A very, very beginner’s guide to understanding BDSM

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

17 Totally Normal Things to Experience in Your Relationship Right Now

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

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

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

Female husbands

Far from being a recent or 21st-century phenomenon, people have chosen, courageously, to trans gender throughout history By Jen Manion One summer night in 1836, police found George Wilson drunk on the street in the Lower East Side in New York City. An officer took Wilson to the station. The officer believed that Wilson was …

What it’s like to be sharing a polyamorous home during lockdown

Love in the time of coronavirus is tough enough for two. Adding a third or fourth romantic partner to the quarantine equation only makes life more complicated. by Abby Moss Quarantine is putting a lot of strain on people in relationships. For long-term couples, being trapped under the same roof 24/7 is inevitably going to …

Your Guide to Fertility and Getting Pregnant

Here’s a primer on how to conceive, whatever your sexual orientation, gender identity or relationship status. By Brooke Borel The early scenes of “Private Life,” a 2018 Netflix film about a New York City couple who are trying to conceive, present an unsettling scenario for anyone pondering their biological clock: A 40-something woman wakes up …