Cosmocking: July '13!

Pinkish cover!  Kelly Osbourne!  Apparently Cosmo feels that tracheas and neck muscles are really unbecoming, this is the zillionth cover in a row where they've Photoshopped all the features off someone's neck!  (Look at the pendant. It's in the center of her chest. Now try to find the center of her throat.)  "Are you too self-obsessed"?  Take a quiz where you answer questions about yourself to find this out about yourself!

Because I have to report a lot of quotes from guys for our stories, one of the first things I did on the job [as a Cosmo writer] was put together a huge e-mail list of every guy I've ever known.  Then I started bombarding their in-boxes with totally TMI questions. ("Happy Monday! What's your favorite sex position?")

Every guy she's ever known?  Gah!  I'm guessing "how important are personal boundaries to you?" wasn't one of the questions.

Also, I just went through my address list for all the men, and a distressing number of them were either relatives or people I have a purely professional relationship with.  If I tried mass e-mailing all the male names, I'd probably end up sending "When do you think is 'too soon' for anal sex?" to my dentist.

"I love bringing guys to my summerhouse to have sex on the lake in this small kayak. The smooth rock of the boat adds unexpected movement, so every feeling is like a shock of pleasure."

I don't think Cosmo knows what a kayak is.

This is a kayak.  Now, granted, I'm sure the ideal Cosmo woman is far smaller and more flexible than I am, but still, I don't see any way that's going to work.

Anyway, I know kayak sex can't be done, because I looked for pictures of it, and I couldn't find any.   If there isn't a picture of a sex act on the Internet, it is physically impossible.

Recently, I jokingly asked my boyfriend which of my friends he'd want to hook up with if he and I weren't together. It took some convincing for him to answer, but he eventually said my best friend. I know I pushed him to answer, but now I'm worried he actually wants to hook up with her, and I'm a little resentful of my friend. Am I being a little too paranoid?

Oh for God's sake.

The troubling thing here is that Cosmo fakes all their "reader-submitted" content, so someone sat down and wrote this, and what they chose to write is the most groaningly misogynistic "women are clingy and fickle and everything they say is secretly a trap" stereotype imaginable.  Yeah, you can argue it's just this one character, nobody said all women are like that, but... this is one step away from "Dear Cosmo, I become unreasonable when I'm on my period and sometimes I deny guys sex just to amuse myself. Also I cry when I break a nail. Please advise."

[When you're traveling alone] Before you even up your hotel-room door, glance over your shoulder to make sure no one sees you enter alone--you want as few people as possible knowing you're there by yourself. If there's someone in the hallway, keep walking and loop back in a few.

And if the other person's room is at the end of the hallway you walk down, that's going to get really awkward.  Maybe she could just walk in and yell "HI HONEY I'M BACK, HOW WAS YOUR KRAV MAGA AND WEIGHTLIFTING AND TARGET SHOOTING CLASS?"  That seems like a much more convenient way to keep up the charade that women shouldn't be out of the house any time they aren't under the protection of a big strong man.

[On a travel first aid kit, because remember, the outside world is scaaaary]: Nine lifesavers. Zero chance of you in a foreign pharmacy, trying to pronounce "diarrhea" in Spanish.

"Diarrhea" in Spanish is "diarrea."


Words that this issue of Cosmo uses:
-Guyeters (guy dieters)
-Friendvy (friend envy)
-Mombomb (being compared to a man's mom)
-Sexercise (*sigh*)
-Breakup-fast (breaking up with someone via carefully arranged breakfast cereal letters)

The meanings of BDSM.

One of the tough parts about discussing BDSM in a feminist context is that everyone seems to have a different idea of what BDSM means.  (The literal answer, of course, is Bondage, Disciplominance, Sadimission, and Masochism.)  What does it mean, what dynamic is really playing out, when you do BDSM?

Does topping a person mean that you're pleasuring them, or testing their limits?  Does choosing to bottom mean that you're choosing to endure harm, or that you're merely asking someone to do things you enjoy?  Does dominating someone mean that you're using them, or that you're taking care of them?  Does submitting mean that you're naturally fit to follow rather than lead, or that you have either potential but choose to follow?

The answer to all those questions is "yes."

A lot of debates about BDSM get stuck because people assume they know the meaning of a physical action.  The simplest, and most frustrating, problem is when someone interprets "hitting" to always mean "attacking with anger and intent to harm," therefore BDSM is about anger and is harmful, QED.  But there are subtler assumptions that crop up in better-informed discussions, sometimes even inside the community.  If you're talking about forced feminization, and one person thinks that means "making someone feminine to make them lesser," and the other thinks it means "helping someone explore femininity in a kinky way," they can talk right past each other for hours.

When I say people have different ideas about what BDSM means, this isn't just about intention or emotion or philosophy.  Sometimes it's quite visible when you watch BDSM actually happen. The same activities, that we describe with the same words, can be done in very different ways that completely change the meanings.

Take rope bondage.  People can use bondage to restrain someone while they do other play, or simply tie them up and let them experience it for a while and then untie them.  It can be drippingly sexual and involve fucking in bondage, or it can be done fully clothed and nonsexually.  (Not that "naked" and "sexual" necessarily go together.  Sometimes nudity in bondage is about freedom of motion, or keeping clothing from tangling up with the rope, or feeling the rope on your skin.  Or just having an excuse to be naked.)  It can be so painful it's a form of sadism, or so comforting the bottom nearly falls asleep.  It can keep a person from moving at all, or be purely decorative ropework that they can walk around in.  It can be rough, brutal, and hastily improvised, or it can be a painstakingly crafted art form.

So when we talk about bondage, we're not talking about a unified mood, intention, or effect. We're talking about an umbrella with a gigantic amount of human variation underneath it.  And we need to acknowledge that.  I'm not saying you can't generalize anything about BDSM, but... it's a lot less than you think.  So when people ask questions like "is BDSM oppressive?", the answer isn't "no" and it isn't "yes."  The answer is "it shouldn't be and it doesn't have to be."



This has a fun side.  It's not all about sexism and abuse.  It's also a tremendously powerful tool to use in play.  Understanding how to control the mood and meaning of a scene opens up a world of glorious possibilities. You can bring your negotiation from "I want to tie you up" to "I want to tie you up sexy" or "I want to tie you up mean" or "I want to tie you up artsy." (actual phrasing not recommended)  You can agree to tie someone up sexy and tease and them with not-quite-sexual bondage before turning it sexy.  You can develop the meaning of a scene in sync with your partner, something you experience together, and the cool part is, you get to decide what that meaning is.

Cosmocking: June '13!

I don't know how long I can keep doing this.  I thought Cosmo would be Cosmo forever, but now I'm afraid/hopeful it might not be.  They have a new editor-in-chief, Joanna Coles, who is slowly and subtly steering Cosmo towards growing the fuck up.

It's not drastic--which I actually approve of; if it turned into Ms. Magazine overnight they'd just lose their audience--but changes are happening.  Each issue has just a little more political and feminist content and just a little less "30 Reasons Your Vagina Is Doing Everything Wrong."  This month's issue has profiles of a woman teaching teenage girls to program, a woman campaigning for better equal-pay laws and enforcement, a female soldier who was wounded in Afghanistan and talks about why she still believes women should be on the front lines... this is not the Cosmo I know.

The magazine is still mostly fluff, and the misogyny and general weirdness are far from gone.  So I've got enough to write about this month.  But if this keeps up, I don't know.  I might have to switch to Maxim or something.  Which might not be all bad; I've mined the well of Cosmo pretty deep at this point, and could use some freshness.  Besides, making fun of Cosmo always has a little tinge of "dammit feminine women, stop oppressing yourselves!" to it; Maximocking (preliminary working title) would be addressing the intersection of masculinity and misogyny.

But for now... Cosmocking's not dead yet!

Purple color!  Sofia Vergara!  I don't know who she is, but to be fair, the only TV shows I watch are Mythbusters and Doctor Who, so I am not a very good arbiter of pop culture notability!  Um... None of these headlines are entertainingly ridiculous!  You see why I'm having problems here! 

Ah, there's the Cosmo I know and... know.  The left-hand image is "sexy," and the right-hand is of course "skanky."  And it's a stunning contrast until you apply the slightest common sense: do you think Heidi Montag suntans in that position?  She just hangs out that way all day?  Or was she shifting position or getting up and the photographer took a picture at the exact moment that looks like she's doing a porn pose?  If anyone's skanky here, it's that photographer.

Have Drunk Sex Sober!

Beats the reverse, I guess.  The idea here is that you can have all the fun of drinking, but without the actual alcohol, by just acting uninhibited and a little bit confused.  Oh, and you should have a red lightbulb.  Red light is a lot like being drunk.

Fall into that bleary-eyed, no-words-needed kind of hookup that's the touchstone of drunk sex. Because you'll be in a slightly dreamy state, the next morning will feel almost the same: Did that really happen... or did I imagine it?

Kudos to Cosmo for not encouraging people to do this via actual alcohol, but I've never said to myself "that was pretty good sex, but dammit, I just remember it too well."

Recently, an anonymous NYC guy put up 600 fliers with the hashtag #ThisIsHowYouWinHerBack all over the city to try to get his ex back.  His efforts, alas, didn't work, but he's just the latest in a slew of men who are trying to dispel their growing rep as wimpy beta boys by posting love declarations online. "We're seeing some young men use big, look-at-me-antics to publicly take back their status as dominators."

Oh my God that guy's poor ex.  I mean, a couple points to the guy for not putting her name or picture out there, but all points immediately subtracted forever because being surrounded by hundreds of public "I won't let you go" messages from your ex is still horrifying no matter how memey-clever they are.

They're right, though, this is a very dominating gesture.  And that's not a good thing.  That's not "taking back" some God-given right he has as a man.  It's putting someone in a submissive position who most likely did not want to and definitely did not agree to be in that position.

[When there's lube on your hands after sex,] use the excess lube to grease each other up. Rub it on his chest and your breasts, since those areas are less likely to come into contact with the fancy linens you scored for 50 percent off at OneKingsLane.com.

1. Ew.  I mean, nothing against people who like it messy, but if you're just trying to be neat and tidy, this is... not neat and tidy.

2. Oh man, I want to see someone try this with silicone lube.

3. Really depends on position what parts of you touch the sheets.

4. Smooth product placement there, champ.  Barely noticed it.

[How to tell if a male friend wants to date you:] Tell him all about other guys you're dating, and see how he reacts.  Or ask about one of his good friends as though you're interested.  If he gets annoyed or defensive, there's a chance he may have feelings for you.

Cosmo doesn't describe how you transition the conversation from "I'm dating a ton of dudes these days... by the way, is Steve single?" to "oh, never mind, I was just making things up to upset you, want to go out?"  That seems like the difficult part.

Could You Fall for a Guy Wearing Clogs?

See? The new, more political Cosmo is all about tackling the tough issues.

[ETA: The video linked in comments on this post, and the ensuing discussion, deal with sexual harassment and assault.]

What I Mean When I Say I'm Sex-Positive.

Pride Pterodactyl, by Rowdy's roomie

I'm sex-positive!

And I'm realizing that's a painfully ambiguous term.  I've seen people use it to mean everything from "not viewing sex as inherently evil" to "insisting that everyone should have tons of orgasms and it'll solve all their problems."  You can see how people using the first definition could have some seriously unproductive arguments with people thinking they're using the second. 

About the "orgasms for everyone!" thing.  It's not entirely a strawman.  I once saw a presentation by Annie Sprinkle (who clearly wrote her own Wikipedia page) where she basically argued that we would have world peace and feminist utopia if everyone in all the armies just fucked and had orgasms instead.   It's superficially sweet-sounding--yay, pleasure!--but there's some really obvious problems.  Not everyone can have orgasms, not everyone wants orgasms, and there are lots of people who have fabulous orgasms but they're still assholes.

Sex-positivity has had problems with misconstruing personal choice as sexual repression and sexual exploitation as personal choice, and I don't want to deny that.  ("Sex work is always great because sex is super fun happy time" is every bit as vacuous as "sex work is always terrible because no one could ever possibly choose that.")  I also don't want to deny that I've done it myself at times.  But I do want to move away from it.

So here's my definition/manifesto.  Defifesto.  (I wrote a much shorter version on Tumblr, and I thought it was worth expanding upon.)  When I say that I'm sex-positive, this is what I mean:

•I think freedom of sexuality is something that we all need and very few of us have.

•I think sexual pleasure is a legitimate thing to want and ethically pursue.

My sex-positivity does not exist in opposition to non-sex-positive feminism.  It exists in opposition to fucked-up social sexual norms.  It exists in opposition to the people who attack any sexuality outside strict norms, the people who demand women and girls be sexy but humiliate them for being sexual, the people who treat discussions of sexual safety and consent like obscenity, the society that constructs sexual desire as something dark and dirty and secret and awful.  That is sex-negativity.  That is the real reason sex-positivity matters.

•I reject preconceptions of what kind of sexuality a person "should" have, whether these preconceptions are based on gender, age, race, culture, disability, trans status, survivor status, or basically anything else.

•I do not judge people for the ethical sex that they have or want.
"Ethical" means "not harming others." Ethics doesn't have a damn thing to say about whether your sex should be kinky, heterosexual, fully clothed, anal, unmarried, boring, gay, still going at age 80, in a kiddy pool full of Karo syrup, twice a year, with twelve people, or not exist at all--and therefore, neither do I.

•I will not tolerate hatred of sex workers.

This means from all sides: employers and customers as well as moralists and police.  Sex workers are people; sex work is work.  There's often a shit-ton of misogyny and exploitation in the sex industry, but the "misogyny" and "exploitation" parts are the problem and what we should be working to fight.  Not the "sex" part.

•I believe comprehensive, honest, non-judgmental sex education is necessary for public health and happiness.
•I think understanding of sexual consent—what it is, why it matters—is sorely lacking in society and crucially important.

These two really, really need to go together.  If abstinence-only sex ed is like driver's ed without talking about cars, then sex ed without talking about consent is like driver's ed where they show you the gas and the brake, but assume you'll pick up all the "how to follow traffic laws so you don't kill people" bits on your own.

•I think the diversity and power of human sexuality is goddamn awe-inspiring.

Sex has the potential to bring great joy or great suffering.  Sex-positivity, to me, means celebrating and cultivating the joy.  Not imposing it upon people, not ignoring the suffering.  But believing that sex brings enough good things to enough people's lives that it is worth talking about, worth working on.

On the other hand, when I say I'm sex-positive, here are a few things that I absolutely do not mean:

•Everyone should have sex.
•Everyone should have kinky, non-monogamous, exhibitionistic, orgasmic, pansexual sex.

Some people are asexual. Some people are sexual but not all that into it.  Some people are monogamous, heterosexual, and not into kink.  Some people have physical or psychological issues that interfere with them having sex.  Trying to "free" any of these people from their "repression" is ignorant, presumptuous, and the very opposite of promoting sexual freedom.

•Accepting someone’s way of having sex means you have to participate in it, watch them engage in it, or hear about it in detail.

Yeah.  Ew.  I hate that I even have to say this.  But it comes up.  And ew.

(Caveat: "you don't have to watch it or hear about it" does assume some initiative on your part to avoid things you don't want to see.  If you say "don't tell me about your sex life," when I'm talking to you, I will respect that; if you say "don't tell me about your sex life" in response to writing not directed at you and clearly labeled as sex writing, I will tear my hair out.)

•Nothing related to sex is ever hurtful for anyone.

•Nothing related to sex should be criticized.

"If it's consensual and ethical, it's all okay" is worlds away from "if it's related to sex, it's all okay."  Worlds.

And I do believe things can be unethical even if all the sex involved is consensual.  Cheating is unethical.  Fetishizing people based on racial stereotypes is unethical.  Treating people as sex objects is unethical.  Imposing strict norms of gender expression and sexual behavior on others is unethical even if you come up with some convoluted argument for why it's your sexuality.

Responsible sex-positivity requires a thorough examination of sexual ethics.  It's just that whether something seems "freaky" or hedonistic or something you wouldn't enjoy yourself should play no part in those ethics.

•Feminism should be all about sex.
•Sex fixes everything.

I'm wary of anything that smacks of "making feminism sexy."  Sex-positivity should be a part of feminism because sexuality is important--not because feminism needs spicing up.  I really don't want to imply any "be a feminist ally and you'll get lots of kinky sex" deals here, or any "don't worry, we're not man-haters, we're into stripteases and blowjobs!" cajoling.  The challenge of integrating sex-positivity into feminism is communicating "women's sexual desire matters" without giving any ammunition to "women are for sex."

Plus, there's a lot of worthy feminist goals that just can't be shoehorned into being about sex.  I think promoting women's sexual autonomy and respecting the diversity of female sexuality should be a part of feminism, but I'm under no illusions that this is going to fix hiring discrimination or domestic violence.  There's a lot of unsexy work to be done in feminism, and sex-positivity shouldn't eclipse that.

No, we won't get feminist utopia through sexual freedom, but that's okay, because sexual freedom is an end in itself.  And that's what I mean when I call myself sex-positive.

Cosmocking: May '13!

It's that time again!  Blue-green cover!  Rachel Bilson!  I have no idea who that is!  "Stuff You Think He Wants In Bed... But Really Doesn't!"  Shit, look at that grammar, I think Cosmo's headline machine is jamming up!  They better unclog it quick or they'll have "847 Ways Sex To Man Your Man Sex Man" all over the floor!

There's an actually-quite-good article in this issue about "My First Year as a Woman," by Laura Jane Grace writing about her transition.  Cosmo doesn't at all acknowledge that horrible article from a couple months ago where they were making fun of a blatantly-fictional trans woman, but maybe this is a quiet apology?  More likely, it was written way in advance and no one at Cosmo even realizes the connection.

Testosterone, one of the hormones that regulates sexual desire, is always higher in the beginning of a relationship for both men and women [...] But as the novelty wears off, less testosterone is produced, and sex with that person seems a little less interesting.

I was going to make fun of this, but it turns out that it's true; barring supplementation or something, people's testosterone always does get lower as a relationship goes on.  Because testosterone decreases with age.

Excessive masturbation will tax a man's libido and make it so he doesn't have a lot of mojo left for you.

In other news from 1829, graham crackers will prevent impure thoughts, as will corn flakes, and taking them along with pure living and cold baths can help you avoid the scourge of self-abuse and consequent blindness.

Unless he's blowing off work to get his fix, it's not something that requires therapy, but it does warrant a discussion.  "Let him know that you can feel the power of his erection when he hasn't ejaculated in a day or two," says Kerner. "That should give him the hint."

Yeah, I don't think you're going to be able to fool him on this one.  I'm pretty sure he can feel the power of his erection himself.

My Boobs Lost Their Power 

[Author has breasts. She discusses this.] A huge part of what I appreciated about having breasts was how much men appreciated me having them. As much as dating can suck, the one consistently fun part was the reaction I got when I took of my top. It was like being in Cirque du Soleil without doing any work. 

[Author enters a long-term relationship.] I wasn't prepared for the scene that occurred two months into our cohabitation. Him: Getting ready for work. Me: Also getting ready, but in jeans, topless as I searched for my bra. I thought this was a pretty hottish look, but when I walked into the bedroom, he looked me in the eyes and asked where his socks were. It's a strange feeling, as a woman, to feel air against your breasts and be talking about laundry. That's when I realized my favorite party trick was no longer new at this party. 

My rack and I entered a mourning phase. We missed even the goofy adolescent attention that we used to get from him--the honk-honks and the Tune in Tokyos that he'd dole out with a dopey grin.

Oh man, I remember when I could freeze a guy mid-sentence and make him turn all goggle-eyed just by showing my boobs.  It was from about January to March of 2002.  After that, my boyfriend still liked my breasts just fine, but no longer made anime nosebleed faces when I got them out.  And everyone I got naked with after that had been in other sexual relationships and thus also gotten over their "anime nosebleed" stage, generally at some point in high school.

Which I was grateful for, because when it's morning and we're getting dressed and we have to go to work and all, I don't really want to be the Cirque du Soleil.  I'm very glad I get to decide which times are Sexy Times, instead of getting dragged into it every time I shower or change my clothes.

Then again, clearly I have a lot of philosophical differences from this author, because I have never once felt a twinge of wistful nostalgia for having my breasts honked.

7 Moves You Think He Wants In Bed -- But He Really Doesn't 

2. Strongly hint that you're in the mood, then play hard to get and make him work at seducing you

That's actually a good point, except for the part where every other issue of Cosmo lovingly teaches women how to do exactly that.

Also, the reasoning they give for this isn't "because he can't tell with 100% certainty the difference between 'hard to get' and 'actually not wanting it,' and refusing to clarify this is not just annoying, it erodes the meaningfulness of consent in your relationship."

No, it's "Just what a guy wants when he gets home from work: more work."  Because "The Chase is a game for those who've just met."  (And then the author gives the example of how he dated a vegan girl so he ate vegan food to have sex with her, and that's some serious work.  He ate cheeseburgers afterwards though, wink nudge!)  And, of course, "we worked hard to catch you in the first place, so let's just enjoy the fruits of our labor."

Oh yeah, that's what women are into: feeling like particularly large fish.

So here's the thing: Guys don't require fancy moves or costumes to get turned on. We're simple creatures with simple needs.

"We're simple creatures with simple needs, and that's why you need to subscribe to an entire magazine about how to find us; how to dress, make up, and present yourself to please us; how to perform a large variety of numbered sex acts upon us; which sex acts you must never perform; and why you're screwing up all your relationships with us.  Because we are so simple!"

Cosmo Sexicon: Whipdar 

whip-dar, n., A woman's astute ability to sense just how whippable a guy really is.  

Does anyone really want to "whip" their boyfriend?  (Certainly some people want to whip their boyfriend, and hey, that's just fine if he's into it.)  I mean, when I watch TV shows with Rowdy, it's because I think we both enjoy them and we're bonding over them.  If I found out he felt "whipped" into it and actually hated the shows, I'd be crushed.

Then again, I live in a universe where people of different genders can enjoy the same activities.

If you simply tell him you're not going to have an orgasm, what he may hear is: "I'm not enjoying this at all. You are less than a man."

Well, tough, because that's not what I said.  I am not responsible for things people decide to imagine I said.

Cosmo's advice, however, is that if you're not going to come you should try and make him come, because that'll get it over with, and boy, there's nothing more sexy and intimate than getting it over with.

I get excited when my crush Likes my pictures on Instagram. But he Likes a lot of other girls' pictures as well. We seem to have a good connection in person. Can Liking my photos mean something more?

If it simplifies your life any, person, I don't Like this at all.

"How can you be a feminist and do BDSM?"

[I'm back!  I know, another really long unannounced hiatus.  I have a good excuse this time.  I had to move sort of unexpectedly and under less than ideal conditions.  I still don't know what I want to say about it, except that this wasn't about Rowdy; Rowdy continues to be awesome.  Anyway.  I'm in a good place now and I have time/energy to write again.]

Journal Of Secrets

I don't think I've ever really answered the title question, even though it's the most obvious thing that comes up when you identify yourself as a feminist who's also into BDSM.  How does this work for me?  Isn't it a big ol' conflict to be for equality and respect for all genders and then give a thumbs-up to men leading women around on leashes and hitting them with whips?

My usual flippant answer--which also happens to be my most  emotionally honest--is that it's like asking how I can be a feminist and keep guinea pigs.  What do my hobbies have to do with anything?  Kink is just a fun activity that involves a different part of my personality.

A deeper answer is that it's pleasurable for everyone involved.  The things I think of as feministically troubling are things that harm someone.  Job and school discrimination harm women economically.  Sexism harms women emotionally.  Violence harms women physically and emotionally.  Receiving pain in BDSM makes me feel strong, makes me feel desired, makes me feel present in the moment, makes me feel alive.  (Also, makes me feel extraordinarily horny and kinda high.)  I know that's not proof that it's good for me or for women, but... it's a significant piece of evidence.  I put up with misogynist environments sometimes because they're the path of least resistance for my personal goals; BDSM requires absolutely no "putting up with."  Good kink experiences are personal goals in themselves.

I also find a lot of the arguments against kink, like the ones in this much-mocked article and many of the ones that pop up in feminist contexts like this random post, to be deeply... god, I'm sick of the word "problematic."  Fuckin' weasel word that can mean anything from "got some facts wrong" to "basically a Nazi."  I find these arguments to be misguided and annoying and sometimes demeaning in exactly the ways feminists are supposed to oppose.



For one thing, a whole lot of those arguments could apply to plain ol' sex.  It can be used as a weapon of, and an excuse for, horrific abuse?  People are sometimes unintentionally harmed doing it?  It's horrible when done nonconsensually?  There are some really awful people who are into it?  A lot of the narratives around it are sexist, hetero/cisnormative, body-policing, and glamorize unsafe and questionably consensual activities?  The industries that sell media and services related to it are often nightmarishly exploitative?  I don't want to deny or minimize the fact that all these things happen in BDSM.  I just don't think it's any worse in kink than in sex.

Actually, I'll go a little further than that.  While "kink is always consensual!" is facile white-washing, on average kinksters are more aware than the general population of what consent is and why it matters.  We talk about it a lot more, and we (at least try to) socially normalize the idea of negotiating it.  We acknowledge that different relationships have different rules and roles, and that gender does not determine them.  We freely admit that lots of people simply aren't wired for what we do, or for specific ways of doing it.  We have concepts like "Risk Aware Consensual Kink" and "Your Kink Is Not My Kink, But Your Kink Is OK."  Again, I won't pretend we all apply these concepts all the time, but... the fact that we even hold these as ideals puts us a little bit ahead of society at large.

I also think a lot of "BDSM is sexist" arguments wouldn't long survive an encounter with a female dominant or a male submissive.  Female dominance is not about women dressing up in leather for men to admire.  It is an actual kink that women can have.  If you see a woman getting her rocks off by having a man service her, and you think "clearly she's only doing that to please him," you're desexualizing her and disregarding her desires.  Although you're still a step ahead of the people who don't even acknowledge that female dominance is a thing at all.

Of course, if we got into the fact that same-sex, nonbinary, and nonsexual kink exist, we'd be here all day.  (I've heard arguments that queer kink is still sexist because people are enacting male and female roles, but... if you see someone who isn't a man being dominant and you think "clearly she's being the man here," I think the problem is on your end.)  And I don't even know what would happen if we let some of these critics know about switching.

Finally, there's the question of whether feminism has any business saving women from themselves.  Because there's a really bad track record here.  At various times, various branches of feminism have swooped in to "save" femme women, married women, women who stay home with their kids, women who do sex work, cis women who welcome trans women into women's spaces--and it has always been a disaster.  It's forced women to defend their dignity and even their safety from the people who are supposed to be advocating for them.  I'm not saying any of these groups are the same as submissive women, obviously, only that "you say you want this... you poor thing" hasn't historically worked out well for feminism.



How can I be a feminist and do BDSM?  Because I trust women to know their own desires.  Because BDSM does not stand apart from the world at large, and if we have to live in this world anyway, we might as well do what we love.  Because I love and respect my body, my mind, and my potential as a human being--and all three are going "hell yeah, I totally want this."

Cosmocking: April '13!

Yellow cover!  Kim Kardashian!  I don't know what's going on with her... lower garment!  I think Cosmo's stylists are getting pretty desperate to make the 35,000-year-old concept of "wearing clothes" seem fresh and new every month!  Go ahead and trace a line from the center of Kim's cleavage to the center of her neck and explain what kind of skeletal structure that implies!  Also please note that her arms are different lengths!

(I think what's going on here is that they've Photoshopped away all creases and features on her neck, which makes the side of her neck look like the front.  And they posed her with both arms behind her so that her chest would stick out, but then her right arm looked wrong or wasn't visible, so they pasted on a replacement arm.  Which would explain the surreal way her hand is interacting with her thighs.)

"I loved reading 'Can Sex Make You Skinnier?'  The next time I had an intense carb craving, I marched right into my bedroom and pounced on my sleeping, unsuspecting boyfriend.  I'm thankful for my new weapon in battling bulge, and my boyfriend is too!  Thanks, Cosmo!"  --Sarah A., Nashville, Tenn.

I'm not, like, an expert in forensic writing analysis or anything, but I think Cosmo's letters page is fake.  Just a hunch here.

Also I would prefer to not eroticize "pouncing" on "unsuspecting" people, but if I point out every time Cosmo does that, we'll be here all day.

Four tiny bottles, each with a secret code name, sit on a shiny table in front of Kim Kardashian, awaiting inspection.  Inside the vial are versions of her latest fragrance, Glam, which is being tweaked to appeal to Japanese consumers. [...] She waves each test strip in front of her perfect, pert nose.  Opulence is too heavy for Asian tastes, she proclaims.  Sequins? Too soft.  "I don't even smell Glitzy any more," she says, before settling on her choice: Geisha Garden.

Kim Kardashian, cross-cultural marketing genius.

Within hookup culture on college campuses, dating is one of the most radical, nonconformist things you can do.

Oh, for fuck's sake.  Yes, young people have casual sex.  No, the entire population between ages 16 and 26 is not subsumed into this boogeyman "hookup culture" where they're all like "what is this Earth thing you call 'love'?"  I would really like the media to get over this particular obsession already and move on to telling us that eating caramel leads to Satanism, or something.

Because our ancestors spoke with their bodies rather than language, we learn more from gestures than words when first meeting someone.  If he's facing you directly, you have his full attention.

I don't think we needed to invoke grunting cavemen to explain the concept of "people look at things they're interested in."

...I would also like to explain to Cosmo that all language is produced by the body.

Make him feel like a piece of meat: "It's a huge turn-on to hear a woman objectify me," 30-year-old Christopher says.  "It seems simple, but it's so powerful."  Take his words to heart and don't be afraid to tell your guy everything you like about his body or what he does that drives you crazy.  He'll be obsessed.

That's not what objectification means.  That's not making him feel like a piece of meat.  That's just sexual compliments.  Yeah, sure, it's easy to say "I don't know what those ladies are complaining about, you can objectify me anytime" if you think it means your girlfriend tells you you have sexy abs.

Objectification is focusing on a person's usefulness to you with total disregard for their desires.  In the context of compliments, it's not saying "You turn me on."  It's saying "You turn me on, and whether you want to turn me on is utterly irrelevant."

Saying "nice ass" to a person who's deliberately wiggling their ass at you is a compliment; saying "nice ass" to a person who's just walking by is objectification.  "I want to sleep with her" is expressing desire;  "I'd hit it" is objectification.  "You're sexy" is nice to say on a date because it's a compliment; "you're sexy" is hideously undermining to say at a business meeting because it's objectification.

Q: My guy constantly asks me for cash to pay the bills.  He's going through a rough time and I don't mind helping out, but how can I stop this from being a regular thing? 

A: The fact that he's asking you for financial help--a tough thing for many guys to do--is a sign that he trusts you.

He Said He Wasn't Ready For Kids [...]  One month, I realized I'd forgotten to take my birth control pill... for five days.  I asked Matt if he thought this was a sign.  "I don't think it's time yet," he said.  Three months later, the same thing happened.

Oh shit, I already used my "this will not end well" image.

(In seriousness, sabotaging birth control is a horrible thing to do, both to your partner and your potential child.  It's really not a cutesy-wootsey "tee hee, whoopsy daisy, hint hint" thing to do.  It's pretty highly correlated with domestic violence.)

The Man-Child Meter  

[selected items from a big boring list of stuff like "he's a man-child if he only eats pizza" and "he's a real man if he has nice wineglasses"]

Man-Child: Invites you over to watch a movie, then texts you to pick up a six-pack on the way 

Getting There: Attempts to go down on you (he's trying!) 

Yep, He's A Man: Reaches for a condom before you have to ask

1. What's wrong with asking someone to bring beer?  I guess it's a little demanding, but "hey, honey, I'm out of beer over here, you want to bring some with you?" is really not that out of line if you like to have a beer with your movie.

2. How do you "attempt" to go down on a person?  Was he licking her knee?
"No, sweetie, not there."
"Okay, how about here?  Is this your clitoris now?"
"Sweetie, that's my elbow."

3. I guess this does rank higher than "just going ahead and having unprotected sex unless you stop him," but... significantly lower than "actually discussing protection before 0.4 seconds prior to intercourse."

Many things in my life are about control and domination, but eating should be a submissive experience, where you let down your guard and enjoy the ride.  I don't have much patience for people who are self-conscious about the act of eating, and it irritates me when someone denies themselves the pleasure of a bloody hunk of steak or a pungent French cheese because of some outdated nonsense about what's appropriate or attractive.  Stop worrying about how your breath's going to smell, whether there's beurre blanc on your face, or whether ordering the braised pork belly will make you look fat. [...] It's all about the enjoyment of the moment and the company and the food.  And if you can be yourself slurping spicy peanut noodles in front of another person, you may have a keeper.

This issue has an article by Anthony Bourdain!  What the heck is he doing here?  Anyway, it's awesome.  And not just because he writes with actual voice instead of "frenemy's va-jay-jay sexcapades" Cosmo-diction.  It's awesome because this is the only article in this magazine full of anatomically detailed sex talk that is actually about pleasure.

A Cosmo writer could have written "have fun eating, because men like it when you're not self-conscious, and it'll totally improve your mood!"  But it took an outside voice to say "have fun eating, because food is awesome."

Bottom skills.

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.

How To Have Sex On Purpose.

Captain Awkward. Or Sue.  I might have gotten my notes switched.

I had an amazing time in Chicago this weekend.   Everyone at the University of Chicago was absolutely wonderful to me, and the talk went great; the room was packed, the audience was great, and besides my little monologue, we had a really good discussion about negotiating sex and relationships.  And then I got to go to the Field Museum and meet Captain Awkward (the blogger) and Sue (the dinosaur).  It was so ridiculously awesome that I'm all out of eloquence and just going "so ridiculously awesome, you guys!"

This is a (rough) transcript of the talk I gave.  It's on a separate page because it's quite a bit longer than my usual posts.  And that's saying something.

Cosmocking: March '13!

[Content notes (and how fucked up is it that a fluffy fashion magazine needs them?): fat-hatred, transmisogyny.]

Pink cover!  Miley Cyrus!  ...wait, what?!  That's Miley Cyrus?!  HANNAH MONTANA?!  Whoa.

...You know what, good for her.

Finally Stop Living Paycheck To Paycheck

Hey broke ladies, it turns out it's super easy to save money!  All you have to do is limit yourself to spending only $1100 on rent and $900 a month on entertainment, and you'll work your way out of poverty in no time!  Don't you feel silly now?

They also describe paying more than 30% of your income in rent as a "faux pas," as if it's a Fashion Don't to want a roof over your head while being poor.

Have a pizza picnic party in bed.  No TV allowed--put on a sexy playlist, and sit across from each other like you would at a restaurant. Serve the pizza on plates, pour some wine, and don't be afraid to get messy with that margherita. 

I've been accused of just not understanding romance in my Cosmocking.  I dunno.  Maybe there's some truth in that.  Because I see this cute little idea for Manic Pixie Dream Girl antics, and all I can think is "oh jeez, that is never washing out."

Orgasms are tension busters, so after a hard day at work, pull your guy close and whisper, "All I want is for you to make me come."  Hello.  When there's a problem, men like to fix it, so you're making him feel like a total stud while getting yours at the same time.

This would be sexy if they didn't give all these fake-ass "reasons."  Let's edit, shall we?

Orgasms feel awesome, so when you want one, pull your partner close and whisper, "All I want is for you to make me come."  Hello.  A lover who knows what they want is hot as hell.

See, just as fun, but doesn't make my vagina sound like a cracked fan belt he needs to replace.

On nights when you want to let your freak flag fly, assume an alter ego. [...]  It's easier to get into character when you don't look like you, so meet him at the door wearing a wig.  Tell him that "Erin is working late tonight.  I'm her evil twin."  His night just got a lot more interesting.

I kind of want to do this, but not with a wig.

 "GREETINGS.  I AM EVIL CLIFF.  IT IS ONLY LOGICAL THAT WE COMMENCE INTIMATE RELATIONS."

...actually that's kind of how we have sex anyway.

[on where to hide a video of you having sex]  Bury the flick in a folder within a folder within a folder on your computer, with a boring name that would never intrigue anyone, like Thank You Card List.

My porn folder, age 15: C:\ windows \ desktop \ stuff \ boring stuff \ old boring stuff
My porn folder, age 20: C:\  program files \ utility \ xp64 \ config \ temp \ 0334 [encrypted] 
My porn folder, age 25: C:\ porn

The 3 Words He Never Wants to Hear You Say 

Imagine the worst thing a guy could say to your (thought joggers: "I'm in love with your sister," "I killed a man..."), multiply it by 10, add a full weekend of nothing but golf on TV--and you'll start to understand how awful it is for us to hear "I look fat" coming out of a girl's mouth.

Oh God.  This is that awful game where you have to obsess over your weight to be sexy, but if you ever let it be known that you're obsessing over your weight, that's terrible.  Sometimes it goes by "order a steak on dates so he knows you're laid-back" followed by five pages of diet tips.  This time it goes by "hearing your insecurities is so hard for me."

Your guy knows you're not fat.  He can see you're not fat.  But the more you say you're fat, the more he'll start to question the evidence.

But I am fat.  I'm not being self-deprecating or whatever, I'm just being... roundish.  And I don't think any combination of words would cause a person who sees me naked to question the "evidence" that my body is the size and shape that it appears to be.

Of course, this sentence makes perfect sense if you understand "fat" to be a word with absolutely no relation to a person's weight or size, but simply an insult of their worth and sexual appeal.  Which seems to be the thing these days.  Kind of painful if you also happen to be roundish, but I don't think "not being painful" was a priority in this process.

[Q: My boyfriend's roommate ogles me and puppydogs me and it's weird.] 

A: Although the roommate should be more subtle about it, checking you out doesn't mean anything.  Men ogle attractive women all the time, even when those women are dating their buddies.  Other than that, it sounds like the roommate's only crime is being exceedingly polite.  If you say something to your guy, it'll create at best an awkward situation and at worst a volatile one.

Yeah, I should have warned you.  This is the point where Cosmo goes completely off the rails.  Where it crosses from "mostly goofy, kinda problematic" to "oh FUCK this was printed THIS YEAR?"  Beyond here I can't even be funny.

"He Didn't Want to Date Me -- He Wanted to Be Me!"

Cosmo's new "Worst Date Ever" column (which is 100% fictional) seems to be a continual fountain of bigotry--it was biphobia last time--but this is a new low.  I don't even want to quote this one.  Basically, the author meets up with an OkCupid date who turns out to be a trans woman.  And her (the date's) behavior is of course hilariously weird and flaky and she reverses in ten seconds from advertising herself as a sexy man to demanding the author do her makeup and go shopping with her.  It's all just the sloppiest, meanest caricature of trans women imaginable. And it plays right into the disgusting "trans people aren't people, they're plot devices to comically/terrifyingly trick you into being gay!" narrative.  It's illustrated with a picture of a big hairy leg in a high-heel shoe.  Once again, I don't think I can be funny about this.

Dammit, Cosmo.  You're supposed to be silly-terrible.  This is no fun when you're straight-up-hatred terrible.

P.S.: In case you missed it last time, I'm talking in Chicago this Saturday!  It's gonna be awesome!

Getting negotiation going.

First, some big news:

I am going to be speaking at the University of Chicago Sex Week!
More details available here, but the short version:

• 5:30 to 7:00pm on February 16th
• The eighth floor of Logan Center (directions on linked page) at the University of Chicago
• It's free and open to the public, and you can register here.

I’m going to be speaking about “How To Have Sex On Purpose”—about creating an intentional and conscious sexuality, informed by kink and poly ethics. Or, less pretentiously: how to go from “sex just happens between us” to “we do sex.” (Doing is better. Not just on, like, an ethical philosophical relational whatever level. Better on the “OH FUCK YEAH” level too.)

We now return you to your incredibly irregularly scheduled Pervocracy.

I never can find pictures that represent these abstract topics.
Here's the cuddly enema that hangs out next to my lab bench at school.

A question I got on Tumblr:

So, I've reread your blog posts on relationship negotiation several times each, because they're so awesome, so I was wondering if you might have some advice. Relationship negotiation meetings is something I'd really like to do. My partner likes the idea too. However, we're both worried that we'll just end up sitting there with neither of us having any idea what to say. Do you have any advice/resources for beginning/structuring such a meeting? Possible discussion questions/categories, etc?

The way these things begin is: awkwardly.  Sitting down and talking frankly about what you're doing in a relationship is awkward as fuck and I can't really sugarcoat that.  It's awkward because it's an activity that completely lacks a cultural script.  It's not something you're "supposed" to do, it's not something you get to watch others do in real life or in media, and the only version of it that does get talked about is one where "can we talk?" means "you're in trouble."  So this isn't going to go super smoothly the first time, and that's okay.  Being real and vulnerable enough to be awkward with each other is great for a relationship.

But how do you get it to go at all?

It starts before you meet, with both of you asking yourselves what you want to get out of the discussion.  What needs work in your relationship?  What's causing you difficulty right now?  If you could have the perfect relationship, how would it be different from this one?  It doesn't have to be all big-deal serious things.  "I need you to stop stealing the blanket" is every bit as legitimate to bring out here as "I need to know how you really feel about my body."  Plus, seeing how able you are to come to an amicable agreement on a simple thing like "we should have two twin-size blankets" is good motivation and practice for working on touchier issues.

I've said this before, in a different context, but any time you catch yourself thinking "well, of course what I would say if I could is XYZ, but I can't possibly," that's your brain telling you exactly what you need to say.  Also, any time something makes you think "I'm unhappy about XYZ, but obviously my partner knows that and has decided to do it anyway," definitely bring it up, because like 75% of the time the answer will be "oh shit, I had no idea that was a problem."

Come to the table with requests, not complaints.  Try to turn every statement about what's wrong into a statement about what you need instead.  (It's okay to not always have solutions in mind.  Just say "I need [thing] to stop/start/change" or "I want us to find a solution to [thing]," rather than "[thing] is bad.")  Even though it's almost the same statement, "I want to have more sex" is a lot easier and less upsetting to address than "I feel like we never have sex anymore."  It makes "we can totally have more sex, I'd like that too" into an agreeable response instead of a defensive one.

Make a date for your first discussion (we call ours the State Of The Relationship Address, because giving it a silly name makes it feel more like "our thing" and less like getting called to the principal's office) somewhere quiet that doesn't mind people camping out for a while--a park bench, a coffeeshop, or a particularly boring bar.

(Actually, it got updated to State Of Our Union, and then corrected to State Of Our Intersection, but anyway.)

Bring notes, and take notes.  It may be dorky--it may even help to acknowledge it's dorky and laugh at it--but nothing says "the serious part of this conversation has started now" like getting out a notepad with "need more attention paid to my clitoris" on it.

As for things to actually discuss, if "stuff that you want to be more better" feels like a hopelessly broad field:

• Sex! Are you happy with the amount you're having?  The type?  Who initiates?  Is there something you'd love to try but couldn't possibly bring up?  Is there something you secretly hate but have been politely not complaining about?
• How much time you spend together.  Too much, too little, too often spent fiddling around the house being bored?
• The path your relationship is on.  Is it something that's going to escalate along the traditional dating -> moving in -> marriage -> kids pathway, follow a less traditional path, or simply stay where it's at?  Obviously your partner can't promise you what the future will bring, but at least saying "I'm hoping if we stay together we can..." versus "I'm really not ever looking for..." can seriously clear the air.
• Fun things you'd like to do together.  Like I said, this doesn't have to all be Heavy Processing.  "We should plan a trip to Maine!" is worth bringing up too.
• Are you monogamous?  If so, what does that mean to you--just no sleeping with other people, or no expressing any kind of attraction, or something in between?  I know this one can be pretty easy to shove under the rug of "but I don't want anyone but you anyway," but it's good to clarify how you feel about flirting/kissing/dinner dates/etc. before you're debating about a specific incident.
• Are you open or poly?  If so, there's a whole bunch of issues that open up, but some relevant ones are: scheduling, how you can express it and what will comfort you if you feel jealous, how much you want them to tell you about what they do with other people, when/whether you want to meet their other partner(s), how you're handling safe sex issues.
• Their friends, your friends, mutual friends--is there anyone who's a major problem for you?  It's hard to ask a partner to drop a friend (although... depends what they've done), but they should at least know what you're feeling.  Or, conversely, do you want to spend more time with your/their/plural-your friends and feel more like you're partnered socially as well as romantically?
• If you live together, all the roommate issues that brings up--chores, budgeting, standards of cleanliness, making your sleep schedules work together, making your "I want to be totally undisturbed while I do this" versus your "I want to interact with you" needs work together.
• How you argue.  "We never argue" isn't good; it means at least one of you is suppressing their disagreement.  But obviously fighting rather than arguing is really, really bad.  Make it explicit between you that dissent is always okay and personal attacks never are, and that you will make every effort to remember the difference.
• That you love each other, and feel your love is worth working on.  Because the end result of all the above shouldn't just be a workable arrangement; it should be a workable arrangement with someone you find incredibly awesome.  Affirming that before, during, and after the meeting makes a big difference.

So that's kind of a lot!  I hope it helps.  I'm sure smart people will add things in the comments that I didn't even think of.

Cosmocking is next!

Circumstantial evidence.

A vaginal photoplethysmograph. It knows what you like.
Even if you disagree.

I got about fifteen pages into Sex at Dawn before giving up. Partly because it seemed to be breaking down "monogamy is natural and therefore good" only to replace it with equally narrow thinking about "polyamory is natural and therefore good."  Partly because the opening chapter is viciously snarky about how everyone is unhappy and bad at sex these days because of their stupid monogamy delusion, which, even though I'm poly, grates on me like condescending sandpaper.  Partly because some of their evidence for universal bad-at-sex-ness is the frequency of Viagra use and female sexual dysfunction--apparently physical genital problems are just proof of your hang-ups, man.

Partly because there's a part where they make the argument that a woman's "copulatory vocalizations" are supposed to excite other men and invite them to have sex with her too, and... NO and EW and WHAT.

But mostly, I gave up on Sex at Dawn because it's full of a problem a lot of sex research suffers from--the love of circumstantial evidence.


Want to know why women moan during sex?  (Or, for starters, whether all women moan during sex?)  What would your first step in answering this question be?

Well, if you're a Serious Sex Researcher, some approaches you might take:
• Watch female chimps having sex.
• Gather media about fictional women making sex noises.
• Dissect female cadavers, searching for the sex-noise node of the brain.
• Read anthropological accounts of the sex-noise practices of women in isolated hunter-gatherer societies.
• Search the literature for historical mentions of women making sex noises.
• Hook up men and women's genitalia to "arousal-measuring" equipment and scan their brains while they listen to sex noises.
• Speculate at length about the sex noises of "cavewomen."

And one approach you would never, ever take because it's just hopelessly unscientific:
• Ask some women "hey, why do you moan during sex?"


Don't get me wrong, I don't think sex science should consist entirely of self-reports, or that cross-cultural and biological perspectives don't have a place in it.  But too often, sex research seems to consist of everything but listening to people about their own experiences.  It's the meticulous aggregation of every possible piece of circumstantial evidence--and no questions for the eyewitnesses.


I have a special hatred for vaginal photoplethysmography, and not just because it's very hard to type.  This is a device that measures bloodflow in the vagina, and therefore purportedly the sexual arousal of the vagina's owner.  Except that study after study shows that subjects' self-reports of their arousal tend to correlate very badly with their photoplethingy readings.  The photothingy says they're aroused, the human beings say they're not feeling a thing.  Naturally, this is reported in the pop-sci press as "Vaginal Blood Flow Not A Reliable Indicator Of Arousal, New Method Needed."

Haha, I'm just messing with you.  I've never seen that headline.  It's always reported as "Women Not Aware Of Their Own Arousal."  (The first link opens with chimps, too!  Oh, those fucking chimps.  Fascinating creatures and all that, but I don't understand the compulsion to study chimps to understand human sexuality, when actual humans are readily available.)  You couldn't get away with this in other branches of science.  If you measured water ice at 20ºC and declared "my thermometer is perfect; this ice must be defective," you'd get laughed out of the lab.  But when it comes to confirming gross old "they don't know what they really want" stereotypes about women, anything goes.

(Don't worry, though; if you have a penis, its degree of erection will also be trusted over your word.  Because no one ever got a hard-on when they didn't want to have sex, right?)



I'm a science nerd at heart.  I like the idea of applying science to sex.  (I'm still trying to find the right excuse to post the pictures from that time we measured my Kegel Power.  About half a kilo, by the way.)  I have no ambition to replace rigorously analyzed data and reproducible double-blind experiments with poems about lilies unfolding.  I think expanding our knowledge of human sexuality is a noble goal in biology, psychology, and sociology, and objective measures are necessary to achieve that.

But I also think that if you want to study humans, study humans.  If you want to study people's feelings, ask them about their feelings.  Cadavers and fMRIs and chimps should be secondary tools to validate what you learn from humans, not the other way around.

In nursing, the definition of pain is simply "whatever the patient says it is," and yet we've still been able to create a massive body of work about the causes, effects, and control of pain.  Our understanding of pain is human and subjective, and still manages to produce precise and meaningful data.  There's no reason we can't study sex this way as well.

Cosmocking: February '13!

Red cover!  Julianne Hough!  The older I get, the less often I recognize these people!  Not quite sure how to feel about that!  She's wearing a, um, transparent plastic cropped biker jacket and satin pajama-underwear-swimsuit... I have no idea what kind of clothing that is!  "Weird Stuff Guys Google About You!"  Believe me, Cosmo, you have no idea!

"A few months ago, my friend asked me to volunteer at a homeless shelter with her--and ever since then, I've been dreaming of opening my own.  I'm so inspired!  I want to give clothing, food, and love to families who live in poverty."

Errgh.  I mean, it's nice that she has good intentions.  But maybe she could be directing those good intentions toward supporting an existing shelter instead of pulling a "I spent four whole hours there, I totally know how to start this from scratch!" Something about this makes me feel like she's not quite prepared for the reality of people who don't just need love, they need healthcare, legal aid, case management, and advocacy.  If all you've got is love, host a fundraiser and give the proceeds to someone who understands social work.

DirtyRottenFlowers.com will send your ex a bouquet of flowers--chopped up, decaying, and decapitated.

Well, you've got to admire the chutzpah of a florist who realized they could make $29 a bundle for their trash pile.

The Fake Chastity Belt 

"When I'm into someone, I don't want to ruin things by having sex with him too soon," says Liz [...] "The problem is, I usually want to have sex with him so badly that I don't trust myself not to go too far with him when we're making out."  So she squeezes herself into her grossest pair of Spanx.  "I have an extra-ugly girdle reserved for really tempting situations." 

Other women rely on things like prickly legs, a grown-out bikini line, or even just a good old-fashioned pair of granny panties. No matter your poison, they are all things we like to call fake chastity belts: preventative measures taken to ensure that no matter how tempted you are to have sex, you don't.

Oh my God.  This fucking article.  This whole fucking article.  I can't even.  I can't.  I just... I'll make a list.

1. Having sex with a guy "too soon" ruins everything. Because the last thing a guy who wants to have sex with you wants is for you to reveal that you want him just as much and then have sex with him, because then you'd both be happy, and that's, uh, terrible.

2. If you don't want to have sex with a guy, you have to go take absurd romantic-comedy measures to prevent it.  You can't just decide not to.

3. A woman with body hair or unflattering underwear is so comically unfuckable no man would want her.

4. No, wait, actually I think the idea is that the man would want you, but you'd be so ashamed by your appearance that you wouldn't let him see you even though he'd want you anyway.

5. The article then goes on to give tips about how to make your unsexiness sexy in case you decide to be sexy after all but you're still in your unsexy clothes that you put on to keep yourself from being sexy.

6. This fucking article.

Q: My guy wants to come on my face. How do I even respond? 

A: [...] If he's into dominating, try doctor-patient role-play.

I needed a breather before I got to the next reprehensible article, so here's something merely inexplicable.

Can Sex Make You Skinnier? 

Carboholism. As much as it sounds like some fake word the diet industry came up with, I can assure you, it is a very real affliction.

Yes.  The fact that you are alive and have a metabolism fueled largely by glucose is a very real affliction.

I joked once, long ago, that one of these days Cosmo was going to tell us the Krebs Cycle was unflatteringly unfeminine.  I never expected them to call my bluff.

Anyway, I had a long quote from this article typed up but it was fuck-all boring, so I'll sum up: writer goes on diet where whenever she wants to eat life-sustaining amounts of food, she does something sexual instead.  (Sometimes the "something sexual" is watching True Blood, or begging her husband to sexy-text her, which he does grudgingly.)  The diet holds up for five whole days.  But it's, y'know, totally an awesome idea that 18 million readers had to hear all about.

"I'm Marrying My Gay Best Friend!"

Spoiler: by "gay," she means "identifies as gay but attracted to some women."  Which kinda changes the whole story from "wow, you better explain why that isn't a terrible idea" to "um, good for you?"

It would be cool if Cosmo used this to discuss how fluid sexuality can be and how people can defy definitions and find happiness in unexpected ways, but they do not take it in that direction.  They take it in this one:

"Oh, my god," I gushed into the phone.  "I just met the cutest gay guy!" [...] 

Dating a gay man has its upsides. [...]  While I wouldn't call myself a slob, Dave basically organizes my whole life.  When we're out shopping, he knows when to ask "Will you really wear those shoes?" He's not just my date to weddings: He helps me pick out the perfect dress and even does my hair."

All of this is very nice, I guess, but also very "Gay man make adorable sassy little pets for straight women!  And I got to take one home!"

I'll let Brian Safi (video link) take it from here.

Go to Best Buy or a specialty audio shop, and ask someone there for a home-theater surround-sound system (warning: a really good one will cost you up to $500).  Say it authoritatively or you're going to get upsold.

I'm pretty sure you're going to get upsold no matter how authoritatively you say that.

(Later, they describe a subwoofer as "a square box that magically balances the sound.")

Touching the strippers is against the rules in clubs, although no one is going to throw a woman out for brushing a thigh or boob.  Because from a woman, that illicit touch manages to be both sexual and sweet.  Instead of doing it with a sleazy grin, like a guy might, women cheer and laugh.  An inquisitive graze resembles a high five at a sporting event between teammates.  Among the female patrons and dancers is an undeniable spirit of camaraderie, like the whole thing is so absurd, they all have to laugh.

Yeah, that's real nice.  Real poetic-like.  Keep your goddamn hands to yourself.

"In our society, the last thing a young woman wants is to be perceived as uptight, humorless, and jealous," says Hugo Schwyzer, who teaches gender studies at Pasadena City College and speaks nationally on gender issues.  "Getting a lap dance assures a man that you're none of these things."[...] 

"Women aren't turned on by male strippers, because they're always presented as a caricature," says Schwyzer.

FFFFUUUUUU....

i'm done.

Teenage Panic.

"But if you do happen to unzip your fly, then, uh... uh...
enjoy your new life as a cautionary example?"

Look at any forum or question site frequented by sexually active teenagers, and you'll see the same theme come up over and over:

"I had sex. I'm terrified I'm pregnant and have every STD ever."

"A guy fingered me.  I'm terrified I'm pregnant and have every STD ever."

"I touched a girl's breasts and then touched my penis. I'm terrified she's pregnant and we both have every STD ever."

I'm paraphrasing a little sardonically, but I remember being there.  The first time I touched a boy's penis, he demanded I wash my hands immediately, because maybe they had some sperm on them and maybe I would masturbate and then I would get pregnant for sure.  And when I started having intercourse, although we always used condoms, I was absolutely convinced I was pregnant and infected.  It got to the point where I would have stomach rumblings and think that I was feeling a baby kicking.

Despite (or because of) this belief, I never took any tests.  I was so scared of seeing a positive result, I couldn't bear to.  I'm damn lucky that I was worried over nothing, because it was more than nine months before I screwed up the courage to actually use a pregnancy test, and years before I went to a clinic for an STI test.

I was a pretty savvy teenager, intellectually.  My school sex ed wasn't much, but I'd been through every page of Scarleteen and the sex chapter of every "you and your health" book I could get my hands on.  I'd read up on the correct methods for every kind of contraception and the symptoms of every infection.  My problem wasn't lack of education, not exactly.  My problem was an all-consuming terror of punishment.  I'd been able to unlearn misconceptions about the biological details, but I hadn't unlearned the idea that having sex was a very wrong and forbidden act.

The morning after I had sex for the first time, I woke up with a crushing feeing that I'd done something evil and I was going to be caught and punished.  The next time I saw my parents, I was terrified.  I thought they were going to catch some nuance in my speech or gestures and go "Wait a second... you're acting like a sex-haver!  You are in so much trouble."  This didn't happen, but the feeling of guilty terror lingered.

And I think it was that guilty terror that led me to my paranoia.  I was so convinced that I had been bad and would be punished, I believed biology itself would punish me.  It didn't help that I'd grown up hearing about how pregnancy and STIs were "consequences" for sex.  Health class, parents, teachers, media, and peers had always talked about these things not as risks that adults have to manage, but as dire fates (or worse, humiliatingly comical fates) for sluts.  At age 15, I took a certain toxic-girl-hate pride in being Responsible and Pure.  At age 16, I'd had a penis inside me.

This nasty mess of emotions did nothing to stop me from having sex, of course.  There was a whole other mess of emotions telling me that you're undesirable and you're not growing up and you're not in a real relationship if you don't have sex, and those won out in the end.  (Plus I was really horny.)  And by "in the end," I mean "within two hours"--I had sex almost immediately the first time I found out a guy wanted to have sex with me.  So much for convincing kids to wait.  All I was convinced to do was have sex, but feel absolutely terrible about it.

But you can't say there was no deterrent effect, because I was powerfully deterred from seeking any kind of medical advice or testing.  That would be humiliating beyond measure, I was convinced.  It wouldn't feel like asking for help; it would feel like turning myself in.  Saying "I need an STD test" felt to me like saying "I'm a disobedient slut who probably got what she deserves," and I couldn't face that shame.  I'd rather just take my chances.  Even though I was terrified of my chances.

God we fuck up teenagers' heads.  We tell them that biological conditions are moral punishments and then we get all shocked when they don't practice rational risk management of biological conditions.  We teach them "sex is super desirable and all the cool kids do it, and it's hideously shameful and will destroy your life" and we wonder why they act an eensy bit neurotic about it.  If you tried to design a system for making sexually active kids confused and unsafe, you couldn't do much better than the American media and school system.

And for once, the answer is relatively simple.  Just talk about sex like it's a part of life.  Some people have sex and some people don't, because people are different. STIs aren't bad because they're Dirty Crotch Rot; they're bad because they're contagious illnesses like strep throat or whooping cough, and you can ask a doctor to check for and treat them just like you would with strep throat.  Unwanted pregnancy isn't a scarlet A; it's a mostly-preventable accident that sometimes occurs when people are going about their normal business of having sex. You can ask the school counselor about a variety of topics, including career planning, problems at home, questions about sex, or conflicts with teachers.

If we could just get the goddamn stick out of our collective ass and accept that sex is a human activity and teenagers are humans, maybe there wouldn't be quite so many plaintive "I don't understand my body and I'm confused and scared and I don't know anyone I can ask in person" messages flying out into the world.