Madison Young, who’s wowed us for years in front of the camera, has lately turned her hand toward directing, and she has a deft hand behind the scenes as well. The all-girl feature Layover stars legendary dominatrix Selina Raven as “Mrs. Robinson” (aptly named!), a woman who takes revenge on her cheating wife — who stands her up, claiming an unavoidable layover in Denver, though it’s obvious she’s actually getting laid — by keeping herself sexually entertained for the evening.

Selina first seduces her teenage daughter’s friend, indie lesbian favorite Jiz Lee, who comes to the door adorably dressed in a suit. She’s looking for the daughter, but she gets the mom instead. A couple of drinks and some seductively skimpy lingerie later, Selina is instructing Jiz in the fine arts of fingering, licking, and fucking, and Jiz does a fantastic job of playing the naive innocent led deliciously astray. Selina’s confidence is incredibly hot, too.

The evening’s entertainment continues when Selina goes to a key party, where she joins a couple already in progress: Penny Play and Tina Horn, who play with an impressive array of toys (including a Julian Snelling jeweled butt plug and a Hitachi magic wand) before Selina jumps in. With two women wearing strap-ons, the double penetration is inevitable and marvelous.

Elsewhere at the party, Sadie Lune blindfolds and playfully torments the delectable Anja, using ice, toys, and other wiles to thoroughly wear her out. It’s an impressively hot scene. The final moments are given over the curvaceous Tee and her real-life girlfriend Pepper; Tee plays Selina’s daughter, and since mom is out for the night, they have the house to themselves, and they do everything it’s possible for two healthy young women to do sexually on a living room couch.

While as a fan of her work I think it’s a shame Madison herself isn’t in this movie (except in a little vocal cameo as the voice of the cheating girlfriend), her presence isn’t really necessary — this film is frankly awesome anyway. Lively, varied, fun, sweet, naughty, and, most of all, totally totally hot. Highly recommended.

• Layover

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One thing the impressive MyStim system has been missing is a solid metal, traditionally-shaped butt-plug. Well, our tushies can now rejoice as we welcome the MyStim Butt-Plug! This heavy medical-grade aluminum wonder is a somewhat squat diamond shape, giving you that lovely streeeetched out feeling as you insert it up to the widest point (1-1/2″ on the Small, 2″ on the Large), then that “ahhhh” as it smoothly guides you back down its slopes to the narrow neck.

A nice wide flange makes sure that’s where the insertion fun ends, but of course this is the world of estim, so we’re really just getting started! Turn on your MyStim Digital Power Box (not included) at any point in the insertion process to help things along — the change in polarity comes about a quarter of the way along the plug, meaning you don’t have to get the whole thing inside before you’ll feel the current. The heft of the metal body is a sensation all in itself, but once you’ve got a pulsing current going the MyStim Butt-Plug has the potential to make you go out of your mind with joy. This is one toy we can really get behind!

• MyStim Butt-Plug
• MyStim Digital Power Box

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Porn and thrillers can be a tricky combination, since it’s hard to maintain suspense when you have to take a break every fifteen minutes or so for a sex scene. Director Francois Clousot manages to marry the genres in Last Call, a film conceptually reminiscent of the 1997 David Fincher film — both involve a main character caught up in surreal machinations they don’t entirely understand, bent to the will of a shadowy conspiracy.

In this case the victim involved is Brad Armstrong as a nice guy going out for a night on the town with a friend. His friend stands him up, but he meets Kaylani Lei, and before long he’s in bed with her . . . and he’s a lucky guy. Kaylani is always hot, and she’s never looked better — sultry, passionate, and tight, with a body that never quits.

Unfortunately for Brad, she steals his wallet, keys, and phone, leaving him stranded in a bad part of town to make his own way home. He wanders the streets and has a strange interaction with Tori Black, who seems to be a street person/hooker/lunatic. Tori plays crazy/funny extremely well — she steals every scene in which she appears, and she’s adorable while she does it.

Brad eventually makes his way to a sleazy sex shop staffed by Mikayla Mendez and Alektra Blue and begs to use the phone. He has trouble reaching anyone who might help him . . . but Mikayla wants to suck him off, and Alektra listens in on the extension while he narrates the action, making for an odd combination of phone sex and actual sex. Those girls ditch him too, though, and the phone stops working, so he’s back out on the street, where he spots Kaylani in his car, and chases her into a building and rides up in a freight elevator. At the top, Tanya James and Bridgette B. appear, dragging him out of the elevator before boarding it themselves and proceeding to make out — and they lock Brad out once he tries to join in, giving us our one girl-girl scene.

We get a glimpse of the conspirators in the form of Tori Black and Eric Masterson — she’s not crazy after all, or at least, not entirely crazy, as they discuss the progress of their night’s persecution. Little is illuminated, but that’s okay; soon they start fucking, and Tori’s just as much fun in the sex scene as she is in the other scenes.

Brad finally stumbles into the final sex scene, an orgy with Alektra, Kaylani, Mikayla Mendez, and Randy Spears. It starts with just Randy on a couch, getting a blowjob from Kaylani, surrounded by guys in monk robes holding candles, but gradually the other characters join in.

Now, maybe stumbling around from sexual interaction to sexual interaction doesn’t sound so bad, but the film does a good job of conveying Brad’s confusion, worry, and sense of real physical peril. It might be the only porn movie I’ve seen where the main character says “Not again” whenever sexytime shenanigans start — he knows he shouldn’t do it, but he just can’t help himself.

Stick around after the hallucinatory orgy scene for an explanation of why Brad was subjected to this ordeal. The explanation doesn’t necessarily make a lot of sense, but surreal persecution fantasies are allowed to be confusing. It’s a dark, twisty thriller with a combination of plot and hot sex that should keep you watching.

• Last Call

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One thing I’ve never understood about most e-stim (that’s electrical stimulation, for those who don’t know, and, no, it’s not necessarily painful) toys is why more of them aren’t made with a handle. Well, the MyStim Mighty Merlin Dagger Dildo has come to the rescue! With a sturdy, long, flanged plastic handle, you can wield its impressive 7″ of gently undulating medical grade aluminum with confidence!

E-stim toys work by sending a current through the body via the shortest direct route between the two poles on the toy. On the Mighty Merlin, this change in polarity is marked by a black line that happens about 2″ along the shaft — so you only need to insert the toy past that a bit to feel the current. Since the shaft isn’t too terribly wide — about 1-1/16″ — you can use the current as part of your warm up, even in anal play (assuming 1-1/16″ is within your warm up range); the handle even serves as a flange. How strong/ prickly the current is can be controlled by your MyStim Digital Power Box (sold separately). As your muscles relax, insert the toy deeper, and the current goes with you, letting you get deeper than other estim toys where the polarity change is further along.

Finally, the Mighty Merlin is simply the best if you have a partner helping you out. That handle protects their hand from the current, so they can probe you with confidence (mighty wizard laugh optional).

• MyStim Mighty Merlin Dagger Dildo
• MyStim Digital Power Box

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Why is the “sex writer” field so dominated by women?

I’ve been thinking about this question for many years. The publisher of this very blog brought it up in a conversation we were having, and it’s been on my mind off and on ever since. It came up again at a recent salon of sex writers and activists; it came up yet again, although more obliquely, in a conversation I was having with a porn writing friend of mine.

Why is the “sex writer” field so dominated by women?

There are exceptions, obviously. Arguably the most famous and influential sex writer right now is the sex advice columnist Dan Savage. And there are others, of course: David Steinberg, Dr. Marty Klein, Charlie Glickman, I could keep going. And of course, there’s plenty of dumb, generic, Maxim-magazine type sex writing from men; in some senses it’s silly to complain about sex writing as female-dominated, given how much of the dumb crap there is. But it does seem as if sex writing — serious, intellectual sex writing, at any rate — is one of those rare fields that’s largely taken up by women, and in which women are both more visible and more generally respected.

And thinking about this question is making me think about the suspectability of male sexuality.

I think that when women write about sex, we’re assumed, in some ways, to be dispassionate observers. Of course we get targeted as sluts and whores and whatnot. But we’re also seen as bringing a fresh perspective to the subject, and a cooler eye, and a more thoughtful point of view.

When men write about sex, on the other hand, they’re assumed to be drooling horndogs.

Of course men have sex on the brain, this assumption goes. They’re men. They think with their dicks. That’s what men do. Who cares what they think about sex? We all know what they think about sex. What men think about sex is that they want it.

The very fact that sex is seen as a primarily male experience makes male sex writers, paradoxically, seem less serious. Our society sees sex as being about maleness: male desires, male insecurities, male satisfaction. Our culture is sexually obsessed with women, of course; but it’s sexually obsessed with women as — and I’m turning into a ’70s lesbian feminist as I write this — the objects of desire, rather than the subjects of it. Sex is seen as a male topic. But therefore, we all too often assume that we know what men think about sex, and how they feel about it. Male sexual desire is assumed to be simple: an animal urge to put a dick in a wet hole. With, occasionally, some variations in the way of orientation and paraphilias. And I think this makes it harder for male sex writers to be taken seriously. Anything they have to say on the subject is likely to be seen as suspect.

Now, I’m not writing this to complain about the terrible unfairness of this reverse discrimination. Yes, this is to some extent unfair. It’s unfair to men to assume that the only thinking they do about sex is with their dicks, and that they therefore don’t have anything to contribute to a serious conversation about it. (Also, I feel compelled to point out, men aren’t the only ones who sometimes think with the little head instead of the big one. Believe me, I speak from experience.) But given how much regular discrimination women deal with in almost every other occupation, I’m not crying a river over the fact that this one little field of endeavor has a more female stamp on it.

That’s not the point of this.

The point of this is twofold. One is this: I, selfishly, want to read more of what men have to say about sex. I want to read more about the varieties of male sexuality, from people who are living it from the inside. I want to read more about the varieties of female sexuality, from people who are seeing it from the outside. I want to read more about how men feel about this “animal urge horndog” label they’ve gotten stuck with: to what extent they think it’s true, to what extent they think it isn’t, how the reality and the unreality of it weave together in their experience of their sexuality. Sex is too interesting and too important a topic to limit most of the serious thought about it to one gender. And in addition to hearing what men, qua men, think about sex, I want to hear what individual men think about it: what Dan and David and Marty and Charlie and so on have to say. Sex is too interesting and too important a topic to limit the voices who can talk about it seriously to the voices that are attached to vaginas. (Psychological and emotional vaginas, as well as the physical ones.)

A porn writing friend of mine was talking with me recently about a story he’d written; a kink-themed story, in which a male character was using economic leverage to take sexual advantage of a female character. My friend found this fantasy scenario hot (as do I — hoo, boy!) . . . but he was finding himself somewhat uneasy about it as well. In particular, as a good feminist, he felt uneasy about eroticizing these gender dynamics and the economic power that men have over women.

And yet, if the story had been written by a woman, telling the story from the female victim’s point of view instead of the male perpetrator’s, I doubt that he would have felt any qualms about reading and enjoying it. It bugged me a little that he felt that way about writing it. It made me wonder how many other good male porn writers had considered writing stories like this, had even started to write stories like this . . . and had stayed their hand, for fear of being seen as, or indeed for fear of being, drooling sexist male horndogs who just want to take sexual advantage of women. If so — that sucks. I, selfishly, as a fan of kinky porn in which men do fucked-up things to women, would like to read more stories like this that are written by men. I know what this fantasy feels like from my end of it. I want to learn more about what it feels like from the other end, from thoughtful feminist men who get off on it, too.

So that’s my first point. My second point is this:

I’ve lived my whole life dealing with the various and sundry ways that female sexuality gets demeaned, by being ignored or trivialized or assumed to not exist.

Thinking about this topic is making me realize the various and sundry ways that male sexuality gets demeaned . . . by the mirror image of that process. It’s making me realize that the amplification of male sexuality — the funhouse mirror that takes the image of a man and distorts it into a drooling tongue and a hard dick — has the effect of demeaning it as well.

And that sucks for all of us.

Greta Christina, copyright © 2010. Be sure to check out Greta’s blog.

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Couch Surfers: Trans Men in Action is a high point in the genre of transmen porn. It doesn’t hesitate to head straight for the action, with transguy Mark van Helsing and cis-gendered-boy Peter Pleas getting together before the opening titles even appear: Mark gets a rim job, then goes down on Peter, and Mark straps on a big cock and fucks Peter in the ass, and there’s a little making out, too — all this in the first, oh, two minutes of the film.

Next up on the fated couch (which one can only hope was at least spritzed with Febreze after the day’s shoot was done) are Lube Boy (I see superhero potential!) and Ian Sparks, who start to make out but don’t get far before Ian Foxe joins in. He assumes a kneeling position, works a cock in each hand, and sucks them while they kiss. They all work through various positions, including Foxe getting simultaneous cock in his mouth and ass, and bio-guy Ian Sparks even dons a strap-on (because obviously two dicks are better than one).

The action transitions to another couch with Ian Sparks joining transguy Brett McCloskey for some mutual rub-and-tug. They take turns sucking one another off until Brett goes down on all fours to get reamed, followed by cowboy riding.

Dex Hardlove strolls in to take things to the next level with a feat of fantastic excess: both Brett and Ian get on all fours while Dex slips his lubed-up fists into their asses — simultaneously! There follows a merry messy lubed-up festival of jerking off, working the balls, and orgasms galore. Dex keeps working over Brett while Ian Foxe joins in the fun — Brett takes cock from both ends, and obviously enjoys all the attention. Dex is an adroit top, and doesn’t skimp on the dirty talk or ass-smacking, either.

The free-flowing action of one scene moving seamlessly into the next is broken up when we return to couch number one with Cupid and Peter Please making out ever-so-briefly before CJ Cockburn joins in. It’s a quiet, intense threeway (especially compared to the noisy — but also intense — scene immediately previous), with everyone pressed together on the couch, kissing, sucking, licking, fucking, jerking, face-sitting, and generally exploring one another thoroughly and with great delight.

While production-wise this is a rather no-frills affair — I mean, the marquee sets are a couple of couches! — the action is top-notch, the sex inventive and genuine, and the boys and bois hot. There’s an extra disc of bonus features, and a brief, informative guide called the “First Timer’s Guide To Playing With Trans Guys” (for those who want to play the home game.) Couch Surfers is genderfuck extraordinaire. Don’t miss the action.

• Couch Surfers: Trans Men in Action

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Are you already a relatively accomplished cocksucker, but looking to expand your skillset, learn some new tricks, or make fellatio into more than just foreplay? Then Tristan Taormino’s Expert Guide to Advanced Fellatio might have some good pointers for you. Tristan assumes you already know how to get on your knees and lick and suck, and that you can handle a basic 69, and that you know whether you’re a spitter or a swallower — this is the advanced class.

After the usual anatomical lecture, Tristan runs down some advanced blowjob positions, including:

“Sword swallowing,” with a woman in bed on her back, head hanging off the edge of the bed, while the man stands and fucks her face (or lets the woman hold his hips to control his thrusting; “Standing 69,” where the man stands, holding the woman upside down with his face planted between her thighs, and she hangs down to suck cock — good for strong men and/or petite women, obviously; “Reverse 69,” with the woman laying face-up on the man’s body (he’s also face up!), and essentially doing a backbend to get his cock in her mouth while he eats her out. Only the young and nimble (or circus acrobats!) need attempt, and it looks more like stunt-fucking than something that would actually be fun, but it’s definitely not a move you see often; And classic “deep throating,” with the caveat that a lot of women have trouble suppressing the gag reflex . . . and the rather hot recommendation that you practice controlling the gag reflex with a dildo as necessary. I’d add that you should let your male partner watch while you practice. So he can, um, understand your plight.

All those techniques (except for practicing with dildo; Satine Phoenix, Adrianna Nicole, and Charley Chase don’t need practice) are demonstrated in hot scenes that usually end with some straight fucking, so it’s not entirely a fellatio extravaganza. Those ladies, their partners, and various other porn stars also weigh in with their opinions on what separates a good blowjob from a great one.

While the educational content here is on par with other Vivid Ed releases, the production seems a little more slapdash — the menu isn’t as sophisticated as usual, there’s no watch-the-sex-scenes-only option, special features are unusually few, and it has a less linear, more cobbled-together feel. That actually results in there being more sex on screen, since there’s no “workshop” section with Tristan addressing a crowd, though some of the snippets of sex get repeated two or three times. But that’s okay, too; they’re good snippets.

• Tristan Taormino’s Expert Guide to Advanced Fellatio

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One of the nice things about erotic comics is their ability to transform fantasy into visual reality on the page. Another nice thing is how they take naughty stories and add images, upping the ante no matter how you’re wired. And nowhere have I seen such stellar examples of both of these perqs than in the latest Best Erotic Comics. Edited by former Blowfishie Greta Christina, Best Erotic Comics 2009 contains some of the hottest, most cutting-edge and downright creative comics to pass across my desk. Think an adorable, tiny sprite would be huge fun tucked inside your pussy? Best Erotic Comics 2009 takes you there. Ever thought getting sucked off by a squid would be incredibly hot? Best Erotic Comics 2009 has that visual for ya. Wish you could do more than just fist your boyfriend up the ass? Oh yeah, Best Erotic Comics 2009 goes there. Artists include Alison Bechdel, Gary Baseman, Peter Kuper, Junko Mizuno, Gilbert Hernandez, Ellen Forney, Toshio Saeki, Colleen Coover, and Quinn among others. No matter your orientation, fetish, kink, or fantasy, you’ll probably find it drawn out for you in exciting new ways in this fabulously filthy collection.

• Best Erotic Comics 2009

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I never get tired of AbbyWinters.com videos — natural amateur Australian lesbians in very minimalist scenes, usually just a girl or two and a camera. There’s none of the posing or pretense you usually see in girl/girl films, and there’s a refreshing sort of innocence, too. These are pretty, pleasant, laughing, happy girls making love (and occasional small talk) together, and they’re a pure pleasure to watch.

Girls in Ecstasy features three long scenes, each with a different couple, all with a very different vibe. We begin with blonde Anneke and brunette Larissa cuddling on the couch, nuzzling and snuggling, gradually moving on to gentle kissing, with lots of close-ups of kissing, glimpses of panties up a denim skirt, and the slow removal of clothes to reveal some nice sexy underwear; it’s almost half an hour before they’re completely naked, but they’re both gorgeous, so it’s worth the wait. It’s an almost totally wordless scene, just a few whispers of encouragement, and it’s a slow, tender build to licking, fingering, scissoring, and snuggling — we even get to see some lovely cuddly afterglow.

Blaire and Joannie are a lot more giggly. They’re both blonde and busty, though Blaire is the overall curvier and more lush of the two. It’s a chatty scene, but they don’t skimp on pleasuring one another, with lots of kissing (tongue piercing!), fingering, attention to one another’s breasts, cunnilingus (piercings down there too!), and sixty-nine.

Anabela and Maria are cute brunettes, one crawling into bed with the other, and they’re neither quiet nor giggly — they’re intense. They start making out passionately, with real sexual hunger — devouring each other, sharing smoldering looks, fingering each other hard, and very demonstrative and vocal all the while. There’s scissoring, sixty-nine, and no end of orgasmic joyful noise.

All three scenes — which are quite long, the film as a whole is over two and a half hours — have some behind-the-scenes material at the end, with more conversation, discussion of past performances, their opinions about the scenes, funny bits (one girl names various slang terms for vagina, some of which I’d never heard before), and interviews . . . often with naked girls showering, which is, I think, how all interviews with hot girls should be conducted. Girls in Ecstasy is an enormously pleasant film, one that — in addition to titillating — also makes you happy.

• Girls in Ecstasy

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Playgirl specializes — not shockingly — in women- and couples-friendly porn with lots of beefcake, more cunnilingus than you usually see, few if any facial cumshots, and (usually) more tender/gentle fantasies. Risqué Moments follows that formula, though as the title suggests, it’s just a little more edgy than usual. There are six vignettes, all cutely titled:

“Clean Sweep” begins with Aurora Snow in the mundane task of doing laundry — and she’s not even dressed like a stripper! Her chores are interrupted by her extraordinarily well-hung black partner CJ White, who proceeds to create some more dirty clothes for her by stripping down, and stripping her clothes off, too. It’s a sweet and flirty scene, mostly on the couch, intimate and homey, with lots of pussy-eating, followed by cocksucking, some cowgirl on the couch, and then — anal! Which surprised me, since you don’t see a lot of anal in this sort of movie, though it’s very woman-controlled anal, with Snow setting the pace. Very hot.

“Bounty Huntress” has Tori Black as a badass bounty hunter in black boots pulling a gun on Mario Rossi and deciding to have a little fun with him before turning him over to the authorities. She makes him strip in the parking lot, he worships her body a bit, she sucks and caresses his cock, and he kneels and eats her out for a long while, plus fucking in various standing (and bending-over) positions in the motel doorway, though they never enter the room.

“Fountain of Love” has Jenaveve Jolie and Evie Delatosso playing in a fountain (as bi-curious girls often do!) and filling their water jugs as a prelude to . . . well . . . rubbing their own jugs together, plus some sweet kissing, eating one another out, and so on — girl/girl stuff seems kind of odd for a Playgirl movie, but it’s nice to see them give a little something to women who love women and men.

The other scenes are less edgy/unusual, but still pleasant. In “Persuasion” Sarah Vandella is an heiress who convinces executor Tommy Gunn to unethically reveal details of a will in advance, using exactly the techniques of persuasion you’d expect. “Time-N-Time” is a vaguely historical scenario with Bridgette B. as a serving girl who comes bearing goblets for Nando Rico, who’d rather come all over her goblets, if you know what I’m saying. (I could do without the bad Ren Faire music, but it does set the tone, I guess.) “Classic Rapture” has Marco Banderas working on a vintage car when tiny blonde Madison Scott comes to him for help — he must be a good two feet taller than her, and while their size difference initially distracted me, they both seem to be enjoying it. She shows her appreciation by kneeling and sucking him, then gets eaten out and rides him reverse cowgirl.

There’s decent bonus content, too, with an extra sex scene and a bonus masturbation scene featuring an incredibly ripped bodybuilder. Ideal for couples who want a little bit of spicy with their sweet.

• Risqué Moments

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This week’s new toy isn’t just new. It’s innovative. Using revolutionary technology that has a distinctively steampunk feel, the Earth Angel Rechargeable Vibrator is a vibrator that runs on, well, you. Or at least, energy that you yourself provide. No, no, you don’t have to crank it while you’re using it; you crank it up ahead of time, and the energy from your industrious clockwise turns of the handle are stored for future use.

And I do mean stored. It has an indicator light (so you know when your stored energy is running low) and even multiple speeds, so you can use your vibrations when, and how, you like! The sleek white vibrator is made out of a hard plastic that translates the vibrations very well into whatever orifice you choose to insert it (or whatever sensitive bit you’ve chosen to titillate with it).

Approximately 8″ long and 1-3/8″ wide at the widest point, the Earth Angel will never need new batteries, meaning that no matter how much you use it, you won’t be contributing to a landfill somewhere. Both the packaging and the vibrator itself is made from recyclable parts and plastic. Good for the environment, the Earth Angel makes you feel good, in more ways than one!

• Earth Angel Rechargeable Vibrator

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As a sex-toy buyer, I answer a lot of questions about sex toys. One question I get quite often these days is whether this toy or that toy has those dreaded phthalates in them. Phthalates are chemical agents used to make hard plastic into soft, pliable plastic. They do this through some sort of chemical magic that lets the plastic molecules slide around more easily (sorry, that’s about as technical as I get). The problem is all this sliding around means they’re not really all that well bonded together, allowing the phthalates to fly free, leading to that off-gassing smell you sometimes find in jelly toys. That smell means another little phthalate got its wings!

But, alas, recent studies have indicated that all these freedom-lovin’ phthalates can build up in the body, and, at high enough levels, may even cause some health problems. Thus, the relatively new interest in phthalate-free toys.

Because of this concern, we decided to make a nice long list of all of our wonderful plastic toys that do not have phthalates in them. These are all of our hard plastic toys, as well as all of our toys made out of higher-quality products such as silicone and elastomer. Since our list was getting long, we only listed toys that use plastic, but that doesn’t mean that just because a glass dildo or a metal butt-plug isn’t listed that it has phthalates — these materials never have phthalates in them, so they’re always phthalate-free!

Please peruse and enjoy our list of plastic toys that are 100% phthalate-free! And if your favorite jelly toy isn’t listed on our safe page, never fear — condoms don’t contain phthalates either, so slapping on a handy Durex Condoms (or Avanti Bare Condoms, if you’re allergic to latex) will help protect you from at least some of the wandering phthalates your favorite rabbit may contain.

• Phthalate-Free Toys
• Durex Condoms
• Avanti Bare Condoms

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Like most guys, I’m a pretty lazy and no-frills masturbator. Evolution gave me opposable thumbs, and that’s about all I need, with maybe some kind of lubricant if I’m feeling fancy.

But then I figured out how to kick it up a notch. A well-placed butt-plug is a masturbating man’s best friend, and if you’ve never experienced the glorious spasms of orgasm with your sphincter muscles clenching and unclenching around a toy, you’re missing out on some major personal pleasure.

Want something even more intense?

You need to try powered toys.

I’ve experimented with various prostate-pleasuring toys, and the Billy Silicone Anal Vibrator is the best I’ve ever tried, and the first butt toy I’ve ever used that I expect to use often in the future — both alone and with friends. It’s an attractive little device, made out of silicone (so use water-based lube; silicone lubes are a no-no with silicone toys), measuring about 6-3/4″ long and x 1-1/3″ in diameter at its widest point, with just the right amount of curve and length to tickle the prostate. (I don’t know how it feels to be a woman having her G-spot stimulated, but if it’s anything like prostate stimulation, I can understand why they get so frustrated when their partners can’t find the spot. It’s easier to find in a guy, I think . . . you just have to reach a little deeper.) The size is small enough that you probably won’t require much warm-up if you’ve done this sort of thing before, but big enough to give you that fine full feeling.

There’s a flange to keep it from slipping beyond your comfort zone, and the controls are neatly integrated into the handle. Said controls are reminiscent of the old-school iPod interface more than anything else (in fact, the whole design looks like what you’d get if the design team at Apple started designing butt toys, which I’ll grant you is an unlikely, if delightful, scenario).

The controls are pretty intuitive. Hold down the plus (+) sign to turn it on, and press it more to make it vibe harder, and press the minus (-) to make it more gentle; hold the minus down to turn it off. (It’s not so sensitive that you’re likely to turn it off by accident.) You can push the up and down arrows to move through five pre-set vibration modes. There’s a steady vibration, interval vibrations of various frequencies, and the final absolutely mind-blowing mode, which revs up the vibrations, slows down, and revs up again in a glorious repeating pulse. I recommend running that one until it becomes too intense . . . then switching to the hard, steady vibe to make it even more intense and finish yourself off.

You have to let it charge for a couple of hours before first use, but after that it runs . . . well, the manual says four hours, which is certainly long enough. Billy boy will take very, very, very good care of you, if you take good care of him.

Takes 3 AAA batteries (not included).

• Billy Silicone Anal Vibrator
• AAA Battery

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I’ve been thinking about orgasms.

Just for a change.

Orgasms, I think we can all agree, are great. (I know — what a controversial and groundbreaking assertion! Alert the media!) But lately, I’ve been thinking about the vast variety of climactic sexual experiences that aren’t, technically speaking, orgasms. I’ve been thinking about sexual experiences that feel, in some sense, like an orgasm, or like a second cousin of an orgasm — a shiver, an explosion of energy, a feeling of relaxation and release — but that probably wouldn’t register as “orgasm” if I was hooked up to a Masters and Johnson orgasm- measuring machine.

We have a poverty of language about sexual pleasure. And this includes a poverty of language about climactic sexual pleasure. Every time I read about the four stages of human sexual response cycle (excitement, plateau, orgasm, and resolution), I feel like I’m looking at a map of a forest that’s only mapping out the one path from the parking lot to the main lodge, without showing any of the trails and creeks and pastures. Technically, I suppose these not-quite-climactic climaxes fall into the “excitement” or “plateau” phase of the response cycle . . . but that language doesn’t capture the feeling of rich, complex satisfaction these other trails have to offer.

So here are some of the not-exactly-orgasmic sexual climaxes I’ve experienced, and the language I’ve come up with to describe them. If you have some of your own, please speak up about them in the comments!

Mini-gasms. When I’m on my way to coming, I’ll often have a series of little mini-climaxes. They’re not technically orgasms; they’re not all-encompassing the way an orgasm is, and they don’t make me feel satisfied, except for just a second. In fact, they actually wind me up more. But they’re definitely in the same family: the “over the top of the rollercoaster” peak, the shuddering release of tension and energy. It’s just a smaller rollercoaster. They’re like the amuse-bouche of the sexual world: in giving a little taste of what’s to come, a taste that’s nowhere nearly large enough to be filling, they excite the hunger rather than satisfying it.

Not that that’s a bad thing.

Thrill-gasms. If I’m really wound up — if I’ve been thinking about a sexual encounter for hours or days before I have it — I’ll sometimes have a little shiver of a climax the moment my partner first touches me. Or a not so little shiver. Or several shivers. The moment after a long period of anticipation, when my body feels the erotic touch of my partner and realizes that it’s finally about to get laid . . . it feels in an odd way like the moment after a long period of foreplay when my body finally gets to come.

Pain-gasms. All the masochists in the audience are nodding their heads. For some of us, pain — the right kind of pain, in the right context — can feel not only as arousing and exciting as more conventional sexual stimulation, but as climatically satisfying as well. It’s like a sexual response cycle in a parallel universe: the excitement of the first few warm-up blows, the plateau of the high-flying endorphin high, the climactic shudders when the pain pushes the envelope, the rich feeling of peace and dissolving into the dark when it’s all over. It just doesn’t involve the involuntary rhythmic contractions of the genital muscles. (Except when it does. The parallel universes do sometimes bleed into each other. I can’t be the only person in the world who’s come from a beating.)

Nipple-gasms. This one is different. This one, I think, legitimately counts as a Masters and Johnson orgasm. I’ve even been known to ejaculate from having my nipples played with. But it has a significantly different flavor to it than a standard “genital sensation” orgasm. Coming without any physical stimulation coming anywhere near my genitals . . . to me, it’s a radically different experience. Different enough that it needs its own name.

Think-gasms. I love this one. Walking to work; sitting at my computer at the cafe; sitting on the bus staring out the window . . . if I’m fiercely fantasizing about a sexual scenario, the imaginary orgasm will sometimes shiver through my real body. It’s not quite like an orgasm itself (which is just as well for the other people at the cafe or on the bus). It’s like an echo of an orgasm. Or a shadow of one.

Finishing off. This one doesn’t quite fit into my list, as it definitely counts as an actual, no-questions genital orgasm. But I’m including it anyway, since I think our language for different kinds of orgasms is even more impoverished than our language for non-orgasmic climaxes.

This is the flip side of the mini-gasm. Sometimes when I’m having sex, I’ll have a series of orgasms — real, honest- to- Loki, Masters and Johnson orgasms, orgasms complete with the peak and the release and the coming down, orgasms that feel shattering and render me speechless — but that don’t quite leave me feeling . . . finished. In order to feel completely satisfied, completely done, I need to have the One Last Orgasm That Finishes Me Off. I don’t know if the One Last Orgasm is physiologically different from a regular one, I don’t know if it would register any differently if I was hooked up to an orgasm detection machine . . . but it feels radically, qualitatively different from other orgasms. Almost as different as coming feels from not coming at all.

Aftershocks. Damn, these are fun. They’re almost better in some ways than the actual orgasms themselves. These are the shivering tremors I sometimes get after I’ve come: when I’m still feeling all open and aroused and sexual, but am totally relaxed and done with the “excitement/ plateau/ orgasm/ rinse and repeat” cycle. I don’t really experience them in my genitals; I feel them more on the surface of my skin (especially if my partner is touching me just right), and deep down in the core of my body. It’s almost as if my muscles and bones are having the orgasm, instead of my clit and my cunt. And they’re a lot more Zen than a regular orgasm: since I’ve already come and am no longer straining frenetically towards that delightful but sometimes elusive goal, I can just lie back and enjoy them.

So those are a few of my trails in the woods; a few samples from my climactic cornucopia.

What are yours?

Greta Christina, copyright © 2010. Be sure to check out Greta’s blog.

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Well, I wasn’t expecting this.

I’ve recently gotten sucked into “Caprica,” the prequel series to “Battlestar Galactica” airing on the SyFy Channel. (Yes, this is about sex — hear me out.) I hadn’t planned to put yet another hour-long drama on my TV schedule, and Loki knows I don’t have time for it; but I watched fifteen minutes of the pilot when I was channel surfing, and I got hooked. I’m such a slut. Give me a complex, thoughtful, nuanced exploration of consciousness and selfhood, and I’m anybody’s.

And the show has had some surprising plot developments in the sexual arena — developments that were all the more surprising for how unceremoniously they were introduced.

A quick precis, for those who aren’t familiar: The weekly science fiction TV series, “Caprica,” takes place in a world that’s eerily parallel to Earth. But the world has some interesting differences from ours, and at the time this story takes place, they’re a few years/ decades ahead of us. Technologically, and socially.

And “socially” is where the sex comes in. (Caution: Spoiler alert. Multiple spoilers. Suck it up.) There’s a major gay character in “Caprica,” and there’s a major polyamorous character. And the way these characters and their sexualities get woven into the story shows a huge leap forward in the way our culture has started to view alternative sexualities . . . and an enormous leap forward in how we view our sexual future.

Let’s start with the gay character.

There’s an equivalent of the Mafia in “Caprica,” a criminal organization called the Ha’la’tha. One of the story’s major characters, Joseph Adama (Esai Morales), is a renowned defense attorney with deep connections to the Mob, and his brother, Sam Adama (Sasha Roiz), is one of the Mob’s enforcers.

And a few episodes into the show, we learn that Sam is gay.

But this development isn’t presented as a shocker. It isn’t presented as The Big Gay Revelation. Here’s how we find out: Sam’s young nephew William (Sina Najafi) is at dinner with Sam and his husband, Larry (Julius Chapple), and he’s asking them why they never had kids. That’s it. That’s the Big Gay Moment. It isn’t even remotely a big effing deal. It’s just the moment in the story when we find out more about Sam Adama and his home life . . . and Sam’s home life includes his husband, Larry.

And as the story unfolds, it becomes clear that Larry is completely accepted as Sam’s husband, by Sam’s brother as well as his nephew — and, as far as I can tell, by everyone else in the story. When Joseph is desperately trying to find Sam, he calls Larry — just like you’d call anyone’s husband or wife if you were desperately trying to reach them. Joseph is freaked out that he can’t reach his brother . . . but his attitude towards Larry, and the fact of his marriage with his brother, is entirely nonchalant. And as of this writing, there’s nothing in the story to indicate that Sam is in the closet, or that his Mob colleagues have any issues at all with his gayness.

This would be surprising enough for any character on a mainstream TV series. (If the SyFy channel counts as “mainstream,” that is.) Even when a TV series is gay positive, it almost always has to make the gayness a major plot point or the central defining feature of the gay character in question. A gay character in mainstream TV is almost always The Gay Character.

But given the character of Sam Adama, this fact is downright flabbergasting. Sam is a freaking Mafia enforcer. He throws trash cans through store windows, and kidnaps the wives of industry leaders, and murders politicians by knifing them to death in their sleep. The guy wears wife-beaters, for heaven’s sake. He’s about as far from a gay stereotype as you can get. You might expect to see a gay TV character who’s a graphic designer or a struggling actor/ waiter, or even a doctor or a lawyer. But a gay character who’s a macho thug? Entrenched in a criminal organization based on macho thuggery?

This, to me, speaks of the normalization of homosexuality . . . more than a hundred episodes of “Will and Grace.” It speaks of a world that recognizes the simple fact that anybody can be gay. It speaks of a world that recognizes that gayness is only one part of a gay person’s life . . . and often not the most interesting part. And it speaks of a world that recognizes the fact of gayness as a simple fact of human life.

So that’s the gayness. Now let’s move on to the group marriage. There’s another interesting major character in “Caprica”: Clarice Willow (Polly Walker), the headmistress of an exclusive private high school, the Athena Academy. (Caprican society is largely polytheistic, believing in a version of the old Greek gods.) And, as it turns out a few episodes into the show, she’s a member of a group marriage.

Now, Clarice’s group marriage isn’t treated quite as casually as Sam’s marriage to Larry. It’s introduced with a bit of . . . not fanfare exactly, but surprise. One of Clarice’s students, Lacy Rand (Magda Apanowicz), comes to her house for a visit — and discovers that she lives with multiple husbands, and multiple wives. And Lacy has a little frisson of nervous excitement when she realizes this. “I knew a few kids from group marriages — it’s cool,” she says . . . in a voice indicating that she actually doesn’t actually know that much about group marriage, and thinks it’s “cool” in the sense of “edgy and slightly outre.”

But at no point is there any implication that Clarice could get into trouble for bringing her student to her group marriage home. Or indeed, for being in a group marriage in the first place. There’s no indication that she’s endangering her job — her job, I’ll remind you, as the head of a high school, attended by underaged teenagers and everything — by being in a group marriage, and inviting one of her students home to visit it.

It’s more than a little comparable to what being gay is like now. Here on Earth, I mean. Being gay is still a little bit shocking (for some people), still a conversation piece (more so in some parts of the country and the world than others). But, at least with the more politically moderate people and places, it’s entirely legal, more or less accepted, only mildly surprising, and not something that will get you drummed out of town or fired from your job for corrupting the morals of the children.

And like Sam Adama’s gayness, Clarice Willow’s group marriage isn’t presented as the most interesting or important aspect of her character. It’s played a little more for curiosity and titillation than Sam’s marriage with Larry; especially in the scene with four people all in bed together (switching partners at an unspoken signal — this seems to be an “everyone’s on a schedule of who sleeps with whom” version of group marriage, not free-form polyamory), and in the scenes when it seems like Clarice might be trying to draw Lacy into the arrangement by introducing her to one of her younger, dishier husbands. But the group marriage is presented as a familiar arrangement in this society, if a somewhat unusual one. And it’s presented as an essentially unthreatening arrangement. The fact that Clarice turns out to be a monotheist — now, that’s a serious threat to Caprican society. (Especially from what we know from “Battlestar Galactica” about how this story turns out.) The fact that she has multiple husbands and wives — that’s seen as relatively normal.

And all of this is a huge departure for mainstream TV dramas. Even in “Big Love,” the most famous current TV show featuring multiple relationships (it’s the show about Mormon polygamy), the fact of the characters’ polygamy is the central defining feature of their lives, and the lynchpin on which the entire storyline turns. I’m hard-pressed to think of another TV program aside from “Caprica” in which multiple relationships are seen as a standard, if somewhat edgy, form of romantic interaction that a stable society could incorporate . . . and in which same-sex relationships are seen as so normal as to need no further comment.

Now. It could be argued that these two characters still perpetuate stereotypes about unconventional sexuality . . . since neither of them is exactly a moral paragon. Sam Adama is, after all, a Mafia enforcer, a criminal who threatens/ beats up/ murders people for money. And Clarice Willow turns out to be involved in an extremist monotheistic terrorist organization. (In “Caprica,” again, the society is mostly polytheistic . . . and monotheists are looked upon as dangerous, radical religious fanatics with an inflexible morality and a close-minded hatred of anyone with different beliefs. Much the way Islam is seen in much of the Western world.) It could be argued that these characters perpetuate the stereotype of sexual minorities as amoral: self-centered pursuers of their own desires, with no concern for decency or social stability.

But . . . well, I have two Buts here. One is that in “Caprica,” pretty much all the characters are morally ambiguous. This is a complex, thoughtful, nuanced story — morally as well as in other ways — and it doesn’t trade in obvious villains and heroes. Sam Adama and Clarice Willow are morally troubling characters . . . but so are Daniel Graystone, and Joseph Adama, and Lacy, and Zoe, and Amanda, and pretty much every single character in the show. Sam and Clarice are fucked-up people doing terrible things for noble reasons, or what they see as noble reasons . . . and in this story, that makes them fit right in.

My other “But” is this: Yes, Sam, and Clarice are morally troubling characters. But there’s no implication that their sexual lives are the cause of their moral shakiness. What makes Clarice bad is her religious fanaticism, not her unconventional marital arrangement; and at this point in the story, it’s not even clear whether her husbands or wives are even aware of her involvement in religious extremism. And Sam Adama’s marriage to Larry is one of the best things about him: a humanizing element, giving his character motivation and depth. Their ethics are deeply problematic; their sexuality is fine.

It’s wonderful to see. And it’s especially wonderful to see in a science fiction show. “Caprica” is technically set in the distant past; but it’s clearly providing an “alternate reality” version of humanity’s future. I so want science fiction to be more visionary about sexuality than conventional fiction . . . and all too often, it so is not. (The various iterations of “Star Trek,” for instance, were so far behind the curve on gayness, it was embarrassing.) It’s a nice sign of how far we’ve come sexually that a regular TV series — and a critically acclaimed one at that — could be this imaginative and forward- thinking about sexuality, and still get on the air. And it’s comforting to think that “Caprica’s” vision of a sexual culture might someday be ours.

If the Cylons don’t get us, that is.

Greta Christina, copyright © 2010. Be sure to check out Greta’s blog.

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I like the Tuyo Vibromasseur Spherical Vibrator (you can just call her “Tuyo”, though, no need to be formal) for Valentine’s Day because it encourages experimentation, exploration and communication. Really! This 100% phthalate-free vibrator is a perfect sphere of vibrating fun, allowing you to roll it over your or your lover’s body and see what feels good. Who knew that a nice pulsating vibration on the back of your knee would send a zing of pleasure right to your clit? Or that a steady buzz between your shoulder blades would get your dick hard? To make sure the Tuyo hits just the right spot in just the right way, her designers gave her three levels of vibration and five patterns of pulsations, as well as a strip of quality silicone around the 3″ diameter middle so you don’t lose your grip.

But it’s the high-end elegance of the Tuyo — the way it nestles in your hand (or between your legs), the pretty pearl white with a pink stripe coloring (not pictured, sorry!), the lovely satin-lined box it comes in — that make this the perfect Valentine’s gift. Get one for yourself or your sweetie and get rolling between the sheets!

Takes 3 AAA batteries (not included).

• Tuyo Vibromasseur Spherical Vibrator
• AAA Battery

One way to take your Valentine’s Day to the next level is to add a little stimulation in just the right spot. For this purpose, allow me to recommend a simple solution at a very nice price: the One-Touch Vibrating Cock-Ring! I nsert the One-Touch Vibrator into the very stretchy purple jelly sleeve, press the button and slip it over his cock. For hetero and strap-on using couples, the nubby vibrator casing vibrates as it rubs against her clit during sex (you can spin the ring around to accomodate different positions), giving her that extra oomph! of sensation to take her over the edge. Or, if that’s too much for her, spin it around so it’s only vibing his balls. For most couples, adding this extra bit of stimulation is a revelation — I’m not saying you get to skip foreplay or anything (and, really, why would you want to?), but a clit-stimulator cock-ring can help take intercourse from “that feels nice” to “oh god, oh god, OH GOD.” And that, my friends, makes for a delightful Valentine’s Day indeed.

Uses three 1.55V Super Cell (aka One-Touch Bullet Batteries), included (though you might want backups, just in case). Bullet is 1″ in diameter, just shy of 3-3/4″ long.

• One-Touch Vibrating Cock-Ring
• One-Touch Bullet Batteries

If it’s just not a Valentine’s Day gift for you without a nice, traditional, heart, the Amazing Hot Heart should heat things up just right. This smooth vinyl heart is filled with a mysterious, yet non-toxic, gel that heats up when you gently bend a small metal disc that’s floating around inside. Offering about 30 minutes of heat, the Amazing Hot Heart slides easily over the skin (you can use a bit of lube if you want things to get really slippery), providing a kind of lovely warmth. And it’s reusable — just pop it in boiling water for 10 minutes to “reset” the crystals so it’s ready to go again! Great for massages, sensation play or just for keeping your hands warm as you entwine your fingers with his in the pocket of his hoodie on your romantic Valentine’s Day stroll.

• Amazing Hot Heart

Want to surprise your sweetie with an unexpected pleasure this Valentine’s Day? There’s nothing like the titilating combination of written and visual delights that you find in an erotic comic to get someone all fired up in every which way. Allow me to suggest you try Scarlett Takes Manhattan. While not your typical love story, the heroine Scarlett O’Herring possesses a kind of delighted love of sex, set against the backdrop of New York’s Gilded Age, that infuses the reader with the same sort of carefree sensuality. The story is compelling, the sex playful and just the right amount of wicked to keep all parts of you interested.

Don’t take my word for it! Check out our celebrity blurbs from the likes of Warren Ellis and Margaret Cho!

“With its tongue in several cheeks at once, Scarlett overheats the Victorian erotic memoir into a madly funny firepit of debauchery. Disgustingly wonderful.” — Warren Ellis, author of Crooked Little Vein, Transmetropolitan, etc.

“Molly Crabapple is THE artist of our time. I am desperately in love with her vision, her world, her characters, her art—and I want to live there.” — Margaret Cho

• Scarlett Takes Manhattan

If you want to push your boundaries, get inspired, or just get really, really turned on for Valentine’s Day, you should check out the latest installment of our award-winning Crash Pad series: Crash Pad Series, Volume 5: The Revolving Door! The Crash Pad series started out as a feature film from indie queer porn director extraordinaire Shine Louise Houston, and then jumped to a web-based series, several volumes of which have been released on DVD. It’s pretty much the gold standard for sex-positive queer porn, with a large umbrella that covers most flavors of lesbianism, transgender, and kinky sexuality, all with great panache and authenticity.

Volume 5 has (coincidentally) five scenes, with a cast of new faces and returning favorites. The Crash Pad of the title is an apartment where an ever-shifting cast of sexually adventurous couples (and occasional groups) come to push the limits of their own fuckability, all watched over by the hidden cameras of the mysterious voyeuristic Shine — the premise, pretty much, is that you’re seeing secret-camera footage of trysts-in-progress. It’s a good and versatile set-up that’s filled a handful of DVDs already, and could go on for the indefinite foreseeable future.

This one opens up with some dripping birthday-candle wax and light bondage between August and the lovely femme Stacy Staxxx, followed by some strap-on riding and lovely doggystyle fucking; it’s a great scene, though the dialogue was a bit hard to hear, at least on my review copy. Still, even watching it with the sound off, you get the general idea — it’s a very nice birthday party.

I also liked trans leather daddy Kuma topping the hell out of the bodacious Julie Warren — any scene that involves floggers and canes and a rough strap-on blowjob has a certain intrinsic appeal. The most surprising scene was the closer, with Shawn (also known, in her toppier roles, as Syd Blackovich) in a scene with an actual bio-guy, Mickey Mod — though don’t expect an uncomplicated and straightforward gender setup here. Mickey sucks Shawn’s big fake cock about as much as she sucks his real one, and honestly, if they had a wrestling match, I’d put my money on Shawn. There’s some cowgirl riding and some in-your-face mutual masturbation (literally — she crouches over him and jills off in his face while he rubs one out himself). The other scenes are good, too — overall, there’s more edgy hot queer sex than you can shake a dick at.

The Crash Pad continues to push limits, boundaries, and the proverbial envelope in its depiction of authentic, complicated queer porn. Let’s hope Shine has a hundred-year lease on the place. May its doors stay open forever.

• Scarlett Takes Manhattan

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What are our bodies meant for?

One of the most common condemnations of non-standard sex — from homosexuality to masturbation — is “that’s not what those body parts were meant for.” Genitals and sexual desire were supposedly designed for reproduction, and reproduction alone: by God (as the argument most commonly goes), or by evolution (as the argument occasionally gets made). To use these parts/ desires for any other purpose is dangerous at best and sinful at worst.

Okay. Let’s set aside for a moment the question of whether there even is a God, much less one who purposely designed the human body to fulfill his divine plan. The most common counter to this accusation is that it doesn’t get applied consistently. Not even by people who do believe in a God who created our bodies. As Dan Savage once pointed out: Our noses weren’t “designed” for us to rest our glasses on — and nobody gets their knickers in a twist over that. Off-label uses of our bodies are ridiculously common. I could come up with them all day. Our feet weren’t “meant” for us to operate the pedals of a car. Our mouths weren’t “meant” for us to play the harmonica. Our heads weren’t “meant” for us to display giant novelty foam-rubber cheese wedges and other oversized signals of allegiance to sports teams. Our hands weren’t “meant” for us to type on computer keyboards. (Boy howdy, were they ever not. My recent tendinitis flare-up is evidence enough of that.) And that doesn’t stop anyone from doing these things.

So why should sex be an exception? No, our mouths and assholes weren’t “designed” for sex, by God or by evolution. So what? We use our bodies in lots of ways and for lots of purposes that they weren’t “designed” for . . . and nobody considers that immoral. Computers and harmonicas and giant novelty cheese wedges are seen as acceptable and even positively neat. Why is anal sex somehow a perversion of the natural order?

A good argument. And one I frequently make myself.

But today, I’m going to take it a step further.

Off-label uses of body parts and biological functions aren’t just acceptable and morally neutral. They are some of the most beautiful, honorable, and deeply treasured parts of the human experience.

Human beings took our animal need for palatable food . . . and turned it into chocolate souffles with salted caramel cream. We took our ability to co-operate as a social species . . . and turned it into craft circles and bowling leagues and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. We took our capacity to make and use tools . . . and turned it into the Apollo moon landing. We took our uniquely precise ability to communicate through language . . . and turned it into King Lear.

None of these things are necessary for survival and reproduction. That is exactly what makes them so splendid. When we take our basic evolutionary wiring and transform it into something far beyond any prosaic matters of survival and reproduction . . . that’s when humanity is at its best. That’s when we show ourselves to be capable of creating meaning and joy, for ourselves and for one another. That’s when we’re most uniquely human.

And the same is true for sex. Human beings have a deep, hard-wired urge to replicate our DNA, instilled in us by millions of years of evolution. And we’ve turned it into an intense and delightful form of communication, intimacy, creativity, community, personal expression, transcendence, joy, pleasure, and love. Regardless of whether any DNA gets replicated in the process.

Why should we see this as sinful?

What makes this any different from chocolate souffles and King Lear?

Rigid moralists — of the “don’t use your asshole for sex, that’s not what it’s meant for” variety — are often fond of talking about “what separates us from the animals.” Our self-restraint, our ability to delay gratification, our ethical judgment . . . these things supposedly make us finer and more noble than the animals, those base creatures who live only to eat and avoid predators and produce the next generation.

I, for one, don’t think anything separates us from the animals. We are animals. We tend to forget that. And in fact, recent research is showing that many non-human animals also have ethics and the ability to delay gratification and whatnot. We’re not as unique as we like to think.

But I do think we’re special animals. I do think we have abilities that make us different from other animals. And at the top of that list is our ability to take our animal instincts, and transform them into pursuits and achievements that have nothing whatsoever to do with their original functions of survival and reproduction — pursuits and achievements that serve no purpose but to create meaning, and connection, and knowledge, and joy.

Sex is most definitely one of those pursuits.

It deserves as much respect as any other.

Greta Christina, copyright © 2010. Be sure to check out Greta’s blog.

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When you’re beginning a relationship, is it reasonable to ask your partner not to watch porn?

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a column here about porn. I was writing in response to an advice column by Scarleteen, an answer to a letter from a young woman who was upset because her boyfriend watched porn. I posed the question, “In a monogamous relationship, is it reasonable to expect your partner not to watch porn?” And I concluded that it was not. I concluded that people have the right to watch whatever they want when they’re by themselves and on their own time, and that asking a partner not to watch porn is no more defensible then asking them not to watch reality TV or read true crime. I concluded that trying to regulate your partner’s private cultural pleasures — pornographic or otherwise — is like trying to regulate their imagination.

But some readers thought I’d misread Scarleteen’s advice. They said Scarleteen’s point wasn’t that people have the right to ask their existing partners not to watch porn . . . but rather that if someone objects to porn, they should spell that out at the beginning of a relationship. And on re-reading the Scarleteen column, I think they’re right. In my defense, the situation I was writing about was, in fact, the situation described in the letter — dealing with an existing partner who watched porn, and trying to decide what to say to them. But I do think I misread Scarleteen’s intention in their response, and for that, I apologize.

So now I’m going to address the position Scarleteen took: that people who object to porn and are beginning to date someone should spell out their position early, and should state clearly that they don’t want to be involved with someone who watches it.

And I’m basically going to stand by my original position.

Which is that this is an unreasonable, overly controlling thing for an adult to ask another adult. It’s somewhat less unreasonable than asking it of a partner you’re already involved with, someone who’s already gotten emotionally invested in your relationship before you dropped your “It’s me or the porn” ultimatum. But I still think this is seriously pushing the line between “reasonable negotiation of desires and limits in a relationship,” and “controlling attempt to regulate not only your partner’s behavior, but their imagination.”

Here’s why.

Like I did in the previous column, I’m going to take this question out of an erotic context, to give it some perspective. (I am, however, going to keep it gendered for the moment, since much of the previous conversation was about gender and sexism.)

Let’s say a single straight woman has objections to televised sports. She thinks they’re immoral, or politically objectionable, or she simply finds them upsetting. (Which some women do — as do some men.) And let’s say she tells all her potential partners, “I just don’t want to be involved with someone who watches sports. Ever. Even when I’m not around. Even on their own time. Even if it’s just when they’re hanging around with their friends. If we’re going to get involved, you have to be someone who doesn’t like watching sports on TV, and you have to promise never to do so.”

Would that be a reasonable thing to ask?

I would argue No.

And I’d argue it pretty darned strongly.

At my most sympathetic and calm, my response to that would be, “You should know that an awful lot of men watch sports on TV. And plenty of those men don’t fit the stereotype of the sports-obsessed Neanderthal. You seem to be making a lot of assumptions about what kind of man likes to watch sports on TV, and whether those men could share your basic values — assumptions that really aren’t warranted. If you’re going to rule out all men who ever like to watch sports on TV, you’re going to limit yourself to a very small dating pool indeed . . . without a very strong or reality-based reason for doing so. You might want to rethink this. You might want to look more carefully at why you feel so strongly about sports — and at whether there might be a better way to handle those feelings than refusing to be involved with anyone who enjoys them.”

If I were feeling less sympathetic and calm, my response would be, “Are you out of your mind? What difference does it make what your partner watches on TV when you’re not around? How is that any of your business? Again — you seem to be making a lot of assumptions about what kind of man likes to watch sports on TV . . . assumptions that really aren’t warranted. What on earth makes you think that’s a reasonable thing for one adult to ask another?”

And frankly, if I were dating that woman, I’d end things as soon as I could after that conversation — even if I didn’t like sports. I’d see it as a huge red flag that she had a very controlling side of her. I’d see it as a huge red flag that she was a seriously insecure person — one who dealt with her insecurities by expecting her partner to tiptoe around them. I’d be out the door as fast as I could — even if I never planned to watch another sporting event in my life.

Why should porn be different?

If watching porn didn’t carry the stigma that it does — if any and all pursuits of sexual pleasure didn’t carry the stigma that they do — would we see these two situations as any different? If it weren’t the case that sports are a generally accepted cultural activity and porn is emphatically not, would we even be having this conversation? If there weren’t a stigma around porn, would anyone seriously consider asking their partner never to watch it . . . and if there weren’t shame around porn, would anyone who was asked not to watch it take the request seriously?

Now. To be fair, it’s certainly true that in relationships, we get a few “I know I’m being irrational, but I feel strongly about this, so can you please just humor me?” free passes. I think we do, anyway. But when we ask for those free passes, I think we need to acknowledge that that’s what we’re doing. I think we need to acknowledge that we’re asking for something unreasonable, above and beyond the call of duty — and not act as if we have the moral high ground.

And we need to recognize that not everyone is going to say Yes. We need to recognize that a lot of smart, thoughtful, decent people are going to turn us down. Especially when the activity we’re asking our partners to forgo is something that’s both ridiculously common and generally harmless.

Like watching sports on TV.

Or watching porn.

Does my hypothetical woman have the right to ask her potential partners not to watch sports on TV, even when she’s not around? Sure, she has the right to ask. We have the right to ask for pretty much anything. We have the right to ask our potential relationship partners to not smoke, to tie us up on a semi- regular basis, to take Argentine tango lessons, to watch the entire DVD set of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” in a one-weekend marathon, to wear polka dotted underwear every Friday without fail.

But does that make it a reasonable thing to ask?

Is “don’t ever watch sports on TV, even when I’m not around” a reasonable thing for one adult to ask of another? Is it reasonable to expect that people will say Yes? Is it reasonable to expect people to even take this request seriously?

I don’t think so.

There are lots of things that we have the right to do, which are still not right or reasonable for us to do. We tend to make that mistake a lot: the mistake of thinking that because we have the right to do something, we should therefore just charge on in and do it. It’s not clear thinking. We have the right to scream bigoted epithets on the street corner, too. That doesn’t make it right or reasonable to do it.

Now.

I will qualify all this by adding: If someone is very firm in their anti-porn position — if they’ve thought it through carefully after being exposed to many sides of the debate about it, and their feelings against it are still as strong as ever — then yes, they should warn their partners up front that this is the case. I don’t think it’s a reasonable thing for them to ask . . . but reasonable or not, if it’s a dealbreaker for them, then by all means, they should ask it. If I were dating someone who felt this way, I sure as hell would want to be warned upfront, before I’d invested a lot of time and emotional energy in the relationship. I’d want to run screaming sooner rather than later.

But here’s the thing. In this particular letter, in the letter to Scarleteen that started this whole conversation, I did not get that impression at all. Nothing about this letter gave me the impression that it was from a confirmed, hard-core anti-porn feminist who was familiar with feminist arguments in favor of porn and had rejected them. Everything about it seemed to be from a young person who was upset by porn, and who ascribed much her of her upset to the supposed sexism of porn . . . without ever really thinking about it carefully, and without ever being exposed to feminism that enjoys and supports porn. (Scarleteen seems to have gotten the same impression, since they made sure to tell her that being anti-porn wasn’t the only way to be feminist, and they provided links to a wide variety of feminist writings on porn.)

So my advice to her would not be, “If you’re opposed to porn, to the point where you’re not willing to be involved with someone who ever watches it, you need to spell that out early in a relationship.”

My advice would be, “If you’re opposed to porn, to the point where you’re not willing to be involved with someone who ever watches it, you need to seriously rethink whether that’s a reasonable thing for one adult to ask another. If you’re assuming that a shared opposition to porn means you’ll have shared values about sex and gender and politics, you need to seriously rethink that assumption. You need to be aware that there are a lot of pro-porn feminists in the world — women and men both — and that opposition to porn isn’t the default feminist position. You need to be aware that an awful lot of men watch porn, and it doesn’t automatically make them sexist objectifiers of women. You need to be aware that refusing to be involved with any man who watches porn is going to seriously limit your dating opportunities — and is likely going to rule out a fair number of men who might otherwise be great for you. You need to be aware that asking someone to limit what they do and don’t watch when they’re not with you is likely to come across as insecure and controlling . . . even to people who share your basic tastes. And you need to be aware that since there’s so much shame and stigma around porn, a lot of men aren’t going to feel comfortable standing up for their right and desire to watch it, and you may not get a straight answer about it. You might want to think about whether there’s a better way to deal with your insecurities than asking your potential partners to never even look at erotic photos or videos of other women.

“And if, after all of that, you’re still opposed to porn, to the point where you’re not willing to be involved with someone who ever watches it — then yes, you need to spell that out early in a relationship. But you need to be aware that you’re asking for a lot. And you need to not take the moral high ground about it.”

Being a feminist means, among other things, recognizing people’s right to sexual autonomy. Women’s and men’s. If you’re going to deal with your bad feelings about porn by expecting your partners to forgo a private sexual activity that doesn’t involve you in any way, you need to consider whether that’s really consistent with your feminism.

Greta Christina, copyright © 2010. Be sure to check out Greta’s blog.

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In any romantic/ sexual relationship, is it reasonable to expect your partner to limit their sexual activity in any way?

Weird question, I know. Here’s why I’m asking it.

In my last column, I talked about porn in relationships. I asked, “In a monogamous relationship, is it reasonable to expect your partner to not watch porn?” And I concluded that it was not. I argued that, for the same reason people don’t have the right to expect their partners not to watch reality TV or read true crime — on their own time, when they don’t have any obligations and their partner isn’t around — people don’t have the right to expect their partners not to enjoy porn. I argued that people have some basic rights to privacy and autonomy — yes, strangely enough, even when they’re in serious committed relationships — and that the things people do on their own time, in ways that don’t have any significant impact on their partner, are entirely their own damn business.

But when I was writing this, I realized that some non-monogamist hard-liners would say the same thing about any sort of sexual activity outside a relationship. Some non-monogamy advocates — not many, but some — would argue that the right to make your own decisions about how to spend your own time extends to having sex with other people. I wrote that people had no more right to expect their partners not to watch porn than to expect them not to watch reality TV . . . and as I wrote it, I could hear voices in the back of my head saying, “But how is sex different from porn? If watching porn is no different from watching reality TV, then how is having sex with someone outside the relationship any different than seeing a basketball game with someone outside the relationship?”

Now, as you may have guessed, I don’t agree with those voices. I do, however, think this is a harder question than it might seem on the surface, and a murkier one, without an obvious place to draw the line. (To some extent, this is one of my “thinking out loud” pieces, and I’m not sure I’ve got the answer quite right.) Ultimately, though, I do think there’s a difference — even if it’s a murky and non-obvious difference — between watching depictions of other people having sex, and actually having sex with other people.

The difference is . . . well, other people.

I think non-monogamy changes a relationship, in a way that porn does not. I think non-monogamy changes a relationship — because it brings other people into it.

For starters, those other people have desires of their own, and limits of their own, and rights of their own . . . desires and limits and rights that have to be taken into consideration.

The porn video doesn’t care if you don’t see it for months at a time. The dirty novel doesn’t have a special new kink that it really wants to explore with you. The book of French postcards doesn’t have a preference about whether or not you discuss it with your partner. The adult comic book doesn’t get hurt if you throw it away without so much as a phone call. Other people do. And they have the right to expect that their cares and kinks and preferences and feelings will get some attention. From both partners in a relationship — not just the one they’re boffing.

Which means that non-monogamy changes the relationship. For everyone in it. Even if you have the simplest, most limited kind of non-monogamous relationship — say, the “You and I are a primary couple, we can have sex with other people but only on our own time, and those other people won’t get involved in our romantic or social life” kind — the other people you’re involved with are still living, breathing, autonomous people, with lives and selves of their own. So both partners in that relationship have to treat the outside person’s desires and limits and rights as if they matter . . . even if only one of those partners is getting the outside nookie.

Plus, other people have emotions of their own — emotions that aren’t always predictable. Porn isn’t going to get obsessed with you and stalk you, or fall in love with you even though you clearly said upfront that that wasn’t an option. And you probably aren’t going to fall in love with your porn. Okay, yes, some people do get fixated on porn to an unhealthy degree. People can get fixated on anything to an unhealthy degree, from weightlifting to “Star Trek” to collecting porcelain pigs. But sexual relationships with other people carry a degree of risk that sexual relationships with books or photos or Internet videos just don’t. (And that’s not even mentioning the physical risk of STI’s and whatnot.)

Finally — for now, anyway — other people change. They change in ways you can’t expect, and ways you have to adapt to. The only way your copy of “Deep Inside Annie Sprinkle” is going to change is when it comes out in a new 30th anniversary edition loaded with DVD extras. (We hope!) But with other people, you can have a nice, neat arrangement that makes everybody happy . . . and then what does that other person go and do but be human, and want something more than they used to, or something less, or something different. Which you then have to accept, or reject, or re-negotiate.

All of which means that non-monogamy requires a level of involvement and negotiation and processing that porn simply doesn’t demand — involvement and negotiation and processing that can have a significant impact on your relationship. It can be a good impact, mind you: a great impact even, an impact that keeps communication open and eroticism alive. But it’s an impact, and we shouldn’t pretend otherwise.

I mean, when it comes to porn, what do you have to negotiate? “Don’t look at it when I’m around.” Or, “If you’re going to look at it when I’m around, let’s pick something we both want to watch together.” Or, “If you watch it so much that you can’t pay your bills and we never have sex, we’re going to have deep trouble.” Or, “Keep the volume down when I’m trying to sleep.” Your arrangements about it don’t have to be any more complicated than your arrangements about any other book or magazine, TV show or Internet site. And they’re entirely between the two of you. They involve your wants and feelings and nobody else’s, and they only have to change if the two of you change.

So that’s why porn and sex are different.

Now, there is an area where this moderately clear distinction starts to get murky. And that area is sex work: prostitution, stripping, pro domination, other forms of live professional sexual entertainment.

Here’s why sex work is murkier. Sex workers are people, obviously. I hope I’m not going to get any debate about that. But with a few exceptions, they’re people who aren’t going to have expectations or make demands outside the professional encounter itself. They’re, you know, professionals, and whatever feelings they might have about their encounters with you, they’re skilled at drawing boundaries between their personal feelings and their professional responsibilities. With a few exceptions, sex workers aren’t going to ask to see you more often, or ask for something sexually that’s outside your agreement with your partner, or stalk you because they think you’re their soulmate. I’m not saying it never happens — but it’s rare.

So it could be argued that the non-monogamy issues I’m talking about here — the concern that other people have needs, desires, emotions, changes, any of which could affect your relationship — don’t apply to sex workers. And it could therefore be argued that, while it might be reasonable to want your partner to not have (shall we say) amateur sex outside your relationship, it’s not reasonable to expect them not to see strippers or pro dominants or prostitutes . . . since encounters with strippers or pro dominants or prostitutes aren’t likely to seriously affect the relationship.

I don’t know. It still seems somehow different to me. But I’m not sure exactly why. I haven’t gotten that far yet.

Thoughts?

Greta Christina, copyright © 2010. Be sure to check out Greta’s blog.

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In a monogamous relationship, is it reasonable to expect your partner to not watch porn?

There was a recent letter to Scarleteen, the sex advice and information site for teenagers and young people. In this letter, the querant was upset because her boyfriend (a) watched porn, and (b) would soon be going on a road trip with his buddies in which he might be getting lap dances. The querant was upset about this — partly because she was a feminist who thought these activities were sexist, and partly because it triggered insecurities about her own body and made her feel inadequate.

Scarleteen’s reply? Feminism doesn’t automatically mean you’re anti-porn — there’s a wide range of feminist views about pornography — and enjoying porn doesn’t automatically make you sexist. When it comes to the details of your relationship and the agreements you make about sexual activity outside it — from porn/ lap dances/ other sexual entertainment to flat-out non-monogamy — you need to decide what would be your ideal, what would be on your “absolutely not” list, and what you’re willing to compromise on. And you need to recognize that your partner has as much right to their version of this list as you do to yours — and then see if you can negotiate a common ground.

Which sounds perfectly reasonable at first.

And then I started thinking about it.

Normally I adore Scarleteen, and recommend them unreservedly as a source of sex info and advice. And I feel a bit churlish calling them out on this one, since I found out about it because they were kind enough to link to me in their “wide range of feminist views of porn” section. If their advice had been about almost any other form of sexual activity, I would have been right there with them. And when it comes to the lap dances, I think their perspective is valid.

But when it comes to porn, I think they missed the boat.

I’m going to go out on a limb here:

I don’t think anyone has the right to expect their partner not to watch porn.

Why not? Well, let me put it this way. Do people have the right to expect their partners not to masturbate? Or, for that matter, do people have the right to expect their partners not to watch reality TV or read true crime? On their own time, when they don’t have any obligations and their partner isn’t around?

And if not — then why on earth would anyone have the right to expect their partner not to watch porn?

Even in a very close, seriously committed relationship, people have some basic rights to privacy and autonomy. What they do all by themselves, on their own time, in ways that don’t have any significant impact on anybody else — that is entirely their own damn business. Trying to regulate your partner’s porn watching is like trying to regulate what they read, what movies they watch, what art they see. No — it’s not like that. It is that. That is exactly what it is. The fact that the content of the writing or the movies or the art is sexual is irrelevant. Trying to regulate your partner’s cultural pleasures is like trying to regulate their imagination. And that’s just as true of pornographic cultural pleasures — and the sexual imagination.

There are some obvious exceptions. If your partner’s porn-watching is seriously affecting your sex life? If their porn is making them dissatisfied with you, or is creating unreasonable expectations about what sex and bodies are supposed to be like? If they’re watching porn to the exclusion of having sex with you? Or if they’re watching porn so much that it’s interfering with their personal or professional life, or is making them spend themselves into serious financial trouble? That’s different.

But “I feel threatened and insecure when my partner watches porn, therefore I have the right to expect them to stop”? I don’t see it. I mean, would it be reasonable to expect your partner not to watch “American Idol” because it made you feel threatened and insecure about your own singing ability? Even if your partner loved your singing, and made that clear in word and deed, and continued singing with you as much as they ever did?

And if not — then why is porn any different?

If you feel insecure and bad about your body and your sexuality — I completely sympathize. I’ve been there, I’m still there sometimes, and it sucks. But there are better ways of dealing with that insecurity and inadequacy than expecting your partner to forgo private, independent activities that don’t involve anyone else, and that have nothing to do with you. There are reasonable compromises that we can ask of our partners in our relationships. This is not one of them.

•

Now. I know there are non-monogamist hard-liners who would say the same thing about any form of sexual activity — not just porn. I know there are non-monogamist hard-liners who think we have no right to expect our partners to limit their sexual activity in any way that doesn’t directly affect us. I know there are non-monogamist hard-liners who would call me a hypocrite for drawing a line between porn — which I don’t think people have any right to expect their partners to consider forgoing — and lap dances, which I do.

I do think there’s a difference. But I will cheerfully acknowledge that the difference isn’t a clear or obvious one. It’s subtle, it’s complex, and it’s not easy to draw the line.

Which means it’s the topic of next week’s column.

Greta Christina, copyright © 2010. Be sure to check out Greta’s blog.

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If you’ve given up on romantic love, is no-strings sex a viable option?

I don’t usually write this column as an advice column. But I make occasional exceptions. And last week, someone wrote a comment in this blog asking for advice . . . a comment that I (a) felt compelled to answer, and (b) couldn’t answer in just a few words. (Third comment from the top on this piece.)

The commenter had responded to a call for sexually-themed New Year’s resolutions by saying that she’d had a terrible experience with someone she met on the Internet, someone she’d traveled across the world to be worth who turned out to be, shall we say, unworthy of her affections. She had vowed to never get emotionally attached to a man again. And she asked this:

So this puts me in a quandary: how “palatable” to a potential male partner would I be if I told him I just wanted some awesome sex without a relationship or any bullshit “I love you’s” that we both know he probably doesn’t mean anyway, and if he does, he only means it when it’s convenient for him to truly love me?

For the moment, I’m going to set aside the question of whether it was wise for this commenter to uproot her life for the sake of an Internet romance with someone in another country thousands of miles away. (Actually . . . no, I’m not. I’m going to address that question right now; it’s a moot point for this particular questioner, but it may not be for someone else reading this. No, this is not a wise move. Internet romances can be great and do sometimes lead to successful physical-world romances; but they have to be treated with great skepticism, serious caution, and very careful timing. And the farther you have to travel for them, the more true that is. As Dan Savage has said: If you fly across the country or across the world to meet the virtual love of your life, don’t treat it as romantic destiny — treat it as an adventure, and frame it so you’ll have a good time on your trip even if your lover turns out to be a loser. If you uproot your entire life for someone in another country you’ve never met . . . well, it sucks if they turn out to be a jerk, but you’re the one who uprooted your life for someone you didn’t really know, so yes, you do bear some responsibility. Also, play it every bit as safely as you would if you were meeting an Internet date in your home town: meet in public for the first time, and make sure someone you know knows where you are and how to reach you.)

Anyway. Back to the question at hand. If the question were simply, “Are there men who want casual, non-romantic sex with no strings attached?” the answer would have to be a vigorous, “Yes! Of course! What planet have you been living on that you even have to ask that question? The world is loaded with men who would treat this offer as a gift from every god they’d ever imagined. And while some of these men are selfish game-players, others are decent, ethical men who’ll be as honest with you as they can about what they do and don’t have to give. Be careful — but go for it.”

But I don’t think that’s the right question here.

I don’t think that’s the question I should be answering.

The question I think I should be answering is one that this commenter didn’t ask. It’s one that she assumed she knew the answer to. And I think the answer she’s come up with is wrong — seriously wrong.

The question I think I should be answering is, “Since I got my heart broken by a lying jerk, should I assume that love is always a lie, give up on romantic love forever, and just get my sexual needs met with no-strings sex?”

The answer to that question is a vigorous “No.”

First of all, this assumption is just flatly not true. Not every man who says “I love you” is lying, and not every man pursues love purely for their own convenience. Not even most men do that. It sucks that this happened to you; but as they say in the sciences, you can’t draw a general conclusion from just one data point. It probably makes sense for you to hold off on an LTR right now, while you’re still feeling raw and demoralized — but vowing to never again get emotionally attached to a man because of one crummy experience is a recipe for unhappiness. (If nothing else, you’ll get hosed by confirmation bias — your assumptions will lead you to ignore decent men who treat women well, and focus your attention on selfish, deceitful schmucks.)

But more pertinently to the question at hand:

This assumption is going to seriously interfere with a satisfying no-strings sex life.

For no-strings sex to work, you need to feel happy about sex. You need to feel happy — at least potentially happy, willing and able to be happy —- about the people you’re having sex with. And you need to feel happy about yourself. You need to see no-strings sex as something positive you’re pursuing for its own benefits, and for your own reasons. You can’t treat no-strings sex as second-rate, something you’re settling for because you’ve given up on what you really want. Not if you want to have a good time doing it.

Let me put it this way. Back in my late twenties and early thirties, I did some serious catting around. I was happily single, and I made it clear to everyone I dated that, while I was interested in sex and even friendship, a serious romantic relationship was out of the question. I wasn’t just happy to meet women who wanted no-strings sex — I only wanted women who wanted no-strings sex.

And yet, if I’d dated a woman who was looking for no-strings sex because she’d been so badly burned by love that she’d vowed never to try that again? If I’d dated a woman who only wanted no-strings sex because she knew that love was bullshit, and that if I said “I love you” I’d only be lying anyway, so she didn’t want to hear it?

Every single one of my red flags would have gone up.

That doesn’t sound like any fun at all.

I am entirely in favor of no-strings sex for people who genuinely want it. I think there are lots of excellent reasons to want no-strings sex. I even think that “I recently got out of a relationship, and I want sex but I’m not ready for another big commitment right now” is a pretty okay reason. And while I am a great lover of love, I don’t think serious romantic relationships are right for everybody all the time. I think there are people who would be happier being single — some temporarily, some permanently. We don’t all have to do relationships the same way.

But if you’re pursuing no-strings sex out of bitterness, cynicism, anger, hurt feelings, and a generally bleak view of romance, sex, and the gender(s) you’re attracted to . . . the chances of it resulting in “awesome sex” are very slim indeed.

At best, you’re going to have some sad, disconnected, unsatisfying sex. You’ll probably get a lot of rejection, too: from guys who are insulted at the assumption that they’re probably liars, and/or who find the prospect of sex with disappointed, pessimistic women to be less than alluring. And at worst, you’re going to make yourself vulnerable to some serious assholes. (Think of the kind of guy who’ll meet you and think, “Hey, she’s bitter and unhappy about men and has given up on love — I bet she’ll put out.” Is that the kind of guy you want to be sleeping with? Forget whether they’d be safe or trustworthy — do you think they’re going to be any fun in the sack?)

In a lot of ways, no-strings sex can be emotionally harder than long-term relationship sex. At least, it’s a different kind of hard. You have to date more people, put yourself out into the world more. You have to date a lot of frogs . . . and you have to date a lot of people who are going to think you’re a frog. You have to be willing to suffer a lot of rejection — and to do a lot of rejecting yourself. You have to be in a pretty strong, self-confident place for that to work.

And it doesn’t sound like you’re in that place right now.

I don’t think you need no-strings sex.

I think you need a therapist, a vibrator, and time.

Not necessarily in that order.

Photography by Yock (Yoshitaka Kawakami)

Greta Christina, copyright © 2010. Be sure to check out Greta’s blog.

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I’m one of those scary people who makes New Year’s Resolutions and takes them fairly seriously. I like having an annual tradition of taking stock of my life and my goals, thinking about what I want to accomplish in the coming year and deciding what I need to do to make that happen. I think it’s my hyper-responsibility gene kicking in. (”Happy New Year! Are you really living up to your potential?”) I even follow through on my resolutions more often than not.

Usually my resolutions have to do with my writing career: finishing a book proposal, contacting new publishers, etc. But this year, I’ve decided to take my own advice about making sex a priority. I’m going to put some conscious thought into what I want my sex life to look like in the coming year — and what actions I need to take to make that happen.

If this inspires you to make some sexual resolutions of your own — speak up in the comments and tell me what they are!

I resolve to proposition at least three people this year. You might not think it, but I’m very shy and lacking in confidence about hitting on people, and I have a bad habit of waiting for the other person to make the first move. But that’s not fair. Being the one to speak up and say, “So are we just flirting, or do you actually want to boff?” is a scary, risky thing to do, and it’s not fair to always expect other people do it. Plus the waiting game doesn’t get me laid nearly as much as I’d like. So I’m resolving to get over my shyness, and to be the one to speak up and make that first move. At least sometimes.

I resolve to do my Kegels more regularly. This one speaks for itself. At the risk of sounding like a ’70s feminist consciousness- raising seminar: I love my vagina. I want to take better care of it.

(Oh, speaking of Kegels: This is something of a tangent, but I thought y’all would appreciate it. There’s a very funny scene in an episode of “Futurama”: they’re in a gym, with various weird aliens on weird gym equipment, and there’s a passing shot of a woman sitting on a Nautilus-type weight machine. You can only see the upper half of her body, and the weights in front of her torso going up and down — and then you see that the name of the machine is the “Kegelcisor.” I’m totally in awe of how they got that one by the censors. I strongly suspect that the censors had no freaking idea what Kegels were.)

Anyway. Kegels. Important. I resolve to do them for a few minutes every day.

And expanding on that theme:

I resolve to continue taking better care of my physical health. I realize this is a pretty standard New Year’s resolution: the iconic one in fact, well past the point of cliche. But the changes I’ve made in my health in the last year or two — going to the gym more regularly, bulding my muscles and my flexibility, losing weight, taking care of my bad knee, getting something vaguely resembling enough sleep — have had a massive impact on my libido and my sex life. I feel friskier more often; I have more sexual stamina; my body has the strength and limberness to do more of what I want it to.

So while this is an embarrassing cartoon cliche of a New Year’s resolution, for the sake of my sexuality I’m making it anyway: Keep walking. Keep going to the gym two to three times a week. Keep counting calories and managing my weight. (I know weight loss isn’t important or necessary for everyone — but it is for me.) Keep up my physical therapy regimen on my bad knee. (If I can get my bad knee into good enough shape that I can stay on my knees for more than a few minutes, I’ll be a very happy camper.) Go to the doctor when I have a health concern, instead of toughing it out. Don’t get less than six hours of sleep more than twice a month. Remember that my body is a source of pleasure and joy — and treat it as such.

I resolve to try at least three sexual variations that I’ve never done before. This is more of a challenge than you might think: I’m in my late 40s, and I’ve already tried most of the sexual variations that I’m seriously interested in.

But not all of them. There’s more than a handful of variations that would make me very sad if I died without ever having tried them. And there’s far more than a handful that I have only a passing interest in but wouldn’t mind checking out. You never know when today’s idle curiosity will turn into tomorrow’s frantic obsession. (That’s what happened to me with “Mad Men.”)

It’s true that one of the great advantages of middle age is that I’ve already figured out a lot of what I do and don’t like in bed . . . and I can now spend my time just doing it. But in the same way that I don’t want to become someone who only listens to the music I liked in my twenties, I don’t want to become someone who only has the sex I liked in my twenties. I want to keep my sexual options open . . . if only so I don’t turn into a crank, griping about how sex isn’t like it used to be and young people these days are doing it all wrong.

Besides, sexual desires can change with time. Just last year, I stumbled on a sexual kink that used to be completely off-limits and has now become a favorite in the regular rotation. So I don’t just want to keep my mind open to things I’ve never tried before. I also want to keep my mind open to things I tried and rejected years ago. If I could rediscover and reclaim Led Zeppelin after years of scorning them, maybe I can rediscover and reclaim deep throating, too.

So those are my sexual resolutions.

What about yours?

Greta Christina, copyright © 2009. Be sure to check out Greta’s blog.

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The topic for today’s sermon:

Women who like gay male porn.

And people who are surprised by this.

We’ll start with the facts: There are some women who like gay male porn. I’m one of them. And I’m not the only one. Look at the widespread phenomenon of slash fanfic: erotic fiction about fictional characters, typically about two or more male characters, and typically written by and for straight women. (Kirk/Spock, anyone? Or are you more of a Snape/Draco girl?) And it isn’t just written porn: there are women who like gay male porn videos, photos, comics. There’s even an entire genre of Japanese comics and graphic novels, yaoi, devoted to gay male love and/or sex stories created for a female audience. (If you’re one of these gay- porn- lovin’ women, btw — please speak up in the comments! I know more or less what I get out of gay male porn, but I’d love to hear what you get out of it.)

It’s true that this desire hasn’t been reflected very much in the video porn industry — and video porn is what a lot of people default to when they think about “porn.” But “women don’t like gay porn” isn’t a very good explanation for this. (Some better ones: Women on average are more interested in written porn than videos. And the video porn industry can be idiots sometimes: they’re terrified of putting something on screen that might turn off straight guys; they largely ignore the potential of the women’s market; and even when they try to cater to women’s tastes in porn, they tend to get it laughably wrong.)

So those are the facts: Some women like gay male porn. Enough so that there are entire porn genres that cater to it.

And yet, many people seem deeply surprised by this. Many people assume that this phenomenon doesn’t exist, and will ponder the question of why women don’t like gay porn when so many guys love the girl-girl stuff And many people are entirely baffled when they hear about women who like all boy-boy action, wondering, “What on earth do they get out of it?”

So if you’re surprised by the fact that some women like to watch/ read about two men doing it, let me ask you this:

Are you surprised by the fact that some men like to watch/ read about two women doing it?

“Girl-girl action” is so common in heterosexual video porn, it’s not even considered a fetish. It’s a completely standard menu item, like fucking and sucking. As for all girl-girl videos, they’re all over the “hetero” porn market like a cheap suit. And nobody seems the least bit surprised by any of this.

So if you’re puzzled by why some women are into porn with two guys, ask yourself: Why are some men — indeed, a whole lotta men — so excited by porn with two girls?

The answers vary, of course. Some men like girl-girl porn because they’re not attracted to men. Some are actively turned off by the sight of men; others really just prefer to look at women. They get off on femaleness — and they like to see a lot of it, undiluted by the maleness that they’re just not that into.

Well, that’s true for some women, too. Some women like gay porn because they’re hot for guys, not girls, and guys are who they want to look at/ read about. They want to enjoy maleness, and male sexuality. And even those of us who appreciate both women and men in our porn sometimes like to enjoy just one or the other. I, for one, like lots of different kinds of porn — but one of them is definitely the kind that’s all about hard cocks and hard muscles. Undiluted by soft breasts and pussies.

Moving on: Some men like girl-girl porn because they like the fantasy of a three-way (or four-way, or five-way, or whatever) that includes them. They like to watch two (or more) women do it because then they can project themselves into the scene. They like to look at all this delightful female pulchritude . . . and then imagine themselves as the center of it all.

Well, that’s true for some women, too. Some women like to watch/ read about two or more guys . . . so they can imagine themselves as the center of a whole lot of hot male attention. The delicious meat in a Kirk/Spock sandwich, if you will.

And some men like girl-girl porn for the exact opposite reason: they like the alien-ness, the difference, of women, and of lesbians. They don’t want to project themselves into the scenario at all. They see women as excitingly mysterious, exotic even. They see lesbians in particular as enticingly out of reach. And they don’t want that mysterious allure tainted by the quotidian familiarity of men.

And again, that’s true for some women, too. For some women, gay male porn is alien, exotic. Forbidden fruit, even. It’s like the key to the secret garden; a keyhole peep into a world we’re not supposed to see.

I’ve read other explanations for why women like boy-boy porn — explanations as varied as the women themselves. Some women like the fact that gay porn features seriously good-looking guys, while straight porn all too often succumbs to the “ugly guys with big dicks” phenomenon. Some like kinky porn, and they’ve found gay kinky porn to be harder and kinkier. Some like kinky porn with male tops, but aren’t comfortable watching women they don’t know get beaten and humiliated. Some like to watch intense butt-sex, and gay porn has plenty to spare. Etc. Etc. Etc. (And yes, for the record: The reasons some men like to watch girl-girl porn are wildly varied as well.)

I’m not sure what my point is here. I think my point is just this:

Yes, Virginia, some women like boy-boy porn. Exclusively, primarily, or as one of many porny varieties. And this fact is entirely unsurprising. Or it should be. The fact that some women like boy-boy porn should be no more surprising that the fact that some men — okay, lots of men — like girl-girl porn.

And if our culture took female sexual desire seriously, nobody would blink an eye at it.

Greta Christina, copyright © 2009. Be sure to check out Greta’s blog.

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So why, from an evolutionary perspective, are there gay people at all?

In my last column, I speculated wildly on the question of why there are so few people who are equally attracted to both women and men; why the distribution of human sexual orientation tends to clump into “more or less heterosexual” and “more or less homosexual” camps. But this intriguing and currently unanswered question begs a much larger, even more intriguing question:

Why — from an evolutionary perspective — are there gay people at all?

Current research seems to be suggesting that homosexuality is a trait people are born with. At least partly, if not mostly or entirely. The jury is still out, but that’s the direction the evidence is currently pointing to. And while it’s possible that gayness is inborn but not genetic — it could be caused by in-utero environmental factors, for instance — it’s looking like genetics are, at the very least, a significant part of the picture.

But when you accept the idea that homosexuality is genetically wired, you get faced with a very puzzling question:

Why would that be?

Why, from an evolutionary perspective, would a not-insignificant number of us have been born wanting to boff people we have zero chance of reproducing with?

Why wouldn’t that trait have been selected out long ago?

There are lots of hypotheses as to why this might be. I’m not going to argue for or against any of them here (if for no other reason, it would make this piece way too long). Instead, I want to point a very important and often overlooked fact about evolution:

To ask “What is the evolutionary reason for (X)? Why did (X) evolve?” is often the entirely wrong question.

There are many, many traits of humans and other living things that are incidental by-products of evolution. They’re not the traits that were selected for. They’re incidental by-products of the traits that were selected for.

Let me give an example. Let’s ask the question, “Why did bones evolve to be white? What is the selective advantage of bones being white?”

As you can probably guess, this is a completely misleading and even silly question. There is no selective advantage whatsoever of bones being white. Bones could be hot pink with zebra stripes for all evolution cares. Bones are white because, due to an assortment of evolutionary pressures and accidents, bones are made of calcium — and calcium is white. The fact that bones are white is an incidental by-product of the fact that they’re made of calcium.

Or, to bring it back to the more interesting topic of sex: Let’s look at the question, “Why do men have nipples?” There is no selective advantage to men having nipples. There is, however, an obvious selective advantage to women having nipples, what with keeping offspring alive and all. And there’s a selective advantage to having women and men grow with the same basic blueprint, with only relatively minor differences. So women and men are both born with nipples . . . nipples that develop in women to serve an important function, and that in men exist only for, shall we say, entertainment.

And it’s been suggested — controversially, but with good evidence to back it up — that the female orgasm works this way as well. According to this hypothesis, there’s no evolutionary reason for women to have orgasms; they play no significant role in our survival or reproduction. (The fact that many women have orgasms so unreliably, and with such difficulty, and that a good number of us don’t have them at all until later in life and in some cases not at all, is some of the strongest evidence for this.) Female orgasms are like male nipples: women have orgasms because men have orgasms, and women’s and men’s biological blueprints are similar enough that a reproductively useful function in one may still be present in the other even if it serves no evolutionary purpose.

Now, whether or not you agree about female orgasm, the general principle applies: Not every trait — not even every trait that’s passed on genetically — has been selected for by the process of evolution. Some are incidental by-products of the traits that were selected for.

And homosexuality could easily be one of these.

There’s a concept in architecture (stay with me, I promise this isn’t a tangent) that’s been swiped by evolutionary biologists — the concept of the spandrel. In architecture, a spandrel is the triangular space under a staircase (or a similar space between two arches). And obviously, it isn’t something an architect will intentionally design. An architect may try to design a staircase so the spandrel is attractive, or so it impinges on the space as little as possible. She may even try to make the spandrel useful (as storage space, for instance). But the spandrel is not the thing that was intended. The staircase is the thing that was intended. The spandrel is only there because the staircase is there . . . and because, with a very few exceptions (such as a spiral staircase), you can’t have a staircase without a spandrel.

Evolutionary biologists have swiped this concept for obvious reasons. There’s no design or intention in evolution, obviously. But the principle is the same: a useful feature with positive benefits will sometimes carry an incidental side effect, a feature that doesn’t have any advantages in itself but that has to be there for the selected feature to exist.

So even if homosexuality is inborn — even if it’s genetic — it may not be the trait being selected for.

Homosexuality may be a spandrel.

It’s possible that there is a positive evolutionary benefit in some people being gay. Some scientists have suggested that there is. But it’s also possible that being gay is an incidental by-product of some other adaptive trait that we need to survive and reproduce. It could be, for instance, that a preference for boffing women (or men) is inborn . . . and that it’s evolutionarily more advantageous for that preference to occasionally show up as same-sex desire than for it to never show up at all. Or the reverse could be true: it could be that in humans and some other animals (homosexual behavior is hardly limited to the human species), there’s an advantage to having our “identify someone you can reproduce with” wiring being more — oh, let’s not say “promiscuous,’ instead let’s say “broad.” With this evolutionary strategy, we may have a lot of sex that doesn’t result in successful reproduction . . . but the chance that we’ll reproduce with somebody becomes rather higher.

I’m not going to speculate on the likelihood of any of these specific hypotheses. I just think it’s important to remember the general principle: Not every trait serves an evolutionary purpose of survival or reproduction. Some are incidental, spandrels. Homosexuality would seem like an odd trait to have evolved, something of a barrier to reproduction that needs some serious explaining . . . but that doesn’t mean the explanation is, “Homosexuality serves (X) purpose.” The explanation could be, “(Y) serves (X) purpose . . . and homosexuality is connected in some way with (Y).”

And I think it’s important to remember this as well:

Homosexuality isn’t as much of a barrier to reproduction as people often think.

Very, very few people are entirely, 100% homosexual. Just like very, very few people are entirely, 100% heterosexual. Our behavior tends to slant more or less in these two directions, possibly due to social constraints as much as natural ones . . . but most people have the capacity to be sexually involved with both/ all genders, at least to some degree. So while homosexuality may seem like kind of a weird trait from an evolutionary standpoint, it’s really not. Unless you’re a 100% completely same-sex oriented Kinsey 6 type gay person, homosexuality is only a moderate liability in the Evolutionary Sweepstakes. (Speaking for myself: Effective modern birth control is way more of a factor in my not reproducing than being a dyke.)

Finally, I want to say this:

I know some gay people won’t like this idea one bit. Some gay people won’t like the idea of gayness being an evolutionary accident or afterthought. To them, I want to say two things.

First: We can’t reject scientific hypotheses simply because we don’t like them. That’s exactly what the homophobic religious right does: they reject the extensive evidence that queers are healthy, stable, responsible contributors to society and family, purely because it doesn’t fit their worldview. If we’re going to demand that they accept reality as it is, then we don’t get to reject reality (or possible hypotheses about reality) just because we don’t like it. There are some good arguments against the spandrel hypothesis of homosexuality . . . but “it isn’t nice to gay people” is not one of them.

Second: If we are an evolutionary spandrel . . . there’s a serious upside.

And that’s that we’re not going anywhere.

If homosexuality is an independent trait that has been selected for (or not selected against) due to some reason of its own . . . it could eventually be selected out. It does confer some selective disadvantage, after all, if not a massive one . . . and as society becomes more gay-accepting and more people are comfortable with entirely same-sex oriented sex lives, that disadvantage only gets more pronounced.

But if homosexuality is a spandrel — an incidental by-product of evolution, hitching a ride on some useful and important trait that our species needs to survive and reproduce — it’s a lot more likely to stick around.

And I, for one, am in favor of us sticking around.

Greta Christina, copyright © 2009. Be sure to check out Greta’s blog.

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Harebrained speculation time:

Why aren’t there more “true” bisexuals? (”True” in quotation marks — so please don’t all start yelling at me.)

One of the interesting puzzles about sexual orientation is the way it’s distributed in the population. It’s very far from a neat bell curve, with a few heterosexuals and homosexuals at either end, and a big peak in the bisexual middle. It’s not even a slanty bell curve, peaking sharply at “more or less heterosexual” and sloping down gradually towards “more or less homosexual.”

Instead, it’s a double bell curve — with one peak near “leaning towards straight,” and another, smaller peak near “leaning towards gay.” (The height and shape and location of these peaks vary depending on who’s doing the study . . . but the basic “double bell curve with one high peak and one low” pattern seems to hold pretty steady.)

Translation: Very few people are strictly straight or strictly gay . . . but most people do have something of a preference for one gender or the other. Quote unquote “true” bisexuals, people who are attracted to women and men equally, are fairly rare. Even if we take self-identification out of the picture — even if we define orientation purely on the basis of desire or behavior — we still see this tendency.

Why would this be?

If sexual orientation were entirely genetic — if there were some evolutionary reason for humans to be more heterosexual than not but to have some fluidity around that — why would we have the double peaks? Wouldn’t we just have the slanty bell curve, peaking around 1 or 1.5 on the 0-to-6 Kinsey scale, and gradually curving down towards 6? Why would we have a small second peak at around 4.5 or 5?

I freely acknowledge that there might be some good genetic reason for this “double bell curve” phenomenon, one that we just don’t know yet. I’ll even acknowledge that there might be some good genetic reason for this phenomenon, one that somebody else knows but that I don’t. I’m definitely not a sexual orientation constructionist (translation: person who thinks orientation is entirely constructed by society). The science is still shaking out, but it does seem to be pointing to genetics as at least a significant factor in determining which gender or genders we like to boff. And it might well turn out that genetics play an important role in this “double peak” pattern.

But I’ll also say this:

I think it’s quite plausible that the double peak is entirely cultural.

And there are two specific cultural trends that I think may be skewing our orientations towards the two peaks.

The first is homophobia . . . and the way it’s sorted our culture into Straight and Gay. The two mix and overlap, of course — straight people have gay friends, and vice versa — but they’re still distinct social categories. Especially in parts of the country and the world that are more homophobic. Because of homophobia, people who lean towards being queer have a strong need to create a gay culture, a community shaped around sexual and romantic desire towards people of the same sex. And of course, because of homophobia, straight people have historically shunned queers — and have denied any queer tendencies in themselves. This has improved dramatically, but it’s only improved fairly recently, and it does still go on today.

So because society has sorted itself into two intermingling but distinct groups — Gay and Straight — people somewhere in the middle often feel a need to pick one. There is a bisexual community, but it’s nowhere near as visible, or as well-organized, as either the straight or gay worlds. And it can be very hard to drift back and forth between those two worlds. People whose natural orientations lie close to the middle of the scale — say, a 2.5 or 3.5 on the scale of 0 to 6 — often wind up picking a side, and more or less sticking to it.

And that tendency can be self-perpetuating. A cultural preference for straight society or the gay community can slant your sexual preference towards women over men, or vice versa. I know that I tend to get more interested in women when I’m spending more time in dyke culture, and I get more interested in men when I’m hanging around straight people more. It’s a simple matter of who’s on my mind. Not to mention who’s available. Love the one you’re with, and all that. Or lust after the one you’re with, anyway.

So that’s Harebrained Speculation Number One for the double peak.

Harebrained Speculation Number Two: Biphobia.

There’s a strong bias against bisexuals in both straight and gay cultures. Gay culture tends to see bisexuals as traitors, fence-sitters, kinky thrill-seekers, people who can’t commit either politically or personally. Straight society tends to see bisexuals as fickle, unreliable, secretly gay people who just can’t admit it. Plus straights often see us as promiscuous . . . and, of course, in the age of AIDS, they see us as vectors of disease. And both gays and straights tend to see us as confused, experimenting, “going through a phase.”

All of which exacerbates people’s tendency to sort into gay or straight culture. The strong biases against bisexuality — from both gays and straights — push many people to pick one camp or the other . . . people who might not otherwise need or want to. People who might have identified as bisexual can internalize this biphobia, and decline to call themselves bi. And people who privately identify as bi are often reluctant to do so publicly.

So largely because of homophobia from the straight world, we have a tendency to sort ourselves into straight society and the gay community. Because of biphobia from both straight and gay cultures, this tendency gets exaggerated. And this cultural tendency gets transformed into personal sex behavior and desire . . . which then turns into a self-perpetuating feedback loop. Hence, the “double peak” pattern in our sexual orientations — a pattern that might be much less pronounced, and might not even be there at all, if these social trends weren’t there.

I’m not sure how you’d test this hypothesis. But here’s what I’d expect to see if it were true:

If it were true, then in parts of the world that were less homophobic — and less biphobic — I’d expect to see a less vividly pronounced double peak. (If the less-homophobic, less-biphobic trend had been happening for long enough, anyway.)

And if it were true, then if society continues to become less homophobic — and less biphobic — over the coming decades, I’d also expect to see the strong double peaks soften and flatten towards a more standard slanty bell curve.

It might not flatten out entirely. Again, there may be some genetic reasons for the double peak in the bell curve, ones that we don’t know about. And even in an entirely non-homophobic, non-biphobic society, we still might have something of a cultural tendency to sort into gay and straight cultures. For dating/ cruising purposes if nothing else. But I think without these cultural factors, this double peak would very likely flatten out significantly.

I’m not saying “everyone is basically bisexual.” I think that’s bullshit. Some people are clearly not bisexual. Some people are clearly gay or straight. And even though most people do have at least some capacity to be attracted to both/all genders, that still doesn’t make them “basically bisexual.” Sexual identity is complicated — it’s about political identity, cultural identity, sexual history, romantic and relationship preferences, etc., as well as basic sexual attraction. And when people are deciding which identity (if any) works best for them, they get to decide for themselves which of these factors gets priority. I don’t want someone insisting that I’m “basically lesbian” because I’m currently hovering around 5 on the Kinsey scale — so I’m not going to insist that someone else is “basically bisexual” because they’re currently hovering around 4.

So I’m not saying “everyone is basically bisexual.” I’m saying that, at least for those of us in the wide sloppy middle of the Kinsey scale, sexual orientation is at least somewhat malleable. Like I wrote in my recent piece here, The Learned Fetish, the finer points of our sexual desires can be shaped by our experiences as adults — even if the basic outlines are set early on.

I’m not sure why I think this is important. I’m not sure the answer would have any effect in figuring out social policy or political strategy or dating strategy, or any other practical decisions we might make about sex. I’m even not sure that it is important, except that figuring out what is and isn’t true about reality is always important.

But I sure do think it’s interesting.

So what do you think? If you lean more towards one end of the Kinsey scale, do you think you might lean more towards the middle if society weren’t so divided into Gay and Straight? And if you’re already pretty squarely in the middle, do you think you’d have had an easier time getting there if it weren’t for the two camps?

Greta Christina, copyright © 2009. Be sure to check out Greta’s blog.

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