Same-sex sexual behavior might have started out on an equal footing with different-sex sex.
Evolutionary scientists have been thinking about same-sex sexual behavior all wrong.
That’s the implication of a new study on same-sex behavior in animals. Instead of asking why animals engage in same-sex behavior (SSB), researchers should be asking, “Why not?” the authors said.
If they’re right, same-sex sex may not have evolved independently in different animals for adpative reasons. Instead, same-sex sex may have emerged very early in time and could persist simply because engaging in it doesn’t cost animals much, evolutionarily speaking.
“Usually, when evolutionary biologists see a trait that’s really widespread across evolutionary lineages, we at least consider the idea that the trait is ancestral and was preserved in all those lineages,” said Julia Monk, a doctoral candidate at Yale University, who co-authored the new research. “So why hadn’t people considered that hypothesis for SSB?”
In evolutionary science, same-sex sexual behavior has long been viewed as a conundrum: Why would animals spend time and energy doing something sexual that won’t pass along their genes to the next generation? And yet, same-sex sexual behavior has been observed in at least 1,500 species, ranging from lowly squash bugs to humans.
(To avoid anthropomorphizing, the researchers don’t use the terms “homosexual,” “heterosexual,” “gay” or “straight” to refer to animal behavior.)
“We can’t assign sexuality to animals — we’re trying our best to learn about them by observing their behaviors,” Monk told Live Science. “And those behaviors shouldn’t be mapped onto human cultural and societal contexts.”
The assumption that there must be an evolutionary reason for all this same-sex sex has led researchers to search for possible benefits to same-sex behavior. For example, in humans, researchers have found that having a gay son or brother seems to be associated with a womanhaving more offspring in total. Other studies have posited that same-sex sexual behavior is a side effect ofother genes that have reproductive benefits.
In evolutionary biology, the ability of an animal to reproduce given its environment is called fitness. It’s entirely possible that in some species, same-sex sex could have fitness benefits, Monk and her colleagues wrote in their paper, published Nov. 18 in the journal Nature Ecology & Evolution. But these evolutionary benefits may not be required for same-sex sexual behavior to exist.
Imagine, instead, that the earliest sexually reproducing animals simply tried to mate with any and all members of their species — regardless of sex. This might have been a logical pathway for evolution, because all the bells and whistles that distinguish males from females are energetically costly to evolve. So any effort expended on mating with the same sex would be compensated for by not spending energy evolving and maintaining distinctive secondary sex characteristics, like differing colors, scents and behaviors. Those sex-distinguishing traits may have all come later in the evolutionary chain, the authors argued.
In this formulation, same-sex and different-sex sexual behavior would have started out on an equal footing, early in animal evolution. This could explain why same-sex sex is so common throughout the animal kingdom: It didn’t evolve multiple times independently, but was instead part of the fabric of animal evolution from the start.
Same-sex penguin couples keep adopting eggs, and the Berlin Zoo is celebrating
The new hypothesis undercuts old assumptions about same-sex behaviors, said Caitlin McDonough, a doctoral candidate at Syracuse University and a study co-author. Much of the research done on these sexual behaviors assumes that same-sex sex is costly for animals and that different-sex sex is not costly, she said.
“You really need to go through those assumptions and test the costs and benefits of both behaviors in a system,” McDonough said.
If same-sex behaviors go back to the roots of animal evolution, the fact that these behaviors are so common today makes sense, Monk said.
“If you assume a trait like SSB is a new development and has high costs, it’s going to be really hard to understand how it could become more and more common from those low initial frequencies,” she said. “It would have to have really large fitness benefits, or be otherwise impervious to natural selection, for that outcome to be probable.
“On the other hand, if you assume a trait is ancestral and was originally common, and it has low costs, it’s much more likely that it would remain widespread to this day, even if it doesn’t seem to contribute much to fitness.”
One piece of evidence supporting this hypothesis is that some echinoderms, including sea stars and sea urchins, engage in same-sex sexual behavior. Echinoderms evolved early in the history of life, likely in the Precambrian period more than 541 million years ago.
But other evidence is slim, largely because scientists haven’t systematically studied same-sex sexual behavior in animals. Most observations have been accidental, and biologists have often viewed sex between two animals of the same sex as irrelevant or improper to note, Monk said. Sometimes, researchers automatically assume that same-sex behavior isn’t really about sex but instead is about dominance or bonding. And often, if two animals are observed having sex, they’re assumed to be male and female without any confirmatory evidence, McDonough said.
“The science that we do is really informed and influenced by cultural biases,” she said.
Thinking of same-sex sexual behavior as a standard part of the animal repertoire would change how researchers approach the study of the evolution of these behaviors. The next step, Monk said, would be to gather more data on the prevalence of same-sex behavior in animals. Then, researchers could compare species from across the tree of life to determine if all linages show same-sex behavior. If so, it would strengthen the argument that same-sex sexuality was part of life for the ancestors of all of today’s sexually reproducing animals.
Name: Hector
Gender: male
Age: 17
Location: Tujunga, CA
I’m afraid my penis isn’t right. I worry because it doesn’t look like other guys. For one thing I’m a lot smaller. I’m afraid to have sex or show my penis. Is there any way for me to know for sure? I hope to hear from you because this is making me real nervous. Thank you.
I’d chill out, if I were you, Hector. Lots of guys your age mistakenly think there is something wrong with their unit, when actually their willie is quite normal. This heightened concern, as you suggest, can lead to anxiety or even a complex about one’s cock size and shape. You don’t really give me much to go on as to why you think your pinga is not like the other guys. That leads me to think you don’t really know all that much about your package in general. Do you? I mean, who are you comparing yourself to anyway?
Since I don’t have a lot of information to go on, I suppose we oughta start with some essentials. Here’s Part 1 of my primer — Your Cock; A Complete Owners Manual (abridged). That’s supposed to be funny, BTW.
We all know that there are big ones and little ones, fat ones and skinny ones. Some are bobbed; some are whole. Some curve and bend; some are straight as an arrow. Some have a mushroom cap; some sport more of a helmet look. Some grow; some show. And they come in a veritable rainbow of colors.
Despite the amazing diversity, there are lots of things that each of our members has in common with everyone else’s. The average length of a flaccid cock is 3.7 inches with a diameter of 1.25 inches. The average length of a hardon is 5.1 inches, with a diameter of 1.6 inches. If you are over the age of 17, you pretty much have all the cock you’re gonna have. That’s not to say that as we age and as our muscles slack, our pal won’t hang a bit differently than when we were a young buck. But there’s not gonna be significant change in length or girth after puberty is done with us. Keep in mind that all this stuff is determined by genetics and heredity, like your overall body type, the color of your eyes, your hair pattern, and how tall you are. So the likelihood that any guy will add even one permanent inch to his dick either in length or girth, without surgery, is about as likely as him adding even an inch to his height.
The head of your dick is called the glans. (It’s the thing that can be shaped like a mushroom or a helmet.) It is made up of soft tissue called the corpus spongiosum. Just below the glans, on the underside of your cock is a waddle of skin called the frenulum. This puppy is chock-full of nerve endings that make it ground zero for dick-centered pleasure.
All uncut (uncircumcised) men have a prepuce, or foreskin that covers and protects his dickhead. Cut (circumcised) men don’t, because it has been surgically removed. If you are lucky enough to be intact, your foreskin is a highly specialized, sensitive, and functional organ of touch. No other part of the body serves the same purpose. Please note: circumcision actually removes 50% of the skin of a guy’s dick. And who among us would choose that if we were allowed to choose?
You know the old adage, “Use it or lose it”? They may have had a penis in mind when that maxim was coined. Researchers agree — erections are good for you. When you get a woody, your cock is engorged with oxygen-rich blood, which is essential for the upkeep of the smooth muscle tissue. This kind of tissue makes up about 90% of your cock. You can see how a healthy circulatory system is vital to a vibrant sex life. An oxygen-deprived cock will build up a kind of plaque in your cock, which resembles scar tissue. This will cripple your rod (Peyronie’s disease) or rob you of your wood altogether.
I also want to alert you of some startling new data that came out of recent research about masturbation. Australian researchers questioned over 1,000 men who had developed prostate cancer and 1,250 men who had not, about their sexual habits. They found those who had ejaculated the most between the ages of 20 and 50 were the least likely to develop prostate cancer.
The protective effect was greatest while the men were in their 20s. And get this; men who ejaculated more than five times a week were a third less likely to develop prostate cancer later in life. But let’s not get off topic too much.
The other big part of your package is the family jewels. We mind as well take a look at them too while we’re at it. Your nuts (testis) and the sack (scrotum) they’re housed in are an evolutionary marvel. Your testicles are about 4°F cooler than your core body temperature. Lucky for us, this is the ideal climate for healthy sperm production. 90% of the male hormone, testosterone, is manufactured in our balls. Evolution has even provided that one nut, generally the left, hangs slightly lower than the other. The lower nut will also be slightly larger. I suppose this keep them from knocking into each other so much.
Ok so you think the outside of your junk is pretty impressive, well you ain’t seen nothin’ yet! Here’s where things get really interesting. First, there is no “bone” in your boner. Don’t laugh! Humans are one of the few mammals (horses, donkeys, rhinoceros, marsupials, rabbits, whales and dolphins, elephants and hyenas are the others) that don’t have a penis bone. Most males of our species have a unique bone called baculum in their penis. The baculum is designed for speed fucking. Sliding a bone in and out of a sheath is much faster than waiting for hydraulics to kick in. This enables our mammalian relatives to spend very little time actually mating. Which is, after all, a vulnerable position for them to be in.
If there’s no bone in there what make our dick hard? Good question. If you dissected your woody and looked at a cross-section you’d see three distinct spongy tubular structures, each are made up of smooth muscle tissue. Two of these tubular structures — one on either side of your cock, both of which run the length of your cock — are called the corpora cavernosa. These marvelous structures become engorged with blood lifting and thickening your cock to erection. The corpus spongiosum, the third tubular structure is located just below the corpora cavernosa. This baby houses your urethra, through which urine and semen pass during urination and ejaculation, respectively. This may also become slightly engorged with blood, but less so than the corpora cavernosa.
There are several points of interest in and around your balls too. I already mentioned your urethra, which stretches from your bladder to the tip of your dick. It carries your piss and cum, but not at the same time, I’m happy to report. Your prostate is an almond shaped gland that sits between your bladder and the root of your dick. Slightly in back of that is a pair of glands called the seminal vesicles. These tubular glands open into the vas deferens as it enters the prostate gland. They secrete the lion’s share of your spooge (ejaculate) about 70% to be precise. Most of us have two vas deferens tubes to correspond to the pair of ball (testicles) most of us have. These convey your mature sperm, the ones that have been comfortably relaxing in the epididymis, which is a tube filled mass at the back of each of your balls.
To conclude, the average male, between the ages of 15 and 60 will ejaculate 30 to 50 quarts of jizz (semen), containing 350 to 500 billion sperm cells. How amazing is that?
The anonymous author of the pamphlet Onania (1716) was very worried about masturbation. The ‘shameful vice’, the ‘solitary act of pleasure’, was something too terrible to even be described. The writer agreed with those ‘who are of the opinion, that… it never ought to be spoken of, or hinted at, because the bare mentioning of it may be dangerous to some’. There was, however, little reticence in cataloguing ‘the frightful consequences of self-pollution’. Gonorrhoea, fits, epilepsy, consumption, impotence, headaches, weakness of intellect, backache, pimples, blisters, glandular swelling, trembling, dizziness, heart palpitations, urinary discharge, ‘wandering pains’, and incontinence – were all attributed to the scourge of onanism.
The fear was not confined to men. The full title of the pamphlet was Onania: Or the Heinous Sin of Self-Pollution, and all its Frightful Consequences (in Both Sexes). Its author was aware that the sin of Onan referred to the spilling of male seed (and divine retribution for the act) but reiterated that he treated ‘of this crime in relation to women as well as men’. ‘[W]hilst the offence is Self-Pollution in both, I could not think of any other word which would so well put the reader in mind both of the sin and its punishment’. Women who indulged could expect disease of the womb, hysteria, infertility and deflowering (the loss of ‘that valuable badge of their chastity and innocence’).
Another bestselling pamphlet was published later in the century: L’onanisme (1760) by Samuel Auguste Tissot. He was critical of Onania, ‘a real chaos … all the author’s reflections are nothing but theological and moral puerilities’, but nevertheless listed ‘the ills of which the English patients complain’. Tissot was likewise fixated on ‘the physical disorders produced by masturbation’, and provided his own case study, a watchmaker who had self-pleasured himself into ‘insensibility’ on a daily basis, sometimes three times a day; ‘I found a being that less resembled a living creature than a corpse, lying upon straw, meagre, pale, and filthy, casting forth an infectious stench; almost incapable of motion.’ The fear these pamphlets promoted soon spread.
The strange thing is that masturbation was never before the object of such horror. In ancient times, masturbation was either not much mentioned or treated as something a little vulgar, not in good taste, a bad joke. In the Middle Ages and for much of the early modern period too, masturbation, while sinful and unnatural, was not invested with such significance. What changed?
Religion and medicine combined powerfully to create a new and hostile discourse. The idea that the soul was present in semen led to thinking that it was very important to retain the vital fluid. Its spilling became, then, both immoral and dangerous (medicine believed in female semen at the time). ‘Sin, vice, and self-destruction’ were the ‘trinity of ideas’ that would dominate from the 18th into the 19th century, as the historians Jean Stengers and Anne Van Neck put it in Masturbation: The Great Terror (2001).
There were exceptions. Sometimes masturbation was opposed for more ‘enlightened’ reasons. In the 1830s and 1840s, for instance, female moral campaign societies in the United States condemned masturbation, not out of hostility to sex, but as a means to self-control. What would now be termed ‘greater sexual agency’ – the historian April Haynes refers to ‘sexual virtue’ and ‘virtuous restraint’ – was central to their message.
Yet it is difficult to escape the intensity of the fear. J H Kellogg’s Plain Facts for Old and Young (1877) contained both exaggerated horror stories and grand claims: ‘neither the plague, nor war, nor smallpox, nor similar diseases, have produced results so disastrous to humanity as the pernicious habit of Onanism; it is the destroying element of civilised societies’. Kellogg suggested remedies for the scourge, such as exercise, strict bathing and sleeping regimes, compresses, douching, enemas and electrical treatment. Diet was vital: this rabid anti-masturbator was co-inventor of the breakfast cereal that still bears his name. ‘Few of today’s eaters of Kellogg’s Corn Flakes know that he invented them, almost literally, as anti-masturbation food,’ as the psychologist John Money once pointed out.
The traces are still with us in other ways. Male circumcision, for instance, originated in part with the 19th-century obsession with the role of the foreskin in encouraging masturbatory practices. Consciously or not, many US males are faced with this bodily reminder every time they masturbate. And the general disquiet unleashed in the 18th century similarly lingers on today. We seem to have a confusing and conflicting relationship with masturbation. On one hand it is accepted, even celebrated – on the other, there remains an unmistakable element of taboo.
When the sociologist Anthony Giddens in The Transformation of Intimacy (1992) attempted to identify what made modern sex modern, one of the characteristics he identified was the acceptance of masturbation. It was, as he said, masturbation’s ‘coming out’. Now it was ‘widely recommended as a major source of sexual pleasure, and actively encouraged as a mode of improving sexual responsiveness on the part of both sexes’. It had indeed come to signify female sexual freedom with Betty Dodson’s Liberating Masturbation (1974) (renamed and republished as Sex for One in 1996), which has sold more than a million copies, and her Bodysex Workshops in Manhattan with their ‘all-women masturbation circles’. The Boston Women’s Health Collective’s classic feminist text Our Bodies, Ourselves (1973) included a section called ‘Learning to Masturbate’.
Alfred Kinsey and his team are mainly remembered for the sex surveys that publicised the pervasiveness of same-sex desires and experiences in the US, but they also recognised the prevalence of masturbation. It was, for both men and women, one of the nation’s principal sexual outlets. In the US National Survey (2009–10), 94 per cent of men aged 25-29 and 85 per cent of women in the same age group said that they had masturbated alone in the course of their lifetime. (All surveys indicate lower reported rates for women.) In the just-published results of the 2012 US National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior, 92 per cent of straight men and a full 100 per cent of gay men recorded lifetime masturbation.
There has certainly been little silence about the activity. Several generations of German university students were questioned by a Hamburg research team about their masturbatory habits to chart changing attitudes and practices from 1966 to 1996; their results were published in 2003. Did they reach orgasm? Were they sexually satisfied? Was it fun? In another study, US women were contacted on Craigslist and asked about their masturbatory experiences, including clitoral stimulation and vaginal penetration. An older, somewhat self-referential study from 1977 of sexual arousal to films of masturbation asked psychology students at the University of Connecticut to report their ‘genital sensations’ while watching those films. Erection? Ejaculation? Breast sensations? Vaginal lubrication? Orgasm? And doctors have written up studies of the failed experiments of unfortunate patients: ‘Masturbation Injury Resulting from Intraurethral Introduction of Spaghetti’ (1986); ‘Penile Incarceration Secondary to Masturbation with A Steel Pipe’ (2013), with illustrations.
‘We are a profoundly self-pleasuring society at both a metaphorical and material level’
Self-stimulation has been employed in sexual research, though not always to great import. Kinsey and his team wanted to measure how far, if at all, semen was projected during ejaculation: Jonathan Gathorne-Hardy, Kinsey’s biographer, refers to queues of men in Greenwich Village waiting to be filmed at $3 an ejaculation. William Masters and Virginia Johnson recorded and measured the physiological response during sexual arousal, using new technology, including a miniature camera inside a plastic phallus. Their book Human Sexual Response (1966) was based on data from more than 10,000 orgasms from nearly 700 volunteers: laboratory research involving sexual intercourse, stimulation, and masturbation by hand and with that transparent phallus. Learned journals have produced findings such as ‘Orgasm in Women in the Laboratory – Quantitative Studies on Duration, Intensity, Latency, and Vaginal Blood Flow’ (1985).
In therapy, too, masturbation has found its place ‘as a means of achieving sexual health’, as an article by Eli Coleman, the director of the programme in human sexuality at the University of Minnesota Medical School, once put it. A published study in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology in 1977 outlined therapist-supervised female masturbation (with dildo, vibrator and ‘organic vegetables’) as a way of encouraging vaginal orgasm. Then there is The Big Book of Masturbation (2003) and the hundreds of (pun intended) self-help books, Masturbation for Weight Loss, a Woman’s Guide only among the latest (and more opportunistic).
Self-pleasure has featured in literature, most famously in Philip Roth’s novel Portnoy’s Complaint (1969). But it is there in more recent writing too, including Chuck Palahniuk’s disturbing short story ‘Guts’ (2004). Autoeroticism (and its traces) have been showcased in artistic expression: in Jordan MacKenzie’s sperm and charcoal canvases (2007), for example, or in Marina Abramović’s reprise of Vito Acconci’s Seedbed at the Guggenheim in 2005, or her video art Balkan Erotic Epic of the same year.
On film and television, masturbation is similarly pervasive: Lauren Rosewarne’s Masturbation in Pop Culture (2014) was able to draw on more than 600 such scenes. My favourites are in the film Spanking the Monkey (1994), in which the main character is trying to masturbate in the bathroom, while the family dog, seemingly alert to such behaviour, pants and whines at the door; and in the Seinfeld episode ‘The Contest’ (1992), in which the ‘m’ word is never uttered, and where George’s mother tells her adult son that he is ‘treating his body like it was an amusement park’.
There is much evidence, then, for what the film scholar Greg Tuck in 2009 called the ‘mainstreaming of masturbation’: ‘We are a profoundly self-pleasuring society at both a metaphorical and material level.’ There are politically-conscious masturbation websites. There is the online ‘Masturbation Hall of Fame’ (sponsored by the sex-toys franchise Good Vibrations). There are masturbationathons, and jack-off-clubs, and masturbation parties.
It would be a mistake, however, to present a rigid contrast between past condemnation and present acceptance. There are continuities. Autoeroticism might be mainstreamed but that does not mean it is totally accepted. In Sexual Investigations (1996), the philosopher Alan Soble observed that people brag about casual sex and infidelities but remain silent about solitary sex. Anne-Francis Watson and Alan McKee’s 2013 study of 14- to 16-year-old Australians found that not only the participants but also their families and teachers were more comfortable talking about almost any other sexual matter than about self-pleasuring. It ‘remains an activity that is viewed as shameful and problematic’, warns the entry on masturbation in the Encyclopedia of Adolescence (2011). In a study of the sexuality of students in a western US university, where they were asked about sexual orientation, anal and vaginal sex, condom use, and masturbation, it was the last topic that occasioned reservation: 28 per cent of the participants ‘declined to answer the masturbation questions’. Masturbation remains, to some extent, taboo.
When the subject is mentioned, it is often as an object of laughter or ridicule. Rosewarne, the dogged viewer of the 600 masturbation scenes in film and TV, concluded that male masturbation was almost invariably portrayed negatively (female masturbation was mostly erotic). Watson and McKee’s study revealed that their young Australians knew that masturbation was normal yet still made ‘negative or ambivalent statements’ about it.
Belief in the evils of masturbation has resurfaced in the figure of the sex addict and in the obsession with the impact of internet pornography. Throughout their relatively short histories, sexual addiction and hypersexual disorder have included masturbation as one of the primary symptoms of their purported maladies. What, in a sex-positive environment, would be considered normal sexual behaviour has been pathologised in another. Of the 152 patients in treatment for hypersexual disorder in clinics in California, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, Texas and Utah, a 2012 study showed that most characterised their sexual disorder in terms of pornography consumption (81 per cent) and masturbation (78 per cent). The NewCatholic Encyclopedia’s supplement on masturbation (2012-13), too, slips into a lengthy disquisition on sex addiction and the evils of internet pornography: ‘The availability of internet pornography has markedly increased the practice of masturbation to the degree that it can be appropriately referred to as an epidemic.’
Critics think that therapeutic masturbation might reinforce sexual selfishness rather than sexual empathy and sharing
The masturbator is often seen as the pornography-consumer and sex addict enslaved by masturbation. The sociologist Steve Garlick has suggested that negative attitudes to masturbation have been reconstituted to ‘surreptitiously infect ideas about pornography’. Pornography has become masturbation’s metonym. Significantly, when the New Zealand politician Shane Jones was exposed for using his taxpayer-funded credit card to view pornographic movies, the unnamed shame was that his self-pleasuring activities were proclaimed on the front pages of the nation’s newspapers – thus the jokes about ‘the matter in hand’ and not shaking hands with him at early morning meetings. It would have been less humiliating, one assumes, if he had used the public purse to finance the services of sex workers.
Nor is there consensus on the benefits of masturbation. Despite its continued use in therapy, some therapists question its usefulness and propriety. ‘It is a mystery to me how conversational psychotherapy has made the sudden transition to massage parlour technology involving vibrators, mirrors, surrogates, and now even carrots and cucumbers!’ one psychologist protested in the late 1970s. He was concerned about issues of client-patient power and a blinkered pursuit of the sexual climax ‘ignoring … the more profound psychological implications of the procedure’. In terms of effectiveness, critics think that therapeutic masturbation might reinforce individual pleasure and sexual selfishness rather than creating sexual empathy and sharing. As one observed in the pages of the Journal of Sex and Marital Therapy in 1995: ‘Ironically, the argument against masturbation in American society was originally religiously founded, but may re-emerge as a humanist argument.’ Oversimplified, but in essence right: people remain disturbed by the solitariness of solitary sex.
Why has what the Japanese charmingly call ‘self-play’ become such a forcing ground for sexual attitudes? Perhaps there is something about masturbation’s uncontrollability that continues to make people anxious. It is perversely non-procreative, incestuous, adulterous, homosexual, ‘often pederastic’ and, in imagination at least, sex with ‘every man, woman, or beast to whom I take a fancy’, to quote Soble. For the ever-astute historian Thomas Laqueur, author of Solitary Sex (2003), masturbation is ‘that part of human sexual life where potentially unlimited pleasure meets social restraint’.
Why did masturbation become such a problem? For Laqueur, it began with developments in 18th-century Europe, with the cultural rise of the imagination in the arts, the seemingly unbounded future of commerce, the role of print culture, the rise of private, silent reading, especially novels, and the democratic ingredients of this transformation. Masturbation’s condemned tendencies – solitariness, excessive desire, limitless imagination, and equal-opportunity pleasure – were an outer limit or testing of these valued attributes, ‘a kind of Satan to the glories of bourgeois civilisation’.
In more pleasure-conscious modern times, the balance has tipped towards personal gratification. The acceptance of personal autonomy, sexual liberation and sexual consumerism, together with a widespread focus on addiction, and the ubiquity of the internet, now seem to demand their own demon. Fears of unrestrained fantasy and endless indulging of the self remain. Onania’s 18th-century complaints about the lack of restraint of solitary sex are not, in the end, all that far away from today’s fear of boundless, ungovernable, unquenchable pleasure in the self.
Strap-on fun isn’t just for women. Men can have fun, too. Use these 8 steps to choose the best strap-on harness for your needs.
Did you know that even if you have a penis that you can still wear a strap-on harness? Yes, manufacturers make strap-on harnesses for the male-bodied as well as the female-bodied. While males can definitely wear strap-on harnesses designed for women, some find that the pressure it places on the penis and testicles to be uncomfortable. Strap-on harnesses for male bodies are designed with a penis in mind, providing much better comfort.
Strap-ons for people who have a penis can be used for a variety of play times. Some people like to use them as an alternative to penetrative sex (or in kinky contexts, as a “punishment” where the wearer doesn’t get to be directly involved in stimulation). Other people like to strap them on to continue the penetrative action after the penis has gotten soft (due to orgasm or other reasons). Yet others like to explore the idea of double penetration.
Spectacular sex – at any size – is really all about putting mind over body mass.
I was in my 20s the first time I heard the term BBW and learned that it stood for Big Beautiful Women. I had access to magazines, TV, books, movies and a host of other media, all without ever hearing of someone who thought fat bodies (like mine) could be sexy. I’m like a lot of fat people. (And yeah, I’m using the word fat even though some people still cringe when they hear it. Nothing about it is inherently insulting, negative, or worthy of scorn. I promise, getting used to hearing it will take the sting out.)
Anyway, like a lot of fat people, I was raised on a steady diet of disdain for my body, predicated on the idea that I could never be happily partnered with anyone if I “stayed fat.” Many people of size are resigned to the idea that they should settle for boring, intermittent, unsatisfying sex, or worse -that they should forgo sexy times altogether until they lose weight. Given the stats on successful weight loss, roughly 95 percent of those people will be waiting a very long time. I’m sure geriatric sex is awesome, but why wait decades to have the awesome giggity you could be having right now? Let’s take a look at what keeps some Big Beautiful Women (and yes, Big Handsome Men too) from the big, big love they could be enjoying now.
Name: Doreen
Gender: female
Age: 30
Location: Memphis
I think I have a spanking fetish. I say I think I do, because I never tried it. But I want to. I think my partner would be up for it, but I have yet to ask her. I thought I’d ask you first. What are your thoughts about spanking?
If you’ve been a bad girl, Doreen, then I think you definitely need a spanking. Have you been naughty, Doreen? Precisely how naughty have you been, Doreen? Everyone here at Dr Dick Sex Advice wants to know!
Spanking is a very popular fetish, one that can be enjoyed with or without sex. At the same time, spanking can be risky if you entrust the task to someone who doesn’t know what they are doing. Of course, it’s not particularly difficult to learn the basics. So just for you, wayward Doreen, I’m gonna offer a brief sexual enrichment tutorial on erotic spanking. YEAH!
Usually one’s hand or a paddle of some sort is used for spanking. This is different from whipping and flogging, which are much more advanced techniques than your garden-variety spanking. We’ll leave these techniques for another time.
There are two musts in this kind of power play: 1) The spanker must always inquire about the health of the spankee before the play begins. 2) Both participants must always agree on a safe word before the play begins. A safe word is a code word that the spankee will use as she is reaching a physical, emotional or moral boundary, or for when she wants the spanker to stop the play.
The safe word will be a word that spankee would not ordinarily use during the play, like “pickles.” This extraordinary word allows the spankee to scream “no, stop”, “please, don’t” etc. as much as they want without really meaning it, and still have a way to stop the play when necessary.
If you actually get around to enticing your partner to join you for a little spanking entertainment, make sure the first adventure is fun for all. I suggest that the spanking be part of a role-play scenario that you and your GF develop together. Your partner may need lots of positive reinforcement, particularly if she reluctant to join you in your kink. Keep telling her how much fun you’ll both have in the role-play. For example, you could be the naughty schoolgirl and your partner could be the stern headmistress. Really get into your roles; you’ll both need to dress the part, of course. You — sexy short pleated Catholic schoolgirl skirt, anklets and trashy high-heels. She — the domineering dyke teacher in a drab, no-nonsense grey suit and sensible shoes. Get the picture?
The headmistress calls you into her office for a corrective interview. She needs to teach you a lesson. She puts you over her knee. She’ll do lots of bottom rubbing first, while she’s lecturing you on your bad behavior. As she gets into it, you know she’ll be getting turned on too. “It will be a shame to spank this beautiful bottom of yours,” she’ll coo. “This is going to hurt me as much as it hurts you!”…sort of deal. She’ll finger your pretty panties, but won’t remove them. She’ll start spanking very gently at first. Light taps on the fleshy part of your ass cheeks. If you want more, start wiggling into the spanking. Remember to stay in character. “No, Miss. Diesel, that hurts, please don’t touch me there! Grind into her lap. Your body language will communicate your desire for her to continue and possibly intensify the spanking.
To insure the comfort of your partner, set some ground rules for your first play session. Don’t ask her for bare-bottom spanking until she readily indicates her willingness to do so. If your partner is a feminist dyke, this whole spanking thing may go against the grain for her. Remind her this is fantasy role-playing; not real life.
The more you get into your roles, the more likely she’ll get into her roles — Catholic schoolgirl/Sr. Mary Holywater, slutty patient/naughty nurse — you get the idea. The more you please her, the better she’ll please you.
You’ll want to reward your partner for her participation. After the first session take her to dinner. Ask her for her for her reactions. What could you have done to make the scenario more pleasurable for her? Talk about your reactions. Tell her how much you appreciated her participation. Talk about the scenario and how well she did. Tell her what you liked most about the spanking itself. If you sense that she’s content with events thus far, you could plan for more.
Set aside a couple of role-play evenings in the coming weeks. If she continues to be open and receptive, you can add more and more spanking, different implements, a ruler, a hairbrush, a paddle. If you want spankings on other parts of your body, tits, pussy and the like introduce those slowly. The intensity of the spanking needs to be adjusted to more sensitive parts of the anatomy. Make sure there’s lots of feedback happening before and after each play session.
Spanking is a full-fledged fetish with loads of spanking associated erotica. It goes from mild to wild. Do some exploring together your GF. Check out some erotica, magazines, or videos. You’d probably do well to stick to the girl-on-girl stuff at first. Some, if not all, of the boy-on-girl stuff may be off-putting to your partner’s lesbiterian sensibilities. Always talk about spanking in a positive way as something that is fun and enjoyable for both of you. Remember to also attend to your partner’s fantasies and the things that turn her on too.
Like I said at the beginning, spanking is a stand-alone fetish, it may be a part of full-on sex, or it may be just a bonding thing between you two naughty bitches.
In the end, introducing your partner to your kink is one of those — “Give To Get” things. Be attentive to her. Make sure she knows she’s the most special person in your life. The more satisfied she is; the more she’ll be open to pleasing you.
Power bottoms are guys who aggressively enjoy being the receiving partner in anal sex. A true power bottom doesn’t just on their back and get penetrated; a good power bottom can assume the dominant role while being fucked. Porn stars like Jessie Colter and Brandon Jones are great examples of true power bottoms.
There are many benefits of learning how to be a power bottom. First, preparing your body for this kind of role will make the act of bottoming more pleasurable; it’s not a skill most guys possess naturally—not every bottom is a power bottom. Tops, who especially like long and rough sessions, enjoy it when their partner can enjoy a pounding without becoming tired or sore.
The first step to becoming a power bottom is to learn the basics of how to bottom. Before you start engaging in any kind of play, you need to start with a hot shower. Learning how to properly cleanse your ass is key. It’s called douching. Douching is a requirement if you’re going to be bottoming. There are many types of anal douches you can choose from; the most popular are a small enema bulb or a more elaborate hose system that connects to your shower head. Fort Troff has a spectacular selection of anal douching kits designed for bottoms that are serious about having a good time, and they are made to be hygienic and user-friendly.
Next you must learn to relax. Being topped aggressively can be overwhelming, and it’s important you learn proper techniques to keep yourself calm so you can enjoy the experience. Practice deep breathing to ease your mind and to relax your body. Being a good power bottom is learning how to maintain the proper mindset. If you’re tense up, then you aren’t going to enjoy yourself as much as you could be and it’s going to become painful and uncomfortable. It’s just as important as breathing. If you start to tense up, just take a couple of deep breaths. Communicating with your partner will let each other know what’s working, not working, what would make it more comfortable or pleasurable.
Becoming a power bottom doesn’t happen overnight, and you have to work towards it with a top that understands how to listen, and is willing to work with you as you progress. When selecting someone to help you become a true power bottom, find someone that is not only a skilled top, but patient, and well-versed in foreplay.
Foreplay should be fun and help you relax. A great way to get started is with some light finger play with some lubricant. Once you start to loosen up and are comfortable, rimming is a great way to have some more fun before getting to the more serious action. Rimming does wonders for helping to relax your hole.
When it’s finally time for get to the point where you are going to attempt to be penetrated, use plenty of lubricant. There are various types of personal lubricant to choose from including, water-based, silicone, and hybrid. Never use baby oil, Vaseline, hair conditioner, soap or other types of products not intended for this use because they can hurt and damage your sensitive skin. Learning how to be a power bottom will take much longer if you’re constantly damaging your asshole. You’re dealing with sensitive equipment, so treat it as such. Even when you are advanced, there is no reason to go balls to the wall without lube.
When first getting started with bottoming, it’s totally acceptable to take breaks. All-too-often people get too excited and want to do too much too quickly. Give your body time to adjust and becoming accustomed to what’s being done to it. Being able to get fucked relentlessly is a skill that has to be developed over time. If you are bottoming and it starts to hurt, then stop immediately. That’s your body telling you it’s time to take a break. You can either stop until the pain subsides and try again, or stop and try again the next day. If there are any signs of blood, stop right away and do not continue.
There are a few things you must not do in the beginning. Bottoming is a skilled art. It takes time. Rushing is a big no-no. Your top shouldn’t escalate to big thrusts before you’re ready to take them comfortably. If he does then things will come to a crashing halt fairly quick. The saying “Go Big or Go Home” only applies to advanced bottoms, not those who are still learning the ropes. Start small and work your way up gradually. Pay attention to what you’re feeling and take not of what hurts and what’s pleasurable.
Lastly, do not turn to drugs, alcohol or poppers to become a better bottom. This can lead to unpleasant, physically damaging, and possibly dangerous scenarios. You can become a power bottom without being under the influence.
Trust that if you take the appropriate steps and respect your body, you will be able to achieve great sexual feats in no-time.
Sex is a craft; and just like any other craft, one improves with study and practice. In our Western Society, sex is taboo, and most of us look on it with varying degrees of shame and embarrassment, but this need not be the case. Whatever your feelings are personally about sex, the fact remains that the more you practice sex with one partner or with many, the better at it you will become. This holds especially true if you take interest in actually being good at it, which is a loaded situation, especially for women. You don’t want to be ‘too good’ because then you’ll raise suspicions about how many men you’ve slept with, but you also want to be ‘good enough’ to please your partner and keep them satisfied.
So as I’ve mentioned, for many sex is a minefield, both emotionally, psychologically and physically. Since I am not a licensed therapist, I cannot walk you through the emotional or psychological aspects of this situation; however, since sex is my craft, something I’ve spent years and years of my life indirectly studying and practicing, I can offer you some physical tips to improve the quality of sex you are or will have. Whether you’re a male or a female, gay or straight or bi, in a monogamous relationship or seeing multiple partners, these tips should improve the sex you’re having. They are general, all around tips for increasing satisfaction and intimacy levels.
Let’s get started!
7. Just Relax!
First of all, sex, as mentioned above, is a very loaded experience for many people. Even for men, despite what most women thing. Men, as much as women, and perhaps more so, experience a large amount of anxiety when it comes to sex, even if they don’t show it, or don’t admit to. Mostly, men are anxious about the actual performance, and if they are with a new partner, being able to please their partner. This is a huge male insecurity—to somehow come up short on actually pleasing the person they are with. Women tend to be more insecure about their looks and their bodies; but either way, there’s a ton of anxiety that happens whenever sex is involved.
Anxiety has no place in the bedroom, though. It makes sex a rushed and shameful affair, and anyone would be hard pressed to enjoy sex if they are too worried about their performance or their looks. So relax! Maybe have a drink beforehand (but not too many!), take a hot bath, sit and meditate for a while. Do something that loosens you up and gets you out of your head, and into your body. Sex is best experienced in a physical way, so when you’re having it, the place to be, mentally, is inside your body, not your head! This is especially true for women, because so much of our orgasm is mentally based. If you can’t let go and get outside of your own insecurities, you’re never going to have a great orgasm. Men as well can experience performance problems if they are too nervous, so do what you can to minimize the anxiety, and also know that whoever your partner is, they obviously like you enough to want to have sex with you, so bare it all! What have you got to lose?
And women—know that not all men are into the type of so-called perfect bodies you see in the magazines. Plenty of men love a muffin top, or a tummy, so even if you think your body isn’t perfect, chances are the man you’re seeing probably disagrees with you. For every body type, there is a man who fetishizes it. Got stretch marks? Some men love that. Saggy boobs? There’s a man who loves those too. And men, your woman wouldn’t be with you in the first place if you didn’t satisfy her. Women don’t need or generally want a 12” penis and 3 hours of hard sex. Your 5” or 4” one is great because it’s attached to you, and so what if you only last 5 minutes? You’re your own worst critic and probably comparing yourself to male porn actors, which is absolutely ridiculous because no woman wants to have sex like that. Don’t aspire to it!
6. Be Gentle
Again, most people don’t want or even like porn sex in real life! Women like a soft touch, and most men like to start off slow, even if they enjoy harder stuff later on. The most erotic thing to both sexes is a soft and velvet touch.
Caress and undress your partner like they were a porcelain doll, and move with caution around them. Do not throw your entire body weight on top of them or accidentally smack them in the face with your elbow because you were not paying attention to where they were anticipating a move. Be aware of your own body and how it’s interacting with your partners, which is a key part of what I mean when I say ‘be in your body’. Be aware of where it is and what it’s doing. And make full use of subtle touches; a piece of hair that drags slowly across their face, or a breath of hot air from your mouth before placing your lips on their stomach. Sex is about the small, gentle, intimate moments between two individuals, and whether you’re going to see this person again or not should be irrelevant. If you’ve chosen to be intimate with someone, no matter who they are or what they mean to you, they deserve to be treated with respect and care because it’s a scary thing indeed to be intimate with anyone. We forget that sometimes, we forget the bravery involved in sex and intimacy, and how much we all risk in sharing this with each other.
So be gentle physically and emotionally with your partner. If they want something rougher later on, you can build to that. It helps to also ask your partner what they want out of the sexual encounter and what type of sex they generally like; however, most people who really enjoy rough sex with share that with you before starting sex, or pretty blatantly indicate it once sex has begun. If you are with a partner who enjoys rough sex, please do remember that human beings are fragile and even then start slowly and build pressure. If they like to be choked, don’t start with a full on grasp of the throat. Start with a gentle but firm grasp of the neck and continue to apply pressure, while gauging their reaction. This applies to all sorts of situations, anal included. Always start slow and gentle.
5. Move Slowly
Slow is always sexy. Always. Sure, there are times, especially towards the end of sex that things can get faster and heavier, but in the initial seduction and foreplay of sex, rushing things and moving fast is really a buzz kill. Unless you’re having a quickie in the coat closet, take your time to enjoy your partner.
Move slowly and pour like water over your partner. A large part of sex is just simply the way you move—be smooth and have rhythm. The best sex is always with people who have a kinesthetic intelligence; i.e. they are very gifted with the way they move. Not all of us can be so gifted and some of us are clumsy and awkward, but that’s where practice comes in. Practice moving in slow motion, trying to feel all parts of your body at once and to glide them over things very slightly. It helps to be in good physical shape, not for looks, but simply because being in good shape makes this aspect of sex much easier. If you’re strong enough to hold yourself up off of your partner instead of laying, full body weight on top of them, it’s much more enjoyable for your partner; plus, later on, once the sex gets going, you’re going to be able to have better rhythmic strokes and you’ll be able to last longer on top and not end up sweaty and winded after 2 minutes of pumping.
Foreplay is an important, if not the most, important part of sex, and when you’re playing with your partner, do it slowly. Most people rush through foreplay or forget it all together, skipping straight to the actual insertion. This is a mistake because foreplay is the singular best way to build intimacy between partners. Sticking something inside of someone doesn’t build intimacy—laying next to each other, gazing into each others eyes, and running ones fingers across one’s skin, that does. The act of sex, in and of itself, is not intimate which is why porn stars don’t fall in love with each other. If you’re with a person you love deeply, or desire to, give them the time to get to know your body as well as your mind and soul. Use your hands to caress their hair and their head while you’re kissing them, and pull them closer to you, or sit on their lap and use your breath to tickle their earlobes. Ears are such an underrated erogenous zone on both men and women.
Even if you’re not trying to emotionally connect with your partner, these slow, sexy moments do help turn them on. Women especially need a lot of foreplay to get close to orgasm, and most men forget this or rush through it, despite wanting to please their partner. Men, in general, watch too much porn and focus too much on the orgasm a woman has during penetration, which is a mistake. Most women don’t orgasm from penetration, despite misleading porn movies. So if you’re genuine and want to please a woman, give her slow foreplay! There’s a reason the word ‘slowly’ shows up often in erotica—it is simply sexier.
4. Skin To Skin Contact
One of the greatest things in sex is the feeling of another human being’s skin touching your skin. It’s an underrated pleasure, and one that many people don’t notice until they haven’t experienced it for a while. Skin to skin contact stimulates a vast variety of neurotransmitters in our brain that bring us feelings of connection and empathy with each other. Not only that, but the feeling of another human’s skin on yours is also a very big turn on. No matter how badly you may want to keep your bra on if you’re ashamed of your boobs, or no matter how much you might want to be lazy and not get fully undressed, I urge you to get over your fear and don’t be lazy and go ahead and get fully naked. You cannot have a truly enjoyable sexual experience without a bit of skin to skin contact.
Even if you’re in a hurry and having a quickie, make time to touch each other. Put your hands up her shirt or down her pants, or kiss his neck and let your hands brush against his stomach. Make sure that your bodies touch and get close to each other; sex should be intimate even if it’s with someone you’re not interested in falling in love with. If the sex is robotic and lacking in human connection, you’re doing a disservice to your partner and it borders on being unhealthy. As I’ve said before, you don’t have to love someone to be intimate with them, and everyone deserves human compassion and care if they are willing be to brave enough to be intimate with you. So make and effort to connect with your partner through skin to skin contact and other things, such as kissing and eye contact.
And lastly, one of my favorite things to do is to smell your partner. Not smell their cologne or their perfume, but to really smell their body and their scent. This is especially important for couples who are in love, as smelling your partner should turn you on and help stimulate you for sex. One of the largest signs of basic compatibility is finding your partner’s natural body scent attractive. It’s also, on the scientific side, a good indicator of reproductive compatibility and a sign of a good genetic match for you.
3. Focus On Your Partner
Focusing on your partner is so important! For a mutually satisfying sexual experience, you must always keep an eye on your partner’s reactions to your sexual moves. Do not just continue doing what you’re doing, and as assume that because a previous sexual partner enjoyed your technique, that your current sexual partner will enjoy it as well. This also applies to what you see in pornography—just because a woman paid to pretend she enjoys some sexual move you saw in a porn does not mean a real woman, or the woman you are with, will enjoy it as well. Always keep an eye out to gauge how your partner is reacting to how you’re treating them and if they look uncomfortable or even bored, switch it up!
This is especially important during intercourse, because you can learn a lot about your partner and their likes and dislikes by just watching their body react to the things you’re doing together. A man’s body is more obvious about whether it likes or dislikes something, but women have tell tale signs of arousal too; namely, perky nipples, flushed cheeks or faces, and becoming lubricated. If you’re having sex and you don’t see these signs of arousal, switch it up and try something else. Don’t keep doing what you’re doing, and expect your partner to tell you if they dislike something. A lot of people have a hard time voicing their feelings during sex, or in the bedroom, so it’s always good to either make the first move yourself and ask “are you enjoying this?” or if they are obviously not, try something else or ask them what they would prefer. Women especially think that being assertive and knowing what they like and dislike during sex and voicing these opinions and thoughts is a turn off for most men, and are unlikely to really be sexually forward in that manner. However, women should remember that in general, this is NOT true and that most men actually love a woman who knows what she likes and dislikes and who isn’t afraid to tell them straight away!
Which leads me too….
2. Communicate, communicate, communicate!
Whether you’re shy or reserved or outgoing and outspoken, you must, either verbally or nonverbally, communicate with your partner! This is very, very important and it is one of the most important things to do if you’re looking to have better sex!
Sex is all about learning what another person likes and learning what you like. Sex is about exploration, and if you’ve chosen to include another partner, it is very important that you share that experience with them. You cannot properly share the experience or have any intimacy with someone who you don’t communicate with. Whether it’s telling them your life’s story and all of your personal turn ons, or simply telling them “faster” or “slower”, communication helps both of you figure out how to please each other. Otherwise, it’s a crap shoot, as human sexual preferences are infinitely variable. What works for one person, won’t for another; what is appealing to one man or woman, is disgusting to another one. Don’t ever assume that you know everything there is to know about sex, or that you know the one true way to great sex and that you will force that one way of having sex onto every partner you may have! The most important thing to remember is that there is no one right or wrong way to have sex because every single person has a special and different sexual “formula” that they prefer and the only way to figure out this formula is to communicate with your partner!
There are two ways to communicate—either verbally or non-verbally. You can either talk to your partner and ask them outright what they like or prefer, or if that’s uncomfortable, be very aware of their reactions to the moves you make in bed. It’s often easy, if you’re paying attention, to figure out what someone prefers in bed. If they are into slow, soft sex, if you experiment and go faster, they will give you signs of discomfort. Obviously it’s easier and more ethical to ask up front, but many, many people are too uncomfortable with the topic of sex to be that forthright. So switch things up and gauge reactions and find out what turns on your partner and what doesn’t, and don’t for a minute think that you can “change someone’s mind” or “turn them on” to a sex act, such as anal, that they show a fundamental dislike towards. Not everyone likes the same thing, and just because your ex-girlfriend was really into anal does NOT mean all women are into it! We are all born with our own sexual formula and it doesn’t change, in general, ever; and if it does change, it’s a self discovered change, and it happens when we are ready to explore more or different sides of our own sexuality. You cannot force anyone to like or to try a sexual experience simply because you want to, or because you yourself enjoy it. That is always unethical and uncalled for.
On the flip side of this, it is also advisable for you to be expressive in your enjoyment during sex. Be appreciative of your partner when they are doing something you are really enjoying! Be vocal, be intimate—grab their butt and pull them deeper into you or closer to you, or reach up and kiss them passionately! It’s never attractive to be a dead fish in bed (male or female). People want to know how you’re feeling, what’s going on with you, and there’s no better reward for good sex than returned passion. Don’t be afraid to look stupid, and don’t be self-conscious; sex has no room for such hang ups. Let the feelings and sensations flow through you and generously release passion. Your partner will love it, guaranteed.
1. Eye Contact
This is the very first thing I say to people who ask me how to have better sex. Eye contact. And I always get the same response, every time: “But isn’t that creepy/weird/uncomfortable/awkward??”.
I feel complete when I’m with you
Short answer: NO. I’m not asking you to stare at your partner, unblinkingly, for 10 minutes straight. I’m simply telling you to make prolonged eye contact with them while being intimate. Eye contact, more than anything else, builds intimacy and connection and eyes express more emotion than words, pictures and hand gestures combined.
Women especially feel awkward making strong eye contact with men because it’s inherently an aggressive thing to do. If you think about it, we find eye contact to be aggressive even in normal situations; aggressive and intrusive. However, if you ask a man what makes a blow job average or phenomenal, chances are he will say ‘eye contact’. So there is a fine line between staring too long and not at all, but I have a 3 to 4 second rule that seems to work well. If you’re having intercourse or oral, take a moment to look deeply into your partners eyes for 3 to 4 seconds, and if you want the connection, bare your soul in those moments. It’s difficult to describe how one bares ones soul through a look, but if you just think about an emotion you’d like to convey while looking at your partner, chances are it will come through your eyes. So if you’re truly enjoying yourself, look deeply at your partner with joy and happiness. They will pick up on that emotion, somehow. That’s the mystery and beauty of human connection; somehow, these things transfer.
Take my word for it—eye contact is sexy and it helps build intimacy and helps further communication between both partners!
I hope that this helps everyone who is looking for a better sexual experience, and remember that while love is not mandatory for all sexual activities, mutual respect and intimacy is! No matter who you are intimate with, whether it’s a one night stand, an escort, your wife, or your girlfriend or possibly a third partner, everyone who is brave enough to get naked and expose themselves to you deserves both respect and mutual intimacy. We must all remember and respect the power that the act of sex holds, and so while it can be fun and light hearted, it must always stem from a mutual and equal point of openness and willingness to be vulnerable with each other.
So much “how to BDSM” material is really “how to top.” Which is understandable, up to a point. The top performs most of the obvious physical parts of the scene–they’re the one who has to know how to tie a knot or swing a flogger. The top is likely to also be dominant, which means that they’re going to be the one in charge of planning the scene and directing it. And the top is also expected to take more responsibility for a scene, because bottoms might be immobilized (or go off into la-la land) and need their tops to watch out for their safety.
There’s also a certain bias in BDSM-land toward thinking tops and dominants should be the authorities and their experiences should be prioritized, because… well, partly because they’re more often men. And partly because they’re in charge in their scenes/relationships so it’s only logical that they be in charge everywhere, even though it’s not like the community agreed to submit to them. So the majority of kink community leaders, authors, and teachers are tops.
As a result of these factors, you can come away from a lot of kink books or conferences thinking that bottoming is… standing there. (For advanced bottoming, you might kneel or lie down.) It seems like a purely receptive thing. Like a beanbag could do it, if you could teach a beanbag to moan and occasionally offer to get people drinks.
This is not the case. Bottoming well, in a way that creates a great experience for yourself and your top, requires effort and skill. We are not canvases for the art of BDSM; we are artists too. Here’s some of the things I’ve learned (or am learning, or need to learn) about being on the bottom:
• Know your desires.
If you don’t know what you like, you’re not likely to get it. I’ve talked about this so much on the blog, I don’t want to belabor the point. Just… have some idea of why you’re bottoming in a BDSM scene instead of back at home knitting. (Knitting fetishists please disregard.) (That is not entirely a joke.) Or if you don’t, at least be aware that you don’t know, and able to say “I’m experimenting right now and finding out what appeals to me.”
• Speak up for yourself.
When I first started playing, I had the idea in my head–maybe not in words, but definitely in feelings–that the best bottoms were the ones who were least demanding. That for me to be an excellent bottom, I should take as much pain as I could stand and allow my top to do whatever they wanted. I certainly noticed that I enjoyed some activities more than others, but I felt like asking for the ones I wanted would be rude or “topping from the bottom” or selfish or something. So I just felt happy when I got things I liked, felt sad or annoyed when I got things I didn’t, and never gave any external indication of either.
Eventually I burned myself out on the stoicism thing. I could only suppress my specific desires and limited pain tolerance for so long. So I became a really grouchy, persnickety bottom. No, I don’t like that. Don’t like that either. Yellow. Yellow to that too. Maybe we should just take a break. It was frustrating, but it was actually progress–being able to say what I didn’t like without being able to say what I liked wasn’t very fun, but it beat the heck out of not being able to say either. My tops were stuck playing “Marco Polo” with my desires, but at least they weren’t unwittingly hurting me.
And then–embarrassingly recently–I realized that asking for what you like isn’t presumptuous or un-bottomly, it’s something that a good top actually wants you to do. Depending on the sort of scene you’re doing, they might not give you everything you like (or they might make you earn it), but they still need to know. Otherwise they don’t know which parts are punishment and which are reward for you, and they’re not in control of the experience they’re creating for you.
• Look out for your safety.
This is a responsibility tops and bottoms share. It’s more the top’s, because they have more control and because they’re going to be at fault if the bottom gets hurt, but it’s an important bottom skill to be able to help the top keep you safe. This means knowing and sharing the limitations of your body and your mind, it means using your safewords when you need to, and it means double-checking the top when they do something potentially unsafe. Your top should notice on their own if they’re cutting off your circulation or positioning you in a way that would be disastrous if you fell, but even good tops can miss things, and it’s a good idea to also do your own safety checks.
(If you’re way off in subspace you may not be able, and then it really is the top’s responsibility alone. But it’s a good thing to do if you can.)
• Play along.
This isn’t a simple directive but a whole set of skills that depend on how you play. This is the physical, immediate side of bottoming, and it’s a whole lot more than standing there. It’s positioning yourself to assist with an elaborate rope tie. It’s being able to absorb blows. It’s knowing when to push back, when to yield, and when to stand firm. This really depends on what specific kinks you do, and it’s mostly stuff you have to learn “on the job.” And it is things you have to learn. “Standing there” looks like a no-brainer, but standing in a way that makes it easy for your top to do their job and supports you when you go wibbly and looks good and feels good? Takes a little bit of brain.
• Give good feedback.
In two ways. There’s the practical feedback, the “oh yeah just like that,” the “wow, I’m really just melting away into the wall here,” and the “okay, that was the bad ow.” And there’s the feedback that tops appreciate and get off on, the… well, actually, the first two sentences above are pretty good examples of that too. I’m not talking about playing it up and putting on a performance, but a lot of tops really like hearing how much impact they’re having on you. Giving them that, especially if they’ve asked for it, is good bottoming.
• Know how to cook what you eat.
I don’t think this is a requirement for everyone (well, nothing here is required, we’re all different and all learning, please don’t take this post as a list of “things bottoms must do”), but it’s something I value for myself. I like to know how to perform all the skills that I enjoy having done to me. I hardly ever top, but I know how to tie a rope harness and where to aim a flogger. Having this knowledge helps me communicate better with my top, know what I can do to make their job easier, understand and process the sensations I’m receiving, and it gives me a whole lot of appreciation for how much energy my top is putting into the scene.
• Process the experience.
This is the internal work of bottoming, and I don’t know what I’m going to write in this section, because it’s… magic or neurology or something. Also a lot of deep breathing. This is where you take in pain, discomfort, fear, and/or humiliation, and you turn them into something wonderful for yourself. And very often it is an effort. It can take focus and intention to turn a spanking from “my butt hurts, ow, my butt hurts again” to “my butt hurts in a way that is giving me the most amazing pleasure.” Or when it isn’t pleasure, “my butt hurts and I am strong and I am taking it.” It’s almost a kind of meditation.
Everything else on this page is about bottoming. It’s all the logistics around bottoming. But this part? This is bottoming. This is why you aren’t home knitting. And there’s nothing easy or passive about it.
•Give aftercare.
Tops drop too. Tops (at least a lot of them) also get into an altered state when they’re playing and they can also come down hard. So tops might need cuddling and talking after scenes, or they might need to drink water and stretch out and cool off, or they might want to mellow out and enjoy the lingering buzz. It’s good bottoming to be attentive to their aftercare needs as well as your own, and to check up on them a bit after the scene.
Just standing there? Bottoming in BDSM is goddamn hard work, and it deserves to be talked about.
Lying across a turquoise rubber plinth, my legs in stirrups, a large blue sheet of paper draped across my pubes (for “modesty”), a doctor slowly pushes a clear plastic duck puppet up my vagina and, precisely at that moment, Total Eclipse of the Heart comes on over the radio and it’s hard not to love the genitourinary medicine, or GUM, clinic.
I mean that most sincerely: I love the GUM clinic. It is wonderful beyond orgasm that in the UK anyone can walk into a sexual health clinic—without registering with a doctor, without an appointment, without any money, without a chaperone—and get seen within a few hours at most. It brings me to the point of climax just thinking about the doctors and health professionals who dedicate their life to the nation’s ovaries, cervixes, vaginas, and wombs.
And yet, not all women are apparently so comfortable discussing their clitoral hall of fame with a doctor. According to a recent report commissioned by Ovarian Cancer Action, almost half of the women surveyed between the ages of 18 and 24 said they feared “intimate examinations,” while 44 percent are too embarrassed to talk about sexual health issues with a GP. What’s more, two thirds of those women said they would be afraid to say the word “vagina” in front of their doctor. Their doctor. That is desperately, disappointingly, dangerously sad.
In 2001, I went to see a sexual health nurse called Ms. Cuthbert who kindly, patiently and sympathetically explained to me that I wasn’t pregnant—in fact could not be pregnant—I was just doing my A-Levels. The reason I was feeling sick, light-headed, and had vaginal discharge that looked like a smear of cream cheese was because I was stressed about my simultaneous equations and whether I could remember the order of British prime ministers between 1902 to 1924. My body was simply doing its best to deal with an overload of adrenaline.
Back then, my GUM clinic was in a small health center opposite a deli that would sell Czechoslovakian beer to anyone old enough to stand unaided, and a nail bar that smelled of fast food. I have never felt more grown up than when I first walked out of that building, holding a striped paper bag of free condoms and enough packets of Microgynon to give a fish tits. My blood pressure, cervix, heartrate, and emotional landscape had all been gently and unobtrusively checked over by my new friend Ms. Cuthbert. I had been given the time and space to discuss my hopes and anxieties and was ready to launch myself, legs akimbo, into a world of love and lust—all without handing over a penny, having to tell my parents, pretending that I was married or worry that I was being judged.
My local sexual health clinic today is, if anything, even more wonderful. In a neighborhood as scratched, scored, and ripped apart by the twin fiends of poverty and gentrification as Hackney, the GUM clinic is the last great social leveler. It is one of our last few collective spaces. Sitting in reception, staring at the enormous pictures of sand dunes and tree canopies it is clear that, for once, we’re all in this together. The man in a blue plastic moulded chair wishing his mum a happy birthday on the phone, the two girls in perfect parallel torn jeans scrolling through WhatsApp, the guy with the Nike logo tattoo on his neck getting a glass of water for his girlfriend, the red-headed hipster in Birkenstocks reading about witchcraft in the waiting room, the mother and daughter with matching vacuum-sized plastic handbags talking about sofas, the fake flowers, Magic FM playing on the wall-mounted TV, the little kids running around trying to say hello to everyone while the rest of us desperately avoided eye contact—the whole gang was there. And that’s the point: you may be a working mum, you may be a teenager, you may be a social media intern at a digital startup, you may be a primary school teacher, you may be married, single, a sex worker, unemployed, wealthy, religious, terrified, or defiant but whatever your background, wherever you’ve come from and whoever you slept with last night, you’ll end up down at the GUM clinic.
Which is why it seems such a vulvic shame that so many women feel scared to discuss their own bodies with the person most dedicated to making sure that body is OK. “No doctor will judge you when you say you have had multiple sexual partners, or for anything that comes up in your sexual history,” Dr. Tracie Miles, the President of the National Forum of Gynecological Oncology Nurses tells me on the phone. “We don’t judge—we’re real human beings ourselves. If we hadn’t done it we probably wish we had and if we have done it then we will probably be celebrating that you have too.”
Doctors are not horrified by women who have sex. Doctors are not grossed out by vaginas. So to shy away from discussing discharge, pain after sex, bloating, a change in color, odor, itching, and bleeding not only renders the doctor patient conversation unhelpful, it also puts doctors at a disadvantage, hinders them from being able to do their job properly, saves nobody’s blushes and could result in putting you and your body at risk.
According to The Eve Appeal—a women’s cancer charity that is campaigning this September to fight the stigma around women’s health, one in five women associate gynecological cancer with promiscuity. That means one in five, somewhere in a damp and dusty corner of their minds, are worried that a doctor will open up her legs, look up at her cervix and think “well you deserve this, you slut.” Which is awful, because they won’t. They never, ever would. Not just because they’re doctors and therefore have spent several years training to view the human body with a mix of human sympathy and professional dispassion, but more importantly, because being promiscuous doesn’t give you cancer.
“There is no causal link between promiscuity and cancer,” says Dr. Miles. “The only sexually transmitted disease is the fear and embarrassment of talking about sex; that’s what can stop us going. If you go to your GP and get checked out, then you’re fine. And you don’t have to know all the anatomical words—if you talk about a wee hole, a bum hole, the hole where you put your Tampax, then that is absolutely fine too.”
Although there is some evidence of a causal link between certain gynecological cancers and High Risk Human Papilloma Virus (HRHPV), that particular virus is so common that, ‘it can be considered a normal consequence of sexual activity’ according to The Eve Appeal. Eighty percent of us will pick up some form of the HPV virus in our lifetime, even if we stick with a single, trustworthy, matching-socks-and-vest-takes-out-the-garbage-talks-to-your-mother-on-the-phone-can’t-find-your-clitoris partner your entire life. In short, HRHPV may lead to cancer, but having different sexual partners doesn’t. Of course, unprotected sex can lead to an orgy of other sexually transmitted infections, not to mention the occasional baby, but promiscuity and safe sex are not mutually exclusive. And medical professionals are unlikely to be shocked by either.
We are incredibly lucky in the UK that any woman can stroll into a sexual health clinic, throw her legs open like a cowboy and receive some of the best medical care the world has ever known. We can Wikipedia diagrams of our vaginas to learn the difference between our frenulum and prepuce (look it up, gals). We can receive free condoms any day of the (working week) from our doctor or friendly neighborhood GUM clinic. We can YouTube how to perform a self-examination, learn to spot the symptoms of STIs, read online accounts by women with various health conditions, and choose from a military-grade arsenal of different contraception methods, entirely free.
A third of women surveyed by The Eve Appeal said that they would feel more comfortable discussing their vaginas and wombs if the stigma around gynecological health and sex was reduced. But a large part of removing that stigma is up to us. We have to own that conversation and use it to our advantage. We need to bite the bullet and start talking about our pudenda. We have to learn to value and accept our genitals as much as any other part of our miraculous, hilarious bodies.
So come on, don’t be a cunt. Open up about your vagina.
This is a guide to various kinks and fetishes that are found in the world of sex. They can be used in your roleplay as your characters turn on’s and turn off’s, or a secret that they have. Or maybe it is something to has shaped them. I have not only discovered various ones and experimented with them personally, but have had exposure to them. Master/Slave RP’s are taking off and I am one of few who will touch on the subject. There is a lot of fear in this world because things can go very VERY wrong very fast. How do I know? I have been there. I have been the observer and the recipient of things going wrong. So this is to help you know and learn about the basics. I will go over some fetishes that are often blown out of proportion and also explain the dynamic of a Dom/sub and Master/slave relationship. I do not claim to be an expert. This is just what I have learned and absorbed from being in the scene for several years.
Now first off this isn’t a way to say “I can do this to someone without asking first” DO NOT EVER DO THAT! No one asks you to do something to them unless they have given you verbal or written permission (That is witnessed) to do the things I will discuss. It is never EVER okay to do this to a man or a woman and anyone who says otherwise has not be in the position where their no’s are not listened.
Kinks are defined as socially acceptable forms of fetishism’s. Where as Fetish is something you worship, fantasize over completely. Both of these are found in the overlapping work of BDSM (Bondage, Domination, Sadism and Masochism). They can vary to the smallest things to the biggest, weirdest things you would ever think of. Almost every town around the world has a community of people who participate in these various acts. The community often meets to talk, hangout and have coffee and throw events for their members. These events include play parties, classes and munches (hanging out in a vanilla setting – vanilla being normal).
The first rule in the community of BDSM, Kink and Fetish is Consent. No matter what it is. You consent with your fellow party(ies) about what is occurring because everything needs to be Safe, Sane and Consensual. You need to establish the basics of what is going to happen, what your limits are (Both soft – so what you aren’t to keen on trying but if you trust your partner enough, you will do it – and hard – so no way in hell you are doing that). You need to establish a signal, be it verbal or physical, to indicate when you need it to stop or change. Often the word Yellow and Red are used and for physical signals, number of blinks or a hand gesture. And you need to express when you do not feel comfortable. If you feel uncomfortable with what is going to be done to you or that you are going to do YOU HAVE EVERY RIGHT TO SAY NO!
That being said! Let us start.
There are many different kinks and fetishes that can be found in the world. These can include simple ones of being tied up, blindfolds, feathers, women (or men) wearing heels, eating food off of one another, biting, hair pulling, uniforms, long hair (or short hair)… the list is long because in truth there are many and I am not going to list them all. Then there are the more complex, more intense ones. These include needle play, CBT, cupping, impact play (This includes paddles, whips, floggers, hair brushes, hands, wooden spoons, canes and any other instrument you can spank with), chastity devices, latex, gagging… again the lists are long.
Impact Play
Impact Play:
Impact Play is the use of a hard (or soft) object by the top to strike the bottom repetitively.
Instruments that can be used in Impact Play include: Flogger, Cane, Paddle, Whip, Riding Crop, Wooden Spoon, belt, hair brush, hand, etc.
Impact play usually occurs on the buttocks and thighs. It is often advised to not strike anywhere that isn’t cushioned with fat. This includes the kidney area, neck, tailbone, hipbones, head and all joints.
When using whips, one has to be careful to avoid a wrap around effect. This is when it coils around an appendage and can either cause excessive pain or something more horrible.
Sensory Play
Sensory Play:
Sensory Play is limiting one sense to enhance the other senses.
Sensory Play includes blind folds, ear muffs/plugs, large boxes over the head, wax, feathers, ice, silk, and anything else that plays with the senses.
These can be used often without much worry, though wax can cause burns ans pain at the same time. Sensory play always involves signals, either verbal or physical and the top must respect when the bottom says stop (or red).
Restraining:
Restraining in kink and BDSM is restricting a limb(s) from movement or use. This includes the arms, feet, legs, hands, neck and whole body if desired.
Bondage
Items often used in restraining include rope, duct tape, packing tape, industrial roles of saran wrap, vacuum bags, spreaders, chains, bondage tape, ties, long pieces of fabric and anything that can tie have a not tied in it.
With rope, there are various ways to it. There is just simple knots and there is also costume style (full body binds). There is also shibari, which is a Japanese form of restraint with rope. Both forms can take loads of time to complete to create beautiful pieces on a man or woman’s body. Costume Style x Shibari Style x
When binding with ANYTHING you do not (And I repeat NOT) want to cut of circulation to any area. You want to be able to place two fingers comfortably in between the restraint used and the skin. If you can’t, it is to tight and will eventually lead to the discoloration of skin and numbness and blood flow begins to slow.
Some people enjoy having this though but it is ill advised to do because nerve damage can occur.
Other Kinks/Fetishes That Need to be Known and Understood:
There are many kinks and fetishes in the world but some are not understood as they should be. This is because the media has made them out to be worse than they are or people are not educated enough to understand them. These include: needle play, voyeurism, exhibition, humiliation, role playing (Not like what we do! I will explain…), artistic cutting.
Needle Play: Needle play is the use of sterile needles to do artistic works on the human body.
Needle Play
The gauge of the needle varies to what the bottom can handle but usually a gauge between 17 and 20 is used. This is always done in a sterile environment with proper precautions taken. This includes the wearing of gloves, a bin to dispose of the used needles and something for the marks left from the needles. If you are uncomfortable with the idea of this being done to you than you have every right to deny it. Some people enjoy having needles put in to all parts of their body, literally. But you are not expected to do it. And you do not have to observe it either. But to some this is very zen.
Voyeurism, Exhibition and Humiliation: I am grouping these together because they often go hand and hand together. Some people do get turned on by doing things in public. Be it having a spanking, walked down the street nude and leashed or, sorry to be so blunt about it, fucked in a public place. People do enjoy this sorta of thing. To many of us this would traumatize us and you have every right to tell the Top that you will not do that.
Role playing: Role playing in BDSM is indeed playing out different roles, which might include: Doctor/Nurse, Priest/Nun, Teacher/Student, Doctor/Patient, Guard/Prisoner… really there is no limit to what can occur. This are all sorts of creations that people come up with and it is always between two consenting adults.
Artistic Cutting: This is in shape, form or way the same as cutting that people do when they are depressed or that. This is done with a sterile razor or scalpel that is disposed of after and done to create a design drawn out and planned. It tends to permanent so it takes a lot of for thought and decision to do before hand. The top has to take plenty of care not to cut to deep in to the skin in order to keep the nerves and veins safe. It is a very delicate process and, once again, you do not have to do it if you do not feel safe doing it.
Relationship Dynamics:
There are various relationship dynamics that can be found in BDSM, Kink, and the Fetish community. A few are as follows:Master/slave or Mistress/Slave
Dominant/sub or Domme/sub
Top/Bottom
Daddy/baby-girl/boy or Mommy/baby-boy/girl
Owner/pet (This can be a puppy, kitten, pony or whatever else one desires.)
All relationships have a contract. This states what the sub/slave/bottom/baby-girl/boy will do and have done to them. But it also stipulates what the Dom/Domme/Master/Mistress/Mommy/Daddy/Top will do for the sub/slave/bottom/baby-girl/boy. Some examples of what would be include in a contract is limits, comfort time, expectations from both sides (weight lose for health, outfits, curfews, etc), safety regulations, etc. Anything to ensure the safety, sanity and respect of BOTH parties is put in to the contracts.
Also you will note that I have capitalized the Dominant role and lower case for the submissive
full out collarnecklace
role. I don’t know exactly why this is done but in my humble opinion it is because the Dominant role is in charge and has the sense of power while the submissive role is lacking power and has given up control to the Dominant role.
Master(Mistress)/slave: This is the most strict relationship that a relationship in the BDSM world has. The Master or Mistress has complete control over what occurs in the slaves life – what is eaten, when and where they sleep, who they see and how often they see these people, where and how money is spent and even chores. Often these relationships are long standing and result in marriage or partnership. The slave however is not the only one who makes a commitment in this relationship. The Master or Mistress agrees to take care of the slave, to help them and comfort them if need be and to protect them. A slave is always wearing a collar. They can be a full out collar, a slim collar, a necklace, a bracelet, or a ring. The giving of one of these items is a very serious ordeal and is often done in a ceremony with friends from the community they are in. The slave wears their collar (or other piece of jewelry that claims they are a slave) 24/7. The also may have multiple collars – one to wear in public, one to be worn at home and one to be worn in play, with a combination of any of these three. They rarely remove it – only if they are showering and the collar is made of leather or if they are changing from an informal one to a formal one.
Dom(Domme)/sub: This is the most common relationship dynamic found in the BDSM
Kitty PlayPuppy Play
community from what I have seen. It is similar to a Master/slave relationship but they are not as strict and direct. They also have a contract drawn up with expectations from both sides as well as what the limits are for the submissive. A sub can receive a collar similar to what a slave receives but they are not obligated to wear it all the time. It is only worn in play or at home usually. However, some Doms may seem like they are more of the Master type as they are firm and hard with their submissive and they refer to themselves as a Dom. It is because of how they are in play and not how they come off. Even the hardest man (or woman) may be a sub in truth.
Top/bottom: This is the center and general names for people who play. Not every Dom is a Top and not every sub is a bottom. These are merely the positions that are taken in play.
The top being the one who does things to the bottom, which usually is involved in any type of play that is done. The Top ensures that all things are safe throughout the entire play session. They are to check on the bottom to ensure that they are okay, that they want to continue on, to ask if they want to take it a step further and to comfort them at the end of the session. The bottom is to tell the top how they feel throughout the whole think. If the bottom at any point wishes to stop and says so by speaking the safe word, than the top must comply. There is no ifs, ands or buts. THE TOP WILL STOP WHEN THE BOTTOM SAYS RED OR WHATEVER SAFE WORD HAS BEEN DESIGNATED TO STOP. The bottom in a sense does have complete control over the session because if they can not do anymore than that is it. The top DOES NOT continue after the safe word is said.
Pony Play
Daddy/baby-girl/boy or Mommy/baby-boy/girl: This is a softer approach to a BDSM relationship. There is often a lot of cuddling and softer things than what you would find in a Dom/sub relationship. The baby-girl/boy does have expectation to and doesn’t have to wear a collar unless they desire to. It is just a softer dynamic and is in no way related to incest. This is two adults who consent to these roles.
Petplay: Petplay involves the taking on an appearance of an animal. The most common ones being puppy, kitty and pony. The animal often has a human owner but in puppy and kitty play, it is possible for both people in the relationship to be the animal, but there is one who is an Alpha. So they take on the Dominant role. There is the costumes and accessories for this sorta of thing available for purchase or you can make your own items.
“But you may ask; why not? I am the Top. The Dom. A true Master.” Really? Cram it! And if I hear you say that again I will take a book to your head to beat some sense in to you! There is no true Master or true Dom. Safety is key and if you can not respect that then you should be reprimanded by everyone and anyone. No matter the dynamic, you take care of one another because that is what a good relationship does. Nurture the relationship and let this guide aid you in creating a good SAFE dynamic between you and others.
If anyone wishes for me to expand on anything, just ask. Maybe I will do a guide with just one thing or another. This is just a summery.
Today I’d like to talk about: The Yin and Yang of Desire — Dopamine, Prolactin and Testosterone.
Let’s talk about love, lust and desire. But instead of looking at these things as social phenomena, let’s look at the chemical reactions going on inside our bodies that make us feel and behave the way we do.
There are clear links between certain chemicals and our most basic drives, which explains, for example, why we feel horny one moment and utterly disinterested the next. Or why our sex drive peaks after exercise. At the core of our sexual and affectional interests and behaviors lie the two chemicals — dopamine and prolactin. In many ways they are complimentary to one another; dopamine turns on desire and prolactin turns it off.
Dopamine is a neurotransmitter. This is basically your body’s pleasure and reward system. Our brains releases dopamine, to one degree or another, when we see, read or think about something sexy, taste something sweet, puff a cigarette, or come into skin-to-skin contact with another person. When dopamine levels are high, our libido goes into overdrive. Sometimes levels can be so dramatic that a person will neglect other essential bodily functions like eating and sleeping. Some “street” drugs —meth and coke among them — can mimic the body into thinking it’s dealing with dopamine.
Dopamine is critical to the way the brain controls our movements. If there’s not enough dopamine, we can’t move, or control our movements. If there’s too much dopamine, we are plagued with repetitive moments like jerking, tapping and twitching.
Get this; novel situations can increase dopamine releases. For example, hooking up with someone for the first time triggers especially high levels of dopamine. Curiously enough, these same high levels will not occur again during subsequent hookups with that same person. This is called the one-night-stand phenomenon; it’s why you can be attracted to someone at first encounter but not afterward.
However, falling in love with someone can sustain high dopamine levels for a longer period of time. This explains why physical infatuation is at its peak in the beginning months of a relationship. Also dopamine floods the brain when we get drunk or take certain drugs, which is why drinking alcohol can make a potential partner look more attractive.
Prolactin is dopamine’s foil. It causes dopamine levels to plummet. Prolactin is a hormone, as opposed to a neurotransmitter, like dopamine. It floods the body during orgasm, virtually shutting down the sex drive, which is nature’s way of allowing us to attend to other essential bodily functions like eating and sleeping. Prolactin release in men will temporarily disable our ability to have an erection. This is called the refractory or recovery phase of our sexual response cycle. And prolactin is at least partially responsible for that happy, relaxed state after we cum. This is precisely the release women get while breastfeeding; in fact, the word “pro-lactin” directly indicates its role in milk production.
Prolactin primes the mind for long-term attachment — a role that helps the mother bond with her suckling child as well as lovers to each other. This means that if you stick around cuddling with your partner right after sex, you may actually start to like him/her more and more. This is called the pair-bonding effect. But prolactin’s dopamine-reducing action has a darker side. It cancels the tolerance you may have for your partner’s flaws.
While dopamine and prolactin are good indicators of the immediate workings of sexual pursuit, it is testosterone that best explains long-term changes in courtship. Testosterone is responsible for the masculinization of the adolescent male body during puberty. And it increases the dopamine levels that regulate our sex drive. But testosterone leaves its fingerprint on the body as much as the brain. It’s the catalyst for changes in skin tone, fat distribution, musculature and demeanor, which are signals to others that this individual male is sexually mature and in good health.
However, if you get a fever or become depressed, your testosterone levels can drop significantly. Malnutrition or high levels of anxiety or stress will also interfere with testosterone levels. The most immediate effect of this is a decrease in libido, and a noticeable drop-off in energy levels as well as confidence. There’s no doubt about it; testosterone levels will signal to potential mates that you are in the throws of depression, stress, anxiety or malnutrition. You will appear a little less attractive to people subconsciously. That’s why a confident, dominant male with high-testosterone levels generally enjoy more mating success.
Testosterone levels are highest in the morning, then wanes throughout the day. It’s also much higher in men in autumn and lowest in the spring.
However, sexual desire is still more complicated than is known to science, and there may be multiple archetypes of partners we’re drawn to — there is evidence that aggressive high-testosterone men appear sexier to women and gay men for a one-night stand. But softer, more sensitive balanced men are more likely to tug at our heartstrings in a relationship. Scientists reason that the bulkier mate is more likely to be physically powerful and carry good genes to create strong children. While the slimmer guy is a more loving, reliable partner likely to help raise the kids so they survive to adulthood. The effect of this strange contradiction seems to be a biological predisposition against monogamy and sexual exclusivity.
But none of this is carved in stone. A man’s hormone’s levels increase when he is in a competitive environment or carries out acts of aggression, which can explain how guys seem to bulk up quickly when they go to prison or join sports teams. These levels decrease when he feels intimidated or humiliated, which might explain why those who get picked on at school stay skinny and mild-mannered compared to their peers. This in turn made them easier targets and only increased the likelihood of them being bullied.
This is not uncommon behavior among primate colonies that have huge alpha males looming over a population of smaller, submissive males and females. While this is not a perfect parallel to human social groups, it does go a long way in explaining how a social environment can be a precursor to physical body changes. And just so you know, our testosterone levels also drop during long-term relationships, giving the male brain a sense of stability and mellowness, easing off the drive to forage for new sexual partners.
Science alone lacks a moral element, and fails to explain, in a modern context, why we should desire to be masculine, aggressive, potent or dominant in the first place. In nature, the alpha-male is the most likely to enjoy reproductive success, but that isn’t what gives our lives value today. We might have more success being an average male that falls in love and becomes a good provider. And in the modern world it’s probably the more stable and sensitive man who is most likely to sire children.
Still, science gives important clues to what’s going on in our minds and bodies and that of our potential partners. A lot of our basic inclinations are out of our control, but when we know what causes them or what to expect, we can work with them for the best outcome.
Arguably, the humble blowjob is the most common partnered sexual activity for men — straight, bi or gay.
It’s pretty obvious why the gays like to suck cock. But nowadays loads of straight women have taken to smokin’ some pole too. Let’s face it; it’s a great way to give pleasure. Regardless of whether it’s part of foreplay, after play, or the main event — like relieving the Commander in Chief in the oval office after a long day of commandering and chiefing, don’t cha know.
Certain skills are essential for mind-blowing oral sex. The preeminent skill, of course, is mastering the gag reflex. But close behind that is keeping your partner’s spooge off your blue dress.
Did you know that the gag response is least active in the morning? That’s right, my pretties, you’re gonna have to know things like this if you aspire to getting a gold medal in cock sucking. Besides, tidbits like this also make for the most charming dinner party trivia.
Today we’re gonna look at three important aspects of understanding and suppressing that nasty gag reflex when chowin’ down on some love muscle.
1) ANATOMY
So let’s take a semi-serious look at the gag response and why we have it. Millions of years of evolution have provided us the anatomical function we call the gag reflex to protect our throat. And as all you rocket scientists know an obstruction in your throat — in either your larynx, which connects to your lungs or the pharynx, which connects to your stomach could be deadly. And since us humans breathe more often than we swallow, the larynx is always open. We all have a piece of cartilage known as the epiglottis at the back of our throat that responds to swallowing. This is not to be confused with the uvula, which is that little thingy that hangs down from the back of your mouth.
Isn’t this fascinating? Aren’t you delighted you stopped by today? Hold on, there’s more!
The passageway to the stomach is fairly narrow, although you’d never guess that from the way some folks wolf down their food. The gag reflex protects us from getting something stuck in there. If the object being swallowed — a big old cock or a piece of cold pizza — can’t easily pass the opening of the pharynx, the epiglottis flaps triggering the gag response. This forces the foreign object — big old cock or cold pizza — out. This is a lifesaving reflex because it protects us from literally biting off more than he can swallow. And since there’s not gonna be a whole lot of biting off and chewing when we blow some dude, the gag reflex can be pretty pronounced.
The object of this tutorial is to help us subdue this lifesaving reflex when needed. The first thing we should know is when suckin’ cock, the dick in question can’t get stuck in our pharynx because, happily it’s attached to the dude we’re blowin’. It can, therefore, be removed without the coughing and choking associated with the garden variety of gagging.
Let’s review, shall we? Your tongue, your salivary glands, your hard palate, your soft palate, your uvula, your epiglottis, your tonsils, and your pharynx are all parts of the sensory experience for you as well as your partner with his dick in your mouth. When you deep throat his johnson, your uvula and the epiglottis tickle his dickhead. I guess that’s why us mens like getting’ head so much.
Like anything worth doing, mastering the gag reflex takes practice. The most important thing to remember is that we cannot simultaneously inhale and swallow. Also the epiglottis is very flexible, while the pharynx is relatively rigid.
Let’s do some math. The depth of our mouth — from the lips to the curve in the pharynx just in the back of the throat is three of four to inches. The pharynx runs another five and half inches or so before the esophagus begins, which continues another eight or nine inches. That makes for total passageway available for swallowing cock between seventeen and nineteen inches long. How’s that for adaptability? Your throat is not just for sword-swallowing any more! As long as your partner’s prick is neither too wide nor too stiff to make the turn in the pharynx, an average cocksucker can completely swallow just about anyone for a short period of time while holding his or her breath.
2) POSITION
Probably you’ve already guessed that positioning the cock your sucking at just the right angle down your throat is crucial. Check it out. Take a deep breath; insert two fingers as far as possible into your mouth. Your fingers will bend easily downward. While you’re rootin’ around inside there, you’ll immediately have a sense of internal capacity of your oral cavity. Carefully placing a couple fingers at the back of your mouth shouldn’t cause you to gag, but moving them around might. This will underscore the importance of having the willie you’re about to swallow go in the right direction.
So let’s say you’re on your knees, with the intended cock right in front of you. If it’s rock-hard and/or curved upward, as some of those darling things are, that dick is gonna go pounding against your tonsils, making you gag, sure as shootin’. The dude’s cock has to go in and then down your throat, not up and against the roof of your mouth. Got it? Jamming his member against your hard palate will also be pretty unpleasant for the owner of the said cock. This could easily give his dickhead a real owie!
This brings us to the ever-popular sixty-nine position. It’s so popular because it points the dude’s rod toward the base of your tongue, thereby successfully navigating of the curve in your throat.
3) BREATHING
A proper breathing technique is as important as position to happy deep throating. The aquatic minded among us already have the key. Swimmers know that synchronizing one’s breathing with the motion one is making with his or her arms and legs makes for less effort and more stamina. The same is true for the person gulping a big one…or even a small one for that matter. You’ll want to inhale while doing down on his cock, exhale quickly while coming up, then inhale again going back down. The deeper you inhale on the down stroke, the longer you’ll be able to hold your breath. And PRESTO! The longer you’re able to hold your breath the deeper your partner’s baloney pony will disappear down your gullet. So you see, it’s exactly like swimming, only completely different.
For the non-athletes in my audience there is another way to learn to control the gag reflex. Simply practice holding your breath and swallowing at the same time.
We could all learn a lot from the little piggie cocksucker among us. They’re in this whole blowjob thing for the long haul, and they know that pacing one’s self is crucial. They know how important it is to pull off the cock from time to time, at least far enough to take in some air before going down on it again. If you try this you could make some yummy sounds while you pull off his cock. Or you could take it out of your mouth and look at it admiringly. He’ll be impressed that you like his rigid piece of art, and only you’ll know that what you’re actually doing is simply catching your breath.
You should know that deep throating a pleasure prong is gonna make a lot of saliva. This is a double-edged sword. Great for keeping things lubed up, but problematic if that abundant saliva falls into the larynx and makes you cough and choke. If your saliva becomes a problem rather than an asset try relaxing for a bit with his cock in the forward of your mouth so that your larynx will open for breathing. This shallow sucking is a delightful counterpoint to deep throat sucking. You can also practice relaxing and stretching the muscles that regulate swallowing by opening your mouth wide, like in a yawn.
Whichever technique or combination of techniques works for you, remember to breathe. Accumulation of mucous will sometimes mean you have to take a break to spit. If you try to continue without spitting, it will just make your uncomfortable. And who need that?
Also when you deep throat your nose will run and your eyes will water. So if you’re wearing a lot of makeup when you’re blowin’ your guy, you’ll look like a raccoon with a clown face by the time you’re through. Some guys really like this. It suggests to them that they have a really big dick to have wreaked so much havoc.
You’ll probably want to keep at least one of your hands on his pole while you’re sucking it. This will give you more control, especially when he starts pelvic thrusting.
It is a good idea to keep a hand on his balls too, as they are usually a good indicator of how close your man is to cuming. As he gets closer to shooting, the skin on his scrotum tightens and pulls his balls towards his body to warm them up. You can let this happen on its own, or help out by stimulating his jewels with your hand, tongue, or mouth.
Finally, common mistake most women and some men make while blowin their guy is using only their mouth to repeatedly bob up and down his weener. This is neither pretty or particularly helpful! Some folks continue doing this until they get a sore jaw or neck. A good deep-throatin’ blowjob should not be too repetitive. The wise cocksucker will keep her/his hands busy throughout. She’ll include stroking his dick, exploring balls, thighs and asshole. By mixing things up, he’ll allow his mouth and throat muscles to relax. This will improve one’s performance and will subdue one’s gag reflex.
Name: Karla
Gender: female
Age: 32
Location: Quebec
I think I want to try spanking. I never tried it, but it gets me hot thinking about it. I think my partner might be up for it, but I have yet to ask him. I thought I’d ask you first. What are your thoughts about spanking?
If you’ve been a bad girl, Karla, then I think you definitely need a spanking. Have you been naughty, Karla? Precisely how naughty have you been, Karla? Everyone here at Dr Dick Sex Advice wants to know!
Spanking is a very popular fetish, one that can be enjoyed with or without sex. At the same time, spanking might be a little risky if you entrust the task to someone who doesn’t know what she or he is doing. Of course, it’s not particularly difficult to learn the basics. So just for you, wayward Karla, I’m gonna offer a brief sexual enrichment tutorial on erotic spanking. YEAH!
Usually a hand or a paddle of some sort is used for spanking. This is different from whipping and flogging, which are much more advanced techniques than your garden-variety spanking. We’ll leave these techniques for another time.
There are two musts in this kind of power play:
The spanker must always inquire about the health of the spankee before the play begins.
Both participants must always agree on a safeword before the play begins. A safeword is a code word that the spankee will use as she is reaching a physical, emotional or moral boundary, or for when she wants the spanker to stop the play.
The safeword will be a word that spankee would not ordinarily use during the play, like “pickles.” This extraordinary word allows the spankee to scream “no, stop”, “Please, don’t!” etc. as much as she/he wants without really meaning it, and still have a way to stop the play when necessary.
If you actually get around to enticing your partner to join you for a little spanking entertainment, make sure the first adventure is fun for all. I suggest that the spanking be part of a role-play scenario that you and your BF develop together. Your partner may need lots of positive reinforcement, particularly if he reluctant to join you in your kink. Keep telling him how much fun you’ll both have in the role-play. For example, you could be the naughty schoolgirl and your partner could be the stern headmaster. Really get into your roles; you’ll both need to dress the part, of course. You—sexy short pleated Catholic schoolgirl skirt, anklets and trashy high-heels. Him—the domineering teacher in a drab, no-nonsense grey suit. Get the picture?
The headmaster calls you into his office for a corrective interview. He needs to teach you a lesson. He puts you over his knee. He’ll do lots of bottom rubbing first, as he’s lecturing you on your bad behavior. As he gets into it, he’ll be getting turned on too. “It will be a shame to spank this beautiful bottom of yours,” he’ll coo. “This is going to hurt me as much as it hurts you!”…that sort of thing. He’ll finger your pretty panties, but won’t remove them. He’ll start spanking very gently at first. Light taps on the fleshy part of your ass cheeks. If you want more, start wiggling into the spanking. Remember to stay in character. “No, Mr. Hardwood, that hurts, please don’t touch me there! Grind into his lap. Your body language will communicate your desire for him to continue and possibly intensify the spanking.
To insure the comfort of your partner, set some ground rules for your first play session. Don’t’ do bare-bottom spanking until he readily indicates his willingness to do so. If your partner is a feminist, this whole spanking thing may go against the grain for him. So remind him this is fantasy role playing; not real life.
The more you get into your roles, the more likely he’ll get into his roles — Catholic schoolgirl/Father Flanagan, slutty patient/naughty doctor — you get the idea. The more you please him, the better he’ll please you.
You’ll want to reward your partner for his participation. After the first session take him to dinner. Ask him for his reactions. What could you have done to make the scenario more pleasurable for him? Talk about your reactions. Tell him how much you appreciated his participation. Talk about the scenario and how well he did. Tell him what you liked most about the spanking itself. If you sense that he’s content with events thus far, you could plan for more.
Set aside a couple of role-play evenings in the coming weeks. If he continues to be open and receptive, you can add more and more spanking, different implements, a ruler, a hairbrush, a paddle. If you want spankings on other parts of your body, tits, pussy, and the like introduce those slowly. The intensity of the spanking needs to be adjusted to more sensitive parts of the anatomy. Make sure there’s lots of feedback happening before and after each play session.
Spanking is a full-fledged fetish with loads of spanking associated erotica. It goes from mild to wild. Do some exploring together your BF. Check out some short stories, magazines or videos. You might want to include some of the hot girl-on-girl stuff for his benefit. Always talk about spanking in a positive way as something that is fun and enjoyable for both of you. Remember to also attend to your partner’s fantasies and the things that turn him on too. Who knows, there may be a time when the roles reverse and you could take your turn as the top and he the bottom. How fun would that be?
Like I said at the beginning, spanking is a stand-alone fetish, it may be a part of full-on sex, or it may be just a bonding thing between you and your partner.
In the end, introducing your partner to your kink is one of those — “Give To Get” things. Be attentive to him. Make sure he knows he’s the most special person in your life. The more satisfied he is; the more he’ll be open to pleasing you.
You must be logged in to post a comment.