On The Internet, Privacy, And Our Children

January 28th, 2020

A couple of weeks ago, someone shared something in one of the Facebook groups to which I belong. Unfortunately, i have lost the post, but I can sum it up and why it set the gears in my head a-grindin’.

The post was a screencap of a tweet, written by a parent who had just informed their daughter that periods will repeat monthly for several decades. The daughter responded negatively. The overall tone was humorous and, as someone who has sometimes struggled with periods, I could relate. It wasn’t my first time viewing the tweet, and I was ready to scroll on by until I saw why the image had been shared to the group.

I believe the reason why this post was shared was to point out how potentially embarrassing it could be for an adolescent to have their parent share with the internet. Although it wasn’t explicitly stated that this is the case, one could reasonably assume so. It wasn’t the point of the tweet, which was to be funny, but the information was still provided with it.

The group’s response was torn. Because the majority of the members were left-leaning women, many made the argument that there is no shame about periods. So what if we talk about it? If someone knows that a person with a uterus is experiencing a normal bodily function?

On the one hand, I completely agree. There is no shame about periods, at least, they shouldn’t be. It’s not always so cut and dry, unfortunately.

But there is an element here that isn’t so much about the content but the privacy of this girl There’s no shame about her period, but it should be her choice what strangers know about her, and this has become an increasingly complicated issue thanks to the popularity of the Internet and social media. You can so easily reach people, but this also means that it’s difficult to know who knows what about you and what the intentions of those people are.

20 years ago, I had my very first website, a simple one-page, HTML-based profile that came with my WBS chat account. Since then, I’ve created dozens of websites and several blogs. I’ve shared myself freely with the Internet. Occasionally, someone would express concern over how freely.

But I wasn’t alone. Before blogs became avenues toward careers, were viewed as legitimate forums to discuss politics or inform the masses about the dangers of certain sex toy materials, or became this grown-up thing, they were almost always personal. And they were, on the whole, owned by preteen and teenaged girls like myself who were all talking about themselves unabashedly, finding community and acceptance, which was sometimes lacking in the face-to-face world.

We’ve come a long time since then, and I still talk to some of those people. Only, we’re not teenagers anymore. Many of them have become parents, and while few of us have blogs that we keep up with anymore, most remain active on social media.

I read the posts wherein people discuss their kids: pregnancy announcements, births, milestones, rewards, and frustrations included. It’s easy to upload a few photos or a video to Facebook and share with the entire extended family. For the most part, these posts are charming, sometimes funny, and typically appropriate. But sometimes they seem to ignore boundaries and step over lines. I wonder how these children will feel when they themselves become teenagers, and then adults, and stumble across what their parents have shared about them, how they’ve been bared to the world without their knowledge or consent. I wonder how it would feel that near and sometimes complete strangers know such intimate details.

So I understood why that tweet rubbed some people wrong. There’s a lack of awareness and an influx of attention that can lead to, what seems to be, poor judgment when it comes to sharing about your child online.

But the Internet did not start this. It only makes it easier to reach more people. Parents have revealed details that their children would prefer remain private since the dawn of time (I can only assume).  I know because mine did, and aside from remaining frustrated about it to this day, the subject is actually relevant to this blog.

I lost my virginity when I was 18 to a boyfriend who I had met online (through a forum about a movie we both enjoyed, not an adult dating site as we were both still minors). I was living with a friend at the time, and he flew from Texas to visit me. Sexuality had been an important part of our online relationship and continued to be once we met in person. That we would have sex wasn’t a question, and the whole experience was generally positive. We would go on to get married, and I would create Of Sex and Love.

In the immediate aftermath of this, however, I was excited, giddy, serene. In short, I was experiencing happiness like I never had before. I had never thought it was even possible if I am being honest.

At the time, my relationship with my mother was strained, as it often is. But I wanted to share this with her. As my friend drove away from the airport after dropping off my ex, I called my mother. I wanted to reconnect and to share the way that daughters do with mothers, at least, they do in the movies.

But the conversation I had was a disappointing one. My mom didn’t pick up on this. What she did do was ask if we’d had sex. I answered honestly, but that wasn’t relevant in my mind. It wasn’t the purpose of that call.

I hung up, dejected. My mom and I didn’t reconnect then. In fact, things even got a little worse.

A few weeks later, I ran into my aunt. She had seen my mom in the interim. As I chatted with my aunt, she informed me that, upon walking into my mom’s house, the first thing my mom said was that I was no longer a virgin.

Now, this was years before the advent of any social media that my mom would use, and I doubt she would have said something like that online, but I still felt hurt that she was discussing my private matters without my consent. I may talk about these things and certainly to more people than just my aunt, but that’s my right, not hers.

It didn’t just sting; I felt a sense of betrayal that added on to my prior disappointment. My relationship with my mother wouldn’t improve anytime soon.

So it’s certainly not the fault of the Internet when people run their mouths that would be better left closed. People have poor judgment, even when those people are parents. They are not infallible. But those of us who strive to be better have a responsibility to at least try to be more conscientious than that, to respect privacy and boundaries, and to be aware of the impact of our words. And in a hyperconnected world, this is all the more important.

While there are things such as periods or sex that I believe we need to talk about more than we do and in smarter ways than we do, when these things pertain to specific people, those people must be involved in those conversations voluntarily.

Maybe the daughter in question from that tweet knew. Maybe she was okay with it or didn’t care either way. But as long as there’s doubt, we have work to do.

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Categories: personal

Screwed: How Women Are Set Up to Fail at Sex

December 24th, 2019

Screwed: How Women Are Set Up to Fail at Sex
$8.69 (Kindle) from Amazon

You wouldn’t necessarily think that a book about how society sets women up to fail at sex would be fun, but you might be wrong. “Fun” may not even be the right word to described Screwed, but it was a real page-turner, and I found myself eager to pick it back up after a break and reluctant to put it back down. This was a surprise, considering that the book hadn’t even been on my radar before I picked it up.

Screwed would be a brisk read for anyone at fewer than 160 pages, of course. But the content within those pages is shrewd in its wisdom and well-timed, at least, as well-timed as it can be considering that not everyone has pondered these things before. Sex, while it can be great, is generally less good for women than men, especially when the desires and even consent of those women is ignored and when those women are not taught how to get what want — and deserve. Screwed tackles all of this.

The book is written by Lil Boisvert, a French-Canadian and host of the show Sexplora, a six-episode documentary, which is “thirty minutes of orgasmic television focused on sex and IQ.” Unfortunately for me, it’s in a mix of English and French, which I haven’t studied in over 15 years. Fortunately, Boisvert brings the same IQ to her Screwed.

Lili actively avoids staying into telling the reader what to do. There are plenty of resources that do this (including Becoming Cliterate and Better Sex Through Mindfulness). Screwed’s focus is how we got to where we are as a society and not how individual women must remedy that to (re)claim their sexualities. Lili Boisvert is transparent about this from the very start. Her warning prefaces the book, stating what it is not and what it is. That includes a note that the slant is heterosexual because it’s the different ways society handles sex in regard to men and women that is so often the problem.

With that in mind, Boisvert jumps out of the gate, explaining how sex in western society is something done for and originating with the man and being done to the woman. This, she says, is the “cumshot principle,” and she’ll references it many times before the end of the book. She quickly breaks down the different roles that we have been taught: how women are the gatekeepers of sex that they “possess,” how men must make the first move even as women seduce (and must be visually appealing to do so), how women must remain passive, and how women must simultaneously fend off unwanted interest and advances from men while also appearing receptive if they do not want to offend. Boisvert even breaks down how women are expected to act in the bedroom. From here, she segues to a reflection on how this impacts a woman’s libido — as the “prey,” she isn’t allowed to focus on her desires the way a man is. Of course, this all paves the way for rape culture, and the author wraps up the chapter with an analysis of that.

It might sound like this first chapter of Screwed covers a lot, but it set the foundation for all of the arguments that follow. Boisvert paints a picture of the cumshot principal and the hunter/prey dynamic as the string that ties the greater mistreatment of women’s sexuality together.

From here, Boisvert jumps into a critical examination of why young women are prizes the way they are, Cougar culture, and whether those arguments that these preferences are all based in biology hold any water. The author continues her forward charge as she takes on the idea that a woman/girl must be pure and that a sexually promiscuous woman is immoral. Boisvert even examines why other women contribute to slut-shaming, including policing the bodies of girls and women.

We’re halfway through the book, now, and Boisvert isn’t nearly finished. She moves from policing of bodies to the way that the sexes are segregated, starting with clothing and moving on the cosmetics, hair, and body hair. It’s here that she swings at feminity, itself a prison that keeps women objectified.

From there, the author deconstructs the very reasons why women, as a whole, cannot objectify men, as a whole. She argues that men are subjectified while women are objectified and examines the way this unfolds every day. Of course, Boisvert comments on how porn upholds these views.

Perhaps the most contentious claim that Boisvert makes comes in the next chapter, where she explains that women who engage in casual sex are not playing on an even playing field because of the way that women have been socialized to seek love and men sex, and everyone is taught that the other team is only out for their single-minded goal. Yet I do not disagree with the author’s reasoning; it’s absolutely true that we are taught these things. Yet, Boisvert breaks down how this is not actually the case, using science to back up her argument. But even when that isn’t the case, Boisvert continues, these lessons color our sexual interactions and often result in women getting less out of sex than men.

Boisvert is no more fired up than she is in the final chapter, perhaps her coup de grace. What might be the ultimate result of this uneven playing field? That’s right, the orgasm gap. The author rails against the continued prioritization of men’s pleasure over women’s and penis-centric sex, which can make many women wonder what’s wrong with them when they do not orgasm easily (or at all) from vaginal penetration. She takes umbrage with Freud’s persistent teachings that clitoral orgasms are lesser than vaginal ones, which has, perhaps, lead to an over-emphasis on finding and stimulating the G-spot. In this final chapter, Boisvert gives a brief anatomy lesson that so many people dearly need before neatly wrapping up the book with a reminder that advice for women to explore their bodies may be misguided until we deal with sexism in sexuality (and life) on a large scale.

I did not intend to summarize Screwed as I did, but the structure is thoughtful, and the argument only picks up more speed and becomes fiery as the book presses on. While the book isn’t especially long, Boisvert manages to be articulate and pragmatic about complex topics in a way that’s accessible without being too daunting or minimizing. It is a book I wound encourage my teenaged sister to read as she considers becoming sexually active and one that I would recommend to any feminists, not to mention a primer on why so many women find sex to be bad or, at the very least, disappointing.

There are very few things that I didn’t love about Screwed; one of them is the tagline. Women don’t fail at sex; society fails women when it comes to sex. and I think “How society fails women when it comes to sex” is just as pithy and perhaps less open to misinterpretation than the tagline we actually got. However, this is really a small thing to pick at when considering the book overall.

Secondly, I was a bit surprised that Boisvert didn’t take on the issue of spontaneous versus responsive desire more thoroughly. She could have if she wanted to. As it stands, she mentions it but perhaps not to the extent that would impress upon the reader how much it impacts sexual frustation between men and women. Perhaps this would treat too far into the territory of telling women what to do individually, rather than criticizing how society views sex. Unfortunately, Screwed doesn’t include a list of resources or recommended reads, but it wouldn’t hurt if it did.

Still, what Boisvert says in these pages remains valuable, and for many people, the book could open their eyes to these issues and start them on their journey to doing better, learning more, and having better sex, even if the intent of the book is to illustrate the way that women are collectively failed when it comes to sex.

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Categories: Books, Reviews

Science of Sex: Sex Chromosomes Aren’t Binary

December 1st, 2019

Sex Chromosomes Aren't Binary

More than once, people have suggested that I cover biological sex in the Science of Sex feature. I have shied away from it because it seemed controversial. However, the more I know, the more I understand that some science isn’t at all controversial. In fact, understanding it can lend to our understanding of sex and gender and why it’s never been black-and-white.

One of the transphobic arguments often made is that two pairs of chromosomes determine if a person has the biological sex of a male or female: XY and XX, respectively.  Each cell contains each of these chromosomes, which each come from one of our parents. Most of us learned this in a science class, and many of us haven’t learned anything more since then.

However, there are actually more than two chromosomal possibilities, including

  • XX
  • XY
  • X
  • XXY and XXXY
  • XXX, XXXX, XXXXX
  • XYY
  • XX with translocation (XX male)
  • XY with deletion (Swyer syndrome)

With this in mind, sex seems much more of a spectrum than a binary.

Some of these variations have their own names. For example, a single X chromosome is Turner Syndrome, which is accompanied by several abnormal growth patterns. On the other hand, having three or more X chromosomes is labeled Triple-X syndrome or trisomy X, and these people have the nickname “super-female”. A “super-male,” on the other hand,  has an extra Y chromosome and will tend to be quite tall with extra testosterone. A person with Triple-X syndrome may be slightly taller and thinner than the typical XX woman, but may not be noticeably different. An assumed male who inherits an extra X chromosome or two has Klinefelter syndrome and may have stereotypically female traits and be unable to reproduce.

The latter two examples represent instances in which person’s sexual organs do not align with their karyotype. For example, a person may have the “male” sex chromosomes with female reproductive organs, which are typically not functional. This is known as Swyer syndrome/XY gonadal dysgenesis. These people are usually raised and treated as women while the counterpart is an XX “male,” who is viewed by the world as a boy. Those with this syndrome may not have a detectable SRY gene, which is responsible for an embryo turning male.

Discrepancies between chromosomes and genitals is sometimes known as being “intersex.” This term can also refer more broadly to anyone whose sexual anatomy doesn’t align with the binary (male or female) or whose internal and external genitals do not match. In the past, this has been confused hermaphroditism; however, many prefer the term “intersex” as a less offensive alternative. The World Health Organization explains how true hermaphroditism occurs when a person has mature testicle and ovary tissues. The term “intersex” is not accepted by everyone, however, because of the implication that something is wrong with someone who has these chromosomal differences.

Surgical interventions can be used on young children to “correct” these things, and those children may never realize that they do not conform to the binary. However, these surgeries. which are intended to allow a person to live normally and prevent or reduce psychosocial outcomes may not work as intended. Many surgeries were performed to feminize an intersex person, but this can affect adult sexual function. Furthermore, people may continue to develop with more typical male patterns.

And sometimes that discrepancy can exist but a person with XX chromosomes can have functional sperm while a person with XY chromosomes may have functional ovaries. So it’s possible for a person not to realize that there is a discrepancy if their sex organs are functional — to be “invisibly” intersex. While current estimates vary — some put the intersex population at about 1 out of 100 people in the US and others at 1 in 2000 — the real number could be higher because of these people.

The final nail in the coffin about chromosomes defining sex and, by association, gender, as binary might be the fact that it doesn’t take into consideration at all the role of hormones, which may not respond as expected, either. A person with XY chromosomes who has androgen sensitivity syndrome will develop female-typical sex organs because their body doesn’t respond to androgens, for instance.

There are cases of female-typical bodies and chromosomes responding in male-typical ways in limited situations. And people with similar chromosomes or bodies can still respond uniquely to different hormones and systems. Understanding these very specific differences has revealed the myriad ways that the sex binary fails us and the important things we must note to provide adequate medical care.

This messiness indicates why viewing male and female as the only two sex options is limiting and confusing. While simplifying these ideas has been helpful in some instances, it has been harmful in others. It’s not scientifically sound and can lead to social stigma for those people who do not fit within the binary.

This is all pretty basic stuff that has been researched, even if the general public hasn’t learned about it. When contrasted with gender identities, which have been conflated with sex and similarly viewed as binary, we see that there should be a lot more room for expression. It may very well be that there is overlap with people whose biology falls more toward the middle and those who identify as nonbinary or transgender (at least one study finds that the brains of trans kids match their gender identity). But these things aren’t mutually inclusive.

Further Reading

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Categories: Science of Sex

April 2019 Media Recommendations

April 26th, 2019

April is almost over, so I better get this posted. This month’s list of recommendations is longer than I realized. Each month, I listen to podcasts, watch videos and read a bit. If something is especially poignant, I might think that I should jot that down somewhere to recommend to you all, but I often forget. As I went through my history, I realized how much good stuff I enjoyed in April. I hope you enjoy some of it, too!

Listen

Feminist podcast The Waves discussed the current state of sex education in the U.S and whether schools is where people should get all their sex ed.

I think I’ve listened to Speaking of Sex before, but I recently came across it again and quickly consumed three or four episodes. They’re in the middle of a series about stress and sex that include an episode with Emily Nagoski, author of Come As You Are, who has a new book about burning out.

In the most recent episode of Science Vs, Wendy discusses whether the fertility cliff for women is real, if men might experience one as well, and what in the world is happening with sperm.

I wouldn’t have started listening to Outward if it wasn’t broadcast on The Waves channel, but I find that I enjoy it. In a recent episode about the gay scene, the hosts discuss how the scene looks different in various locales. While that was interesting, I especially enjoyed the segment with Shirley Chan about bi culture — what is it, does it exist, and how does it look? Examining bi culture and identities also hits home for me. It’s been difficult for me to identify with the larger queer community when parts of hetero culture still apply to me. Plus, they discuss democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg and whether his being gay should matter to votes when it doesn’t seem to matter to him. 

Watch

It seems as though queer issues and sexuality are gaining more traction in mainstream media, so some of my recommendations this month fall under that purview.

Netflix has a new series called Bonding about a couple of friends who work in a BDSM dungeon. I’m only a few episodes in, and it’s a bit silly but enjoyable.

I’ve thoroughly enjoyed Good Girls (NBC) since it debuted. Christina Hendricks and Retta nail it. In a recent episode, one of the characters has come out as trans.

While The Bold Type is sometimes white feminism at its worst, the newest season shows Jane taking charge of her reproductive future by freezing her eggs. She’s currently dating someone, and the show has handled it well. It’s compassionate, real, and touching.

Two therapists discuss consent in BDSM in this short video. Somehow they manage to address what people can learn about how the kink community handles consent, knowing yourself before you can ask what you want, and more in just a few minutes!

Read

I haven’t started a new book about sex since I finished Tongue Tied (check out my review). Still, I enjoyed a few pieces online and parts of other books that touched on sex.

I’ve been reading Human Errors by Nathaniel Lents. The author walks readers through all the quirks of the human body as a result of evolution and sometimes random flukes. Although it’s not all about sex, a chapter that discusses the intricacies of reproduction and fertility are fascinating and timely for this post.

Editor, writer and more Rachel Kramer Bussel wrote a piece called “I Suddenly Stopped Being Kinky and I’m Not Sure Why” for Self last month. It was honest and interesting. This piece complements her interview on Sex Out Loud quite well. In the podcast, Rachel and Tristan discuss when kink is something we do versus who we are.

Let me know what you think of this media. Do you have some recommendations of your own? I feel like there’s a lot of new shows and movies that are queer-oriented that I hear about but then forget. Feel free to let me know if you’ve got a favorite.

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Categories: media recommendations

Tongue Tied: Untangling Communication in Sex, Kink, and Relationships

March 9th, 2019

Tongue Tied: Untangling Communication in Sex, Kink, and Relationships
$10 Kindle/%15 physical from Amazon

I wasn’t intending to read Tongue Tied initially. I was previously unfamiliar with Stella Harris (who I now know is an experienced sex educator and coach as well as an erotica writer) and, perhaps more importantly, felt pretty familiar with communicating about sex. I’ve frequently read about the topic. I’ve argued that we need to talk more about sex and do it in a healthy way that isn’t inherently sex-negative. Hell, I’ve written about talking about sex and provided instructions for readers to do so. Tongue Tied, therefore, seemed a bit old hat.

But I heard Stella on American Sex, and she made a few points that resonated with me enough to change my mind. Soon after, I had a digital copy of the book, and it wasn’t much longer after that I had finished it. Unlike, say, BDSM: A Guide for Explorers of Extreme Eroticism, Tongue Tied isn’t a huge book, and it’s a pretty easy read. Of course, you can pick and choose what you read in Tongue Tied to save a little time and effort, but reading the whole thing gives you a better impression of not just how to communicate but what you need to do so.

Right from the introduction, Ms. Harris draws on her experience as a sex coach, explaining that her most frequently received questions about sex involved communication, even if the people asking those questions were unaware of that fact. A quick look at r/sex on Reddit shows that most people need to talk to their partners to resolve issues in the bedroom, so many people realize this. When our mouths are closed shut about sex, people learn the wrong — and sometimes dangerous — things from less-than-reputable sources. We need to talk about sex. However, like most things, it’s easier said than done.

Initially, I didn’t expect a book on communicating about sex to cover so much non-communication issues. But it’s true that one of the main inhibitors of talking about sex is the way people think about sex. From the very start, the author proposes that every person is responsible for themselves and the way they behave in relationships. She dedicates the entire first chapter to the goal of sexual communication (healthy relationships with boundaries and goals regardless of the specific arrangement of those relationships). In this chapter she addresses how it’s easier to talk about sex when you make a habit of it from the getgo but also how sometimes these discussions are uncomfortable, and that’s okay.

From here, she follows a chapter detailing the common mistakes when communication. Knowing what not to do when talking about sex is as important as knowing what to do. Ms. Harris writes about common mistakes include being selfish, not speaking up about what you want, assuming there’s such a thing as normal, and others. She also advises the reader to check their cultural biases and not to make assumptions or to lie about pleasure and orgasm (ie faking it).

The third chapter reveals how differently we can each define things as common as “sex”. This encourages clarity, specificity and positivity. The chapter ends with a quick anatomy lesson.

If you’re familiar with all these ideas, you might skip ahead to the next chapter, wherein Ms. Harris gets to the specifics of talking about sex, starting with when to do have conversations. I especially appreciated how she guides the reader through talking to friends as a form of support and when people should reach out for professional help to deal with their relationship and sex issues.

Readers who are struggling to define what they want would benefit from the chapter six in which Stella encourages readers to examine their future “perfect” sex lives and presents them with tools such as a Yes/No/Maybe list and a “Sensation Exercise.” It’s not the first time when she suggests tools that originated within the kink community for discussion “vanilla” sex nor the last. Throughout her book, Ms. Harris encourages explicit and practical communication in these ways.

The goal of these exercises is to encourage readers to explore their sexuality and find scenes that represent their desires and interests. This is the last chapter that focuses on setting the foundation for talking about sex.

The chapter that follows is one that provides examples of what to say to your sexual partners. Chapter 6 is where you’ll want to start if you have a good foundation for talking about sex but you just need to know what to say.

There’s some typical advice such as using “I” statements, and Stella suggests questions and exercises that reminded me a bit of sensate focus. The goal, at least, is the same: to learn more about your partner’s body and reactions. She stresses remaining positive, listening without judgment, and the word “No.” There are plenty of examples of exactly what to say that will benefit readers who just aren’t sure what words to use. Chapter 6 is the meat and potatoes of the book and perhaps the longest as well.

In the vein of sensate focus or practicing using a safe word, the next chapter details exercises to get readers used to communicating about sex including giving feedback, asking questions, and communicating without words. No book about communication would be complete without information about body language and nonverbal communication, so I was glad to see it included.

There are types of people who I would imagine find these activities silly, the type whom I suspect need more than a single book to fine tune their attitudes about sex, relationships, and communication. If readers don’t already agree with much of the author’s point of view, they’ll struggle to get much out of the book, I think. Arguably, most people reading a book about talking about sex are at least open to new points of view, but some people will struggle to learn from this book.

Others may find the exercises fun or sexy. But they’re useful if you go into them willing to experience and learn. I imagine readers might use these tools with new partners or over the long run to improve communication and understanding of themselves. Among the tools suggested are methods of tracking arousal, which is especially important to women, and using sex toys with partners. I’m so glad to see that included in these pages.

Incorporated into the book is a (short) chapter on talking about safer sex specifically, an important topic and one that may happen in the confines of a casual encounter with a stranger versus a longterm partner.

I appreciate that Ms. Harris walks us through apologizing and accepting an apology as part of her next chapter about difficult discussions, which also tackled fighting, mismatched desire, admitting a lie, and breaking up.

Chapter 11 had the potential to be one of the most useful in the book. The author lists examples of phrases to use in particular scenarios. However, she goes from examples to anecdotes involving past clients. From here, it seems that Stella becomes much less specific, illustrating fewer examples of how to speak about specific issues. This is especially noticeable when she talks about kink in the next chapter, and the section seems brusque. It’s not that phrases exemplified previously in the book can’t be used for these things. I just think a book that walks you through talking about sex benefits from specificity. Sometimes people know they need to talk about sex have all the right attitudes and goals but don’t know exactly what to say.

Communicating in a healthy manner can feel awkward and stilted to a person who hasn’t done a lot of explicit communication. The more examples, the better. Yet examples seemed sparse the further I got into Tongue Tied. It may not have been as noticeable if the author hadn’t done such a good job providing them in other parts of the book. But it was frustrating as I read on.

I am not sure if Ms. Harris was rushing to complete, felt that expanding on certain topics was too niche or would make the book too long, thought that specific examples weren’t necessary, or had another reason for her change. Unfortunately, this seeming lapse meant the end of the book was a bit of a letdown for me, and that the information on kink isn’t presented as usefully as information from previous chapters, especially chapter six. the final chapter — one self-care — made little impression on me because of my frustration.

This doesn’t mean there isn’t useful information in Tongue Tied, just that it didn’t quite reach its potential. This could be remedied in following editions or, less ideally, perhaps with a sort of companion workbook. But it’s a shame because Stella Harris writes in an approachable way, the book is easy to digest, and the topic is so important.

On a final note, Tongue Tied is gender neutral, a point that Ms. Stella makes on purpose and addresses early on. This should make it welcome to people regardless of the gender configuration of their sexual relationships.

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Categories: Books, Reviews

December 2018 Media Recommendations

December 29th, 2018

By the time you see this, most of the December holidays will have passed. I hope that you enjoyed them, along with time with your loved ones. At the very least, I hope people have time free time, which you could perhaps use to enjoy some of the recommendations below.

Watch

  • I came across Gurit E. Birnbaum’s recent TED Talk because she posted a transcript on Psychology Today. In her video, she discusses the myriad reasons humans recognize for having sex that go well beyond procreation.
  • “A dummy’s guide to how the world regulates sex work in three minutes” is exactly what the title suggests. It’s not a deep dive, but it might encourage you to look into how sex workers operate in some locations.
  • I’ve been rewatching The L Word. I suspect many of my readers have enjoyed this, but it’s interesting to watch it in 2018 and with a more critical eye to see some of the negatives in the show. I don’t recall hating Jenny nearly this much the first time around, but I also don’t think I finished the series. So many events seem to be occurring for the first time for me.
  • Also, while non-related, Travelers (Netflix) and Marvel’s Runaways (Hulu) have returned with new seasons, and I’ve been enjoying both of them a lot.

Listen

This was such a great month for podcasts. I’ve been trying to branch out from the ones that I listen to the most and, as such, tend to frequently recommend. There have been more misses than hits, but the strong episodes really stuck with me.

  • This first recommendation isn’t a new release, but it’s definitely worth listening to (and there’s also a full transcript if you prefer to read). This American Life’s episode on the 81 words about homosexuality in the DSM, the book that defines mental disorders, tell how being gay went from being pathologized to generally being accepted after the entry was finally edited. There’s some information about the gay professionals who helped make this happen that I especially appreciated.
  • I started listening to Let’s Do It with Alex and Liz just this week. I’ve only listened to two episodes, but the very first one I had a chance to listen to blew me away. The hosts invited Teddy Cook, a health promotion specialist who attended the AIDS2018 conference in Amsterdam this year and reported on the latest research into HIV and AIDS. There’s been good news, some of which I’ve shared on social media; although, there are some frustrating trends.
  • This week, Science VS looked into the “science of being transgender.” Like many of us already know, it’s complicated. This episode explains some of the basics as well as the more complex interplay between hormones, our brains, genitals, and gender identity in an easy-to-digest format. The results might frustrate some transphobes but, hey, it’s science.
  • Another new podcast that I checked out is Two Married Sluts. Hosts Tristan and Bowie recently discussed taking a break from polyamory in the interest of self-care. I suspect some of my readers will find this useful. Even if you’re not poly, the advice rings true for other situations and types of relationships. It also ends with some sexy recaps.

I’ve been focusing on finishing up book’s I’d previously started as well as catching up on those for review, so there are no new reading recommendations this month. However, I’ll soon be starting some new reading material, so you can expect some next month.. if they’re any good.

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Categories: media recommendations

November 2018 Media Recommendations

November 28th, 2018

The last month has really flown by. I feel like I was just writing last month’s media recommendations. Yet, I’m unsure exactly what I’ve done since then. It hasn’t been writing reviews.

Nor did I watch anything to include in this month’s recommendations. I’ve been reading — but no books I haven’t already mentioned. I did listen to some fantastic podcasts this month, however.

I’ll hopefully return next month with a few more book recommendations and the list won’t be quite so short. This also means a couple of upcoming book reviews!

In the meantime, I put out a call on Twitter for more podcast recommendations. I’m familiar with about a dozen, several of which I regularly listen to, but I’d love to know what my readers are listening to and why they think I might enjoy it.

 

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Categories: media recommendations

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