to sleep. I can either take care of that in the bathroom, or I can do it here. If I do it here,
then you can help me along, or not. I'd especially appreciate it if you could talk dirty
while I jerk off, but it's your decision."
Talk about low pressure! Yeah, I learned a lot from that guy.
* * *
2) Scripts and Lists. I had one brief relationship last year with a gentleman who is really,
really awesome -- but we have very different approaches to S&M. We had a hard time
communicating about it... honestly, if he hadn't been such an awesome guy, I would
probably have given up on the relationship after a couple nights together. We were great
at having extensive theoretical conversations about sexuality, but when it came down to
actually having sex with each other, things got puzzling. We had difficulty predicting,
understanding, and initiating with each other.
I'm not sure what made it so hard. I think, mostly, we just brought really different
assumptions to the table. I tend to take an "improvisational" approach to my encounters,
whereas he tends to take a "scripted" approach. He's into doing stuff like rearranging the
furniture, taking on specific roles (e.g. teacher and student), using costumes and props,
and knowing exactly what will be said beforehand.
Me, I like going free-form. I talk to my partner about hard limits (things we absolutely
don't want to do); I talk to him about things we really like; and we set a safeword. I'm
usually okay with diving in from there. If he wants a more structured conversation, I'm
glad to have one (and sometimes, especially when I'm dominant, I'll ask for more
conversation myself). But generally, I like seeing how things go based on a very loose set
of guidelines, and making minor adjustments during the encounter, then evaluating the
situation afterwards.
One of the reasons I like doing this is that unexpected things happen. On the flip side,
there's also more room for experiences that aren't very exciting. I think I'm more likely to
have disjointed or confusing encounters than a lot of other BDSMers I know, although
maybe I'm just falling prey to the bias of assuming other people are doing better than I
am. And Scripty Guy in particular really doesn't like disjoint and confusion -- he likes
knowing what's going to happen.
Late in the relationship, I suggested that we try going through a checklist. When people
use these checklists, a lot of the time they just write their rating for each act, and give
them to each other to read. What we did instead was go through the checklist together
and discuss what we found hot, what was not, and whatever else came to mind.
This worked amazingly well -- it totally bridged our theoretical gap and it was a turn-on
in itself! (Seriously, by the time we were done going through the whole list, I could not
wait to have sex with that guy.) The conversation also helped me figure out the scripted
vs. un-scripted difference between us.
We stopped seeing each other for unrelated reasons soon afterwards, and they were good
reasons, but it seemed like a shame; I felt like we'd only just started figuring things out.
I'm not sure how well our S&M styles would have ultimately meshed, but I was curious
to try. Oh well... win some, lose some.
* * *
3) Transparent as Glass. Very rarely, I'll end up with a BDSM partner where our brief
in-the-moment communications -- you know, like groans, or physical shifts, or facial
expressions, or even jokes -- function very well. We can get into intense, intimate S&M
in a way that seems almost instinctive (although it helps future encounters if we talk it
over and process what we did afterwards). This is really exciting when it happens, but I
recognize it as unusual. A gift.
The person I'm about to write about is totally going to get a swelled head because I write
about him so much, but he's such a good example, I have to. The first time I went home
with him, I knew he wasn't in the public BDSM community. We'd had one really vague
conversation about BDSM previously, and he'd read a small sample of my work. I didn't
expect anything much.
He kissed me, and then I think he gave me some kind of mild signal like a bite on my
shoulder. It was a gentle bite, by my standards. So I took matters into my own hands and
removed my shirt, preparing to give him some feedback. He leaned back and said,
"Whoa," and I thought, Oh damn, I'm totally going too fast for him, he's probably not
accustomed to a high degree of sexual directness, so I said, "Sorry, is this okay?" and he
laughed and kind of threw up his hands and said, "Sure."
That made me a tad nervous -- if me taking off my shirt surprised him, what else would
surprise him? -- but I figured I'd see it through, see what happened. So I explained to him
what kind of biting I really like, and showed where I like it on my back and my arms. I
think I gave him a couple of other tips, too, but I honestly can't remember; it didn't take
more than five minutes. I certainly didn't give him an exhaustive rundown of my
preferences before I said, "Does that all make sense?" and he said "Yes," and put his
hands on me.
Which is why it was so surprising that within a very short time, both of us were breathing
hard and confused and maybe slightly dizzy and looking at each other with very wide
eyes, and he was saying in an amazed tone: "I just -- I'm a little shocked. That was really
good," and I was saying: "Yes. Yes it was."
It went like that for a while. He'd go for it, and then pull back, and I'd drag myself out of
my BDSM headspace long enough to explain one or two ideas, or reassure him that I felt
fine. And then he'd go for it again. And by the end of it, I was -- blazing.
Sometimes, it just works. You've never met this person before, you've talked for half an
hour about something completely irrelevant like science fiction novels, yet it only takes
five minutes of discussion about preferences and safewords, and then it just works. I
don't know why, and I don't know how, but sometimes you find a partner who can just --
read you, like an open book -- or who seems as transparent as glass to you; or, if you're
really lucky, both.
(But I write about this with some hesitation, and I'm putting it at the end of this post after
two other examples for a reason: because I don't think it's the standard, and I don't think it
ought to be seen as standard. Especially because, paradoxically, this kind of instinctive
connection will sometimes throw me off guard, make me unlikely to communicate when
I probably ought to, because if he can read me that well -- it's so tempting to assume that
"he just knows" everything. But of course he doesn't. I later had a couple rough moments
with that particular guy, where I didn't tell him about boundaries that were actually pretty
important, because I thought he could just tell -- and of course he couldn't always "just
tell." Sometimes he could, but sometimes he couldn't.)
The overall moral of the story is this. Even with him, even with this guy, who totally
blindsided me with his ability to read me despite the fact that he barely knew me: even
with him, I had to be able to talk directly about what I wanted. Our connection was
established because I was able to say, "Okay, that bite was a tad gentle, here's how I
really like it, and here's what not to do with your teeth on me." All my most
extraordinary sexual connections have benefited from everyone involved taking
ownership of their desire, and talking about it directly at least a little bit.
I occasionally come across people who ask me how they can get their partners to do
BDSM without talking about it directly. While I appreciate and sympathize with both
their need to do BDSM, and their anxiety about talking about it -- I just can't get behind
the premise of the question. The fantasy of a sexual relationship that is totally instinctive
and perfect without any effort is just that -- a fantasy. And moreover, while you might be
able to get some BDSM experiences without actually having a conversation about
BDSM, direct sexual communication is not a threat to your sexual experiences -- it can
improve them.
Do what you want, really, as long as it's consensual. If you want to have sex that's not
communicative, that is your prerogative, as long as it's always consensual. (It's worth
asking, though... are you so sure you can tell that it's consensual, if you don't talk about
it?) Still. Learning how to talk about sex more directly and exactly might be hard or
embarrassing or complicated, but it is seriously worth it. Not just BDSM; all sex.
It's so worth it.
* * *
This post originally appeared at:
http://clarissethorn.com/blog/2011/03/11/storytime-sex-communication-case-studies/
* * *
* * *
* * *
FEMINISM:
[theory] Towards My Personal Sex-Positive Feminist 101
I wrote this in 2011, when I realized that I couldn't find a good Sex-Positive Feminist 101
anywhere on the Internet. The original version contains a lot more links, including an
evolving set of relevant links at the end.
* * *
Towards My Personal Sex-Positive Feminist 101
There's an aphorism from the early 1900s literary critic Andre Maurois: "The difficult
part in an argument is not to defend one's opinion but to know it." Even though I identify
as an activist and genuinely want to make a real impact on the world based on my
beliefs... I often think that much of my blogging has been more an attempt to figure out
what I believe, than to tell people what I believe. And sometimes, I fall into the trap of
wanting to be consistent more than I want to understand what I really believe -- or more
than I want to empathize with other people -- or more than I want to be correct. We all
gotta watch out for that.
But I'm getting too philosophical here. (Who, me?) The point is, I am hesitant to write
something with a title like "Sex-Positive 101," because not only does it seem arrogant
(who says Clarisse Thorn gets to define Sex-Positive 101?) -- it also implies that my
thoughts on sex-positivity have come to a coherent, standardized end. Which they
haven't! I'm still figuring things out, just like everyone else.
However, lately I've been thinking that I really want to write about some basic ideas that
inform my thoughts on sex-positive feminism. I acknowledge that I am incredibly
privileged (white, upper-middle-class, heteroflexible, cisgendered etc) and coming
mostly from a particular community, the BDSM community; both of these factors inform
and limit the principles that underpin my sex-positivity. I welcome ideas for Sex-Positive
Feminism 101, links to relevant 101 resources, etc.
* * *
Some Central Sex-Positive Feminist Ideas, according to Clarisse Thorn
1) Desire is complicated, and people are different. These ideas both seem basic and
obvious to me as I write them, but I wanted to put them out there because I think they're
useful anchors for all the rest.
2) Gender is not a binary, and gender cannot be determined by a person's outer
appearance or behavior. Different people experience and display gender in a galaxy of
ways. No woman in the world is perfectly submissive, perfectly hourglass-shaped,
perfectly kind, etc, although these are stereotypes commonly associated with women. No
man in the world is perfectly dominant, perfectly confident, perfectly muscular, etc.
While many people reduce the idea of a person's gender to whether they have a penis or a
vagina, the existence of trans people and intersex people proves that this isn't a valid
approach. Individual people have all kinds of qualities that are attributed to the "other"
gender... and the concept of an "other" (or "opposite") gender is weird in itself, because
why does one gender have to be the "other," and what does that imply?
All this having been said, gender is frequently perceived as a binary, and many people fit
themselves into the possibly-arbitrary system of gender that currently exists. There are
ideas of "men" and "women" that are culturally understood, widely adopted, and socially
enforced. Feminism has its roots in women resisting men's violent and social dominance,
and in women resisting the cultural emphasis on stereotypical men's desires.
3) Historically, sex has usually been defined in terms of two things: (a) reproduction,
and (b) the sexual pleasure of stereotypical men. Cultural sexual standards are based
on these things. For example, the sexual "base system"; if you've read my work before
then you'll have seen me talk about it a lot, because it's such a perfect example. It's
commonly discussed among USA schoolchildren and it describes kissing as "first base,"
groping as "second base," oral sex as "third base" and penis-in-vagina sex as "home
base." Why should this hierarchy exist? It only makes sense if we think of sex as being
centered around reproduction. If we think of sex as being about pleasure and open
exploration in ways that are different for everyone, then having a "home base" -- a
standardized goal -- makes zero sense.
Another example: penis-in-vagina sex is often seen as "real" sex or "actual" sex, with all
other sex considered "less real." How many arguments have you had over the course of
your lifetime about whether oral sex "counts" as sex? (Hint: more than the subject
deserves.) For a recent example, there's the Kink.com virgin shoot, wherein a porn model
publicly "lost her virginity" notwithstanding the fact that she'd already had plenty of oral
and anal sex on camera for years -- she'd just never had vaginal sex.
As for sex being defined by the pleasure of stereotypical men: one example is how people
usually think about orgasms. In my experience and that of people I talk to -- and in the
vast majority of porn -- it seems commonly accepted that sexual activity ends with a
man's orgasm, whereas women are commonly expected to continue engaging in sex after
having an orgasm... despite the fact that many women seem just as tired and lessinterested
in sex post-orgasm as many men are. In part, this goes back to defining sex in
terms of reproduction: men have to orgasm in order for reproduction to happen, so men's
orgasms must (supposedly) be central to sex. It's all influenced by these other
constructions, like how penis-in-vagina sex is "real" sex, or "home base": many people
are confused by the idea that you'd shift sexual gears to (for example) manual stimulation
if you've already "made it to home base." But it also arises from centering stereotypical
men's desires -- from a culture that just generally sees them as more important, more
driving, and more necessary than women's. (Note that the majority of women don't
achieve orgasm from penis-in-vagina sex in itself.)
When sex is defined in terms of reproduction and stereotypical male pleasure, the
following things result:
+ People who aren't men have a harder time understanding their sexuality, because there
are fewer models (for example: it's fairly common for women to figure out how to have
orgasms much later in life than the average man -- like 20s or 30s, if ever)
+ Men who don't fit masculine stereotypes have a harder time understanding their
sexuality (for example: there's a great essay by a former men's magazine editor in the
anthology Best Sex Writing 2010 in which he talks about how hard it was for him to come
to terms with his desire for heavy women)
+ Even men who do fit masculine stereotypes feel limited from other types of
exploration, and may derive less pleasure from sex than they would in a less broken
world
+ Sex acts or sexual relationships that aren't reproductive are devalued, are seen as weird,
or aren't even defined as sex (for example: stigma against gay sex, lesbian sex, many
fetishes, etc)
4) Women are expected to trade sex to men in exchange for support or romance.
Women who don't get a "good trade" (e.g. women who don't receive a certain level of
financial support or romance "in exchange for" sex) are seen as sluts. Men who don't get
a "good trade" (e.g. men who don't receive a certain amount of sex "in exchange for" a
relationship) are seen as pussies. (Yes, "pussies"... don't you just love that a word for
female genitalia is a commonly used insult against so-called "weak" men?)
What this also means is that many people have trouble examining motivations outside
this framework: women are always expected to be looking for more emotional or
financial investment from a guy, whereas men are always expected to be looking for
more (or more so-called "extreme") sex. Women who actively seek sex, or men who
actively seek intimacy, are shamed and hurt and confused for it -- often even within their
own heads.
5) Since stereotypical men have historically been much freer to explore their
sexuality than people of other genders, the desires of stereotypical men have formed
the pattern for "liberated sexuality." As women have won freedom to act, work and
explore outside the home more, we've been following patterns created mostly by men,
and those patterns might look extremely different if women had created them.
When we talk about sexuality, I think that leads us to examine what "liberated sexuality"
looks like. "Liberated sexuality" is often stereotyped as promiscuous, for example.
"Liberated sexuality" is also stereotyped as being unromantic, never involving any of
those pesky pesky feelings, etc. I write about this cautiously: I have no intention of telling
anyone what "real" men do or feel, or what "real" women do or feel. However, it seems
conceivable to me that most men are generally more likely to enjoy promiscuity and
emotionless sex than most women are -- if only for hormonal reasons. Here's a quotation
from the brilliant trans man sex writer Patrick Califia on the effects of testosterone:
It's harder to track psychological and emotional changes caused by one's taking
testosterone than it is to notice the physical differences. But I think the former actually
outweigh the latter. It isn't that testosterone has made me a different person. I always had
a high sex drive, liked porn and casual sex, couldn't imagine giving up masturbation, was
able to express my anger, and showed a pretty high level of autonomy and assertiveness.
But all of these things have gotten much more intense since I began hormone treatments.
During the first six months on T, every appetite I had was painfully sharp. A friend of
mine expressed it this way: "When I had to eat, I had to eat right fucking now. If I was
horny, I had to come immediately. If I needed to shit, I couldn't wait. If I was pissed off,
the words came right out of my mouth. If I was bored, I had to leave." My body and all
the physical sensations that spring from it have acquired a piquancy and an immediacy
that is both entertaining and occasionally inconvenient. Moving through the world is
even more fun, involves more stimulation than it used to; life is more in the here-andnow,
more about bodies and objects, less about thoughts and feelings.
… Casual sex has changed. When I want to get off, my priority is to find somebody who
will do that as efficiently as possible, and while I certainly would rather have a pleasant
interaction with that person, I don't think a lot about how they were doing before they got
down on their knees, and I don't care very much how they feel after they get up and
leave. It's hard to keep their needs in mind; it's easier to just assume that if they wanted
anything, it was their responsibility to try to get it. I always preferred to take sexual
initiative, and that has become even more ego-congruent. (pages 397-398, Speaking Sex
To Power)
A trans woman friend once told me that not only did she get turned on more frequently
pre-transition; also, she now has to feel more emotionally connected to her partner in
order to enjoy sex. And she noted that she has to "take care of herself more" in order to
feel turned on now -- not just in the moment, but in life, and in the relationship.
If we accept that there is, speaking generally, a difference in sexual desires between men
and women (although individuals will always be unique), then it leads to new questions.
If women were socially and culturally dominant, what would so-called "liberated
sexuality" look like? If people of all genders are following patterns set by stereotypical
men, then what does that mean for attempts to think around those patterns?
6) Communicating consent is complicated, but consent is the only thing that makes
sex okay, so we have to make every effort to respect it. All sex is completely fine with
me as long as it's consensual. Seriously, I really don't care what you do -- as long as it's
consensual. (Try to find a consensual sex act that shocks me. I dare you.)
Communicating consent can, however, be complicated, and there are lots of different
ways to do it. Many BDSMers are eminently familiar with this, as you can tell by the fact
that some parts of the BDSM community have developed an extensive array of tactics for
discussing consent. For example, the most famous BDSM communication tactic is
safewords, which gives everyone involved a clear word that they can invoke to stop the
action at any time.
Most people don't communicate directly about most things, and the stigma and high
emotions around sexuality make it even harder for most people to communicate directly
about sex. Hence, most sexual communication is highly indirect. Even among people
who are accustomed to direct sexual communication -- like many BDSMers -- a lot of
communication ends up being indirect and instinctive anyway; there's just no way to
discuss every possible reaction and every single desire ahead of time. Everyone fucks up
sometimes. No one in the world has a perfect track record on creating a pressure-free
environment for their partners to express what they want... or asking their partners for
what they want... or even knowing what they want in the first place.
So, yes, I acknowledge that communicating about sex and getting what you want
consensually can be really hard. However, it's most important to not violate people's
boundaries. No matter how hard it is, it's necessary to make a serious and genuine effort
to measure and respect a partner's consent every time sex happens. Feminist ideas of
enthusiastic consent are designed to help this process.
Here's my attempt at a quick definition of enthusiastic consent:
The basic idea is simple: don't initiate sex unless you have your partner's enthusiastic
consent. Not a partner who says, "Okay, I guess," in a bored tone, but doesn't actively
say "no." Not a partner who is silent and non-reactive, but doesn't actively stop you when
you start having sex with them. Not a partner who seems hesitant, or anxious, or
confused. Enthusiastic consent means an enthusiastic partner: one who is responding
passionately, kissing you back, saying things like "Yes" or "Oh my God, don't stop"... or
a partner who talks to you ahead of time about what will happen, as many BDSMers and
sex workers do, and knows how to safeword or otherwise get out of the situation if you do
something they don't like.
It's worth noting that there are critiques within feminism of the concept of enthusiastic
consent. For example, some feminist sex workers point out that when they have sex for
money, their consent is not exactly "enthusiastic," but they still feel that their consent is
real consent, and that their choices must be respected. The same goes for some asexual
people. Asexuality is commonly defined as "not feeling sexual attraction to others," but
some asexual people have romantic relationships with other people in which they have
sex entirely to satisfy their partner, and some of them have said that they don't feel
included by feminist discussions of enthusiastic consent.
Hey, even some of my non-asexual, non-sex worker friends have problems with the idea
that they aren't "really" consenting unless they're super-enthusiastic about the sexual act
at hand. A married friend once commented wryly that if she and her husband always
demanded 100% enthusiastic consent from each other, then the marriage would fall apart.
But as we continued to discuss it, she and her husband both agreed that they have zero
problem with the situation as it stands.
I don't want to sweep those critiques under the rug. I figure that as long as everyone's
communicating about the situation openly, and working to keep things relatively lowpressure,
then consent is likely to happen, even if it's not perfectly "enthusiastic." I've had
extensive debates on the topic with other feminists, though, and I often seek more,
because honing consent theory is one of my favorite things!
All this having been said: the concept of enthusiastic consent has been very helpful for
me personally. I know that it's also been helpful for an enormous number of other people
who are trying to understand boundaries in their sexual relationships. I absolutely believe
that enthusiastic consent is an important and useful standard, and I do my best to observe
that standard as much as I can in my own relationships. So, while I think some critiques
are reasonable, I also think that the idea of enthusiastic consent is the best baseline
assumption to start these conversations... if not to end them.
7) In practice, as long as everyone involved is having consensual fun, criticism is
secondary. Practically speaking, consent is the most important thing; from a pragmatic
standpoint, the question of whether sexuality arises from biology or culture doesn't matter
nearly as much. (I find the question of whether BDSM can be categorized as a sexual
orientation to be more politically and theoretically interesting than practically important.)
Understanding sexual biology or culture may help us grasp some of the complexities of
consent. For example, people often have trouble saying "no" to things directly: when was
the last time you explicitly said "no" when you didn't want to do something? Which of
the following exchanges is more likely:
Person A: Hey, want to come over tonight?
Person B: You know, I'd love to, but I'm so exhausted from work, I really need to get
some sleep.
or
Person A: Hey, want to come over tonight?
Person B: No.
People of all genders really don't like saying "no" to things directly. Grasping this
important cultural concept is one step on the path of learning how to communicate
effectively about consent. But in my book, it's really not as important to understand why
people hate saying "no" directly, as it is to understand that people hate saying "no"
directly. It's necessary to understand that because it means that pushing someone until
they say "no" can mean pushing them further than they wanted to go.
I believe that the most important role of social criticism -- including sex-positive
feminism -- is not to tell people what to do. If you have sex that appears to be in line with
ridiculous and oppressive stereotypes, I really do not care as long as everyone involved is
consenting and having fun. I reserve the right to occasionally have consensual sex where
a gentleman friend beats me up before fucking me, and I reserve the right to enjoy it.
But I want to offer sex-positive feminist analyses in order to help people understand
themselves and their desires... and also understand their partners and their desires. I think
that many people have sex they don't like, sex that's in line with ridiculous and oppressive
stereotypes, because they haven't been exposed to anything they like better. I think many
people have sex they don't like because they don't feel like they can look for something
different -- they think it's the best they can get. I think many people have sex they don't
like because they think it's what their partner wants -- and I think those people are
frequently wrong, and I think most partners would genuinely prefer that everyone be
having fun.
Which is why I try to deconstruct sexual norms and stereotypes. Which is why I
encourage people to look for what they like. Which is why I always emphasize talking
about it.
8) Awesome, respectful, joyful, mutual sex means approaching sex as collaborative
rather than adversarial. Aside from solo sex (i.e. masturbation), sex always involves
another person. And at its best, it's about having a good time with other people --
understanding their reality, accepting it, playing with it. The best metaphors I've ever
heard for sex were all about collaborative art, like a musical jam performance. Here's a
bit from Thomas MacAulay Millar's totally brilliant essay "Towards a Performance
Model of Sex" (please do read the whole thing someday):
The negotiation is the creative process of building something from a set of available
elements. Musicians have to choose, explicitly or implicitly, what they are going to play:
genre, song, key and interpretation. The palette available to them is their entire skill set
-- all the instruments they have and know how to play, their entire repertoire, their
imagination and their skills -- and the product will depend on the pieces each individual
brings to the performance. Two musicians steeped in Delta blues will produce very
different music from one musician with a love for soul and funk and another with roots in
hip-hop or 1980s hardcore. This process involves communication of likes and dislikes
and preferences, not a series of proposals that meet with acceptance or rejection.
… Under this model, the sexual interaction should be creative, positive, and respectful
even in the most casual of circumstances.
("Towards a Performance Model of Sex" was first printed in Yes Means Yes, edited by
Jessica Valenti and Jaclyn Friedman, the brilliant sex-positive anti-rape anthology that I
want everyone in the entire world to read. It was also reprinted in Best Sex Writing 2010,
edited by Rachel Kramer Bussel.)
9) All people deserve equal rights, including sexual minorities. As long as people are
having consensual sex, they do not deserve to be stigmatized, harassed, or otherwise
harmed for their sexuality. Period. No one should be fired for their sexual or gender
identity. No one should have their kids taken away for their sexual or gender identity.
Rape is still rape, even when it's perpetrated against a sex worker. I support
decriminalizing sex work for a lot of reasons; for example, I'd love it if the law would
quit harassing and jailing sex workers for having consensual sex, and I'd love it if sex
workers could organize for better workplace safety. The bottom line is that people -- all
people -- have rights. It's time to treat them that way.
* * *
In terms of actual ways to be sex-positive in everyday life, here are the three ways I
usually encourage people to spread the sex-positive love:
A) Avoid re-centering. Sexuality shouldn't be societally "centered" on any particular
norm, idea, or stereotype (except consent). It is frequently tempting to re-center
"objective" ideas about sexuality onto ourselves, if we're different from the norm, or onto
people we admire. But the truth is that -- on a societal level -- queer sex is just as
awesome as straight sex; that BDSM sex is equally admirable as vanilla sex; that
cisgendered people are not any more or less amazing than trans people. The decision to
have sex is no better than the decision to avoid sex, and asexual people are just as great as
hypersexual people who are just as great as anyone with any level of sex drive.
In alternative sexuality subcultures, one often encounters a kind of superior attitude,
perhaps because we have to push back so hard against the norm. In polyamory, for
example, some of us use the sarcastic term "polyvangelist": a person who insists that
polyamory is "better" or "more evolved" or "makes more sense" for everyone,
everywhere, than monogamy does. Neither monogamy nor polyamory is better than the
other; they're just different. Polyvangelists are trying to re-center onto polyamory. Not
cool.
B) Start conversations. One of the most damaging problems around sexuality is the
overwhelming and constant stigma. It hurts people with certain sexual identities,
preferences or pasts. It hurts them spiritually. It can hurt them societally, like when
LGBTQ folks have difficulty adopting children, or former sex workers are not allowed to
work at other jobs. It can even hurt them physically: 40 years after doctors started
noticing the HIV pandemic, too many people are still refusing to talk about sex openly, or
give healthcare to sexual minorities directly affected by HIV. To say nothing of people
who are attacked or killed for their sexual minority status, like trans people who are
murdered in the street, or lesbians who are raped in order to "fix" their sexuality. Sexual
stigma kills.
So when someone says something icky about sex and gender, or stereotypes a certain sex
or gender identity, it's so great to challenge them -- or at least to question them. ("Really?
What makes you think all gay people are abuse survivors?") And some of the most
powerful sex activism out there involves starting discussion groups, creating venues for
discussion, hosting sexuality speakers or sex-related art, etc.
C) Be "out" or open, without being invasive. This can be tricky, because I don't want
to encourage people to aggressively talk about sex at totally inappropriate times -- and
again, I'm against re-centering. On the other hand, the most powerful tool for
destigmatizing sexuality appears to be coming out of the closet -- whether a person is
queer, BDSM, or whatever. Openly acknowledging, owning, and discussing your sexual
preferences can help others respect those preferences -- and can help others who share
those preferences respect themselves. (Can you tell that I cried when I saw the movie
Milk?)
* * *
This post can be found on the Internet at:
http://clarissethorn.com/blog/2011/05/08/towards-my-personal-sex-positive-feminist-
101/
* * *
* * *
* * *
S&M:
[theory] S&M Superpowers
I wrote this post in 2011, but I encountered the "superpower" framework for fetishes in
2008, before I started blogging. I was telling one of my first S&M partners about how
broken and anxious I felt, and he said: "Why talk about it that way? You haven't lost
anything. You've gained a superpower!"
* * *
S&M Superpowers
I've gotten so bored of the biases and stereotypes against S&M. It's like, "Hey, another
person who implies that those of us who do consensual S&M were all abused as
children? Sweet! That person is wrong, and I consider those views highly stigmatizing
and sometimes damaging. So, can we go for a swim now?"
(For the record, the biggest and best-designed study ever done on this topic surveyed
20,000 people and found that S&Mers "were no more likely to have been coerced into
sexual activity" than the general population. But -- also for the record -- an S&Mer whose
sexuality was associated with being abused would not be "less legitimate" than the rest of
us, as long as that person practiced kink consensually. Because what makes S&M okay is
consent, right? Right. S&M isn't okay or not okay because of its "source," whatever that
might be -- it's okay only when it's practiced consensually, right? Right. So this is all
actually kind of a silly conversation to have in the first place, right? Right. It's too bad
stigma tends to make zero sense, isn't it? Stigma loves to trick you into debating on its
own terms.)
It's much more entertaining to imagine how people would talk about S&M, if we lived in
a culture where S&M wasn't wildly stigmatized. In fact, what if S&M were admired or
seen as a great thing... instead of being repressed and forced underground and seen as a
dark, evil, disgusting thing? I've known people who called S&M and other fetishes
"superpowers," in a kind of ironic twist on this concept.
Many people have written about how S&Mers can offer lessons in sexuality that we
gleaned from our outside-the-box perspective (there's a whole paper on this topic for
clinicians, written by psychologist Peggy Kleinplatz and titled "Learning from
Extraordinary Lovers"). I myself have talked about how S&Mers tend to use much more
careful and precise sexual communication tactics than the mainstream (examples include
checklists and safewords). But these lessons are hardly confined to S&Mers -- there are
lots of vanilla people out there who are awesomely careful and precise about
communicating sexually.
The superpower framework is a bit different....
+ For example, I already noted that it's been demonstrated that S&Mers are not more
likely to have endured non-consensual acts -- so we know that despite what Freud would
have had you believe, all S&M does not arise from childhood abuse. But maybe it does
arise from a childhood experience... an awesome childhood experience. Maybe the
Missing S&M Link is that something totally wonderful happened to S&Mers in our
childhoods.
Hey, vanilla people? I'm so sorry you all had such bad childhoods. Really, you have my
sincerest sympathies.
+ For example, some folks will say that we S&Mers have a wire crossed somewhere;
some genetic inferiority. But maybe we are totally way superior. Maybe average
dominants and sadists are, say, more empathic than the norm. (There is, after all, actual
research showing that consensual S&M increases intimacy.) Maybe average submissives
and masochists are better at processing pain and enduring challenges, both physical and
emotional, than the norm.
Sorry vanilla people, but we're going to have to start screening for your gross vanilla
genes in the womb. Nothing personal.
+ For example, one of my exes has a story about how he was down in Latin America and
he only had access to incredibly cold showers. So he gritted his teeth, stepped into the
shower, and told himself that a dominant woman was forcing him to take it. "Actually it
made the shower a million times easier to deal with," he said later. "And I had a raging
erection the whole time."
Aren't submissives awesome? I pity those of you who lack submissive tendencies.
Just because anything on the Internet can and will be misread, I will conclude this post by
hammering down the point that this is all a thought experiment, and I do not actually
think vanilla people are any less wonderful than S&M people. It's okay vanilla folks.
I love you just the way you are.
* * *
This post can be found on the Internet at:
http://clarissethorn.com/blog/2011/06/21/sm-superpowers/
* * *
* * *
* * *
S&M:
[theory] BDSM Can Be "Love Sex" Too
In early 2011, my fellow sex blogger Rachel Rabbit White asked me to participate in her
initiative "Lady Porn Day." This was the result. There's a list of relevant links at the end
of the online version of this article.
* * *
BDSM Can Be "Love Sex" Too
I'm not a big porn consumer, but I have no problem with porn in itself. When I have a
problem with porn, it's because I have a problem with how it was made: because there are
labor issues, or questions of the actors' consent. Sometimes, I get frustrated with the
context in which porn exists or the stereotypes it expresses -- but there, the problem is
with the context and the stereotypes, not with porn in itself. I tend to think that most antiporn
anxiety arises from irrational grossed-out reactions and stereotype-created fears, and
I try to open up conversations about the ethics of making porn whenever I can.
This isn't to say I don't get angry because many people in our society are pressured to
have sex that doesn't work for them -- but that's not the fault of porn. I certainly get
frustrated by sexual stereotypes, but I don't think porn created those stereotypes.
One stereotype I've been thinking about a lot lately -- one that I see expressed over and
over in BDSM porn -- is the idea that BDSMers don't love our partners, or that love can't
be part of a BDSM relationship. Here's a quotation from Pat Califia's Speaking Sex To
Power that touches on this (note: contains spoilers about the endings of three famous
BDSM novels -- Story of O, Return to the Chateau and Nine And A Half Weeks):
I still remember how crushed I was when I read Story of O and Return to the Chateau
and came to the ending, where Sir Stephen loses interest in O and tells her to kill herself.
I can also remember being furious with the way Nine And A Half Weeks (the book, not
the movie) ends. The submissive woman has a public breakdown. She begins to cry
hysterically, and is abandoned by her master, so that strangers have to obtain help for
her. One of the cruelest stereotypes of S/M people is that we don't love each other, that
there is something about our sexual style that makes our relationships mutually
destructive and predisposes us to suicide.
This quotation came to mind during a conversation I had a few days ago: I was talking to
a girl who really likes BDSM sex but referred to non-BDSM sex as "love sex." Because,
you know, love is just not an ingredient in BDSM sex. "Everyone knows" that -- the same
way "everyone knows" that BDSM always arises from childhood abuse, or dominant
sadism is for villains, or everyone who likes BDSM is damaged and miserable and
irresponsible, or....
Not to put too fine a point on it: fuck that.
I'm not saying there's no BDSM smut out there with love in it. Anne Rice's Beauty series
ends with Beauty riding off into the sunset with her loving sadomasochistic partner
(although of course the characters deal with all kinds of uncaring brutality first). But even
nuanced BDSM erotica seems to fall into this trap more often than not -- for example,
Jacqueline Carey's Kushiel's Dart, which is so consciously written that it includes
safewords, also portrays a main character whose most compelling BDSM relationships
are with her enemies and whose love relationship is with a man who can't stand to hurt
her. (Carey took a very different tack later in the series, with other characters; I've always
wondered whether she did so as a reaction to criticism.)
It's easier to criticize than create. And all my porn critiques could come back and bite me
soon, because I plan on releasing my own BDSM smut sometime... and I'm sure that what
I produce won't even be close to perfect. Yet one thing I really want to ensure I represent
in whatever I write is love. There are plenty of BDSM fantasies that partly operate on the
absence of love -- that even demand it, perhaps because the fantasy is all about a vicious
and emotionally distant dominant, or because much of the erotic tension is derived from
how much the partners hate each other, or for lots of other reasons. And yeah, they're hot
in their own way....
But it'd be so great if those weren't the standard.
* * *
This can be found on the Internet at:
http://clarissethorn.com/blog/2011/02/22/ladypornday-bdsm-can-be-love-sex-too/
* * *
* * *
* * *
S&M:
[theory] Body Chemistry and S&M
This was originally published in 2011. I don't normally write basic "how-to" posts like
this, but every once in a while I see a gap I just have to fill.
* * *
Body Chemistry and S&M
I often think that good physical health is a widely-ignored element of good sex. I am
obviously not saying that people in poor health can't have good sex (and in fact, I
certainly hope they do -- more power to 'em). But it consistently amazes me how much
my physical health factors into my sexuality, especially S&M. I am by no means an
expert on this topic, but here are some examples:
* Food. I am both less interested in sex and in S&M when I'm hungry; ensuring that I've
eaten well before I take some punishment is especially crucial. I try to eat well in general,
but if I'm planning to have a heavy S&M encounter, I don't cut myself any slack. I try to
specifically ensure that I eat enough protein before the date and I try to include some
vitamin-heavy foods like beets, leafy green vegetables, etc. Eggs are a good source of
protein; nuts, beans and tofu are my primary protein sources. If I don't have enough
protein available for whatever reason, I at least eat enough food that I won't be hungry
when I see my partner.
Part of the reason I'm writing this right now is that I've had trouble finding useful
resources on the Internet for what people recommend as good pre- or post-S&M food,
especially during aftercare. "Aftercare" is an S&M term for how people end their S&M
encounters. One excellent page on aftercare describes it thusly:
Aftercare is the last act of the SM drama. It is the culmination, the pulling together of all
loose ends, the finishing touches, the final communion between sharers of the SM ritual,
the phase where the participants (usually the tops) formally give the fantasy scene a
context in everyday reality. Its technical purpose is to transition both players from the
elevated states created in a scene [i.e., an S&M encounter] back into normalcy,
returning to the motor control and awareness they will need to drive home once the
scene is over. But as any good SM practitioner will tell you, it's much more than that. It
is the time after the action when the participants come together in mutual affirmation
that something special was created and shared. It is when affection and closeness is
offered and sought. It is, at very least, the proper time to express thanks to the person
who has shared this tiny segment of your life with you. It can be, and often is, the most
beautiful part of a scene, and it is part of the scene. To skip it altogether is as rude as
having dinner at a friend's house and then bolting once you've eaten your fill.
A lot of tops keep food and water on hand to give bottoms at the end of a scene, which I
think is probably a good idea. (Eating post-scene doesn't feel necessary for me as a
bottom, but it might if I weren't so careful about what I eat beforehand.) Some people say
that fruit or fruit juice is the way to go -- and indeed, it will give the bottom's system a
sugar boost and may make them feel better for that reason -- but I would personally rather
eat a protein bar, and I have some friends who feel the same way. Dungeons usually serve
snacks, although the snacks aren't always very healthy.
A final note on food: I know there are people who specifically include food deprivation
as part of their S&M. Obviously, this is totally fine by me as long as it is consensual, but
I'd encourage people not to expect themselves -- or their partners -- to react the way they
usually do to S&M, as long as they're hungry.
* Weight. I used to be much scrawnier than I am now, and as my health has improved,
I've gained weight. Sometimes this freaks me out (it's impossible to be female in our
society and not daydream about having cheekbones that can stab people), but it has been
worth it. One time, after I'd been having a lot of anxiety about weight gain, my thenboyfriend
emailed me the image of an art card printed with the words, "I gained 30
pounds... & sex has never been better!" He perceptively wrote: "Maybe that's why it's
easier for you to have orgasms now? I think you should investigate this if you try to lose
weight."
I am not in a position to comment about whether being overweight affects sex. But I can
definitely assure you that being underweight is not good for your sexual well-being.
* Sleep. I much prefer to have S&M encounters on days when I've gotten a lot of sleep
the night before; this is at least as crucial as eating well before an encounter. There are
approximately a billion studies that show the far-reaching effects that getting enough
sleep can have on our health, and they seem to usually recommend around 7-8 hours as a
good amount per night (more for teenagers).
As with food, I know there are people who include sleep deprivation as part of their S&M
encounters. Again, this is obviously fine by me as long as it is consensual, but I'd
encourage people not to expect themselves -- or their partners -- to react the way they
usually do to S&M, as long as they're tired. I don't know about you, but exhaustion
certainly makes me erratic and overly emotional. If you're going to be doing something
like S&M that can specifically create an erratic and overly emotional state... well, when
overlapping that with exhaustion, it just seems like a good idea to be careful.
* Alcohol. Alcohol definitely decreases my pain tolerance (quite dramatically in fact),
and it definitely makes it harder for me to get turned on. There is only one bonus to
alcohol, and that's the famous "social lubricant" effect. I personally prefer to limit myself
to one glass of wine, maaaaybe two, if I'm planning to hook up with someone; in general,
stone-cold sobriety is my preferred state to go into S&M. Good S&M makes me high
enough on its own.
I get the impression that some people get drunk before they do S&M because otherwise
they feel too anxious to do S&M. As always, I'm not going to tell other people that they
shouldn't do consensual things... but drunkenness frequently makes it hard to
communicate and hard to know what's going on in your head, which means that
drunkenness makes consent hard. Not impossible, just hard. Be careful.
A lot of people say that mixing substances and BDSM is always bad. Personally, I figure
that if a person has a lot of experience with a given substance, and a lot of experience
with a given BDSM act, and a lot of experience with their partner... then I kind of doubt
they're taking a huge risk by doing a familiar BDSM act with a familiar partner in a
familiar state of mind. It's a lot to deal with at once, and again, it's worth being careful.
And of course, substance abuse problems are a whole nother ballgame. But if a person
has been drinking a glass of wine with dinner every night for 10 years, then I'm not going
to tell her that I consider her incapable of doing BDSM after dinner.
I am not qualified to comment on non-alcohol drugs because I, of course, never do
anything illegal. But for all your drug-related questions, the website Erowid.org is often
very useful.
* Illness. I don't have any particular observations about how being sick changes my
experience of S&M, but it definitely does. When I get sick and I have the option to
reschedule a date, I always do.
* Aaand finally, menstrual cycle. I haven't tracked my cycle with enough care to know
exactly how it affects me S&M-wise, but I'm pretty sure it does. As one of the good
people at EduKink once observed, "The great part about playing with a woman is that
you have 28 different partners, one for each day of the month!"
* * *
This can be found on the Internet at:
http://clarissethorn.com/blog/2011/01/30/body-chemistry-and-sm/
* * *
* * *
* * *
S&M:
[theory] Going Under
This was originally published in 2011. People have asked me whether there's any actual
research out there on the altered states that some people access through S&M; as far as
I know, there isn't. It's also worth noting that a lot of dominant partners go into another
kind of "zone" that's sometimes called top-space.
* * *
Going Under
"Come back," an S&M partner said softly, the other day, pushing my hair out of my eyes.
I blinked and shook my head in a futile attempt to clear it.
"That's weird," I said. "Someone else used to say those words to me when I was coming
out of subspace. I... that's weird."
"I'm not surprised," he said. "It's a natural thing to say to you. You go under so fast, and
so deep. You're so far away."
"Not all the time," I said. "And not with everyone. You're good at putting me there."
He smiled. "You bring it out in me."
Subspace is so hard to describe. I've written about it before, in passing, so many times,
because it's so important, but I've never come up with a good description for it; and when
I Google for it I can see that other people have the same problem. When I'm starting to go
into subspace it's just soft and dark and slow. But when I'm really far under, I'm totally
blank. Falling. Flying.
Somewhere else.
Come back.
What is it, where do I go? It's just submissive, masochist headspace. But I don't always
get into subspace when I submit, and I don't always get into it when I take pain either. I'm
not sure what the other ingredients are: some amount of trust, of course. And strong
feelings about my partner make everything more intense... way more intense. Orders of
magnitude more intense. Still, I've had new partners put me under with surprising
thoroughness.
It's a lot like deep sexual arousal -- hard to think, hard to process, hard to make decisions
-- but the deepest sexual arousal does not put me anywhere near deep subspace. Deep
subspace is. More. Than anything else.
Some S&M teachers tell people not to drive after an S&M encounter, not for a while; not
until you're over the subspace. They compare it to an altered state, like being drunk.
Some S&M teachers caution that it's dangerous for the dominant partner to suggest a new
activity in the middle of an S&M encounter -- something that wasn't negotiated
beforehand -- because the submissive may not be able to think clearly enough to consent.
(And because in those moments, the submissive will have a harder time than ever saying
no.)
I sometimes think that when I was younger and less experienced, I abandoned myself to
subspace more easily. I'm better at pulling myself out of subspace now, but I think the
cost may be that it's harder for me to really get into it. (Safety first?) I trained myself to
be able to say, "Don't stop," when I wanted my partner to keep going. (Sound easy? Trust
me, it took a while.) Playing with unfamiliar partners, I trained myself to be on guard.
(One of my sex worker friends told me once, "I don't care how deep the subspace is, I can
always come out if the client tries to fuck me without a condom.") I got better at calling
my safeword before I had to -- asking my partner to do something else or give me a
break, rather than suddenly stopping everything once I hit my absolute limit.
I am nowhere near perfect, of course. In particular, I can rarely answer complicated
questions, and sometimes my partners literally can't get me to answer any questions
when I'm subspaced. Sometimes it takes me a long time to come out, and partners may
get nervous while I'm surfacing. But I'm not sure these aspects can actually be eliminated
from subspace. And I've gotten better.
I'm sure that in an emergency, I could talk and function straight out of heavy subspace. I
doubt I would be optimally intelligent and thoughtful, however.
When I was younger, I'd get frustrated with my partner if he tried to ask me questions or
clarify things or otherwise check in with me when I was in subspace. Damn it, can't you
see I'm not here? Can't you see I'm under? Don't drag me back -- Intellectually, I
understood that my frustration was unreasonable, and I did my best to train myself to deal
with the check-ins. To surface quickly, slip back under afterwards. But I had to
experience subspace from the dominant side before I understood how hard it was to deal
with.
I remember sitting with my arms around the submissive and occasionally asking him how
he was; in response, he would murmur and snuggle up to me. Ten minutes. Twenty
minutes. I was processing my own dominant experience, and I had questions; I'd
occasionally ask one. He'd murmur something softly. After a while I really wanted a
glass of water and I thought he'd basically fallen asleep, so I said, "Hey, I'm going to go
get a glass of water, okay?" and tried to move away.
"No," he cried, and grabbed me. Holy shit, I thought, so that's what surfacing from
subspace can look like from the outside. Suddenly I understood exactly where his head
was at: barely any time had passed for him at all, and he was still drifting up through
velvety layers of consciousness. When I tried to leave, he'd felt sudden panic, a shot of
pure abandonment, no no no you can't, you can't leave me alone when I'm like this,
please I need your arms around me, I need you --
I knew exactly what to tell him. "Shh," I said, "I'm here."
A dominant friend once told me that he always informs his partners ahead of time that he
has to move after a good scene, he has to go for a run, and he won't stick around to guide
them out of subspace. I've always wondered how his partners deal with it. Maybe it's
easier if you know it's coming.
There are questions of consent, of negotiating new activities while a partner's in
subspace. Some people have told me they can't even actually safeword when they're in
deep subspace; I can't quite relate to this, but I imagine it could happen sometime. I
myself have occasionally had trouble safewording in the past, but it wasn't ever just
because of subspace, it was because of pride or difficult emotions with the dominant
partner. Subspace did complicate things, but I don't think it was the reason I had trouble
(though it can be hard to disentangle these things). But maybe someday I'll go under so
far that it will be.
I'm not saying it's never okay to push further than you discussed, once they're under -- it's
just important to be careful, and not to do it unless you're pretty sure you can read your
partner... or that they have the emotional wherewithal to deal with it if you push too hard.
Because safety in subspace is a question of emotional safety, more than anything. The
vulnerability and intimacy in those moments can be terrifying. The tiniest change in his
tone can mean the difference between mindless fear and absolute trust. It's so scary, and
so intoxicating, and so weirdly unexplainably glorious.
Come back.
The best part might actually be coming back.
* * *
This can be found on the Internet at:
http://clarissethorn.com/blog/2011/04/22/going-under/
* * *
* * *
* * *
ORGASMIC "DYSFUNCTION":
[storytime] A Unified Theory of Orgasm
At one point during my blogging career, an editor for the iconic feminist publication Ms.
Magazine got in touch and asked me to do some promotion for them. I asked if they
would accept a submission from me, and when the editor said yes, I poured my soul into
this long article about my experiences learning how to have an orgasm. The article was
rejected by Ms., so I went back to my old friend the Internet and got published on the
adorable girl-power site OffOurChests.com. Then it was cross-posted in about a million
places. I would love to get published in Ms., but in retrospect, I'm actually glad that this
piece went out on the Internet instead of being trapped in a print publication. I've
received an enormous amount of positive feedback for this piece, and I'm certain that
most of the young people who tell me it helped them would never have seen it if it were in
a print magazine.
* * *
A Unified Theory of Orgasm
I CAN'T COME.
and it's poisoned
every romance
I've ever had.
masturbating doesn't work. I don't know why. I tried therapy too, but my smart,
understanding, sex-positive, open-hearted doctor couldn't help. drugs while fucking?
check. I date attentive men who only want to make me happy, but no matter how fantastic
they make me feel, I can't get off. and believe me, I like sex. I love sex! how can it feel so
good and not end in an orgasm? I tried experimenting, and I sure do love the kink. it
feels great. but doesn't get me off. I've tried everything. everything.
now I have the best boyfriend I've ever had. but just like every other one, he can't get me
off. big dick? oral sex? tons of foreplay? kink? it's all there. nothing works. I used to lie
to my boyfriends and say it was ok that I couldn't get off. then at least they could enjoy
sex without feeling guilty. but then they'd stop trying, of course. and this one is still
trying... sometimes. I mean, it's clearly never going to work. so I can't blame him for not
having the same passion for trying as he used to. and I keep thinking I should back off.
after all, why put pressure on him to "perform"? he'll just resent me if I keep asking for
more, even if I'm gentle about it and compliment him and all that. since nothing he does
works. it will never work.
and I try so hard not to get frustrated, but I can't avoid the knowledge that I am fucked
up, I must be broken. I mean, any normal woman would have come by now. so what do I
do? I don't know what I need. do I back off and focus on him? that's what I end up doing,
because I can't face asking for a little more attention in bed anymore. what's the point?
he'll just resent me when it doesn't work again. so I back off. and I can't help resenting
him, just a little, for not noticing how much I'm hurting. and not trying, even if I am
broken, and I will never ever come.
* * *
I. Vaginal Pain
When I wrote the above, I was actually pretty close to figuring out how to have an
orgasm. But I didn't know that. I'd dealt with the anxiety of being unable to come for so
long -- and I'd also recently begun to understand that my sexuality is oriented towards
S&M -- and so anguish just flooded out of me, into those words. I craved S&M, but
acknowledging the craving made me feel like a "pervert," a "freak." It contributed to my
already-overwhelming fear that I was "broken" because I couldn't figure out how to
come.
There's one thing I didn't mention when I poured out all that fear and shame: I experience
rare vaginal pain -- not every time I have sex, not even most times, but occasionally.
Medical science has traditionally failed to care about how women experience our
sexuality, so very little research has been done on the subject. As a result, it's impossible
to say why I get that pain. Is it some kind of physical problem? That seems likely,
because my psychological comfort level with a sexual encounter doesn't seem to correlate
with whether the pain happens or not. But because female sexuality is often stereotyped
as too mysterious and emotional to be worth rigorous medical investigation, I doubt I'll
ever know for sure.
For a while I was sure I was allergic to semen, because I read a magazine feature by a
woman who said she was. Aha, I thought. I stopped taking hormonal birth control pills. I
made my trusted monogamous boyfriends use condoms. The pain became less common.
Yet throughout that time -- continuing through today -- I still get the pain occasionally,
very occasionally. Sometimes I even feel the pain during encounters that lack vaginal
penetration, so it's clearly not about having a penis in me.
I can push through the pain; I can even have an orgasm, a reflex that feels good yet is
surrounded by not-good; but I can't get rid of the pain entirely. Whenever I think I'll
never feel it again, it sneaks into some sexual encounter.
The semen allergy theory has been ruled out, since I get the pain without semen contact.
That doesn't mean that hormonal birth control didn't have an effect, though -- the pain
was definitely worse while I was taking it. The Pill intersects with sexuality in ways we
still don't understand; one common side effect is that it reduces sex drive. Perhaps the Pill
affected my sexuality in some physical-medical way, worsening the pain problem.
The long and the short of it is that I experience some vaginal pain; the pain is confusing
and hard to predict, and there aren't any good medical resources on the matter. Maybe the
pain points to something unusual about my constitution. Maybe there's a reason it's
harder for me to have orgasms than the "average" woman.
But the vaginal pain itself is not overwhelming, on the rare occasions that it crops up.
And the vaginal pain is not even close to the most central issue of my sexuality -- or the
biggest influence on my orgasmic ability.
* * *
II. S&M
I identify my sexuality as BDSM -- a.k.a. kink, leather, fetish, S&M, or B&D. BDSM is a
6-for-4 acronym that encompasses a host of related activities, including bondage,
discipline, dominance, submission, sadism and masochism. And yeah, I'm really into it:
my desires are heavy and overwhelming; I dream of agony, of terrified screams for
mercy. I've gone so far as to describe BDSM as my sexual orientation.
Before someone goes leaping to conclusions, there is a definite difference between "good
pain" and "bad pain." The occasional pain I feel within my vagina is not good pain; it's
not even interesting. It's just annoying. It's not sexy or enjoyable at all.
Some of us in the BDSM community have felt lifelong tendencies towards BDSM. We
have conversations ending with thrilled exclamations: "You mean, you tied up your
Barbie dolls as a child too?!" But BDSM is widely misunderstood and negatively
stereotyped, and thus, many of us also went through periods of rejection. We've
internalized so much anti-BDSM stigma from society that, at times, we freak out. We
deny or erase our BDSM desires.
That's what happened to me when I was in middle school. As my sexuality made itself
more and more evident, my anxiety peaked. I'd been producing secret sadomasochistic art
and stories without labeling what I was doing, but I stopped. I blockaded my thoughts of
violent power-play. I closed it all away as thoroughly as I could.
I still felt sexual desire -- I mean, I was entering my teens, so of course I did. Sometimes I
felt so much desire, like in the middle of some inconvenient class, that I'd have to rest my
burning forehead on the cold desk. I would close my eyes, and breathe deeply, and wait
for the erotic shiver to pass. At home, I'd lie around my twin bed and dream about kisses;
imagine men's hair and skin and touch.
Yet it was hard for me to trace my desire, to take control of it. I thought I had no problem
with the idea of masturbation, but when I touched my own lady bits, I went cold.
Vibrators did nothing but bore me.
I had excellent sex education, thank goodness. I went through a Unitarian Universalist
sex education program that talked carefully about different experiences, that made space
for gay and lesbian and bisexual and transgender and queer folks. I didn't only learn
about sexually transmitted infections and pregnancy and condom usage; I was also
encouraged to explore my sexuality, to value it. But this marvelous curriculum did not
include BDSM and other non-standard sexual identities. Nor did it include much advice
on how to negotiate sexual encounters with my partners. So, although I internalized many
positive and feminist messages about sex, my own sexuality remained invisible,
bewildering and hard to talk about.
When I started having sex around my mid-teens, I liked it -- I liked it a lot -- but it
seemed weirdly lacking. I'd never figured out how to masturbate, so I couldn't show my
partners how to pleasure me. And although I occasionally suspected that I wanted
something like S&M, I didn't understand how far I wanted to go.
A couple of teenage boyfriends tied me up... but then they acted solicitous and went
down on me, which didn't send me over the moon (though it was fun). From this, I
concluded that S&M was boring, but the truth is, I hadn't come close to the extremes that
form my preferences. It was years later that I released my need for agony, tears, bruises
and blood.
* * *
III. Frigid
As I got older and had more sex, my apparent inability to orgasm became the most toxic
secret I had. Most of my closest friends didn't know. For a while I thought I must be
"frigid," and ripped myself apart over the idea that I was a "frigid bitch," even though that
made no sense. It was ridiculous to conceptualize myself that way -- my sexual desire
was undeniable, unavoidable. But I had no other words, no other images or stereotypes,
that described a pre-orgasmic woman.
When I did tell my friends, it almost never went well. The best-case scenario was a
conversation with anecdotal fragments: "I knew a girl," one friend advised, "who couldn't
have orgasms. Then one day she was tripping, and having sex, and she fell asleep, and
when she woke up she was having an orgasm."
I also found a book on my father's top shelf, written by a guy who said he could give
"any" girl a squirting orgasm. The author claimed that the key was for the woman to be
comfortable. He also claimed that the woman had to not know what he was trying to do.
In fact, the book explicitly recommended that men prevent their girlfriends from reading
it.
Needless to say, it was hard to extrapolate a Unified Orgasm Theory from these tales.
The only things that seemed clear were that I somehow needed to both "let go" and to
"keep trying." But how?
Every once in a while I made the mistake of telling someone who was convinced they
knew the answer -- which was: sleep with them. When I got drunk with one sexually
experienced male friend and asked for advice, he insisted that if I'd just fuck him I'd be
sure to come. "Anytime you want," he slurred, "I'll give you an orgasm. Guaranteed!"
The fact that I was not attracted to him was, in his view, unimportant.
Worse was my lesbian female friend who declared that I had "issues." She said that I
ought to sleep with a woman. Ultimately, she turned out to be right that the problem was
one of sexual identity, but she was wrong that I was a repressed bisexual. Her campaign
to get me to sleep with her ended in a threesome with a guy I had a crush on. I liked bits
of that evening, but most of it was boring -- if not distasteful. When I tried to talk to my
friend honestly about it later, she insisted that I loved the whole experience. She said that
I was merely feeling morning-after guilt. "You were totally into it," she informed me. She
was clearly smug with victory, but angry that I resisted her version of events. I felt
resentful for years.
I didn't even tell my partners about my orgasm difficulties until I'd known them for a
while, because my secret felt like such Restricted Information: I couldn't give it to anyone
I didn't trust. I couldn't abide the idea of "everyone knowing" how broken I felt. I couldn't
stand the combination of pity and fascination that my problem evoked in the few who
knew.
When I did get around to telling my partners, that was most complicated of all. I was
quite unpopular in high school, and so I was something of a late bloomer -- boyfriendfree
until my late teens. It took years before I had any confidence in my boyfriend
interactions. And because I had no idea how to come and no idea where to start and little
idea of how to communicate about sex, I could not give guidance about what I wanted.
I also felt paranoid that lovers would resent me if they felt I was demanding something
too "difficult" during the sexual "exchange," so I downplayed my feelings. I told awful
lies like "it's not a big deal that I can't come" -- lies that broke my heart as I spoke them,
but felt safer than the truth.
I did manage to have one orgasm in my teens -- one. I'm still not sure how it happened. It
occurred one evening when I was incredibly tired, but went out with friends to get a
fudge brownie sundae anyway. When I got back, my boyfriend came over and wanted to
have sex, and I let it happen -- despite being tired and uninterested and full of sundae --
because I had not yet internalized the notion that my boyfriends wouldn't hate me if I
denied them sex. I was barely present during the act, but I jolted into awareness when I
realized I was having an orgasm. Afterwards, exhaustion overwhelmed me and I fell
straight into sleep -- so deep that my boyfriend was unable to wake me.
This was puzzling and hard to analyze. What aspects of my singular orgasm should go
into my Unified Theory... and which aspects were irrelevant?
The chocolate? Well, chocolate is arguably a mild drug, and drugs help some people
come. Also, there were studies that found mild aphrodisiac qualities to chocolate. So
maybe.
The position? The position had felt really good but was somewhat awkward, and I felt
weird asking my boyfriend to reproduce it, so I didn't let myself think about the position.
(I'm much better at communicating with my partners now.)
What about the exhaustion? It made sense that being very tired might help me "let go."
But I hadn't been very turned on or enjoyed the rest of the encounter, mostly because I
was so exhausted; and I didn't want to deliberately force myself to have sex while tired.
So while the exhaustion might have been a factor, I filed it under "less-than-useful" as
well.
I didn't worry about the problem too much for a while, because I figured that now that I'd
had one orgasm, surely it would become easy. I didn't tell my boyfriend it had happened,
either, because I didn't know how to describe exactly how. I thought I'd figure it out as
we went along, and then I would tell him exactly what it took.
Unfortunately, it wasn't that easy. Months and years passed without replicating the
incident. Anxiety began seeping back. My Unified Orgasm Theory was not doing well.
My fear of being perceived as "demanding" during sex and relationships was at a
ridiculous extreme back then. For example, I'd heard over and over that boys don't like
girls who are "high-maintenance," so I told my boyfriends that I never wanted them to
buy me flowers. I thought that men would feel relieved that they didn't "have to cater to
me," but they were just puzzled. (One responded by buying me fake flowers.)
Because of the awful shaming stereotypes around cunnilingus, I sometimes refused that
too. I couldn't believe that the boyfriends who were willing to go down on me were
actually enthusiastic about it, enjoying it -- and when my anxiety became too painful, I
inevitably stopped them. I always stopped them long before I stopped enjoying the act,
because I was so scared that they hated it, and hated me for wanting it. I was scared that
they resented me more and more, the longer they did it and I didn't come. My fear crept
up my spine and twisted around my heart until I had to make them stop.
Sometimes I felt trapped between love and disgust, like with the boyfriend who
constantly complimented me on how great in bed I was, but who seemed unaware of how
much I felt missing. The worst was when he went off on a rhapsodic list of my wonderful
qualities ending with: "... and I don't even have to worry about giving you an orgasm!"
He didn't see the bind he was putting me in, the awful self-suppression and self-wounding
that he encouraged. He seemed unaware that I heard him telling me: "You're great in bed
because you are constantly disappearing your own needs, and never asking anything
complicated of me!"
In fairness, I wasn't giving him any guidance on how to do better with me. In fairness, I
had no idea what kind of guidance to give.
They had their own social programming, and I didn't communicate well. But sometimes I
still have trouble forgiving my early boyfriends.
* * *
IV. The Fight
Not all my boyfriends were willing to do as little as going down on me. One, in
particular, resisted very strongly; never did it at all. This was an especial problem because
he was one of the men I've loved most in my life, and our relationship lasted for years. I
think well of him when I think of anything other than sex. But when I remember having
sex with him, I feel echoes of sick panic and heartbreak.
By the end, every time I slept with him I felt nothing but disgust.
He seemed to prove all my fears: that the men in my life would loathe and resent me if I
tried to discuss my confusion and desperation; that they would loathe and resent me if I
asked for help with my sexual needs. Towards the beginning of our relationship, I tried
asking him (very timidly) to go down on me, and he simply refused. In later
conversations he insisted that cunnilingus was "too degrading," an assertion he made with
a weird lack of irony, given that I was going down on him regularly.
As the years passed, my frustration deepened and I started thinking about experimenting
more sexually, but I was terrified of mentioning it. I didn't know what I wanted to
experiment with -- I really believed that I'd "already tried" BDSM, and that I didn't like it
-- but his initial rejection of mere cunnilingus didn't make me feel confident.
Finally, I got to the point of directly asking for sexual experimentation, and we had the
worst fight ever.
I recall that our relationship was somewhat rocky already. One of my journal entries from
that time contains the sentence, "I can't seem to not make him angry when I'm trying to
discuss our relationship." For this particular fight, we were sitting in his room reading
when I scraped together my courage and asked for his help in figuring out my sexuality.
"Well, what do you want me to do?" he demanded.
"I don't know," I said, "but I think there must be some way to find out -- I don't know,
there have to be books?"
"That's ridiculous," he snapped. "I love you, but I'm not going to read books in order to
figure out how to have sex with you."
It got worse from there. I was crying within the first few sentences. At one point, he
outright shouted at me "I don't care about your satisfaction," at which point I said, "You
can't mean that," and he repeated it. Eventually, I simply turned around and walked out of
his room. I had nowhere to go; it was a long train ride to visit him, and the trains had
stopped running that day. It was mid-winter, and freezing cold. Crying, I put on my coat
and shoes and exited the house, onto his suburban street.
I walked completely at random. I was hardly able to see. Fortunately, because it was so
cold, no one else was out and about. I muffled my sobs by bowing my head into my
collar. After fifteen minutes, I discovered my cell phone in my pocket and tried to call my
best friend, but she didn't answer. I was still walking around crying an hour later, when
she returned the call.
She calmed me down and got the story out of me. It was the first she'd heard about my
inability to orgasm, and she didn't know how to advise me because she didn't have the
same problem. Also, it was obvious to both of us that trying to communicate with my
boyfriend wasn't working. It was obvious that there might be no way to successfully
communicate with him on this topic at all.
Eventually, after she'd managed to quiet me into a trembling jellylike mass, my friend
said gently, "Okay, hon, you need to hang up and go back inside." She was right. So I
did.
When I stepped back into my boyfriend's room, he was still reading. I could sense from
the texture of our silence that he felt bad, though. I was exhausted, I felt like a stiff breeze
would blow me apart, but I told myself that I had to set a line. I was sure my voice would
waver as I made myself say: "If you're going to tell me that you don't care about my
sexual satisfaction, then I can't do this anymore...."
"I never said that," he said softly.
I closed my eyes. He would do this sometimes, insist that he hadn't said words I was sure
I'd heard, and it always made me feel like I had gone insane. I knew he'd said it. I'd even
responded with, "You can't mean that," and then he'd repeated it. But I felt so tired. It
had been hard enough to start the conversation. Hard enough to walk around the streets
crying for hours.
Maybe I really did misunderstand him somehow; I've been over those moments in my
head a million times, and I don't know anymore. Maybe I misunderstood. Or maybe he
was falling into a classic pattern of emotional abusers. Maybe he insisted that I was
hallucinating in order to confuse me out of protesting: abusers do these things because
they work.
What I do know for sure is that when he halted the conversation with a flat denial, I
couldn't bring myself to even try to talk about it again. Couldn't bring myself to resume
the conversation. But I also couldn't bring myself to break up with someone I loved so
much. We talked about other things instead.
And, of course, nothing about our sex life changed at all.
When my best friend called me the next day to check in, I said, "Well, he says that he
didn't say what I thought he did."
Her silence echoed with disbelief.
"Maybe I just... didn't understand what he actually meant," I said, but my words sounded
weak even to my own ears.
"Maybe," she said doubtfully, but she didn't press the issue.
Even after that fight, I continued dating that man for a long time. I look back now and I
can't imagine how I did it.
* * *
V. Men's Perspective
The gendered societal pressures that affect men are worth discussing, and worth
analyzing, and I often do just that. There is undeniable pressure on men to "perform"
sexually, for example. I try to have sympathy for men who feel this pressure -- but it is
difficult sometimes, because its major effect on my life has been to silence me. To make
me feel as though I couldn't ask for anything sexually. As though I couldn't express my
needs without hurting my boyfriend's feelings or making him angry.
And even now, when I talk about this stuff, I am as vague as I possibly can be about the
exact timeline. The last thing I want is for people who know me to read this and know
exactly when I started having orgasms. I don't want anyone to know exactly which
partners "couldn't perform." Because I know those men might feel it as a social
punishment, and as much as I hate the dynamics at work, I can't hate the men who were
part of them. They had their own social anxieties and their own blind spots and if I didn't
understand what was wrong, how could they?
I recently had dinner with a former partner. At one point we found ourselves having a
very explicit conversation, and I mentioned that I've figured out how to come. He looked
sad and apologized: "I'm sorry I was never able to get you there." I had no idea what to
say.
* * *
VI. S&M, Redux
I finally came into my BDSM identity around age 20. At first, when I was faced with the
fact that I wanted to be hurt until I cried and begged for mercy, I freaked out. I had no
idea what to do about BDSM, no idea how to feel about it. The only thing I knew for sure
was that I'd found something I really needed. But what did that mean for me, when I was
also trying hard to be an independent, rational feminist with self-esteem and integrity?
It took me years to parse out my thoughts on feminism and BDSM, to feel comfortable
with BDSM, and to talk openly and comfortably about it. During that process, I got better
and better at finding partners who were interested in my sexual desires and willing to
experiment. I also got to the point of reading sexuality advice books on my own,
including books specifically on BDSM. (For recommendations, please check the notes at
the beginning of this book.)
And I gritted my teeth, forced down my anxiety, and looked into books about the female
orgasm.
One book that came highly recommended from Amazon.com was Lonnie Barbach's For
Yourself. By the time I was halfway through the first chapter, I was crying because what
she wrote felt so true. At the end of the first chapter, I put it down and was never able to
pick it up again. Barbach wrote compassionately about experiences very similar to mine
-- for instance: [Are you afraid to talk to your partner about your problem] because
you're embarrassed to ask for what you want at a particular time; afraid your partner
will refuse, get angry, or feel emasculated?
But she also ended the first chapter this way: You have to assume responsibility and be
somewhat assertive. Our culture has taught us that a woman should depend on a man to
take care of her, which means she can blame him for any mistakes. It's nice to be driven
around in a car, but it's also nice to be able to drive yourself so you can go where you
want to, when you want to. But to do that, you'd have to assume some responsibility.
It was the same "let go" and "keep trying" advice I'd been coming across for years, except
that now it was wrapped up in a nice package of assumptions about me: implications that
I wasn't assuming responsibility or being assertive. I felt like she was telling me that I
chose to depend on a man to take care of me.
Maybe it would have been okay if the rest of the chapter hadn't been so miserably true,
but the combination of reading a bunch of truth about how I was feeling -- then being told
that I wasn't trying hard enough, that I was choosing to avoid responsibility.... It was
toxic.
I also had the bright idea of asking my gynecologist. The doctor rolled her eyes as I
spoke, then told me that the problem was obviously my partners. When I insisted that I
needed more guidance, she referred me to a center that gave orgasmic dysfunction
"evaluations" at $1,500.00 a pop. I was earning $7.50 per hour at the time. I didn't go.
I got up my nerve and talked to my mother, who had been extremely helpful and caring
when I came out to her about BDSM. During the BDSM conversation, I'd been scared --
then I felt immense relief as Mom told me that there was nothing wrong with me, and
reassured me that I wasn't "giving up my liberation." When it came to orgasms, though,
she seemed unsure of what to say. She did at least tell me that she, too, couldn't come
easily, which made me feel a little better.
Most helpful was the therapist I found on the Kink Aware Professionals list -- an online
list of doctors, lawyers, and other professionals who believe they understand alternative
sexualities such as BDSM. I tried one therapist who didn't seem to get it, but the second
therapist I saw was wonderful. He helped me through an enormous amount of my BDSM
anxiety. The orgasm problem was thornier, but he didn't make any assumptions, and he
did listen carefully, which was more than most people did.
My therapist gently encouraged me to get a second opinion about my how my body
worked, from a new gynecologist. Irrationally, I didn't. I suppose I still felt crushed by
how the first gynecologist had reacted. I also hoped I'd learn to come as I explored
BDSM more -- which turned out to be true.
* * *
VII. Figuring It Out
In retrospect, I recognize that I went through a brief period where I had orgasms
sometimes -- weak ones. But the orgasms were hard to hang on to because they happened
during sex with my boyfriend. This would be the same boyfriend I described at the
beginning of this piece, when I wrote: now I have the best boyfriend I've ever had. but
just like every other one, he can't get me off. big dick? oral sex? tons of foreplay? kink?
it's all there.
Now I see, in retrospect, that not everything was there: neither of us had questioned our
sexual assumptions, our societally-determined sexual scripts. And one of the biggest
sexual scripts is that sex ends with the man's orgasm. That the man's orgasm is the goal.
It's very hard to think around these scripts. It's very hard to even be aware of them. So,
since my paramount goal during sex was obviously "satisfying my man," I often pushed
my orgasm away due to my focus on him. I knew that if I came then I'd feel tired and less
interested in sex (at least for a while). And obviously, if he were to have his all-important
manly orgasm, I couldn't go falling asleep on him could I? I couldn't even pause to
mentally process my sensations if he seemed to be enjoying himself, now could I? Plus,
once he'd come, I certainly couldn't expect him to stimulate me any more than he already
had, because he was tired; he'd just had an orgasm!
(These days, one of my #1 judgments of whether a new partner could be good for me is
this: if I didn't come before he did, then does he take a moment post-orgasm to catch his
breath, and then turn to me and smile and offer to do what it takes?)
In the end, figuring it out was almost anticlimactic.
I saw an online video from sex educator Betty Dodson called "Did I Orgasm?"... and I
realized that I'd been occasionally having weak orgasms already. I was also
experimenting more and more with BDSM; simultaneously, I put more and more power
into the hands of my fantasy men; and once I had compelling private fantasies to feed on,
I couldn't help masturbating. Here was the key: initially, I'd felt that masturbating in itself
involved having too much control over the situation. And that's not how my sexuality
worked.
Oh yes, in practice I take responsibility for my pleasure; and now I'm pretty good at
clearly discussing what kind of role my partners will take ahead of time, describing what
they'll do with me. These days, I sometimes take the dominant role, too. But even now,
it's hard for me to come if I feel like I'm in control.
On some level, even if it's the most tissue-thin fantasy, I usually have to convince my
emotional-sexual self that I'm not in charge. It helps if I have an emotional connection
with whoever I'm fantasizing about, too. If I don't have an emotionally involved romantic
partner, I seem to automatically create BDSM-themed fantasy worlds with hilariously
ornate storylines. Years ago, it never occurred to me that I couldn't reach orgasm because
my internal characters weren't compelling or my plotlines weren't dramatic enough... but
sometimes it's true!
In my case, I believe that BDSM is the key to my sexuality. It is as close to the core of
my sexual identity as I can get; close enough that, like some other BDSMers, I
occasionally call it my "orientation." But I don't think BDSM is like that for everyone,
and I don't even think that's the whole story with me -- because during the whole time,
this self-discovery process, I was doing things like eating more regularly, keeping a
healthier diet, putting some weight on my previously stick-thin frame, and exercising
more. Health plays a big role in any kind of sex, and it's important to think about. Still,
even now I can't come without some thread of dominance and submission, even if it's an
entirely internal fantasy that I imprint on whatever is happening.
When women ask me for advice on how to have orgasms, I feel helpless because there is
no "one true way." I don't want to fall back on the old "let go" and "keep trying" that I
received -- it's decent advice, but it's so vague. Perhaps something more useful would be
this: first, it really helps to have an idea of what you want. I know this can be hard in a
society that soaks us with sexual images designed for stereotypical men, rather than
images for women (and especially not for non-normative women like myself). And I feel
so aware of how patronizing and useless the "you aren't in touch with your sexuality,
that's why you can't come" argument can be. Remember, I had that argument used against
me by my lesbian friend. But it was, in fact, kinda true for me -- just in a different way: I
need BDSM.
If you're not sure what you want, don't panic. Just keep your eyes and ears open, and try
to monitor your reactions. It may surprise you. If it does, don't worry -- just research it!
No matter how unusual your sexuality, there is probably information on the Internet
about it. (And even if your sexuality is unusual, odds are it's not nearly as unusual as you
think it is.)
I often refer to my personal favorite sex education website in the entire world: it's
Scarleteen.com, a grassroots feminist effort with an amazingly comprehensive
perspective. Scarleteen has an incredible impact on many, many lives. Sometimes I read
it just for fun!
Secondly: it may help not to prioritize orgasms. I am not saying orgasms aren't important;
I just don't want the importance of orgasms to wound you, the way it wounded me. For
me, it is helpful to imagine sex as a journey. For me, it helps to focus on having fun
throughout, instead of doing what it takes to reach the "goal" of orgasm. If you're not
taking pleasure in the journey -- or at least indulging some curiosity -- then why keep
going? Why not stop and try something else?
Experimenting sexually in an open-ended way has been, for me, the most productive
possible attitude. And in fact, once I knew how to make myself come, I discovered that --
though it's helpful to be able to attain that release if I really want to -- orgasms aren't
actually my favorite part of sex! There are lots of other things I like better.
It's also worth noting that our definitions of "orgasm" are fairly narrow. Some research
indicates that there may be other ways to conceptualize orgasms than the stereotypical
genital-focused approach.
Thirdly, although it's possible for a person to explore sexuality on her own, relationships
can make or break the process. We all make some compromises for romance. But when
we compromise, we should know what we're compromising, and we should think about
whether the compromise is worth it.
For me, sexual exploration and satisfaction are incredibly important -- but it took ages to
develop the courage to put my foot down about them. After my boyfriend shouted at me
that he didn't care about my sexual satisfaction, it took me an embarrassingly long time to
end things with him; I really was in love, and we'd been together for years. But my
sexuality wasn't even close to a priority for him, and breaking up with him was one of the
best decisions I ever made.
After ending that relationship, I was able to build my self-confidence and self-esteem
with new boyfriends surprisingly fast -- and my boyfriends helped me more than they
probably know. I owe countless small debts to men who accepted my inability to orgasm,
took my anxieties about it into account, and sometimes gently pushed me to try new
things.
One particular guy comes to mind: I told him I couldn't come, but that I wanted to
experiment with S&M, so we arranged to buy rope and some painful equipment. During
our conversation, he gently drew me out on my history, and then he said, "You know
what I think we need to go along with this rope? A vibrator."
I blinked and said hesitantly, "I don't know, I've never really liked vibrators." But I was
willing to try it again, and that's when I learned that vibrators are awesome. That's when I
learned that what I really need is to convince myself I'm not in charge -- that once the
correct fantasy is in place, vibrators make everything easy.
Even today, few things make me happier than a man who grasps the tension I still
sometimes feel about "being demanding" or "asking for too much." I communicate with
straightforwardness that amazes most partners, but it's crucial for them to understand that
I still have hesitations. That even I, sometimes, need a moment to articulate what I want
-- or need to be asked whether there's anything he can do.
Lastly, and most importantly: don't let go of your boundaries unless you're sure you're
ready. If you really don't want to do something, you don't have to make yourself do it.
I'm writing this because when I was growing up, all the sex-positive work I read
encouraged exploration at the cost of boundaries, and I think that's wrong. There were
times when that attitude hurt me -- for example, I did things I didn't like because people
claimed I hadn't yet gotten over my sexual "issues," like my lesbian friend in college.
And I know that attitude has hurt other women, too.
I don't like seeing sex-positive feminism equated with making oneself freely sexually
available. Exploring sexuality does not mean you have to ignore your warning bells.
Sexuality is so complicated. Sex cannot be reduced to bodies, or hormones, or
psychological stereotypes. Sex cannot be reduced to certainties, to shoulds and
shouldn'ts. If I could destroy every force in our lives that drives home ideas of sexual
"normality," I would. Which leads to my final piece of advice: don't let me tell you
what to do. This is just my experience, just my ideas. As with everything, I want you to
do whatever feels right for you -- as long as it's among consenting adults.
* * *
VIII. Study Questions!
Here are some things that might be interesting to reflect on:
1) What questions do you have about your orgasm?
1a) Where have you researched the answers to those questions?
1b) Have you ever discussed those questions with your partners?
2) What questions do you have about your partners' orgasms?
2a) Have you ever asked your partners about their orgasms?
3) What's one thing you wish you'd said in bed to a partner?
3a) What would have made it easier to say it?
4) What are your favorite sexual acts? Are there other ways you could perform them?
5) What's the best sexual experience you remember? What made it great?
6) What's the hottest thing you've seen or read? What made it great and are there ways
you could participate?
7) Does anything from this article resonate with you? What?
* * *
Here is a tangential footnote on issues of manliness:
When this article was first posted, a guy grabbed the first comment on the version that I
posted to the feminist blog Feministe, protesting that I clearly don't get the men's side of
this equation. I don't usually get super angry about comments on the Internet, but in that
case I did, and I had to take a while to calm down.
There was a mild comment fracas. Eventually, in response to that guy, I wrote:
I worked really hard on this article to try and note both:
A) how men's perspective might make this difficult for them, but simultaneously
B) why men's insecurities aren't actually an excuse for men to treat women badly.
In my experience women are actually extremely aware of men's insecurities. Women
frequently silence themselves and put up with a lot of crap because we are afraid of
"emasculating" our man, as I specifically noted in the article.
Given that this was an article about:
1) a woman's experience,
2) and what it's like to be a woman,
3) and why this issue is difficult to take on as a woman,
4) and why women shouldn't allow men's insecurities to shut us up...
... can you see why I would avoid putting a lot of text towards describing men's
insecurities in loving detail?
Now. With that having been said....
One of the guys in the Clarisse Thorn Manliness Brain Trust (tm) emailed me with some
thoughts in the wake of this article. Once again, I want to emphasize that I don't want
anyone to feel that they "ought to" give a crappy partner "another chance" if that partner
is treating them badly. I spent years giving a terrible boyfriend millions of second
chances because I kept telling myself that he was just "insecure." Walking away from
that oh-so-"insecure" man was one of the best choices I ever made. Nonetheless, I
think that the following comment from my Manliness Brain Trust (tm) friend might be
useful for some people:
When I first saw this post, my first thought was that I have to pass it on to a couple of the
people I'm involved with, who have difficulty reaching orgasm because it's an awesome,
awesome article. My second thought was that it seemed like Clarisse didn't really grok
the guy's side of this exchange.
Somewhere among 5th, 7th and 9th thoughts, was the notion that I'd be a jerk to raise
that point in the comments. This article is a great reference for women working through
difficult climax issues and there's no need to drag the conversation off to the guy side of
the experience... So I sent Clarisse an email about it instead. Because the thing with
Unification theories is that they're never all the way done. And things could have been so
much easier for Clarisse if her boyfriends didn't suck. Maybe some insight into why they
sucked would help with the ongoing development of the model, or at least provide some
eased management strategies.
The thing is, I don't feel attacked or diminished or anything else by this article. Despite
the fact that I'm a guy, I have insecurities and I can in some places see a stupid,
obnoxious mirror of myself in Clarisse's dumb ex boyfriends -- that isn't at all why I
thought I should talk about the topic more with the author. It just seemed to me like
Clarisse hadn't quite got her head around what the guys were going through with their
side of this interaction. Where their insecurities came into play.
In my head, I see a young woman, working through her own issues with orgasms reading
this, and seeing her young boyfriend reflected in Clarisse's past relationships. And the
take away from Clarisse's experience at the moment seems to be that if your boyfriend is
insecure and stupid, maybe he's not the right person to work through this with you. And
I'm not sure that's doing anyone any favors. I mean shit, maybe that is what you should