In any case, the original study has some interesting things to say about how sexual activity may change over the lifespan. In the 75 to 85 year old group, men were twice as likely as women to be sexually active (38.9% v. 16.8%), more likely to report a “good quality sex life” (70.8% v. 50.9%) and more likely to be interested in sex (41.2% v. 11.4%). Also of interest is the fact that being in good health makes it more likely that you’ll have a “good quality sexual life” for longer.

Time Magazine’s article touches on some of the reasons for these disparities, although the statement that “[s]ome of this surely has to do with Viagra, which makes it easier for older men to be interested in sex” makes it clear that someone over there doesn’t understand the difference between arousal and erection. And there are some other factors that I think have been mostly left out of the discussion.

For example, according to the 2000 Census, there were 4,879,353 men and 7,481,827 women between the ages of 75-84. So when you multiply the numbers together, 1,898,068 men in that age range had sex, compared to 1,256,946 women. There’s still a disparity, but it’s less than it seems at first glance (66 women for every 100 men, rather than the 43 to 100 ratio that you’d get if you just looked at the percentages).

Similarly, Science Daily reports that “[a]lthough 72 percent of men aged 75 to 85 have partners, fewer than 40 percent of women that age do”. If we do the same calculations, we see that 3,513,134 men in that age range had partners, compared with 2,992,730 women. (Actually, it’s a bit less since I used 40% rather than “fewer than 40%”.) That means that only 15% of men in that age range had younger partners, rather than the 45% that it seems at first.

This is one of the biggest problems that I see with a lot of sex research and of media discussions around sex. It’s a lot easier to study people in ways that generate numbers and it certainly makes for more interesting sound bites. But there’s often a backstory that gets left out and that creates misunderstandings and misapplication of the data. Sometimes, looking at the percentages gives us a different picture than looking at the actual numbers

Granted, there are still significant differences in the experiences that men and women reported and I certainly am not trying to calculate them away. For example, the fact that more sexually active men reported a good sex life than active women is definitely important. And the fact that men tend to be sexually active later in life is also significant. All I’m saying is that it’s valuable to see how the different pieces come together before jumping to conclusions.

As the saying goes, “there are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.” You need to dig a little deeper to get a better story.

What led you to become a sex educator?

I have always been interested in sexuality as both an art form and a science but my very first teaching experiences were community based classes on body image. My body has always been naturally larger and as a teenager I struggled a lot with self acceptance. When I began to embrace my body in its natural state, everything in my life instantly felt more fulfilling.

I thought that by sharing my experiences with other women I would be able to empower them.  Questions about the body very quickly led to questions about sex & relationships and I found that providing information about those areas was just as comfortable for me. Now its over 15 years later and I’m still doing it!

What kinds of sex education do you offer?

I provide individual sex therapy, couples/poly group counseling & educational workshops for community groups of all types. My favorite topics include pleasure physiology, sex & pregnancy, body image, sexual communication, sex techniques, sex during aging, bdsm, & sex positivity for health care providers. My classes are provided through Good Vibration’s OSSE program, independently & through local universities & community centers.

Where did you get your education in sexuality?

Like most sex educators I have a mix of formal education & informal community training!

I have a BA with highest honors in Psychology from UC Berkeley where I studied body image & sexuality through their honors program.

My Masters degree is in Counseling Psychology where I did a Master’s thesis on training therapists  to work with kinky clients.

I also completed San Francisco Sex Information’s sex educator training & Good Vibrations OSSE training in addition to thousands of hours of workshops and independent study.

What do you love about giving sex advice?

I have always believed that the hardest topics to discuss tend to be the ones most worth tackling. Although sexuality is both a beautiful and necessary aspect of human nature, it is often discussed with shame and secrecy. I love knowing that by providing information about sexuality I am able to help bring sexuality and sensuality into the spotlight where they belong.

What is your most common question?

“Am I normal?”  I’ve been asked this thousands of times and the answer is always “Yes!”

What is the most difficult or hard-to-answer question you’ve ever received?

“I was raped and can’t enjoy sex any more but I want to. What should I do?” This is not something that can be answered in a few lines! I really wished that it could be! I referred her to a fabulous therapist that she loves and now reports having a much better relationship with sex..

What is your favorite sex toy or product and why?

The most important sex toy by far is a good quality lube. My personal favorite is PleasureGlide. I love that it has a limited number of easy to pronounce ingredients (including aloe!)

My FAVORITE sex toy is the Hitachi Magic Wand. There have been many imitators over the years but nothing can match its ability to deliver orgasms on a regular basis. Its long handle makes it easy to use for larger bodies or those with limited mobility & its electrical cord means it will never run out of juice.

Where do you teach? If you travel, what is it like? Where was your favorite place to teach? Most unusual panel or experience?

I primarily teach in the San Francisco Bay Area but traveling is fun! I recently spent several months in Denmark and I hope to return there to teach later this year.

My favorite classes are the ones where well educated adults realize that there is so much more left to learn.

My favorite panel was for partners of people with multiple sclerosis. We talked a lot about how to get their needs met, not feel guilty about having needs & be creative when mobility issues come into play.

How has what you’ve done or found at Good Vibrations helped you?

Good Vibrations is more than a store, its a community. I’ve worked with them in dozens of different ways throughout the years and the one thing that has remained constant is their dedication to education and quality products. Often their stores are the place where sex educators first find their passion, mentors or fine tune their subject area.

What would be your number one piece of advice for someone interested in a career of sex education?

Always look at sexuality as an empirical science. Request sources for data, compare research methodologies and look for bias in anything that is stated as fact.

Cultural bias, political agendas & simple lack of evidence based information can have a huge impact on the quality of information that you get, even in courses given at prestigious universities. Question everything and use your judgment to filter out what is science & what is myth.

What’s the best thing you’ve learned or best advice you’ve received?

Never assume that someone else’s definitions are the same as yours. Always ask for clarifying information.

What do you think is the biggest misconception about sex?

That orgasms are necessary for good sex. Seriously, if you’re having 45 minutes of great sex and 2 minutes of orgasm do those last 2 minutes really define your experience? If I had to choose between 45 minutes of intense foreplay or 2 minutes of intense orgasms, I’d choose the 45 minutes every time!

Which is your favorite project that you’ve worked on?

The BDSM & Therapy project. We created guidelines for working with kinky clients that acknowledges that kinky is a part of the normal sexuality spectrum and should be treated as a multicultural issue rather than as a disease.

What is your best piece of sex advice for women?

Never stop learning about your own body!

What projects are you working on now?

A guidebook for mental health practitioners on kinky issues. I’m also putting together a blog that will discuss sexuality topics, including taboo subjects, from an intellectual perspective.

Where can people find out more about you?

www.heatherpowers.com is my primary website.

I have a sexuality blog launching in April at intellisexy.org. Bookmark it now

Photo by Kash (www.rocknrollgeishas.com)

What is your favorite porno of all time?

Fashionistas.  Hands down.  I saw it not too long after it came out and it literally blew my mind.  It was before I had discovered kink for myself and so much of the content stirred my in really challenging and unexpected ways.  The eroticism, the connection and passion between Rocco Siffredi and Belladonna were so intense and powerful.  It is the one movie I can watch over and over again, the one porn I never tire of.  It is was fostered my mini-obsession with Belladonna.  She is still the most outstanding performer I have ever seen, fully embodies my definition of “authentic”.

What sex toy(s) do you like to use on film?

I really like glass toys.  I think they are pretty and look gorgeous inside the body as well as out.  For anal, I think there is really nothing better… they warm to body temperature, they are smooth and work well with lube and when in the ass, the clear ones give a sweet picture of anus insides, how cool is that?  I think metal is sexy too but they can be much colder going in than glass, so glass is my favorite.  There is one particular anal toy…it is used in Fashionistas I believe…I call it The Juicer…I have no idea what the name of it is. It is a butt toy that has a tip that looks like an orange juicer, a shaft that is covered in nubbins and a handle on the flange so it can be turned…so it looks like you are juicing the behind.  It is fabulous and feels amazing.

If you could have a Good Vibrations Shopping Spree, what would you put in your cart?

Oh wow.  The amazing thing is that I have so many sex toys already!  My partner works at a sex toy retailer so between the two of us, we have quite a few.  I think I would try a Feeldoe after all these years…I am still quite curious about it and have never had a chance to use it.  I would buy my own Eleven because that toy is gorgeous and hot and I don’t own one yet… I would stock up on Maximus which is my favorite lube for butt play and get a new Hitachi.  My old one is still going strong but I am going to be super sad the day it kicks out.  I would also buy a few straps (harnesses), my old ones, though worn-in are a little worse for the wear. =)

What was it like working on set for this film (with Good Releasing)?

Every set I’m on for a Good Releasing film feels like hang-out time with family.  I have “grown up” in porn with the lovely directors that are now working for Good Releasing so consequently it is just like being over at a friend’s house where the friend just happens to have a video camera.  Things get professional for sure and when it’s time to get down to business so-to-speak we all focus.  Before and after however, it’s the best.  I am so lucky to work and shoot with people I respect and admire.

If you’ve worked with other film companies, how was that different?

There is obviously not such a familial element and it can be less comedic, though I am often a super hambone on the set of films I’m in.  Depending on the shoot it can be much more get in, get out, get on with it but now less fun.  I think Good Releasing is producing films that allow performers a chance to be themselves and let their true personalities shine.  That might be one difference, there is more of “me” on a Good Releasing set for sure.

If you could give one piece of sex advice, what would it be?

MASTURBATE!!! I really feel that it is the single most important element to having a fulfilling sex life, not only because it tunes a person in to their own body but because it helps them know what they want and like.  Masturbating also gives a person a bigger bag of tricks… if something felt good during a great session of masturbation, why not bring that into  sexual experience with a partner?  As in; “Let me show you this new thing I tried while I was in the bath last night”. That could lead to a smokin’ hot shower, if you ask me… Our bodies are outstanding and have a huge capacity for pleasure.  I don’t think we as individuals need to wait for that potential to be released only through interaction with another person, we can do that for ourselves.

What do you think is the biggest myth about sex?

There are a few I would choose:

1. That you don’t need lube for anal and that saliva is enough.
2. That women can’t cum from anything but clitoral stimulation.  I like that the myth of purely vaginal orgasm was busted but it can invalidate the may other ways that women like to and tend to come.
3. That all women should be capable of doing what is seen in porn, what is more important is do they WANT to do what they see in porn? Is that hot for them? Not everyone is capable of gaping but more importantly, not every woman wants to. Desire is paramount.

Who are your influential co-stars, directors, both folks you’ve worked with and those you’d like to work with?

Oh there are so many! Shine Louise Houston, Madison Young, Courtney Trouble, Tristan Taormino, Jiz Lee, Belladonna, Dia Zerva, Kimberly Kane, NIna Hartley, Eon McKai, John Stagliano, Princess Donna, Nica Noelle James Mogul, Annie Sprinkle, Carol Queen, Jackie Strano, Jenna Jameson, Shar Rednour… the list is endless.  And consider this the same list of people I want to work with… especially those I haven’t worked with yet.

How do you prepare for your sex scenes?

A long shower and shave, a delicious meal, enemas if necessary, getting my fingers and toes polished up, listening to great music that gets me pumped and feeling sexy.  Anything that helps me focus on me and why I’m sexy and powerful and gets me in the mood.

What did/do you hope your performance(s) portray about sexuality?

That women can love sex.  In many, many different ways.  That it is ok to be sex and want sex.  That sex is fun and empowering and necessary.  That a woman can want to be touched and tied up and smacked and kissed and finger-fucked and rimmed and held and pounded and stroked and…

How has having access to sex-positive information and support changed your life?

I would not be anywhere near where I am today without the influence of people in my life who provided me with honest and open information about sex and sexuality.  I am open about sex and feel good about my body because I had access to information and ideas that reinforced healthy sexuality.  Information that promoted sexual desire, sexual safety and most importantly, sexual agency and choice.  I think sex is wonderful because I was lucky enough to be surrounded by people who told me that it could be and that it was.

What projects are you working on now?

This is a very exciting time!  I’ll be heading to LA soon to shoot with one of my favorite stars, the lovely Sinn Sage. I will be shooting a new scene for The Crash Pad Series with the hot Dia Zerva and a new photo set for my friend Jiz Lee’s new website, Karma Pervs!  I have a ton of work coming up so keep your eyes peeled.  Also, my website, www.dylanryanx.com will be launching right around my birthday and just before the Feminist Porn Awards!

Where can fans find more of your work? (website, twitter, facebook…)

for now, Twitter: @thedylanryan and FetLife: Dylan Ryan

And my friend and Colleague Courtney Trouble is now representing me and has started a sex-positive agency called Little Pink Book.  You can find it and me at www.littlepinkbook.biz.

I believe in loving one another. But ultimately, I believe in loving yourself. You are beautiful. Everything about you is unique and special and absolutely perfect. You look in the mirror and pick yourself apart. You are too this… too that… The truth is, we are humans just trying to get by on this planet. Everyone is so caught up in their issues, imperfections, drama and pain that they do not even notice something you may spend hours worrying about. We must love ourselves, commune with ourselves.

Appreciate your body as if you are examining a flower. Your vulva is an orchid, a beautiful flower budding when it’s open and ready. Look at your body.  Love every second of it.  Your body is a road map of your life, your journey… a story waiting to be told.  Learning what your body likes, and what it doesn’t, can change your entire outlook on life.  Let your body tell its story. Masturbate. Make love to yourself with everything you’ve got. Because all you truly have on this planet is yourself. When you get to know what you like then you have the confidence to express your needs and desires. You will then be able to better articulate them to a partner, a lover, or even utter them softly to yourself.

Embrace the power of your sexuality. Harness your power. Do not let anyone take away your beauty. Love yourself and in turn you will help heal the world. Orgasms are revolutionary.  Join the revolution. We will change the world…one orgasm at a time. Start… now… and have fun!!!

If you want to learn more about female masturbation, I am teaching a workshop and  I would love to see you there!!!

Discover the Beauty of Your Body: The “In’s AND Out’s” of Female Masturbation
(NEW)
(After Hours Workshop)
When Wed, March 17, 8pm – 10pm
Where Good Vibrations Valencia St., 603 Valencia Street (at 17th Street), San Francisco, CA 94110 (map)

Discover the Beauty of Your Body: The “In’s AND Out’s” of Female Masturbation (NEW)
Wednesday, March 17, 8-10 pm $25 if pre-registered, $30 for drop-ins
Women only
Self-pleasure is one of the best ways to discover what you like, gain self love and appreciation, and make yourself feel great! But with all of the mixed messages that women receive about sex, many of us never learn how much fun it can be. GV staffer Lolo Winters leads this workshop in self-love and sexual exploration. You’ll learn how masturbation can improve your health and happiness, find new ways to bring yourself pleasure, how your sexual anatomy works, tips for using toys, erotica, movies and fantasies, setting the mood, and more! Did you know that different breathing techniques can change the way you feel pleasure? Come find out how, in this fun workshop!

To purchase a ticket for this workshop, please visit http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/90090.

My observations pretty much match hers. There are a lot more women who write about sex than men. She hits on some of the factors that contribute to that, and I think that there are some others that are worth delving into. I’m going to talk about sex educators and sex writers together because I see many of the same influences in both of these arenas. Anyway, I consider thoughtful sex writing to be one facet of sex education so it’s a somewhat unnecessary distinction, at least for the purposes of this piece.

Greta writes that one of the reasons that there are fewer men who talk, write or teach about sex is that “[w]hen men write about sex, on the other hand, they’re assumed to be drooling horndogs.” That certainly fits my observations. Men who want to talk thoughtfully about sex have to prove to their audience that they’re not creepy or just looking to get laid.

I certainly acknowledge that there are a lot of creepy guys in the world. There are a lot of predatory guys. There are a lot of manipulative guys. Most of them are looking to get laid, and many of them feel free to voice their opinions about sex and women. I really understand why many male sex educators & writers need to prove that they’re not one of these guys. However, one of the effects of that is that many men who write or talk about sex often avoid talking about their personal sexual experiences. It’s one way to make it clear that we’re talking about sexuality in general, not our sexualities in particular. That creates a distance that serves to insulate us in order to minimize the chance that someone is going to misinterpret what we write. Being able to do that is a skill that takes a fair amount of practice and a lot of people simply don’t want to bother or don’t know how to start.

Another reason is that sex and relationship advice is generally seen as part of the female sphere of influence. Some of that stems from the ways in which girls and women usually have a lot more practice at talking about and processing their emotional relationships than men do. When men start talking about these topics, we usually have more of a learning curve, simply as a result of not having had as many opportunities to develop those skills. And without role models to learn from, it’s harder for boys and men to acquire those skills, which reinforces the cycle. This is slowly changing, but it’s still a strong element. (This is also evident in the field of psychotherapy, which is heavily skewed towards women practitioners.)

Still another factor is that we have an overly simple and reductionist view of male sexuality. We have this idea that male sexuality is simple: get it hard, get it in, get it off. And we have this idea that female sexuality is this vastly complex, confusing terrain that requires a lot to make it work. But my experience is that men’s sexual desires are just as complex, tricky, rewarding, and fraught as women’s.

Of course, there are some differences. For example, a lot of girls and women don’t know where the clitoris is and I have yet to hear of a cisgender boy or man who didn’t know where his penis is. My observation is that while some women know little or nothing about their sexual and/or reproductive physiology, there are others who know a lot. Meanwhile, almost every man knows something about how his body works, but far fewer know as much about it as a well-informed woman knows about hers. It’s as if we’ve decided “I know where this one button is. There’s nothing else to know.” And so male sexuality gets reduced to that single function, which then becomes another self-reinforcing loop.

That means that a man who’s willing to talk about something other than “get it hard, get it in, get it off” risks the backlash that any guy who steps outside the box of masculinity risks. This is one of the consequences of sexism, homophobia, and gender essentialism, and not a lot of men have the tools they need to be brave enough to break free. I don’t think it’s a worthwhile endeavor to compare the impact of sexism et al on men versus women, and I have no interest in coddling men who aren’t willing to take the chance to step out of their boxes. But when we’re asking why there aren’t more men writing about sex, the ways in which sexism affects men is certainly part of the puzzle. And given that (heterosexual) men generally benefit from sexism in some very real, material ways, there are barriers to stepping outside of the box that other folks don’t experience in the same ways.

Having said that, there are some clear general differences in the ways that men and women experience sex, some of which I’ve learned from transgender folks. Several of the transmen I’ve spoken with have told me that when they started taking hormones, their sexual desires became more visual and more focused on their genitals and on penetrating a partner. By contrast, some transwomen have told me that their sexual desires shifted towards a more general, full-body experience. These aren’t meant to be representative of transpeople’s experiences in general, but I’ve heard enough of these stories to suggest a pattern. To me, this suggests that some of the differences in how people experience sex is grounded in biology. I believe that as long as we’re mindful of the existence of sexual diversity and we remember that we’re talking about overlapping bell curves rather than a mars/venus dichotomy, we can explore that.

But when you put these different pieces together, it’s easy to see where some of the barriers to men entering the sex writer/educator field come from. To the degree that men want to explore/discuss/write about their desire to satisfy (as Greta phrased it) “an animal urge to put a dick in a wet hole,” there’s not a lot of room to do that without being attacked as a perpetrator or a predator. And to the degree that men want to talk about their other desires, fantasies, and interests, there’s a whole lot of folks ready to discount them for being unmanly.

Making this even harder, most men don’t have as much experience in talking about these things as many women do, so there are often a lot of stumbles and mistakes. My observation from reading blogs and articles is that there’s no shortage of people waiting to attack someone for a clumsily-phrased idea, especially when it comes to sex. This tends to keep folks from being willing to dive into the water and as a result, many of the men who are interested in exploring sexuality topics don’t want to do it in such a public venue.

So I think that there are a lot of different pieces to this puzzle, but what they all seem to come down to is that men don’t write about sex because they don’t see other men writing about sex. All I can say to that is “Come on in. The water’s fine.”

Photo: Courtney Trouble

What is your favorite porno of all time?

My earliest associations with porn were always the male camaraderie that was so essential to the development of my own queer identity. I always got so much more pleasure out of socializing with boys, liking things boys liked, knowing things that boys knew, doing things boys did, wearing things boys wore, behaving like them, etc. My desire to fuck men was always tied up in a desire to be one – this is why I have had so much satisfaction identifying as a faggot.

My buddy Lucas used to housesit for a woman who had a huge porn collection. My other guy friends and I would go over and watch movies. I could of course never forget my first, which was Muffy the Vampire Layer. It was formulaic but campy, and I remember being impressed by how integral puns and parody was to sexually explicit movies. And of course, we all sat around pretending not to be totally turned on by the site of the ole in out in out, in which none of us had yet participated.

I started obsessively watching porn after college when I got the notion in my head that sex work would be a brilliant racket to support the rocknroll lifestyle I wanted. I was totally blown away by my discovery – countless women representing themselves as intelligent, creative, hypersexed, individualists consciously capitalizing on their own enjoyment of exhibitionism.

In particular I developed a fixation on Joanna Angel, whose movies revitalized my sex life with my then-partner. Identifying with her sexuality, personality and entrepreneurship inspired me to try my hand at pro-domming and eventually porn. And I got off watching her movies and feeling like I was watching someone I knew have sex.

I also loved NoFauxxx for the queer identity politics and body variety, Crash Pad for its realism and Madisonbound for the rampant kink. Courtney Trouble and Madison Young and Shine Louise Houston have given me so much work and opportunity. My porn career really is living proof that all you need to work with your idols is a little moxie and commitment.

What sex toy(s) do you like to use on film?

I love to wear larger-than-life cocks because the proportions look so great on film and because I feel like a giant boner is the perfect physical manifestation of how excited and energized I get when I fuck on camera.

I also love to use black leather impact toys like floggers and belts because I love capturing the ballistic movement, elegance and power of beating a submissive’s ass.

If you could have a Good Vibrations Shopping Spree, what would you put in your cart?

I hate shopping, but GV is dangerous for me, because no matter how much excessive money I spend there, IT’S ALWAYS WORTH IT. I love and practice safer sex on and off the clock, so I always get PJUR silicon lube, condoms and latex gloves. I’m a sucker for big, g-spot friendly, super-hard toys and natural materials, so I’ve been dying to get my hands on those Nob Essence wooden dildos, especially the Fling G spot toy! And I’ve yet to have the pleasure of the Eleven.

And I’d throw in every single book and dvd that they stock.

What was it like working on set for this film with Good Releasing?

Well, I’ve been fortunate enough to perform in five films for Good Releasing: Nostalgia, Seven Minutes in Heaven: Coming Out and Bordello for Courtney Trouble, and Macbeth and Fluid: Women Redefining Sexuality for Madison Young. My experience making all of these has several extraordinary things in common.

First of all, both Madison and Courtney encouraged me to meet up with my fellow performers and develop our rapport and our scenes together, which leads to some pretty interesting conversations in Mission diners and bars! “Hi, nice to meet you, we’re gonna fuck on Saturday, so what do you like?” My fellow cast members are always their own kind of expressive, progressive sexy,regardless of body or gender or identity- in other words exactly the kind of people I like to fuck, work with, and be around.

On set, there is a sense of truly radical creativity and respect among performers and crew. I wake up every day knowing that I did something right in my life because I get to perform an amplified version of my sexual id and gleefully, filthily generate sex positivity in my work!

If you could give one piece of sex advice, what would it be?

Fantasies are like dogs. They require training in order to bring you happiness. Walk your fantasies; don’t let them walk you.

What do you believe is the biggest myth about sex?

That it’s wrong or unhealthy to enjoy a fantasy, or act a way during sex and play, that you would never actually act out in real life. Indulge in your fantasies and desires, in your own masturbation life and in your relations with other humans. Anything within the realm of fantasy or played out with consenting adults is healthy. Enjoy the thrill of the taboo instead of giving in to shame.

Who are your influential co-stars, directors, both folks you’ve worked with and those you’d like to work with?

Courtney Trouble and Madison Young have given me so many opportunities. They both work extremely hard to represent queer identity politics and female empowerment in sexy, smart, funny, original ways. I don’t throw the word visionary around, but these women are it.

Carson is my co-conspirator in sex work, performance, writing, publishing, filmmaking, and leather-jacket-wearing – I am extremely proud to have enacted a bathroom duel between good-evil/white-leather-black-leather in Seven Minutes in Heaven: Coming Out and to know a woman who is so tough and brilliant and sly.

It has also been my pleasure to fuck, be fucked by, spank, tie-up, or boss around James Darling, Vid Tuesday, Mickey Mod, Maestro, Billie Sweet, Puck Goodfellow, Joline Parton, Sophia/Chocolate Chip, Sarah Lee Sinful, and Jae in Good Releasing movies.

I still have yet to fuck either of the aformentioned directors (hey ladies!). I would not turn down a gig with: April Flores, Jiz Lee, Billy Castro, Sid Blakovich, or Joanna Angel. And Lorelei Lee is the lifelong contract star of my heart.

How do you prepare for your sex scenes?

My partner is good enough to warm me up by fucking the shit out of me before a shoot (even when my call time is 9am!) and then providing tons of gushing post-shoot aftercare.

Also: tons of yoga. A good night’s sleep. Cutting back on intoxicants for a while to clear my mind and system. I do not cut back on food, however: good healthy energizing food, like what you would take on a long hike, is crucial to enjoying intensive performative sex, and way more important than looking half a pound skinnier.

What did/do you hope your performance(s) portray about sexuality?

All I can do is be myself and hope people are inspired by my natural shamelessness. Tina Horn is my rampant candid sexual persona: a queer, switchy, campy, cerebral weird-bodied faggot with an utter lack of fashion sense.

How has having access to sex-positive information and support change your life?

I would quite simply not be the happy healthy person I am today without these resources and community.

What projects are you working on now?

I was the first producer for Dark Horse Theater/Pink and White’s new project Point of Contact, where I documented my sexual mischief. I’m working on new content for that site for June.

I am teaching a beginners’ but comprehensive spanking class called Bottoms Up at Good Vibrations in April for tops and bottoms.

I’m headed to Toronto in April for the Feminist Porn Awards! As always, I am rocking and rolling, writing and distributing my zine, doing readings and performance, writing for AORTA magazine, and doing education and professional fantasy exploration in the East Bay.

Where can fans find more of your work?

My blog is http://tinahorn.blogspot.com/

Follow my ass on twitter: @tinahornsass

I’m on Facebook as Tina Horn

It’s bad enough that I have just learned that some workplace firewall software won’t let you look up porn, restaurant reviews, OR sex education (yes, really, there is a website category called “sex education” in which the Center for Sex & Culture plus many other legit sites are included, and at least some firewall programs disallow it — presumably they so fervently don’t want to encourage lunch hour trysts in the janitor’s closet that they won’t let the inmates look up safer sex questions on their morning coffee break). Really, that’s bad enough. But an even more widespread problem is occurring: Apple is yanking its (wait for it…) sex apps!

Loads more info here, and here’s more:

http://www.tgdaily.com/business-and-law-features/48531-report-apple-purged-over-5000-overtly-sexual-apps

http://www.dailytech.com/Apple+Gets+Strict+on+Adult+Apps/article17753.htm

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/apple-porn-purge-sex-themed-apps-smart-move/story?id=9919620

http://www.pcworld.com/article/190028/not_all_adult_iphone_apps_purged_from_app_store.html

http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2010/02/apple-vp-attempts-to-explain-double-standard-for-risque-apps.ars

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2360271,00.asp

It seems that several complaints about porny apps have reached sensitive ears in the corner offices high above Cupertino, and three main reasons are cited for the resultant purge: the App Store has been so overrun with sex apps that people couldn’t find the other stuff they wanted to download; women with iPhones have felt the sexual app content demeaning (and here I should be very clear and say some women, because of course other women have been happily downloading frisky apps, not to mention creating them and posing for them–like the Suicide Girls, who are hopping mad that their plans for world domination no longer include the iPhone); and, very predictably, What About The Children?

I had a perfectly sensible idea about this situation the other day and wish I’d had time to write about it before Apple apparently used the secret mind-reading app it had installed on my iPhone without my knowledge (is it a function of the GPS system? Exactly how paranoid do I need to be?) to suck the useful thought right out of my head and claim it as its own. As I began to write this, news is that Apple has created an App Store “explicit” category, to which I would like to say: What, you hadn’t created one before!?

(More on this: http://www.macworld.com/article/146694/2010/02/appstore_explicit.html)

Perhaps it is just that I toil in the fields of sex education and so am aware of how concerned (nay, freakin’ freaked out) some Americans are about sexuality-related issues, even very non-porny ones. But it comes as no surprise to me that 1) people download tons of these apps, which range from goofy to explicit to informational, 2) certain other people find this upsetting, and 3) this is suddenly a PR nightmare even though, given numbers 1 and 2, it was completely predictable. And it can be readily fixed! Corral the adult apps in one place so they are easy for interested adults to find, plus both hard for disinterested adults to find and curious youth to access. See how simple that was?

Let’s go back to two of the elements of sex-positivity. Everyone has a right to the sexuality (and/or information or entertainment) that is natural and interesting to them (young people excepted, granted; this is how our culture attempts to encourage disaffected youth to actually live through adolescence, by promising them adult perks and pleasures on the other side). AND, a consent-based understanding of sexuality means that people also have the right NOT to be troubled by sexual content they choose not to view.

These two things are hardly mutually exclusive. Cable TV manages fairly well to give its users the technology to block adult material; computer software exists to do the same thing on your laptop. Back in the days when people were sent things through the mail (I know, what a quaint recollection, eh?), porn companies would send an envelope with another envelope inside, telling you that in opening the inner envelope you were about to encounter porn. It didn’t say “Porn!” on the outside envelope, because that would make the other people in your apartment building want to steal your mail.

Today, we receive an email with a spicy, hint-hint intro, and then are invited to click on a link that gets us to the site where the pictures are. Why can’t the App Store take a page from this book? They could certainly congregate all the adult apps together (and in fact, if they care about customer service, they could order them even more carefully than that: sex info here, gay stuff there, nakedness only over here, games in another listing, explicit content — no, I mean really explicit, I’m not sure why all these folks think mere nudity is explicit) in the App Store equivalent of a double envelope.

This would serve two salutary purposes — keep it out from under blue noses (and anyone else who’d prefer not to see it, and kids), and it would make it easier for you and me to find what we want, when/if we want it. Nobody loses here, people! Except possibly the bluenoses themselves, some of whom are so absexual* [footnoted below] that they want to find that stuff randomly so it’ll give them a conniption fit-slash-hard-on. You can tell these people apart because some of them say, “Drat! I happened upon objectionable content I would very much prefer not to have seen!” and the other ones say, “You people will not stop shoving this trash down our throats!” (Bonus points if they go on to say “…until we gag!”)

See, people think I’m just a porn-monger, but I am so much more; I’m a social scientist. I’d be very happy to see us build a world together where all the adult content you or I could possibly want was available to us, and not to people who didn’t choose to see it, because that way we’d soon see who would seek it out just so they could fulminate. I believe that’d be useful knowledge to have, plus oh so entertaining.

Now I just have two nagging business questions for Apple. First: Why are the people who don’t like elements of your product the ones you feel you need to please? With all the happy (or happy enough) users who’ve consumed iPhones and shopped the App Store and have not worried about the sex-related apps, either because they like them or they just don’t give a damn, why throw the baby (who can no longer be shaken, thanks to last month’s app purge) out with the bathwater? Don’t they understand that when they delete zillions of apps, they both do a kind of censorship to those who want them (in fact, they behave in a downright judgmental way to their existing customers, which is really offensive) and they economically harm app creators? Is that really what these guys want to do?

Because, I’ll say it again, they don’t have to proceed this way: they can corral the content and let only the people access it who want it (ooops, I really mean adult people; sorry, mature youth, check back later). They could even build a way to do this into the iPhone or iPad when you get it from the store: turn on or turn off the adult content access in the device. Sure, young people will attempt to hack this, but that’s good practice for the jobs they’ll have in a few years — it will just make them better citizens of the global info-age economy.

The bottom line for Apple appears to be its desire to have the iPad adopted in schools as a scholastic enabler, though (note to Apple, concerned parents, and everyone who doesn’t want youth to have access to porn) its sizable, clear screen and Internet access mean that each iPad issued to an underage person will need to come equipped with a hectoring adult who starts chiding the child every time they get curious and try to access Scarleteen, much less the Swimsuit Issue.

Was Apple perhaps hoping that this special add-on would be unnecessary because, let’s say, parents and teachers would cover that base? What, none of Cupertino’s finest ever snuck away as a 17-year-old with a purloined Playboy? Ahhh, how quickly they forget.

Listen, I don’t want youth to have access to porn any more than the next Concerned Citizen. I do want them to have access to good sex information, but that’s another topic; most of the App Store inventory that got nuked last week wasn’t actually good sex ed, though as usual they threw out the serious with the salacious. When, oh when, will our culture’s gatekeepers be able to tell one from the other?

But I find it so very ironic that when Apple cleaned house, they didn’t bother to sweep out the SI swimsuit issue or Playboy. That’s my second biz question: Really? So what this means is that we can deal in sexuality if we’re big and powerful enough? But if you’re a dork with an idea that you could write code to make boobies shake,** or you’re an actual sex educator, take a hike. (Or maybe those guys really do have a crazy soft spot for Playboy. Well, OK.)

Bottom line, the stunningly sex-negative message sent by the first news of the purge was: We could be shopping the App Store appropriately for adult stuff, but no — apparently Apple doesn’t want there to be an app for that.

Notes:

*Absexual: A term invented by my partner Robert and me meaning someone who not only disapproves of some or all sexual things, but gets turned on when they do so–sometimes, even, visibly entering the sexual response cycle. I wrote about it in my essay collection Real Live Nude Girl, and am working up to a new take on the topic.

**Boobie-shaking inventor guys: Hey, I know you’re real people, and I’m sorry I’m using the term “dork” here. I don’t mean it personally. I especially like that you can customize your app with the boobies you’d like to shake. This allows for a sort of post-modern and personalized interface with the machine that will need to become the rule in order for human-computer interactions to go to the next level; you guys are on the cutting edge, as far as I’m concerned.

Editor’s note: Wired magazine just posted an article about Apple’s secret IPhone developer agreement, which specifies:

A ban on public statements, forbidding developers to speak about the agreement.

Apps made with the iPhone software development kit can only be distributed through the App Store, meaning rejected apps can’t be served through the underground app store Cydia, for instance.

Apple indemnifies itself against developer liability surpassing $50, meaning if developers get sued, Apple will be liable for no more than $50 in damages.

No reverse engineering, or enabling others to reverse-engineer, the iPhone SDK.

No messing with Apple products. That means no apps that enable modifying or hacking Apple products are allowed.

Apple can “revoke digital certification of any of Your Applications at any time.” No surprise there: Your app can be pulled even if it’s already been approved, which we’ve already seen happen a number of times.

KFA is totally free and it’s crowd-sourced which means that each participant is expected to “give a talk or presentation, help with one, or otherwise contribute in some way.” The idea is that there are no spectators and everyone helps to make it happen. Of course, there are plenty of ways to do that.

To make it even more fun, there’s no pre-planning events. You show up and write your name and topic in an open space on the schedule. Each presentation is strictly limited to 20 minutes, so it’s more like a buffet rather than an entire meal. You can sample lots of different ideas and then seek more information elsewhere.

KinkForAllSanFrancisco takes place on March 21 from 10-5 at the Women’s Building (3543 18^th Street, San Francisco, CA 94110) People are already signing up to help make it happen, so click on the link and check it out. It looks like it’ll be a fun time!

There are also KinkForAll events in the works for Boston, Washington DC, and New York. And there’s a press release about the SF event here.

Here’s how it works. You go to their site, select which tests you want and pay with a credit card. You get a printout that you take to the closest lab (they have a search function) and give them a blood and/or urine sample. It’s fast, it’s easy, and nobody will know why you’re at the lab since the same sites also do lots of other medical stuff. If you test positive for anything, you get a phone consultation with a doctor who can write prescriptions as appropriate.

First, here’s what I like about it:

It makes it a lot easier for folks to get tested if they don’t have an STI clinic nearby or if they can’t get to the clinic. Many STI clinics are open for limited hours, or fill up quickly which makes it a time-consuming process.

If you’re nervous about walking into your local STI clinic or Planned Parenthood, you don’t have to worry about that. You could be going to get your blood sugar tested, your liver function tested, your cholesterol tested, or anything else. So it may feel a lot more private.

You can select which STIs to get tested for, which can be useful if you know what you’ve been exposed to. They also have an online form that you can fill out to figure out which tests to get.

Having said all that:

It’s not cheap. Most of the tests are $79-99, although you can get all 8 for $249. This creates a barrier to access to health care and STI testing for people who can’t afford to pay for it. That $249 would go a lot further towards health care for more people if it went directly to the clinic.

While it’s a confidential service, it only offers the illusion of anonymity. Since they have your name, credit card number, email and mailing addresses, it only feels anonymous in the sense that nobody knows why you’re going to the lab. They do offer this confidentiality info:

Your lab tests and results will not appear on your permanent medical records without your explicit permission.

Your lab tests and results will not appear in any insurance records.

We will not sell or rent your personal data.

We keep credit card information safe never storing anything other than the last four digits and transferring all financial information using a Secure Socket Layer (SSL encryption).

We destroy all personal results data after 90 days.

Many systems integrations use an HL-7 interface, the industry-standard for secure personal health information data transaction. All systems integrations occur over SSL.

This is definitely a step up from going to your regular doctor, in terms of whether insurance companies can access this information. But I’m skeptical of how well this will play out in real life, if only because private information has been hacked, stolen or leaked from plenty of companies. Plus, many states have mandatory reporting for certain STIs and I can’t find any info on their site about how that works.

I’m also not thrilled with their risk assessment on the recommendation form. The form doesn’t have room for transgender or intersex respondents, it doesn’t ask enough about sexual history (such as the number and genders of your partners) to give an accurate assessment, it doesn’t ask about alcohol and drug use, and it seems to equate the risk from all sexual acts (even though there is a spectrum of risk). A well-trained testing counselor would do a much better job of interviewing a client and assessing what tests somebody needs. And speaking of counselors, there’s also no pre-test counseling so there’s a lost opportunity for safer sex and sexual health information.

And while it’s great that they have doctors available for phone consultations, they don’t seem to say anything about what training these folks have in dealing with sexuality issues. Maybe the person on the other end of the phone is comfortable talking about using meth, barebacking, having multiple partners, fisting, or other things that lots of people do that can affect their risk. But there’s nothing on the site to suggest that.

So while there are some definite advantages to this model, there are some clear drawbacks and I don’t think that it’ll suit everyone. If you have safe access to an anonymous STI clinic, I think that’s still a better option. Plus, you can make a donation and help other people have access to health care, too.

(Lastly, I just need to say that it annoys me that they talk about STDs when the more accurate term is STI. That’s because you can have an infection without having a disease, and safer sex advocates and educators have been using the latter term for years. I’d really like it if these folks did, too.)