community with other young people and with elders who respect and have been through that journey,” Jay says. “Along the way, I’m really concerned about ways that their privacy can be violated, potentially by families who are not supportive, or ways that online channels can become avenues for online harassment.

“From working with families who’ve lost kids, I can see how bad algorithmic recommendations and online harassment can get. TikTok and Instagram algorithms will happily say: ‘You seem a little depressed. Do you want nothing but content about depression for four hours a day?’ That makes me really, really worried.”

Jay points to legislation around online safety and improved platforms, like Blue Fever, an app that supports teen socializing and mental health with qualified adult mentors, as a way of reducing this risk. For as much as artificial intelligence is preparing to catapult the internet into its next iteration, “an algorithm can’t replace a mentor,” Jay says. While the internet can expand identity and validate self-concepts, it needs to offer places of belonging to do that.

This revolution, as it turns out, still needs people behind its screens.

Complete Article ↪HERE↩!

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What Is a Queerplatonic Relationship?

— Allow the experts to explain

By Sophie Saint Thomas

Have you ever had a bestie who feels like more than a bestie, but not necessarily in a rom-com, friends-to-lovers kind of sense? You know, a friend you love so deeply you swear they’re more of a life partner than a best friend? It’s something lots of us feel on some level with our closest friends, à la the Sex and the City gals declaring themselves each other’s soulmates. But for folks in queerplatonic relationships, not-necessarily-sexual, not-traditionally-romantic life partnership with a deeply beloved friend is a daily reality—a life choice on par with moving in with or marrying a romantic partner, but one that exists outside the heteropatriarchal and mono-normative hierarchy that privileges monogamous, romantic partnership above all other relationships.

“Queerplatonic relationships challenge the idea that romance is the only way to be close to someone,” says sex education expert Mariah Freya, founder of Beducated. “They show that non-romantic connections are just as valid and important.”

As the “queer” in “queerplatonic” suggests, this relationship dynamic evolved and primarily exists within the LGBTQIA+ community, where queerplatonic relationships can exist between and among partners of any gender or sexual orientation. If you’re in a queerplatonic ’ship, you may live together, go on dates, and even help each other out with other intimate gestures that folks usually associate with romantic partners rather than friends, from household tasks like taking out the trash to life admin like doing taxes.

Queerplatonic relationships are different from regular friendships because of the “sheer level of intimacy,” says Carly, who suggests thinking of queerplatonic relationships as more couture than off-the-rack. “You get to build your own relationships however you want as an adult, and it’s really freeing when you find other people who are down to create intimate relationships that aren’t necessarily built on romance.”

Whether you’re in a queerplatonic relationship, think you might want to be, or just came here to learn, here’s everything you need to know about queerplatonic relationships, from what they are to who can be in one to how to have a healthy queerplatonic partnership.

What Is a Queerplatonic Relationship?

“A queerplatonic relationship is a close, not inherently sexual or romantic relationship that is beyond what most would consider to be a friendship,” Freya says. Queerplatonic relationships can often be the bedrock of chosen family. Of course, so can regular friendships, but in queerplatonic relationships, your favorite person really, truly, feels like a love of your life—no sex required.

“Queerplatonic relationships are chosen family and life partners that you’re not having sex with, but you share other intimate parts of your life with that you wouldn’t share with your standard friend,” Carly says.

What Are the Origins of Queerplatonic Relationships?

The times are (thankfully) changing, yes. But historically, queer people have often had to create their own family structures due to both rejection from blood relatives and the illegality/inability to create “traditional families” by way of marriage and reproduction that existed within much of modern western society until far too recently. Hence the largely queer-coded concept of “chosen family.”

“Queerplatonic relationships have always existed. As with most relationship labels, this type of relationship has existed long before the term was coined,” says Dulcinea Alex Pitagora, PhD, an NYC-based psychotherapist and sex therapist. “These types of relationships most likely were forged by those who recognized the value in leaning into a close, mutually satisfying and beneficial relationship, particularly before relationships outside of heteronormative socialization became stigmatized.”

And speaking of the LGBTQIA+ origins of all things queerplatonic, let’s talk about asexuality for a moment, shall we? As you may recall, the “A” in LGBTQIA+ stands for “asexual,” which refers to someone who experiences little to no sexual attraction. (Remember, asexuality is a spectrum.) While you don’t need to be asexual to enjoy queerplatonic relationships—and we’ll get to that—we can thank ace folks for blessing us with the term “queerplatonic.”

“In the early 2010s, folks in the asexual and aromantic communities were trying to put a name to their deep emotional connections that weren’t quite friendships or romances,” says Freya. “That’s when they coined the term “queerplatonic.”

Some experts also say that these relationships can be traced back to “Boston marriages,” aka those historical relationships in which two women decide to live as life partners rather than enter traditional marriages with men.

“Queerplatonic relationships have roots in the concept of ‘Romantic Friendship,’ coined in the 19th century to describe emotionally intense, ‘non-sexual’ friendships, often between same-sex individuals, primarily women,” Freya says. “These friendships offered companionship and support in societies where women had limited freedoms, leading to an era of passionate but non-sexual love.”

What Does a Queerplatonic Relationship Look Like?

Remember, queerplatonic relationships are couture, not off-the-rack, meaning they’re a bit of a choose-your-own-adventure situation—and that’s the beauty of it.< “Queering relationships means questioning societal standards and creating a structure that works for you,” Freya says. “In queerplatonic partnerships, some partners sleep in the same bed, while others live separately. Some may decide to have kids together or blend their families, while others might choose not to. The possibilities are endless.”

Which is to say that queerplatonic relationships can look like emotionally charged friendships, roommates, life partners, or all of the above. It just depends on the people involved.

“You’d have to ask the people involved in the relationship how they define what it means to them to be queerplatonic, because relationship labels can vary widely from one person to the next,” says Pitagora. “In general, a queerplatonic relationship is one that, at a baseline, is transgressing conventional relationship norms, made inherent by the inclusion of ‘queer’ in the word.”

Most queerplatonic relationships do not involve sex. However, they do have emotional intimacy and intense love. While they don’t tend to be sexual (although they can be, more on that to come), they can absolutely feel romantic. Queerplatonic relationships offer the same—if not even more intense—support and closeness that more traditional romantic partnerships do. And, unlike regular friendships between straight people (although, honestly, many straight women reading this may identify with them), queerplatonic relationships form a queer chosen family.

“In truth, my queerplatonic relationships sometimes include romance—which I think is a key part of them!” says sex educator Portia Brown. “There is still some blurring of the lines and disrupting the status quo in some of these connections. While I am monogamous—and, as a rule, I don’t like to have sexual connections in my platonic friendships—I value my queerplatonic relationships because they allow a closeness I don’t always have in friendships with hetero friends.”

Can Queerplatonic Relationships Be Confusing?

In queer culture, there’s this thing where you can become friends with your ex, then start hooking up again, then, like, get a matching tattoo, then break up…and not even know how to define it. There’s also a joke, especially among queer women and non-binary folks, where you don’t know if you’re dear friends or something more. Given that, queerplatonic relationships may sound confusing, but they set themselves apart from this grey area by being important relationships all on their own. The way to avoid confusion or hurt feelings is, of course, communication.

“Any relationship can be confusing due to assumptions, projections, and expectations, and I would say that happens more often in more normative relationship structures than in queerplatonic relationships, since partners are more likely to talk things through transparently in the latter to avoid confusion,” Pitagora says. “Even in the most well-communicated queerplatonic relationship, however, people can fall prey to internalized heteronormativity rising to the surface, which can be something that creates confusion.”

Who Can Have a Queerplatonic Relationship?

It’s more than okay if you’re straight and reading this thinking, “Damn, this sounds exactly like me and my best friend.” However, queerplatonic relationships are—by definition—queer. (I’m not one to tell you that you’re not straight; but if this sounds like you, then, hey, maybe think about it!)

Asexuality plays a crucial role in the history of the term queerplatonic, but this relationship dynamic isn’t just for asexuals. Another relationship structure that places a lot of value on this type of relationship is relationship anarchy, which holds all partnerships equal and essential, not just those that involve orgasms.

“While some relationship anarchists will gravitate organically toward queerplatonic relationships, others will not,” says Pitagora. “There is, however, a greater likelihood that relationship anarchists will find themselves in a queerplatonic relationship since they are more open to non-traditional relationship structures.”

And you don’t need to identify as non-monogamous to have a queerplatonic relationship; as Brown notes, they can be the most important relationships for monogamous queer people, too. Remember, these relationships can continue to affirm queerness, which can be exceptionally useful for the monogamous.

“I am a bisexual woman in a beautiful relationship with someone who happens to be a cis man,” says Brown. “While my relationship status doesn’t make me any less queer, it does mean I am not often perceived by other people as queer. My queerplatonic relationships are a place where my queerness is seen and celebrated, which is really important for me.”

Queerplatonic relationships are also super valuable in the sex work community, in which friends can end up having sex.

“I’m not only a queer person but a sex worker, so my relationships—especially with other queer sex workers—can look strange to outsiders,” Carly explains. “Especially because they can also have a sexual component to them that can exclusively fall under the sex work umbrella. Just because I’ve slept with someone for work doesn’t mean that we’re dating or would have sex in our private lives. I have a very intimate relationship with a friend who I say is a platonic friend because, in our personal lives, we do not sleep together, but we’ve made porn together and have gone to play parties and have had sex in the same room casually, which can be very strange to outside people looking in.”

Can You Hook Up in Queerplatonic Relationships?

Technically, you can do whatever you want in your queerplatonic relationship. Maybe there are goodnight kisses or, as Carly shares, sex for unique reasons.

“Even though these relationships are platonic, physical affection like hand-holding, kissing, and sometimes even sex can still happen,” Freya says.

Can Queerplatonic Relationships Prevent Unhealthy Romantic Partnerships?

Having the emotional support of a queerplatonic relationship can, at times, prevent one from jumping into an unhealthy romantic or sexual relationship out of loneliness.

“They know me best, so they can help me realize red flags and be more honest and blunt with me than a standard friend would,” Carly says of their queerplatonic relationships.

However, the experts caution that even those in seemingly enlightened queerplatonics can still, unfortunately, enter other unhealthy partnerships.

“While it can be helpful to have a queerplatonic partner to process what’s going on in other partnerships, it’s not always available or helpful—it is not a given that a queerplatonic partner will be able to check blind spots and advise their partner on boundaries for other relationships,” Pitagora says. “Some folks in queerplatonic relationships might prioritize non-sexual and/or non-romantic relationships and only engage in casual sexual relationships or hookups, and in that way have the opportunity to avoid unhealthy ongoing sexual partnerships.”

But having extra support, honesty, and communication is most often going to be something healthy that can rub off on your relationships that are inherently sexual. “I would say we all help each other navigate romantic highs and lows,” Brown says.

What Do People Misunderstand About Queerplatonic Relationships?

As with all things queer, the outside world can get a lot of things wrong about the queerplatonic lifestyle. When asked what people misunderstand about her queerplatonic relationships, Brown shares: “The most obvious answer is the assumption that we are all hooking up or that we have. That is the case for some, and in no way do I think this invalidates the friendship, but it’s not true for everyone.”

Unfortunately, the intimacy of queerplatonic relationships can be intimidating for other friends or even partners. “I had a girlfriend who refused to accept that my friendship was platonic, but if that’s how my friend and I define our relationship, then that’s how it is,” Carly says.If you’re dating someone who has queerplatonic relationships, then count yourself lucky to have a partner who is so cared for. Rather than give into jealousy, remind yourself that this network of support nurtures your relationship, too.

How Can You Nurture a Queerplatonic Relationship?

I can’t stress enough that queerplatonic relationships can feel like the love of your life—and yeah, they actually can be. While this doesn’t mean that you can’t also enjoy romantic relationships, it does mean that these partnerships require extra love, time, support, and communication compared to regular friendships. While these relationships can ebb and flow with time (and, yes, even end), you have a better chance of maintaining them if you practice active communication.

“Like any committed relationship, healthy queerplatonic partnerships require open communication and setting boundaries,” Freya says. “It’s all about actively working on the relationship together.” To properly communicate, you need to understand how you feel. It’s helpful to check in with yourself before approaching your queerplatonic partner. And while letting shit go is an art, if something truly hurts or confuses you, approach your partner and talk it out rather than letting it fester into resentment.

As we’ve learned by now, queerplatonic relationships can affect other partnerships; it’s helpful to check in with one another when you get a new friend or sexual partner.

In Conclusion…

Queerplatonic relationships provide true love, intimacy, support, and validation.

“For me, queerplatonic relationships are where my queerness is simultaneously centered and exists as a nonfactor,” Brown says. “I love that I am fully seen and that even if I wasn’t queer, my friends would love and adore me just the same.”

By treating these relationships with the respect and attention that romantic partnership traditionally demands through active communication, empathy, and listening, you can enjoy some of the most fulfilling and long-lasting relationships of a lifetime.

Complete Article ↪HERE↩!

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Gender, Sex, & Sexuality: What’s the Difference?

We tend to think life fits in two tidy categories: male or female, XX or XY. But it’s so much more diverse and complicated! In this episode of Crash Course Biology, we’ll discover sex and sexuality as a continuum across life. We’ll learn why humans are the only species with gender, and why same-sex mating is more common than you might think.

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What It’s Like To Come Out Later In Life

— According To Real Women (Who’ve Been There)

Six women share their stories of how they learned to live—and love—authentically.

By

For decades, Susie Stonefield thought she was straight. She was married to a man, had three kids with him, and, from the outside, was enjoying a “perfect” marriage. Then, at 56 years old, she came out as gay—a process that involved a lot of fear, and even grief. But today, she’s happier than ever.

Susie, now 61, is not the only “late bloomer” who discovered her sexuality later in life. Suzette Mullen, 63, didn’t come out until her 50s. Paulette Thomas-Martin, 72, liked girls at a young age but didn’t come out until around 40. Bridget Bertrand, 48, came out six years ago. And both Allison Garcia, 43, and Marina Brochado, 42, started discovering their sexuality around ages 37 and 38, respectively.

As of 2023, nearly 8 percent of U.S. adults identify as queer—a statistic that has increased from 5.6 percent in 2020 and 3.5 percent in 2012, per Gallup. Many of those individuals are Gen Z and younger millennials who came of age during a time of increased LGBTQ+ visibility and representation (in film and TV, for example, and also in real life), and against the backdrop of the legalization of gay marriage in 2015.

“Being able to see folks living real, full lives in news, media, shows, and romance novels can show all kinds of folks that, ‘Oh, I can be out at this age. There’s a whole community behind me,’” says Christina DaCosta, chief experience officer for SAGE, an advocacy organization that supports LGBTQ+ elders. And as a millennial–Gen Z cusper, I’m among these ranks: I came out shortly after my 20th birthday, which could be considered early or late, depending on who you ask.

two women posing for a photo
Courtesy of Paulette Thomas-MartinPaulette Thomas-Martin, 72 (right), and her wife, Pat, in 2022

While younger queer women might take center stage on Instagram, in pop culture, and even at Pride parades, the rich community of those who discovered their queerness in their 30s, 40s, 50s, and even later often goes overlooked. Many of these late-blooming lesbians and queer women were married to men, either before or while they figured out their sexuality; a lot of them are parents. Some found love with other people who came out later in life, or with women who’d been out since childhood.

Throughout my conversations with these women, I was moved by how many were able to identify with—and embrace—their queerness despite growing up amid varying degrees of homophobia, as well as little to no positive representation in the media (and, often, in their personal lives). I swooned over their stories of falling in love, resonated with their experiences of finding community, and learned from their reflections on living authentically. Most notably, though, I was surprised and struck that we shared many of the same core experiences, despite coming out at different ages, in different places, and under wildly different circumstances.

Like Allison, I found comfort and joy in queer shows and romance novels before I came out. Like Marina, I somehow internalized the belief that kissing (or wanting to kiss) your friends as a teenager didn’t necessarily mean anything about your sexuality. And like Susie, I once had a thrilling, visceral, semi-spiritual moment of locking eyes with a person across the room and thinking, This is unavoidable for me, and my life isn’t going to be the same.

The interviews tapped into deep emotions—pain, relief, joy, and a complete lack of regret. “[My wife] and I talk about this all the time. If we had figured ourselves out sooner, we would never have met,” Allison says. “I feel like all of the things in my life built to where I am today.”

“I knew in that second; I felt this magnetic pull. I have to be with that woman.”

That doesn’t mean it was easy, though. Many of these women also shared fears, doubts, and the loneliness that came with feeling like the only person questioning their sexuality later in life—until they found community with other queer people, including fellow “late bloomers” online and in person.

This shared feeling of isolation is likely a result of the limited data about this community. LGBTQ+ data collection is “sorely lacking” in general, explains DaCosta. “We don’t even have an accurate census count of people who identify as LGBTQ+ in this country.” Anecdotally, though, “we definitely find that people are coming out in different ways in their later years,” DaCosta says. “A common refrain I’ve heard is, ‘I’m ready to live my life. I don’t want to die not being who I am.’”

Of course, there are unique struggles associated with coming out later in life too. Some of the women I spoke to had difficult experiences leaving their husbands, or fears about how they’d support themselves financially. Many worried about losing lifelong friends, alienating relatives, or upsetting their kids.

Joanne Fleisher, LCSW, author of Living Two Lives: Married to a Man and In Love With a Woman, had been married to a man for 12 years when she started to figure out her sexuality in the late 1970s. She was already a therapist, and after ending her marriage, she began working with married women who were questioning their sexuality or coming out. Back then, she felt she was one of very few professionals who had lived this transition herself and, therefore, was uniquely qualified to advise others.

“The process [of figuring out your sexuality and coming out] is extremely painful and uprooting, and there are a lot of losses in the process,” says Fleisher. But many of the women she’s connected with have also described the happiness and authenticity they eventually stepped into as something that’s “worth the struggle.”

“Almost everybody I have ever talked to feels like, as hard as the process was—and it is a hard process—there is such a sense of having landed,” Fleisher says. “Many people say it’s like coming home.”

Cultural Contexts

For a long time, being in the LGBTQ+ community was “such a hidden experience,” says Fleisher, and some of the women I spoke to didn’t realize that queerness was even an option for them. Others grew up watching LGBTQ+ folks get subjected to violence and discrimination, which can make it difficult for someone to identify and celebrate their sexuality at a younger age, DaCosta adds.

Paulette was raised to believe that it was okay for others to be gay, as long as she wasn’t. In hindsight, she knew she liked girls at age 7—and then, at age 16, a girl kissed her. “I just knew that, one, I was scared. And two, I liked it,” she says. Even after she married a man, had kids, and moved to Hawaii, she knew she liked women; the thought would crop up when she looked at pictures or watched movies. Still, she thought, Having children and a family, how can I be gay? Gay women don’t give birth to children. [There was] a lot of lack of knowledge and understanding.”

a couple posing for a picture
Susie Stonefield, 61 (left), and her partner, Mary

Marina also crushed on and kissed girls in high school but didn’t necessarily question her sexuality. She was born in Brazil and moved to a “very conservative part” of Texas at 14, where she had a traditional Christian upbringing and saw a very prescribed path for her life. “I thought, All girls think girls are attractive, and now, we do the thing where we stay with men and have relationships with men,” she says. Marina got married shortly after college and had a baby, which only made it easier to follow the path of least resistance: “Then, it becomes even more of not only doing what’s ‘next,’ but you also do what’s next for your kid and put yourself aside.”

“There was a part of myself I had just never met… and once I met that part of myself, there was no turning back. I couldn’t ignore her anymore.”

When Allison was growing up in the ’80s and ’90s, she just didn’t see many lesbians or queer people anywhere—on her favorite sitcoms, in her neighborhood. When a lesbian couple moved into a house nearby, she remembers being told not to talk to them; in fact, no one on their block talked to them. She remembers thinking it was strange but obeyed her parents’ instructions.

Allison married in her mid-20s and became involved in a conservative church that espoused the idea that being gay was a sin. But she didn’t subscribe to her church’s homophobic teachings. “It didn’t track with how I knew I felt about God, and how I felt about these people,” she says. Still, it helped her stay “in denial” about her own queerness, she says.

Susie, on the other hand, grew up in a liberal environment but still didn’t think of queerness as an option. Her sex life with her husband was lackluster, but she just assumed that all women hated having sex with men. Yet when she started thinking about women, “it just felt scary and incredibly inconvenient,” she tells me. “And I just felt like everyone would feel sorry for [my husband]. Who breaks up a marriage when they have a great husband? I had a lot of friends with horrible husbands, so why would I end a marriage with a great guy for this? It felt incredibly selfish.”

Still, she found herself thinking about women…a lot. “It became this constant thought that was sort of driving me crazy,” she remembers. “And I tried really hard not to, but it just started to show up in all these places. I’m not really a secret person, but it started to occur to me, ‘You have a secret, and you’re not telling anybody what’s going on here.’”

The Catalyst Effect

In chemistry, a catalyst is a substance that speeds up a chemical reaction. It changes an environment just enough to speed along an outcome. A lot of late bloomers use the word catalyst to describe the specific crush, love interest, or moment that helped them realize their sexuality.

Bridget says her sexuality first started to “flicker” in college, when she was spending a semester in New York, but it wasn’t until she took an expressive arts workshop on healing through the body that the flicker turned into a full-blown flame. Prompted to paint a picture of her body and identify what she showed the world versus what she didn’t, the realization about her sexuality “just broke open,” she says. Everything started to click: crushes over the years, an openly queer friend she’d had a “deep friendship” with, the 11 Ani DiFranco concerts.

At that workshop, she met the woman who would become her first lesbian relationship. Bridget told her spouse right away and asked if he’d be open to her dating that woman. “Within short order, he agreed,” she says. “And then I said, ‘This is really who I am,’ and he wasn’t surprised at all.” She moved out two weeks later.

Susie’s catalyst was a woman at synagogue. “In the middle of the service, we were sitting in a circle, and I’m looking across the room at her. And she’s just staring at me. I’d never felt anything like it. I knew in that second; I felt this magnetic pull. I have to be with that woman,” she says.

Once Susie took the leap (with her husband’s blessing to explore her sexuality), everything fell into place. Her relationship with the woman was short-lived, but it propelled Susie forward: She ended her marriage, moved out, and came out as queer. “There was a part of myself I had just never met, who was so voraciously sensual and sexual…And once I met that part of myself, there was no turning back. I couldn’t ignore her anymore.”

For Suzette, the cataclysmic event involved writing. Around the time she became an empty nester, Suzette began focusing on her writing career. She found herself writing about an intimate moment with her best friend of 17 years: She had felt the urge to touch her, and then, once she did, “this electric charge went through my body.” Suzette shared the scene with her book coach, who told her, “That sounds exactly like someone falling in love.”

“When I saw her comment…I was like, ‘Oh, f*ck,’” Suzette says. “I had written it, and I knew it [meant] something, but it took someone else to actually name it. And then, once it was named, I knew it was true.”

Allison, also a writer, had a similar breakthrough moment. In 2018, at the end of a particularly bad year in her marriage, she sat down and started writing a novel. She wrote just three sentences—about a 37-year-old woman who was married to a man, had a kid, and was questioning her sexuality—and then realized, “Oh, shit. This is me.” She kept writing, stream-of-consciousness style, until she hit 80,000 words.

Finding New Roots

Often, after a catalytic moment comes a metamorphosis—which can look a little different for everyone, even if they’re on similar journeys. When Joanne Fleisher sees patients or receives messages from women online, she always reassures them that coming out is personal, and that it’s okay to take your time figuring out what you want to do. “There’s no right decision,” Fleisher says. Some people choose to stay in their marriage or open them up. Others end their relationship, but it takes a while.

Coming out—especially later in life—can bring a lot of loss. But it can also open the door for beautiful new communities, chosen families, and deep, soul-filling relationships. Allison was scared that coming out would ostracize her from people in her life. And she did, in fact, end up losing her best friend, who went to her old church. “But I gained all of these really wonderful people,” Allison says.

She joined a progressive, queer-affirming church and started connecting with other later-in-life lesbians online. She started dating, and suddenly, sex made sense. With her ex-husband, Allison had always felt “clumsy,” but with women, she “seemed to know exactly what to do.”

“I just find myself blossoming in every corner of my life now.”

While seeking out queer community, Allison attended a potluck for older lesbians. She brought her then 4-year-old son and connected with the woman who is now her wife. “She was just very cute with my son. He was crawling over her, and it wasn’t fazing her,” Allison says. She lights up as she tells me about the woman’s calves, her tattoo, and their early conversations about the intersection of faith and sexuality. They got married in 2022.

Paulette also went through a metamorphosis after her divorce. Around age 40, she found solace at a domestic violence center, where she eventually began working. Completely surrounded by women in that environment, she started having the feeling of Oh, this is what I’ve been missing, she recalls.

She became involved in her local community in Hawaii, started advocating for same-sex marriage, and went to many events geared toward women. She surrounded herself with a strong support system and “just really started exploring how I felt and how I wanted to live.” In 2012, Paulette moved back to her childhood home of New York. While volunteering for SAGE, she met Pat, her future wife, who was promoting a dance event. They got married in 2018.

Helping Others Blossom

These late bloomers know that real-life communities can be hard to find, especially when you’re first questioning your sexuality. So, many of them sought out that connection and support online. After Fleisher ended her marriage, she talked about her experiences in magazine interviews and, in the early days of the Internet, launched a popular advice column called “Ask Joanne.” “I knew that married women wanted to be hidden and discreet about exploring their sexuality, so the Internet was a place where they could do a little bit of searching,” she says.

These days, the Internet is a massive resource for women who are questioning and reckoning with their sexuality. Almost every woman interviewed in this piece found solace, community, and information in some digital form. Marina regularly posts videos about her experiences as a late bloomer on TikTok. Suzette also found a “lifeline” through online support groups and eventually published a memoir to help others on their journey.

After Susie came out, she found a late-in-life lesbian support group on Facebook. She remembers sharing her photo and story in a post and receiving lots of affirming messages, compliments, and even flirtatious comments. “It felt so good and made me realize how I’d really been not trying to encourage that from my husband for a long time—and how it made me really uncomfortable, feeling his attraction to me,” she says. This kind of attention from women, however, was another story. “So that was very clarifying for me.”

Some of the women have also used their own stories as a way to help the next generation, including their own kids. “We groom our daughters from early on to live under this mindset that their purpose is to get men’s attention and get their approval, and that’s how you’re successful,” Marina says. But she intentionally parents her teenage daughter to help her understand what she wants and what makes her happy, not what society tells her.

And in a beautiful, interconnected moment, Bridget found that her own coming-out story helped her child feel more affirmed in his budding awareness of his queer and trans identity, encouraging him to come out a few years later.

marina
Kate LintsMarina Brochado, 42, in 2024

Meanwhile, Paulette and her wife have established and gotten involved in several nonprofits and organizations devoted to serving the LGBTQ+ community—including older LGBTQ+ folks and lesbians of color—in Harlem. Safe, nurturing, and community-focused places are extremely vital for queer folks who grew up at a time when it wasn’t always safe to be out. “Even the word queer, which I just find so liberating now, before, it was derogatory. It wasn’t to be said or used,” she tells me. “You could be killed, maimed—you still can today, but [there’s] freedom. But a lot of seniors are still locked in that same mindset.” That’s why creating community and support systems is so important, she adds.

Paulette thinks that if her younger self could see her life today—her marriage, community, and work—she “would rejoice and know that I am so loved,” she says. “She would think I am fabulous and ferocious and be so happy that I made the choices that I made before I left this earth.”

For a long time, Susie was guided by fear, but she’s now happy too. She’s in a safe, loving, emotionally deep, and passionate relationship with her fiancée. She’s even still “good friends” with the man she now calls her “wasband,” who still comes to her family events and gets along well with her partner.

“I feel so blessed to have had the opportunity to have two wonderful partners in my life. My kids are fine—they got to see their parents doing what was right for them,” she says. “ And I just find myself blossoming in every corner of my life now.”

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There’s a clear connection between Nazism & anti-abortion, anti-gay conservatism

— We’ve seen this playbook before — in fact, I even made a film about it.

A pink triangle monument in Sitges, Spain

By

While serving as features editor between 1980 and 1981 for the Boston-based Gay Community News – a progressive national publication – I received a telephone call from Margaret Lazarus, co-director of Cambridge Documentary Films, Inc. located across the Charles River. She explained to me that she and her husband, co-director Renner Wunderlich, had been making documentary films on several topics for classroom use. They were now very much interested in producing a film about homophobia.

She asked whether I would like to join a production team and whether I knew others who were knowledgeable and interested in such a project.

And that was the beginning of a nearly two-year project of working on the greatest joint venture I’d ever had the pleasure of joining. I met some phenomenal, compassionate, and committed social activists to discuss the process of coming to a consensus on the philosophical parameters of this vast topic, determining who we would like to interview, deciding upon the editing, and other considerations in the film’s production.

Our collection included a diversity of backgrounds and experiences: healthcare workers, community activists, anti-war peace activists, anti-nuclear organizers, feminist and anti-racist activists all, as well as those who experienced the brutal forces of homophobia. Most of us had been for years on the front lines in the battle for freedom and equality.

Setting the Context

It was a time, 1981, before the larger public had access to personal computers, and longer still before the invention and distribution of the smartphone. Over a decade would pass before widespread internet by the public. Homes had very reduced cable television services while many homes still watched a limited number and variety of channel options.

Positive representations of lesbians and gays on the small and large screen were limited, but on the rise.

It’d be another decade before community legal groups would begin challenging discriminatory marriage statutes banning same-sex couples, and approximately 35 years until we won the right to marriage equality in the 2015 Supreme Court ruling of Obergefell v. Hodges.

In 1986, four years after the release of our film, the Supreme Court’s ruling in Bowers v. Hardwick upheld the constitutionality of a Georgia sodomy law criminalizing oral and anal sex in private between consenting adults — in this particular case regarding male same-sex sodomy. Another 20 years would pass until the last of the anti-sodomy statutes outlawing our sexuality would finally fall in the court’s 2003 Lawrence v. Texas ruling.

We filmed our interviews during the very beginning of the Ronald Reagan years in the White House, years with a distinctly Christian conservative focus, years of the so-called “trickle down” economic climate concentrating on giving preferences to the titans of industry. This resulted in the enormous wealth and income gap that has only increased since Reagan left the Oval Office.

In many ways, it was a very different time. In 1981, AIDS had hardly hit the public consciousness, and the heightened inclusion of bisexual and trans people had not yet occurred in the larger movement for LGBTQ+ rights.

Over a decade would pass before the Rainbow Flag would become the accepted symbol of the LGBTQ+ movement.

In 1977, just a few years before our filming, Anita Bryant — a former Miss Oklahoma, Christian nationalist, and singer— launched her “Save Our Children” campaign to reverse a Dade County, Florida ordinance outlawing discrimination based on sexual orientation in housing, education, and public accommodations. Bryant and the Christian conservatives she attracted were successful in overturning the non-discrimination law by a 2-to-1 margin in a public vote.

Sparked by this victory, groups in other regions of the country with similar ordinances organized to overturn theirs as well. Using many of the anti-homosexual scare tactics – including that we “recruit minors” into a so-called “deviant homosexual lifestyle” and into a “gay agenda” since we “can’t reproduce,” and ending the supposed “gay control of politicians and the media”— voters in 1978 overturned similar ordinances in St. Paul, Minnesota; Wichita, Kansas; and Eugene, Oregon.

Not surprisingly, several conservative Christian organizations were ascendant at this time. One of the most notable and toxic was the Moral Majority founded by Baptist minister, Jerry Falwell Sr. who was staunchly anti-homosexual in his beliefs and rhetoric.

During our film, we included some television propaganda advertisements produced by the Christian theocratic right that promoted homophobic tropes as scare tactics.

A decade later, the Springs of Life Church located north of Los Angeles, California, produced a propaganda film to reverse equality ordinances protecting lesbian and gay people. The Church shipped an estimated 25,000 copies of the film across the nation to conservative organizations and churches spreading fear and hatred.

The film’s announcer arrogantly claimed that “17% of homosexual men consume human feces for erotic thrills,” “28% of homosexual men engage in sodomy with more than one thousand partners,” and “They spread diseases that imperil the entire society.”

This film seemed to have patterned itself on the 1940 Nazi propaganda film, Der Ewige Jude (The Eternal Jew) in which the film’s narrator asserted that Jews are involved in 47% of robberies in Germany, and 98% of prostitutes are Jewish.

That film argued, “The Jews are only 1% of the population, but they know how to terrorize a great, tolerant nation by controlling finance, the arts, education, and the media.”

The links between antisemitism and anti-gay propaganda could not have been stronger.

“Pink Triangles: A Study of Prejudice against Lesbians and Gay Men”

At the very beginning of the film and interspersed throughout, we included a series of “person on the street” comments taken from random interviews conducted at a shopping mall in a Boston suburb. The interviewee responses ranged from very negative homophobic reactions to some that were fairly neutral or even very positive.

I often wonder whether we might receive similar or distinctly different responses if we traveled back to this mall today. What would reactions be if we venture into deep red states?

Historian and writer, Richard Plant, author of the book The Pink Triangle: The Nazi War against Homosexuals provides a historical analysis of times preceding our own. Plant fled Germany during the early years of Nazi rule. He lost many friends to the persecution of homosexuals in his native land.

With Plant’s overview, we structured our film in segments.

During the New England Lesbian and Gay Conference, we filmed a panel of activists talking about the state of the movement and projections for the future.

Educator and poet Ron Schriber discussed the role of “victimhood” in the autocratic project of the Middle Ages and during the German Holocaust. He also talked about how “homosexuality” has been constricted differently within various social contexts and cultures.

Barbara Smith, a writer and social activist, discussed the ideological functions dominant groups have used to oppress lesbians and gay men, and how homophobia within the Black community dysfunctionally “oppresses some of its own members.”

Political activist Leslie Cagan, discussed the concept of scapegoating during times of crisis, and attempted to predict what it portends for the near future: how conditions will deteriorate further and how we must join with other marginalized communities in coalition to defeat the forces of oppression.

And Armando Gaitan, a community activist, talked about our community’s understanding of different forms of oppression since we are members of intersectional communities.

In our healthcare segment, Kevin McGirr, a psychiatric nurse, talked about the psychological damage homophobia inflicts upon individuals of any sexual orientation.

Jonah Fields, a psychiatrist, related his personal experiences with homophobia when colleagues who became aware of his sexuality suddenly doubted his qualifications to serve clients. He quipped how the extant psychological literature, with its false conclusions and flawed research methodologies, represented lesbian and gay men’s experiences “as much as Gone with the Wind represented the lives of Black people.”

Mental health worker Michael Crowley linked homophobia with sexism in instances when “gay men are represented as feminine, and are therefore, oppressed as women are oppressed in our society” in certain ways.

Some members of our collective traveled to New York City to discover what that community was doing to counter the rising tide of violence directed against lesbians and gay males.

Tamar Hosanski of the Safety and Fitness Exchange provided some background of the types of attacks people have suffered because of their assumed sexuality.

Flora Colao, a patient advocate at St. Vincent’s Hospital in New York discussed her work with victims of crime, particularly homophobic hate crimes, and how she advocates for their recovery within the healthcare, law enforcement, and judicial systems.

In the personal testimonies segment, we profiled Aaron Fricke, who one year prior to our interview, in 1980, sued his high school in Cumberland, Rhode Island — in the case of Fricke v. Lynch — for the right to take a male date to his senior prom after the principle denied his request.

Aaron discussed the violent backlash he had gone through being a victim as an out gay student at his school. He closed by relating a “bittersweet” story of his high school graduation: “When I arrived at the podium [on the stage to receive my diploma], all the people in the bleachers — the parents and, maybe, the brothers and sisters — they all booed for me. But then I turned around and bowed to the students who all cheered for me.”

Julia Perez, a community worker, discussed the role of gender in her community, and how “there was no role for me as a lesbian.” She also talked about her experiences as a lesbian mother.

In this connection, Gail Bradley from the organization Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) related her daughter Sarah’s path in “coming out” to her, saying, “Foremost, I wanted Sarah’s love” and, “I did what I could, given my own limitations” to maintain her love.

Two members of the Boston Asian Gay and Lesbian Group talked about issues of homophobia, identity, and community.

Lester Wong discussed the difficulty he had coming out gay within the Asian community and being ethnically Chinese within the white gay male community. When he told his mother that he likes men, his mother retorted, “I don’t care if you like men. You still have to get married [to a woman].”

Gillian Gee connected homophobia with racism. When Lester explained how people called him homophobic epithets like “f*g” and “sissy” before they knew he was gay, Gillian explained that “it wasn’t because you were a ‘f*g’ or ‘sissy,’ but it was because you were Chinese. And that’s how homophobia and racism connect. They called you a homophobic name, ‘f*g’ ‘sissy,’ to really express a racist sentiment.”

We included a segment in which I and Hilary Kay from the Boston Gay Speakers Bureau had a deep and honest exchange with 10th to 12th grade students at The Group School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Theresa Simmons and Sam Dolson talked openly about the challenges they witnessed when their peers have “come out,”

In our attempt to continually place the topic in historical perspective, we obtained original footage from the so-called “Army McCarthy” U.S. Senate hearings of 1954, in which infamous Senator Joseph McCarthy (the namesake of “McCarthyism”) had his vicious homophobic lawyer Roy Cohn (who happened to be gay) look on.

the McCarthy hearings we included were held to investigate allegations of suspected “homosexual activity” on “a large Army base in the South,” and insurgent homosexuals within the government during what came to be known as the “Lavender Menace,” parallel to the Communist “Red Menace” in our governmental centers of power.

At the beginning of our work on the film, we did not have a definite title. Watching over the rough interviews, references to the Nazi symbol in the concentration camps for gay men, the pink triangle, emerged several times from Richard Plant and from Aaron Fricke. It seemed to us, therefore, to use this symbol of homosexual oppression (and later of resistance) to name our documentary on homophobia.

In one of the final segments, we circled back to Richard Plant who discussed the allies liberating the concentration camps. While homosexuality remained illegal in the allied countries at the time, “some of the U.S. officials were legalistic and sent [the pink triangle gay prisoners] back to jail.”

The Nazis’ anti-homosexual & anti-abortion campaign

The Nazis ruthlessly enforced and eventually extended Paragraph 175, the section of the German Penal Code dating back to 1871 with the unification of Germany: “Unnatural vice committed by two persons of the male sex or by people with animals is to be punished by imprisonment; the verdict may also include the loss of civil rights.”

Nazi ideology rested on the assessment that homosexual males lowered the German birth rate; they endangered, recruited, enticed, and corrupted youth; risked a possible homosexual epidemic could spread; accused homosexuals of being “potential oppositionists” and enemies of respectable society; and held that sexual relations between people of the same sex impairs their “sense of shame” and undermines morality, inevitably heralding the “decline of social community.”

While Nazi ideology and practice rejected lesbianism as well, they did not criminalize same-sex sexuality between women as they had in Germany’s Paragraph 175 of the Penal Code because they believed that so-called “Aryan” lesbians could at least birth children for the “New Germany.” The Nazis did incarcerate lesbians, however, sent to the camps under the red triangle (political prisoners) or the black triangle (vagrants).

On the other hand, Heinrich Himmler, Gestapo head and chief architect of the Reich’s anti-homosexual campaign, justified his actions by arguing that male homosexuals were “like women” and therefore, could not fight in any German war effort. Subsequently, he conducted surveillance operations on an estimated 90,000 suspected homosexuals, arrested approximately 50,000, and transported somewhere between 10,000 and 15,000 to concentration camps throughout the Nazi dominion. Very few survived.

Hitler also proposed eliminating all sexuality education from the German school system and encouraged parents to take on the primary responsibilities for sexual instruction within the home.

Alfred Rosenberg, one of the Nazi’s chief ideologues, directed his misogynist outrage against women: “The emancipation of women from the women’s emancipation movement is the first demand of a female generation trying to rescue nation and race, the eternally unconscious, the foundation of all civilization, from decline…. A woman should have every opportunity to realize her potential, but one thing must be made clear: Only a man must be and remain judge, soldier, and politician.”

Englebert Huber, a Nazi propagandist, dictated the “proper” place of women in the Third Reich as being figuratively and literally beneath men: “In the ideology of National Socialism, there is no room for the political woman….[Our] movement places woman in her natural sphere of the family and stresses her duties as wife and mother. The political, that post-war creature, who rarely ‘cut a good figure’ in parliamentary debates, represents the denigration of women. The German uprising is a male phenomenon.”

The Nazis added Paragraph 218 of the German Penal Code to outlaw abortions and establish a national file on women who had undergone abortions and doctors who had performed abortions.

The common thread running through Nazi ideology regarding gender, gender expression, and sexuality was an intensive campaign to control individuals’ bodies and the bodies of members of entire communities in an attempt to control their minds.

What does all this mean for the future of gay rights in the U.S.?

When we interviewed Richard for the film, Renner asked him if he could imagine where the U.S. might be heading in its treatment of lesbians and gay men.

“I really will not make a prediction for modern day,” he began, “but it seems to me clear that if you look at the whole picture, that any society that is under indomitable stress, that cannot deal with the problems, that feels that the fabric of society is disintegrating, will look for scapegoats. And there are always scapegoats around. The gays are always a very welcome scapegoat.”

“And in our modern times,” he concluded, “that should come to pass that even America, one of the most powerful countries in the world, feels it is at the edge of an abyss, they might repeat, in another way, the pattern of the Nazis.”

The film closed with footage from the 1982 Boston Pride March down Boylston Street. The final image is of a woman in the march carrying a handmade sign, “No More Holocausts.”

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Sexual identity is an important part of our lives, and the law should recognize that


Living in a tolerant and accepting society means being able to define ourselves on our own terms, without the state passing judgment on how we chose to do it.

By

An Alberta court recently ruled in the case of a Calgary man, Matthew Mills, who ran a private club out of his home for people who identify as non-monogamous. Mills was charged for a zoning violation — he was accused of operating an unsanctioned “social organization” in a residential area.

Mills claimed that the charges against him infringed on his right to define his identity in his own way. This is because, as he told the court, he is “involved in ethical non-monogamy as a core aspect of his lifestyle” and that he “considers his views and preferences in this regard to be part of his sexual orientation.”

The court decided that Mills could continue hosting the event, but could not continue to brand it as a club. The judge said “personal sexual expression, in all its many-splendored forms, is a fundamental aspect of human life, experience and fulfillment. Legislative or other state restrictions targeting legal, consensual, private sexual activity will attract close Charter scrutiny.”

The court did not go as far as Mills wanted it to. It declined to recognize polyamory as a protected category under the Charter. However, in the near future, the courts may not be so hesitant. Nor should they be. As this case shows, sexual identity is central to people’s conceptions of themselves. It is just as important as traditional sources of identity such as religion — and it deserves the same level of protection.

How sex became an identity

Sexual identity is not only a matter of our sexual orientation or gender identity — as important as these still are. People increasingly also define themselves with reference to things like kinks, non-monogamy and asexuality, as well as less familiar categories such as ecosexual and digisexual.

This idea that a person’s sexuality can be an integral part of their identity, of their sense of “who I am as a person” is still quite new.

Before the 19th century, people did not think sexual behaviour reflected some essential feature of an individual. Sex was just something you did. This is not to say sex acts were morally neutral, or that they were left unregulated. Both church and state kept a close eye on people’s private behaviour. However, even if you transgressed the society’s many restrictions, your sexual behaviour did not determine your identity.

three pairs of legs in pyjamas sitting on the edge of a bed
Sexual identity is not only a matter of our sexual orientation or gender identity. People increasingly also define themselves with reference to things like kinks or non-monogamy.

This changed in the late 19th century, when psychologists began to categorize people according to the gender of the person they were attracted to. This was not at first a great advance, since same-sex desire was considered by many of these early psychologists to be a pathology. But as the result of a long struggle by gay and lesbian activists, being gay became something to be proud of, and it is now an identity protected by law.

In the last few decades, other sexual identities have become more visible, and the people who define themselves with reference to them have started to demand similar recognition.

We should embrace these new, various sources of sexual self-definition. It is one of the great virtues of living in an accepting, tolerant society, that we can define ourselves and our sense of self on our own terms, without the state passing judgment on how we chose to do it.

The backlash

There are those who disagree. They view the demands for recognition by sexual minorities as dangerous. After former New York governor Andrew Cuomo’s daughter, Michaela Cuomo, came out as demisexual (demisexuals prefer to have sex within the context of an intimate relationship), the conservative commentator Ben Shapiro railed against what he called “neo-identities.” He said: “The country does not have a future with this kind of stuff, it just does not.”

Shapiro worries that young people have been told that there are “only victims and victimizers in American society” and that they are therefore seeking out, or even creating, minority identities for themselves specifically in order to join the “coalition of the oppressed.” Trendy new sexual identities give them, he thinks, something to latch on to for this purpose.

But people like Mills are not making extravagant demands in order to promote their own victimhood. They are asking for the social recognition, along with the basic legal protections, we already offer a wide range of other groups.

Mills compared his legal claim to what would be offered to members of a minority religion. In explaining his ruling, the judge wrote:

The Applicant argues that his belief in ethical non-monogamy is a sincerely held, profoundly personal belief, governing his perception of himself and how he should live. As such, he claims that these beliefs attract the protection of s 2(a) of the Charter, which enshrines “freedom of conscience and religion” as a fundamental freedom.

Indeed, the legal system affords recognition and protection to a very wide diversity of religious groups, including ones some people would dismiss as weird or marginal. So, why can’t our sexual identities also benefit from the same protection?

A group of young people of diverse races holding a rainbow flag.
The way to fight hatred against one group is to create a world where everyone is accepted.

The value of diversity

Some in the LGBTQ+ community have resisted the idea that identities such as being polyamorous deserve recognition on par with sexual orientation. One worry is that, if people claiming a wide array of sexual identities all start seeking recognition, it will take the focus away from the on-going struggle for full equality for gays, lesbians and trans people, who have been long-standing targets of discrimination.

This concern, though understandable, is unfounded. Social toleration is not a finite resource, and neither are legal rights. A society that values racial diversity, for instance, does not, and need not, pick and choose which racial groups to accept.

On the contrary, the way to fight hatred against one group is to create a world where everyone is accepted. Toleration is not a stock of capital we spend down till it is gone. It is an investment that returns us dividends, and these dividends grow more generous the more we spend on it.

Protecting sexual identity in the same way we protect other identities, like religious beliefs, would lead to modest but important changes to our laws. People could no longer be fired from their job because they are kinky or non-monogamous, for instance. Their sexual choices could not be used against them in custody disputes. We might have to expand our definition of marriage further, to include multiple partnerships. Above all, we would send a powerful message as a society, by affirming the importance of sexuality in its wondrous diversity.

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What Exactly Is a Polycule Anyway?

— Everything you need to know about this particularly buzzy form of polyamory.

By Varuna Srinivasan

If you are just now hearing the word “polycule” for the first time, you’re not alone. Even I was quite unaware of this concept until a barrage of features on polycules (and the dynamics involved in them) took over The Discourse this year.

A polycule—a portmanteau of the word “poly,” meaning many, and “molecule,” referring to how a map of the different relationships in a polycule might resemble a diagram of the atomic bonds in a molecule—is a type of polyamory, though the term refers more to the dynamics outside of the sexual/romantic aspects of multi-partner relationships. While many polyamorous people keep their relationships with each partner separate, typically all members of a polycule are closely involved in each other’s lives, often even living in the same household.

Michelle Hy, polyamory expert and founder of the website Polyamorous While Asian, defines polyamory as the capacity to have multiple simultaneous intimate relationships and a polycule a way to vaguely refer to the web of these multiple relationships—both platonic and romantic. For example, say you have a boyfriend who has a girlfriend who has another partner. You would move from polyamory to polycule status if you are all regularly spending time together. While you wouldn’t necessarily all be involved with each other romantically or sexually, all members of a polycule must be platonically involved to some extent.

A polycule usually involves at least three people, but there is technically no upper limit to how many people one can contain—the New York Times recently profiled a 20-person polycule. The most important thing is that everyone involved agrees on the group’s boundaries and dynamics.

Polycules often begin when two people who serve as each other’s primary partners open their relationship to involve other people. Primary partners are usually those who are married, have children together, or have designated their relationship as the originating point from which a polycule is formed. Not all polycules have primary partners and, while many choose to use the word “primary” to describe one of their relationships, it doesn’t have to signify any type of relationship hierarchy.

Platonic Relationships in a Polycule

Beyond the various romantic and sexual relationships they maintain, members of a polycule are often quite involved in each other’s everyday lives. They can share child care duties, share housekeeping responsibilities, run errands for one another, and celebrate important milestones together.

Although polycules have been getting a lot of buzz in 2024, Hy confirms that this type of communal living is nothing new, particularly in the queer community. “Many queer folks co-create new families and communities outside of their families of origin and outside of some cishet norms,” she says. Additionally, while polyamory might not always be involved, there are many cultures where communal living is the norm. “Many people of color live or have lived in multigenerational households with large families,” Hy says.“These can look similar to some kitchen table-style polycules.”

While most platonic relationships within a polycule form organically—you might become close with your boyfriend’s girlfriend, but not as tight with that girlfriend’s other partner—kitchen table polycules refer to a type of network where every individual is required or encouraged to have a close relationship with one another. For instance, as the name implies, there might be one night a week reserved for the entire group to sit down for dinner together.

The Dynamics of Two Real-Life Polycules

Andrea, 41, lives in Houston and has six people in her polycule. Andrea has a romantic/sexual relationship with Brandon and David. In addition to Andrea, David also has a romantic/sexual relationship with Krystal and Matthew (individually, not together). Matthew has a romantic/sexual relationship with Nick and David (again, individually) and Brandon is only involved with Andrea.

In addition to the individual romantic and sexual relationships, Andrea says they are all close with one another platonically. “It goes beyond just friendship though,” she says. “The relationships between metamours [a partner of your partner who you’re not romantically involved with] is a special type of intertwinement in our individual lives. They are all part of my chosen family.” For Andrea and her two partners, Brandon and David, a typical day involves going to work and splitting household responsibilities, including picking up her kids from school. Andrea and Brandon live together; David and his wife, Krystal, live together; and Mathew and Nick live in their own individual apartments. Though they don’t live together, they try to make time to hang out in a group, while couples set aside a fixed time to have regular date nights; Andrea and David, for example, have a fixed date night every Friday.

Thirty-eight-year-old Jessica, her husband (Joe), their two kids and two other members in her polycule (Ash and Dr. M) live together under one household in Reno. After a couple of years of being in a monogamous relationship, Jessica and Joe decided to explore polyamory after meeting another polyamorous couple. They practiced poly exploration for a few years, going in and out of various relationships. In 2022, Joe met Ash online and, shortly after, she moved in. In January 2023, Jessica started dating Dr. M, who she also met online. Dr. M was staying at their place frequently before completely moving in a couple of months into their relationships. While all four members of the polycule now live together, Ash and Dr. M are not romantically or sexually involved.

The four members of the polycule share childcare duties for Jessica and Joe’s children, along with other household responsibilities. Outside of this polycule, Ash has another partner who also has a nested partner.

According to Joe, the group “likes to have evenings together as a family, eating, playing games, reading, or letting the kids play independently while we clean, or trade going on walks…provided it’s not someone’s date night.”

Navigating boundary setting, jealousy, and conflict in a polycule can be complex, but it ultimately depends on good communication and letting relationships unfold organically. While kitchen table style polyamory suggests that all members of the group should hang out regularly, Andrea encourages people not to force any type of interaction between metamours. But what about jealousy? Dr. M emphasizes that being in occasional conflict with one another is natural and that it can be resolved through vulnerable and non-violent communication.

“It is each person’s responsibility to identify, name, and communicate their needs in the broader polycule system,” says Rel Friedman, PhD, a clinical psychologist who specializes in sex and relationships. “When all members take on that personal responsibility, so much room is freed up for intimacy and connection.”

How to Create or Join a Polycule

While there are many aspects that can look similar from one polycule to the next—communal living and co-parenting, for instance—the road to creating and living within one isn’t the same for every group. Everyone’s journey will be unique, but they all go beyond simply waking up one day and deciding you’d like to add a few more people to your relationship.

Before jumping into a polycule, Leanna Yau, a polyamory educator, recommends that previously-monogamous couples try polyamory that doesn’t involve cohabitation first. “If you both are open to dating other people, you could say that, at the moment, that your polycule is just yourself and your partner,” Yau says. You and your partner should be able to have consistent partners outside their primary relationship before deciding to create more intimate dynamics within the group.

Jessica and Joe spent nearly a decade experimenting with polyamory before finding a polycule dynamic that worked. Within their group, they spend a lot of time “dialoguing” with each other, as Ash puts it. Joe emphasizes that with more people, there’s just more to consider: more personal habits, preferences, and emotions to respect.

From there, if you and your primary partner are thinking of moving from a parallel polyamory type relationship (where all the relationships exist in parallel without involvement between members of those separate relationships) to a kitchen table-style polyamory, Yau encourages you to be open minded in your approach.

If you have too many rigid ideas about what a polycule “should” look like—for instance, one big happy family “where everyone loves each equally, lives together, and has a baby that they all raise,” Yau says—it will make the process more difficult… and turn it into something of a chore. “This makes it harder to find someone since it’s quite restrictive and it sort of becomes more of a job interview than a request for connection,” Yau says. “The best thing to do is to be flexible and resilient while you look to build your polycule.”

If you are considering opening up your relationship or joining a polycule, know that it takes a lot of work on your part to work through conflict and contribute to the longevity of the relationships. Once in a polycule, you aren’t just in a relationship with your primary or secondary partner. You have an ongoing emotional or platonic relationship with everyone involved. In addition participating in household activities and potentially taking care of children, one has to be prepared to treat all of these relationships in an equitable manner.

As a group, it is vital that all members find time to touch base regularly, not just to do recreational things together but to bring potential issues while creating space for everyone to share and be heard.

And as Ash succinctly puts it: “Being in a polycule with such compassionate, caring, ambitious, and growth-mindset oriented people has helped me to learn how to prioritize my own goals and needs. I have learned that relationships should complement you, not complete you.”

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