In defense of the sanctimonious women's studies set || First feminist blog on the internet

Category: Sex

Becoming Orgasmic

I find it funny just how much I enjoy science blogs, especially since I can’t grasp the basic rules of science. Nonetheless, this is one reason why the sciences appeal to me so much: Becoming Orgasmic — A Chat With the Director of the Kinsey Institute, Dr. Julia R. Heiman.

It is surprising that the same kinds of arguments are made even though they don’t hold water. The same kinds of accusations are made about what is good and bad about sex research even though we need to know more for everybody’s sexual health to have a society that works well in this area. We’re not very good in that in the United States. We have a very high teen pregnancy rate. We’ve got a relatively high STD rate even though it has dropped a lot. These things shouldn’t be happening in an industrialized country that has good information available to it. That those messages that would protect people don’t have an easy forum can be frustrating

Read the rest for an engaging discussion on sexuality and sexual behavior wordwide.

via Becky

Love is the Drug

Grace Jones had it right:

In an analysis of the images appearing today in The Journal of Neurophysiology, researchers in New York and New Jersey argue that romantic love is a biological urge distinct from sexual arousal.

This research specifically covers infatuation, the time period in which one may actually devote 3-4 hours developing the perfect mix tape to snare one’s beloved.

It is closer in its neural profile to drives like hunger, thirst or drug craving, the researchers assert, than to emotional states like excitement or affection. As a relationship deepens, the brain scans suggest, the neural activity associated with romantic love alters slightly, and in some cases primes areas deep in the primitive brain that are involved in long-term attachment.

…This distinction, between finding someone attractive and desiring him or her, between liking and wanting, “is all happening in an area of the mammalian brain that takes care of most basic functions, like eating, drinking, eye movements, all at an unconscious level, and I don’t think anyone expected this part of the brain to be so specialized,” Dr. Brown said.

This could explain why I find Bill O’Reilly smarmily attractive even if I wouldn’t touch him with a ten thousand-foot pole. But Keith Olbermann, baby. Keith is my Other Boyfriend.

Did I just say that?

Posted in Sex

Should parents be allowed to sit in on sex ed classes?

This woman tried, and was turned away. While I’m sympathetic to her cause — she didn’t want her child being misinformed by fact-deficient abstinence-only education — I think that as a general rule, it’s not a good idea to have parents in sex ed classes. In Washington state, sexual health educators are required to present their curriculum to interested parents prior to teaching it in the classroom; when I was an HIV/AIDS educator in high school, we had an annual evening meeting where we went over our entire lesson with parents who then gave us feedback or chose to sign their child out of class. So there is a state law here allowing parents to see what their kids are being taught. That’s important. But putting parents in a classroom where sensitive topics like sexuality are being discussed changes the dynamic of the room, and inhibits the free flow of conversation and question-asking. Kids aren’t going to want to ask certain questions if their best friend’s mom or dad (or their own parent) is sitting five feet away, listening to every word. So while parents rights are important, there needs to be a balance — and in my opinion, placing parents in the classroom during sex ed is intimidating and limiting, and not condusive to the kind of open environment necessary for that kind of curriculum. Thoughts?

Restoring virginity

Doctors who “repair” women’s hymens are being threatened, apparently, by people who judge women’s value by the state of their hymen. While the stereotype of someone getting this surgery is a veiled Muslim woman, that isn’t entirely accurate.

Young also said that it’s not just women with Middle Eastern backgrounds seeking the surgeries. There has also been an increase in the number of women requesting hymen repair from both the Orthodox Jewish and Christian fundamentalist communities, as well as from women of all nationalities who want the surgery as a sexual enhancement.

“Within the fundamentalist Christian population as well there has been an apparent recent movement towards ‘traditional family values’ and there is pressure put on women to be virgins,” Young said.

Hymen repair is “sexual enhancement”? That’s odd to me… I don’t really understand how having a piece of tissue torn is sexually pleasurable for anyone, especially when that tearing comes complete with blood spillage.

So what exactly is hymen repair?

Typical hymen repair surgery involves stitching the remnants of a torn hymen together and inserting a gelatin capsule that contains a blood-mimicking substance. After the hymen has been surgically repaired, a woman will bleed the fake blood the next time she has sexual intercourse. The surgery, which costs from $2,500 to $4,500, is performed on an outpatient basis. Healing can take from a few days to a few weeks.

Fake blood. How sexy. The article is interesting, but what nags at me is the fact that no one really discusses the real problem: the fact that women’s hymens are equated with their purity, value and general worth, and the fact that women are ostracized and sometimes even killed for making their own sexual decisions (or for having those decisions made for them). While I obviously don’t believe any doctor deserves to be threatened or killed for doing their job, I would hope that this problem is being more seriously attacked at its roots. And I would also hope that these doctors are offering their patients information about domestic violence and family abuse resources. If a woman comes in and is afraid of being beaten or killed for having sex, repairing her hymen isn’t going to solve the problem.

Feminists Hate Sex

Can a bitch get a break?

Why do so many women not want to call themselves feminists? I sincerely think it’s because the word carries the stigma that feminists don’t like bonking — least of all bonking guys.

If feminism wants its good name back, it will have to come up with a pro-sex, highly bonkable feminist spokeswoman, who is seen to screw guys, and to like screwing them. Often. A feminist who digs cock.

Ahem. Well, I can think of a few “bonkable” feminists who “dig cock.” But most of us sex-obsessed feminists have moved far beyond the heteronormative memes and refuse to play nice with the PR machine.

Adam Ash needs to pick up BUST’s One-Handed Read, among other feminist erotica, and rethink his thesis.

via Archaeopteryx, a brand new, kickass, feminist-minded blog by a grad student in the sciences.

Sex and the asexual girl

Asexuals are finally coming out. I can’t even begin to summarize the entire article, but it’s incredibly interesting; it seems that the discourse around asexuality is trying to walk a fine line where asexual people are validated, but where issues leading to asexuality can still be discussed and examined.

Posted in Sex

This website really stinks

Hah. Gotta love stupid puns about repulsive, sexist deodorant websites. I wasn’t aware that even deodorant could be marketed with such over-the-top sexism, but the Axe website proves that it can. You build (or “customize,” as they call it, kind of like a car) your “dream girl,” and Axe tells you what kind of body spray to purchase to snag her. Rad. Now, my slow dial-up connection was taking a few minutes to get me all the way into the site, and after about 30 seconds I asked myself, “Wait, why am I looking at an Axe deodorant site to customize my dream girl?” so I clicked out of the page. But not before I read the lovely “page loading” message:

Your desires are important to us. Please continue to hold. loading legs loading firm buttocks loading swan-like necks loading super-sized chest you could bury your head in loading moist pillow lips loading seductive haunting eyes loading naughty tongue…

I’m just gonna skip the usual deconstruction of this website because, really, it’s not that complicated to see what’s going on here: women, like cars and other things you “customize,” are things. They serve a particular purpose in a man’s life, and that purpose is sexual, ornamental or both. Plus, you should buy things. Things like Axe. Because buying things gets you more things.

So everything else aside, let me just add this: Axe stinks. Seriously. I’ve smelled it, and it’s nasty. I also have a (perhaps unfair, but now… maybe not) stereotype about the type of guy who uses Axe body spray — and it’s not appealing. And let me reiterate: It. Is. Smelly. No offense to any nice boys or girls out there who use it — but do you even exist? Are there nice, cool, progressive and socially conscious men and women who are purchasing and using Axe body spray, after their repulsive ad campaign and this inane website? Anyone?

Via Shankar at TK. Because for whatever reason, today I’m really feelin’ the blogs of conservative former NYU students.

Instructions and advice for the young bride

From an 1894 newsletter:

To the sensitive young woman who has had the benefits of proper upbringing, the wedding day is, ironically, both the happiest and most terrifying day of her life. On the positive side, there is the wedding itself, in which the bride is the central attraction in a beautiful and inspiring ceremony, symbolizing her triumph in securing a male to provide for all her needs for the rest of her life. On the negative side, there is the wedding night, during which the bride must pay the piper, so to speak, by facing for the first time the terrible experience of sex.

Read More…Read More…

More on Orgasm Science

The NYTimes has a review of Lloyd’s book that I wrote about yesterday, including a quote that greater clarifies her position:

Western culture is suffused with images of women’s sexuality, of women in the throes of orgasm during intercourse and seeming to reach heights of pleasure that are rare, if not impossible, for most women in everyday life.

“Accounts of our evolutionary past tell us how the various parts of our body should function,” Dr. Lloyd said.

If women, she said, are told that it is “natural” to have orgasms every time they have intercourse and that orgasms will help make them pregnant, then they feel inadequate or inferior or abnormal when they do not achieve it.

“Getting the evolutionary story straight has potentially very large social and personal consequences for all women,” Dr. Lloyd said. “And indirectly for men, as well.”

Thoughts?

And perhaps I can give Jam a forum to write a review when he’s done with the book… yes? Yes?