What Spam Says About Society’s Problems with Sexuality

November 12th, 2023

I’ve received a few scammy spam messages identical to the one above this week. It’s not the first time I’ve opened my inbox to such messages, and I’m sure it won’t be the last, either. In fact, I almost missed it because Thunderbird correctly marked it as spam.

What you cannot see is that the sender appears to be me. To the average person, this might lend credence to the threat. Previous versions have included real passwords that became exposed rather than claiming to use some “Remote Administration Tool” malware to record the user and it has not always appeared to come from my email account, but the sentiment remains the same.

Some people know it as a Sextortion Email Scam, although many victims would likely not know if this is a common type of scam or what it’s called. Ignoring the fact that people may fall for the messages because they do not understand how easily scammers can spoof any email address, including their own, and how their efforts become untraceable by using Bitcoin, I find these scam messages to be an interesting lens through which we can understand society.

The scammers make several assumptions about their victims:

  • They have masturbated
  • Kinkily
  • While at their computers
  • Which have working cameras
  • That are connected to the Internet

Several of these assumptions are likely to be true. After all, many people masturbate, and most devices have integrated cameras.

Perhaps most interesting is the assumption that anyone would pay to prevent their loved ones from accessing evidence of their sexuality, so much so that their worry would prevent them from checking whether the message is a scam. I am sure this is occasionally true. I’ve received similar messages for years, and scammers only need to trick one unsuspecting recipient for their effort to pay off.

Yet I cannot help but think about how the threat wouldn’t be effective if we did not live in a culture that shames and censors sexuality. If we recognized our inherent sexual natures in all their variety, messages like this would have little power. Sure, it might be uncomfortable if someone in our address books saw us in a sexually precarious position, just like it can be awkward to walk in on our parents having sex, but it shouldn’t be the end-of-the-world scenario as this spam suggests.

Greater than 99% of all people exist because someone else had sex, and we all recognize that sex can be pleasurable. The time and effort people spend pretending otherwise isn’t just unnecessary, it’s entirely misguided. And the attempts to deny others their sexuality is harmful in more ways than one. From slut shaming to barring comprehensive and inclusive sex education, we live in a world where sex doesn’t get the respect it deserves.

So, it’s no surprise that spammers might use sexuality as an angle to scam people out of money. But it is incredibly frustrating that sexuality is still so powerfully attached to shame in 2023.

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Categories: Articles, internet

Media Recommendations September 2019

September 28th, 2019

Whether you like to listen, read, or watch content that discusses sexuality in humans (and occasionally other creatures), you’ve come to the right place! I gave myself an extra day to write this, which meant I could add three stellar podcast episodes to my media recommendations. I realized that September is almost over I recently learned as I typed “August” into the title field, checked my calendar, and remembered I was off by a whole month. Welp!

Listen

NPR’s Hidden Brain tackles the intersection of sex and tech that will eventually usher in sex robots and has given hookup culture a facelift via apps such as Tinder and how that affects intimacy. If you don’t want to listen, you can read the accompanying article.

In his podcast, Dr. Lehmiller interviews author and psychologist Dr. Ari Tuckman who recently wrote the book about ADHD and relationships, including how it can affect sexual relationships.

I started listened to Peepshow Podcast last month. As I was scrolling for episodes that seemed particularly interesting, this one featuring Nicoletta and Simone from Sluts and Scholars, which I have previously recommended. The pair discuss starting their podcast and balancing their day jobs with communicating about sex in a world where that’s still a boundary-breaking thing to do despite the fact that’s the very stigma they’ve set about to break. Simone also talks about becoming an abortion doula

The first of two Slate podcasts I’ll recommend this month is is their queer podcast Outward, which recently tackled the issue of what makes us gay after the recently-released study about how much our genetics influence sexual orientation. This episode really got me thinking about what it means to be gay, including the importance of community. It made me think about my own sexuality and my struggle to be part of a community.

Finally, Slate’s feminist podcast The Waves discussed a chapter of journalist and podcaster Malcolm Gladwell’s recently-published book, How to Talk to Strangers. It was a book I thought would be interesting but now am not so sure about. The chapter looks at sexual assault and drinking in the great context of knowing whether a person is being duplicitous, but Gladwell’s privilege shines through when he makes the case that no one can ever know the truth. The hosts of The Waves point out how weak this argument, which shames victims, truly is.

Read

I haven’t managed to get very far in Screwed: How Women Are Set Up to Fail at Sex, but I’ve enjoyed almost every word that I’ve read thus far. Lili Boisvert challenges gender roles, sexual scripts, slut-shaming, and more in on cohesive argument about how society has done women dirty when it comes to sex.

Watch

In this short snippet from the BBC, a gentleman discusses the abuse he receives because of his HIV+ status.

I somehow managed to miss this older TED talk, which delves into why humans are among the few species that menstruate.

I was thoroughly impressed with the Sex Ed School series by Shaftesbury Kids. The eight episodes in the first season follow Eva and Nadine as they provide real, age-appropriate, and fact-based sex ed to kids on topics such as anatomy, consent, orientation, and more. They even use dolls and toys to teach students in a way that would neeevvver be allowed in any but the most progressive schools, American or otherwise. It makes me a bit sad for the state of sex ed, but this is really how it could look.

Hopefully, I’ll have a chance to read a bit more next month, but I think this post really covers it.

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Categories: media recommendations

Turned On: Science, Sex and Robots

August 13th, 2019

 

Turned On: Science, Sex and Robots
$9.99 (Kindle) from Amazon

Writing about science, sex, and robots is a daunting task, but one that Dr. Kate Devlin, computer scientist and AI expert, proves she is up to in Turned On. Almost immediately, I found Turned On to be a delight, mostly because Kate Devlin is funny and uses her humor in this book. However, that specific brand of British humor that I became accustomed to when reading authors such as Douglas Adams is also present in this book, which made it all the more entertaining for me.

Rest assured that while Turned On is entertaining, it’s also incredibly educational. Whether Devlin is writing us about the current state of sex dolls and robots (hint: less advanced than some people would have us believe or fear) or examining the implications of sex dolls that might look like minors, Kate Devin did her homework. Devlin’s research took her around the world, and she brings the reader with her to attend English conferences, speak with sex doll connoisseurs in Michigan, meet the manufacturers in California, and more. In this way, the reader gets an overall picture that sex tech is truly a worldwide affair.

Before diving into where we are right now, Kate Devlin writes about the history of sex toys and erotic representations and breaks down the myth that vibrator was created to cure hysteria in women. Rather, its use as a sexual device was known but not discussed. This wasn’t news to me and wouldn’t be anyone who is familiar with the history of sex toys, but the myth is pervasive. I’ve read it in more than one book. Devlin doesn’t settle for pervasive myths, however.

Even if you are intimately familiar with sex toys and their sex toys, you may not really know the current state sex robots or what is on the horizon for teledildonics. This is where Devlin’s research sheds new light on the subject. She goes back to basics when she defines robots and discusses the reality and implication of them. In many ways, robots have improved our lives, and the reader gets the feeling that Kate Devlin thinks they can improve our sex lives as well. As she dives into computers and how machines can learn to think, and the relationship between man and machine, she illustrates the finer details and outlines the broad context that helps the reader understand the significance of sex robots.

While this book is ostensibly about science sex and robots, you can’t help it feel like it’s actually about what it means to be human and to interact with other people. I think that’s the crux of the sex robot debate. When Devlin delves into the more recent history of sex dolls and those who purchase them, she doesn’t fall into the trap of picking fun at the people who choose to use them. She approaches the subject with a kind of necessary sensitivity. Yes, these people are mostly men, but they’re still human, after all, even if their companions are robots.

Turned On isn’t the only book I’ve read recently that tackles how technological changes will affect us. However, it’s the only one that’s thought to broach the topic of sex let alone sex robots.  Devlin gives the subject its due respect. It’s not something that everyone can do well or would even be willing to do, yet Devlin does. Judging from the public’s obsession with sex robots, it’s difficult to understand why so many academics ignore the subject. Kate writes about how the 2016 Love and Sex with Robots conference she attended was moved twice before finding a home at Goldsmiths, University of London.

The questions that she attempts to answer and even those that she admits cannot be answered at this point in time are those that anyone who has given any thought to sex robots has entertained at one point or another:

Just what is sex, and is sex with a robot masturbation? Can sex robots mitigate violence, especially sexual violence, against humans or will it worsen objectification of women? If robots become sentient, will we need to protect them from violent offenders (the author busts the incorrectly reported myth that robot “Samantha” was “molested” at one con) or protect ourselves? How will sex robots affect sex work? What are the legal implications of sex robots or someone else using your likeness to create one? Will people want to marry robots and, if so, what will that mean? Is sex with a robot still sex? Do robot opponents have a point when they say that sex robots only contribute to further objectification of women? Will we see sex robot brothels like the doll brothels that already exist in Japan and Europe?

In Turned On, Devlin spends some time examining why sex robots so often look and sound like women (at least one misunderstood study has been cited by those who choose to use female sounding voices) and the implications of this. Again, she pulls back the curtain to reveal how the state of robots is a commentary on the state of humanity.

Fembots are designed to play to cultural stereotypes, generally taking an eroticized form: shapely, sexy and obedient. There’s an essence of the Femme Fatale about some of them – the perfect woman, but without an underlying potential for danger.

The author’s background in technology is never more apparent than when she considers the privacy risks that sex robots present. She points to the vulnerabilities of one of We-Vibe’s smart toys that were revealed by hackers in 2016 who were able to access information collected from toys. There are so many implications of sex robotics, and Devlin leaves out none.

Perhaps the most important question of all and the one that Devlin ends the book with is where we go from here. After reading Turned On, I found myself curious and hopeful but also with a side of trepidation. Like any technological breakthrough, sex robots have the potential to change the world. But if humanity misuses that power, those changes could be awful instead of awesome. Kate makes a plea at the end of her book for designers to think abstract and fantastic — outside of the box — when creating sex robots. She implores the world to focus on how a robot can give pleasure and why they don’t have to imitate women to do so. It might surprise some that Devlin believes the current fembot style robots will remain a niche market and that true innovation can go much further when those limitations are lifted.

And those changes are happening. In fact, Kate added an epilogue after she wrote the initial bulk of the book about how technology had already changed so much. Turned On may not be accurate for long if changes keep occurring at this pace. Yet it’s still a good resource for anyone who wants to know how we got to where we are. Kate Devlin makes you laugh along the way, which helps balance any worries you may have about sex robots and the influence of technology on our sex lives. Her writing similarly balances education and entertainment, and I’m glad to recommend Turned On to anyone who has an interest in the subject.

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Categories: Books

Why I Don’t Tell People I’m a Sex Educator (Even Though I Should)

November 16th, 2018

It’s only been this year that I have come around to calling myself a sex educator. I am late in the game compared to some of my fellow bloggers and authors, perhaps because I failed to see how this hobby could become a legitimate career for anyone. Before this, I would describe myself as a freelance writer who often, but not always, wrote about sex. While this isn’t wrong, it’s not the complete picture. I compartmentalized the work I am paid for and the words I write on this blog, despite much of it being about sex and despite that some of my working relationships originated because of this blog.

It’s 2018, I have been writing about sex, toys, and relationships in this blog for over a decade, and I have finally accepted myself as a sex educator. Yet, I am still hesitant to be upfront about what I do for work.

When people ask about my job as a writer, I usually gloss over the specifics. The reasons are twofold and while explaining how copywriting on the Internet works and reassuring people that, yes, you can get paid for that, the bigger hangup I have is that I so often write about sex. It’s not my own shame that prevents me from answering honestly; although, others sometimes respond in that manner, which I’ll touch on later.

No, it’s the response, almost always from straight men. It’s the assumption that any mention of sex, no matter how intellectual or removed from my own preferences, is viewed by these people as an invitation to pry into my personal sex life. Specifically, these men want to know if my interest in writing about sex, which must be spurred by a personal interest in sex, will lead me to sleep with them.

Then comes the question. To be fair, it’s not exactly one question. It’s simply the type of question that follows what was previously a non-sexual discussion. The question often pries into whether it’s my sexual interest that inspired me to write about sex. Of course, this is the case for me and plenty of other sex educators. I know this. You, my readers, know this. But that’s not the point.  People will take any mention of sex as an invitation to ask invasive questions or as a segue to discussing sex with them.

Let me make it clear: just because I talk about sex for my job doesn’t mean I want to talk about my personal sex life with you.

Sex coach and erotica writer Stella Harris discussed this briefly in an episode of American Sex about sexual communication. Stella, like myself, is a sex educator. Ms. Harris mentioned how disheartening it can be when these discussions happen because people may be so starved of any opportunity to discuss sex or because they “conflate the job with the person,” losing the decorum people usually abide by. I immediately knew what Ms. Harris meant when she said this about interactions with female-presenting people who are sex educators:

gives them license to be overly intimate right away

Although I would never classify myself as highly as someone who is certified as a sex coach, I have come to realize how valuable it is for as many people as possible to discuss sex in a positive and healthy way. In doing so, I have “invited” some of the same unwanted attention that Stella Harris discussed. And it’s not fun.

I write about sex and may be willing to talk about sex intellectually and hypothetically with you, but I don’t want to talk about my own sex life or my preferences. This is not an invitation for a man to fish to see if I might be willing to sleep with him and, dear god, I certainly don’t want dick pics from anyone with whom I have not already established a sexual rapport.

I do not want my personal space, safety or comfort invaded in the way that men so often do when the subject comes up. Yet they continue to fail to see how inappropriate their questions are.

While I have thus far focused on my interactions with men, I’ve noticed a different trend in some people when I reveal what I do for a living. Instead of creeping on me, they respond with coquettish giggles or hushed whispers. I realize both of these responses are due to society not discussing sex often or positively enough, in part because I was once guilty of the same behavior. Sometimes people are so starved for discussions about sex that they act giddy because it’s oh-so-naughty to do so. But there’s a place for knowing winks among friends, and it’s usually not when I am in sex-educator mode.

There’s no doubt that sex is concomitantly on display and hidden away in American culture. Those people who want to talk to sex may resort to hushed tones because they have never been taught how. And others may respond with shame because they have been taught that sex is something we don’t speak about.

That ties into how men react when they find out that I’m a sex educator. No matter the response, it’s based in the way that sex is shrouded. The response I often receive when people learn that I am a sex educator devalue the work I do because society devalues sex.

People probably don’t mean it, but because they don’t see sex as something that should be talked about, let alone something that needs to be discussed, they respond with giggles or jump straight to intimacy that is unearned. It’s not their fault if they’ve never been taught anything else.

Truthfully, this makes educating people about sex all the more important because they don’t treat the subject with the respect it deserves. They haven’t realized how significant sex can be to a satisfying life let alone a relationship. They fail to understand that an inability to discuss sex with partners leads to orgasm inequality, breeding resentment, boredom, and potentially cheating. People have yet to learn the basics of anatomy, physiology, and psychology that play very real roles in the sex they have — or don’t have. And this dearth of knowledge leads to risky sexual decisions including those that sometimes lead to sex.

The fact that some people try to change the subject or hem and haw over my job as a sex educator and others try to force themselves into my sex life when they realize that I write about sex means I need to keep talking about it. I’ve read the comments and emails from readers whose sex lives have somehow improved after reading my work, and I know there are people who have yet to stumble upon the information that will transform them and their understanding of sex, even if the information is presented by someone else.

I’ve stated that we don’t talk about sex often or correctly enough so many times that it might as well be my mantra, but it’s sadly as true today as it was when I started this blog a decade ago, and the interactions that follow after I explain to people that I am a sex educator prove it. I will continue to use myself as an example and continue to educate about sex, even if it leaves me open to inappropriate comments because I know how valuable sex education is — always will be. 

If I, and others like me, keep talking about sex, we may eventually see a world where people make smarter decisions about sex and more fully experience their sexualities and, perhaps, when someone reveals to another person that they are a sex educator, their audience will respond with, “Wow! I respect what you do.”

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Categories: Articles

10 Years of Blogging About Sex in 5150 Words

July 16th, 2018

10 years. 10 years is a long time to stick with anything whether it be a relationship, a job or, yes, a blog. Indeed, 10 years is nearly a third of my life as a 32-year-old. That really puts things in perspective.

Another way to think about the last 10 years that I’ve spent on this blog is to break down the numbers. 10 years equals 1002 posts. 5239 comments, 1742 tags, 554,109 words (not counting the 5,000 some words in this post), and countless of posts that never made it live. Not to mention the products I’ve reviewed, companies I’ve worked with, and time spent on social media and replying to emails.

There has been tremendous change in the sex toy industry as well as the sex blogosphere over the last decade, too, and I didn’t think a post about the 10 years I’ve been blogging about sex toys would be complete without commenting on those changes.

Jump to a section:

How Sex Toys Have Changed Over The Last Decade

Talking about the changes in toys might be among the easiest topics to address in this post; although, it’s all too easy to forget that things haven’t always been this way. Perhaps one of the best changes was the move to body-safe materials such as silicone. When I first started using and reviewing sex toys, I used more than a few jelly monstrosities and, yes, even some Sil-A-Gel. Sometimes material was an enigma: it was impossible to tell what it was or how safe it was.

This is no longer the case, however. Now, silicone fills the dildo and vibrator market. Nonporous materials are everywhere. It seems to be more difficult to find cheap, unsafe materials than it is to buy something that won’t leach chemicals into your body or become deformed if it touches another toy. With an increase in availability comes a decrease in price. It’s not just the luxury brands producing these toys, and you don’t have to spend an arm and a leg to own something that’s not hazardous. Awesome.

Another wonderful change in this arena is the availability of information. While sex toys, lube, and gear is still not overseen by a big agency and companies can and do get away with lying about their products (there’s a reason nearly every toy reviewer has tried to set a dildo on fire, folks!), some have stepped up. They’ve increased transparency and directly communicated with bloggers and shoppers. The end result is greater knowledge about how silicone dildos are made, why and when they might react with silicone-based lubes (RIP my VixSkin Spur )=), what makes a glass sex toy unsafe, how wood is treated to become nonporous and what osmolality has to do with lube safety, among other topics. This, along with an increase in research into sexuality, has made it even possible for me to write my monthly (I know, I know: I am using that loosely) Science of Sex feature. We have more information than ever before.

Even if you’re not interested in the science side of things, sex toys have come a long way. The toys of yore, including rabbits with beads that always jammed and weirdly thrusting shafts (because sex toys had to mimic intercourse), seem almost laughable in comparison to today’s sex-tech: toys with remotes, pressure-responsive vibrators, sound-controlled toys, warming shafts, expanding toys, vibrators with cameras on them, oral sex simulators, toys that wave and rock, vibrators that rely on magnetic or induction charging, toys that bend and click into place, modular vibrators, wearable vibrators and dildos, and toys that work with your phone (some of which require firmware updates).

The list is long and, yet, I know that I am missing something.

Once upon a time, a toy with a dock and an internal battery was novel. Now, you have to hunt for battery-powered sex toys. Condoms are made with hexagonal shapes (that may actually be more prone to breakage).

Even when technology hasn’t changed, design has. Jimmyjane has recently produced a rideable sex toy that looks quite futuristic compared to the Sybian. Lelo has revamped numerous vibrators over the years, and Fun Factory is no stranger with more Boss vibrators that I can count (or hold) on one hand as well as a sophomore version of my favorite: the Laya Spot.

Where once only a handful of companies were producing toys that looked like works of art, we now have a multitude of sleek designs to choose from. Indeed, cheap toys may be designed well, or those gorgeous lines might lead us astray when they house inferior builds.

Of particular note are smart toys. You can control your vibrator with your phone, download new settings, and sync it. Of course, not everyone wants to do that. Epiphora has come out against using apps with her sex toys. I haven’t been quite as vehement but, you know what? I’m not a fan. Still, apps are handy for receiving feedback for kegel exercisers, a type of sex toy that has really changed leaps and bounds over the past decade. My first pair were tiny. painful beads made of plastic that hurt my PC muscles. I moved on to much larger balls, this time made of silicone and with an internal ball. I tried Lelo’s Luna Beads, which many people loved but left me lukewarm. Insert vibrating balls that were too uncomfortable and awkward for me to try twice. I eventually moved on to kGoal, which seemed the holy grail of smart kegel toys, only to find that it wasn’t built for my body. Did that stop me from trying yet another smart toy? No.

Not all of these changes are great. Some were ridiculous from the start (a tuxedo for your dick? C’mon!). A few ideas sounded promising but only succeeded to varying degrees (I liked Lelo’s Ora and thought the Ora 2 was even better, but it didn’t work for everyone. Same goes for JeJoue’s Ooh line with its modular motor). Some “new” ideas were simply rehashes of old failures, forgotten long enough that companies figured we might be willing to go through that hell again (I’m talking about We-Vibe Gala, which has already been shunned and removed from the market!). Sometimes we tried toys only to remember that less is more and, no, adding 3,000 settings to a vibrator does not guarantee orgasm.

For every Stronic that bloggers fell in love with, there was a much-hyped toy, often one created for a woman with absolutely no input from a woman or one that came after a boisterous crowdfunding campaign that advertised revolutionary tech and an amazingly-powerful motor, that barely made reviewers tingle let alone orgasm (although, as we all know, I try not to define satisfaction by the presence or number of orgasms).

Like the commas in my run-on sentence, new ideas, changes and sex tech keep coming. Some of it makes us come, too. It’s pretty rad when this happens.

And while some of these changes were pretty obviously on the horizon (smart toys that connect to your phone via Bluetooth, for example), I was astounded by the announcement or even the sheer speculation of many of them.

Overall, these changes are things about which I cannot complain. Although, I can bemoan and commiserate when my favorite toy is no longer made (and the sophomore effort falls short), when amazing companies go out of business before I can get my hands on their goodies (sometimes only to pop back up again.. and sometimes again) and when websites mysteriously disappear without a trade or an explanation.

With that, I am on to discussing the changes in sex toy stores.

Changes In Sex Toy Retailers Over the Last 10 Years

In some ways, sex toy stores have changed alongside toy makers. They both tend to be more transparent and accountable, which is something that bloggers like myself have demanded. Stores without reputations and with shady practices are no longer supported.

The notable exception I see is the number of Amazon vendors who have popped up, selling Chinese-made toys with no brand or with Amazon-only brands. You’ve probably seen them: they’re all over Amazon but no reputable seller carries them. They’re often direct knockoffs of familiar toys. Utimi is one brand that comes to mind. I more often receive contact from these makers than I do reputable sellers or manufacturers, and I almost always reject them. Some of these toys may very well work fine (and because it’s Amazon, many people have tried and like them), but it’s just so hard to know. Hell, even toys from brands that I know and have historically liked can miss the mark.

I’ve also not held my tongue about working with these people. There’s more than just a language barrier: they’re focusing on quick links and sales. In the past, vendors like these have been very pushy. They’ve wanted me to ignore FCC guidelines. It leaves a very sour taste in my mouth, and I’d rather avoid that.

I think that I was like many others when I first started. I wanted to get free toys. So I accepted a lot of shitty ones from even shittier companies. As I learned what I liked I became more selective, both in what I accepted and with whom I worked. This means I try fewer toys, preferring to focus on those that will actually work for me.

It also means that I work with very few companies. I still work with Good Vibes, Lovehoney, and SheVibe, and have made an effort to forge new alliances since I started this post. I’ve seen many, many PR people come and go. I’ve seen companies switched from in-house to external PR, purchase other brands (GoodVibes now owns Babeland), and change how they interact with bloggers. This is mostly due to how Google handles search engine optimization. Years ago, you could get a ton of people to use a link such as “sex toys” to your store and fly right to the top. And everyone did it. My old posts are full of those links words as well as others (vibrators, dildos, bondage gear, etc). In hindsight, it’s really awkward and lacks context. Sometimes the sheer number of links in posts was inundating.

This behavior is no longer lucrative, but neither is sending out product haphazardly. Many review programs have simply disappeared. Others have discontinued specific programs that didn’t work. I really enjoyed working with PinkCherry, sigh. But they discontinued their affiliate program for American bloggers (and perhaps others).

Looking back, it’s also no surprise that search engines would crack down on this sort of search engine manipulation (I also think this is why so many vendors have headed to Amazon, where they’ve got better visibility). Thus, no companies demand links like this anymore, and most seem to work only with affiliates and not just bloggers. As an affiliate of a few companies, I don’t personally mind. Affiliate links are a chance for me to make a commission as well as for the store to make a sale. However, I’ve had varying success with those links because I do not promote them as well as some. That sort of promotion is crucial to your success as a blogger/reviewer in 2018, not just in making money from your blog but in attracting and maintaining relationships with sites.

Because of this, I tend to work with companies that I’ve known quite a while. There aren’t as many new companies popping up and very few that I support. Unbound Babes is one that’s been on my radar and that I’ll give props to. Not only have I worked with them and joined their affiliate program, but they have awesome newsletters and are a company that I just feel good supporting.

This isn’t to say that I won’t sometimes reach out or accept an invite from a newer company. Last year, I tried a number of Satisfyer models, and Svakom, whom I worked with a while back, is still lesser-known. I’m just less likely to do so. But those invites seem fewer and further between, too, as reputable companies work with fewer bloggers and discontinue their review programs.

I am not alone when I say that I am no longer happy supporting shitty companies. Yes, I’m talking about EdenFantasys, which I haven’t visited in years. But I’m also talking about how Lilly will call out Lelo or Pipedream when necessary. It’s why Epiphora speaks out about her experiences with Don Wands and Liberator. I have been fortunate to not deal with a lot of bullshit directly, but ours it a community that supports its members and that sometimes takes shape of revoking support of companies that refuse to do right by bloggers and consumers at large.

Occasionally this results in calling out the wrongdoings of companies we do support. Sometimes they’re just faux pas. It’s often the case of not knowing better, and companies have shown that they want to do better. Betty’s Toy Box, for example, ditched their gendered toy categories to make their site more inclusive. SheVibe actually made a few tweaks to their affiliate program after I wrote about using it years ago. Vibrant canceled a sale that some people thought was misguided. That’s the sort of thing that keeps me recommending a store. The expectations have changed, standards have increased.

Unsurprisingly, some stores have worked with manufacturers to created their own branded toys, some of which are identical to the originals. This is something that I’ve seen for quite a while, but it does seem to be more common. Trusted stores are putting their name on toys they want you to trust, too.

I’ve alluded to how blogging has changed, and that’s where I’ll give in next. But before I do, I just wanted to mention how manufacturers play a role in this. I’ve seen a number of boutique toy makers come and go (and sometimes come again): Fucking Sculptures and Phallix are just a few now-defunct companies that I can name off the top of my head. As I go cull broken links, I inevitably wind up lamenting that a wonderful toy or company no longer exists, perhaps to recommend a less alternative.

For every Split Peaches or Funkit, I worry how long they’ll manage to be around or who they may be replacing. Jollies has come, gone, come back, gone, and returned again. Phew! It’s hard to make it in this business, and this is my segue to talk about blogging.

How Sex Blogging Has Changed Over the Last 10 Years

When I started, I only figured this was a hobby, as did most other bloggers/reviewers. We created and maintained our blogs, tried toys, posted reviews and took pictures. Over the last ten years, it became more common for people to pay for professional/custom themes or even to have someone else maintain their blog while they focused solely on the writing. There are bloggers who don’t know a lick of HTML, a far cry from the Internet I cut my teeth on.

While there were people on both Blogger and WordPress in the beginning, most people use WordPress, and they’re almost entirely self-hosted. This is due to how Blogger has treated adult sites and users, I’m sure. I was always a bigger fan of WordPress myself. I’ve seen commenters move through Intense Debate, Livefyre, and Disqus for comments. I’ve never enjoyed any third-party commenting apps, but they’re here to stay. Regardless, the number of comments seems to have dropped, even for the most infamous of bloggers.

And there are only so many of those original bloggers around. I’ve already mentioned Lilly and Epiphora. Myself, of course. But so many names have disappeared and faded. The same, too, goes for communities and roundups. Pleasurists, Sugasm. You name it. That’s not even counting hashtag trends. I’m surprised when I still see someone use #FollowFriday and confused when #SOSS turns up.

It’s interesting how some platforms haven’t changed. Twitter still reigns supreme; although, it will be interesting to see how long this remains true with their recent shadowbans of sex workers and educators. Facebook, in some ways, has become another venue to leave comments, perhaps some of the reasons why blog comment counts are so low.

Another change is that photography has become increasingly more important, much to my chagrin. Not only do I personally prefer text to photos when I read reviews (especially if the reviews are all visual and do nothing to explain how well a product works), but I am not an excellent photographer. I have been trying more, however. Sometimes it’s apparent. But as someone who posts many of their reviews in the middle of the night (and may only be awake during those hours), natural light is a limited resource. Many of my reviews lack an original image let alone multiple, and I suspect this hurts my site.

While I struggled, I watched others succeed — and did they! Blogs became news sources. Bloggers became voices to be heard, and they were educating and revealing issues in the world. They earned respect. Bloggers went on to write for serious publications. Journalists began sex blogging as another venue to educate and discuss important issues at hand. From sex bloggers, were learned about shady companies, unsafe products, dubious practices. Companies were forced to take notice and do better. Bloggers were forced to up their game to remain relevant.

But I never really expected that having this blog would become a competition. I had no idea that people would make a job of it, that this was even possible, that people would no longer be doing it all themselves (although, in terms of sex blogging, many of us still are) and would hire different people to fill every possible role on their blog. I’ve made money through affiliate links and ads, but it was always spending money. Chump change. There came a point when I realized that if I wanted to keep up, make money and stay relevant, I would need to make this my full-time job. But that’s never what I wanted. It’s grueling and tedious. But the more I treated this as a hobby, the more I seemed to fade into the background. I think this leads to my final point.

How I Have Changed After a Decade of Blogging

I had so much time for this blog when I first started. At one point, I maintained five or so. I wrote reviews frequently, hung out in reviewer chatrooms, and posted on multiple forums. If you recall, I was married when I first started this blog — and living overseas. Returning home meant I was able to receive more packages in a more timely manner. It also meant that my marriage would soon be over.

During that time, I started working again. I moved home. I spent more time with people in real life. I shared with them my knowledge of sex and toys. The liberal and feminist ideals that I was exposed to as a sex blogger bled into my real life in big ways, but it was a one-way flow. I fell out of touch with my friends on Twitter, the blogosphere. I became more of who I am in person but shrunk away in the sex blogosphere. I felt alienated when I did return. I didn’t know where or how to dig my way back in or what I wanted out of it anymore. In my absence, people popped up. Bloggers who I still think of unproven newbies have been around for four or five years. How did that happen?

I had no time for the Internet, and as much as I wanted to still be apart of it, it was so difficult. On top of that, it all felt so fake. I had better things to do, and I was doing them. Still, I couldn’t help but grieve my losses, and I think my tweets and posts fell under a shadow because of this. It’s not like I didn’t decide I would return to blogging with a renewed vigor or didn’t try to come up with new features. I just couldn’t make it stick. It was hard to break back in, and time-management has never been my strong suit. Although I’ve stuck with the Science of Sex for over a year now, I rarely post on the second Saturday of every month the way I want to.

It’s no help that I have rarely had a consistent sexual partner since my divorce, and romance? Ha! I occasionally have some dating foibles to write about or thoughts on the whole process, but I felt as though being single somehow made me less qualified to write this blog. And it certainly makes it harder to explore some interests, bondage being one, that might make for interesting reading.

I really struggled to add personal thoughts to this blog because of that. Something that was once so relevant to this blog, to my identity, no longer existed in my life. This isn’t to say that it won’t ever again, but it makes things so much more difficult. And it was certainly an adjustment personally. My life went off the tracks in a major way, and I had to reconcile where I thought it was going with where it actually went.

Even if that weren’t the case, writing about toys gets old after a while. It takes so much more to blow my mind. So many reviews landed square in the realm of “This works. Now, why am I doing it again?” You can tell. And the process of writing a review became so dull, that I fell far behind. I couldn’t force myself to keep up with my obligations.

Aside from this, I became disenchanted with even reading blogs. Epiphora’s is the only blog that I read at any sort of frequent interval. I could scarcely keep up with new bloggers who seemed to disappear just as soon as they popped up.

It was such a chore when I could be spending time with people and immersing myself in my newfound/re-invigorated nerdy interests and friends. Boy, do I wish I knew which words in that sentence were worthy of parenthesis! LOL! I no longer needed to connect with people, ideas or communities online when I had those things offline. In my real life. I didn’t need to vent here when I could do so to people face-to-face. But it is my so-called real life that has brought me round again.

In 2016, I reconnected with my love of science, and the Science of Sex feature only made sense a few months later. I gleefully read the papers and learned the facts so that I could provide it with my readers. I remembered how awesome it felt to actively seek more knowledge. More than one month passed where I only posted once, and it was for this feature. It became my goal to post once a month for a year, which I had. During that time, I found bloggers, authors, podcasters, and other educators to teach and inspire me. I proactively make time to listen and read, and I follow some of these sources on both of my social networks, sharing with both of them as well.

In some ways, I’ve changed so much from the person who I was when I first began this blog. In other ways, I struggle with how I’ve remained stagnant over the last few years. It would certainly be nice if I had more things happening in my personal life that were also relevant to this blog, namely: love and sex.

I’ve often tried — and failed — to express these thoughts. Where I wanted to be vulnerable, I fear I simply came across as negative, whiny, and defensive, pushing away the people with whom I wanted to connect. I wanted to express my feelings of confusion, loneliness, and disconnection. I wanted to talk to my readers and fellow bloggers about how lost I felt. But it was so difficultc, perhaps because I started this with a pseudonym and tried not to let the streams of my two personas cross. I shared only so much information with my readers. I compartmentalized anything that wasn’t directly related to love, sex, masturbation or kink.

I think what will eventually make the most sense is for me to stop blogging under a pseudonym, to combine my professional writer persona with this identity and put everything under one umbrella. I am not yet ready to do this, but I can imagine how it will be when I do. Then, I will be able to share with all of you all of me. I won’t have to compartmentalize. I’ll be able to talk about sex with everyone from my real life and mention all those nerdy things to my readers here. It sounds like a pretty good deal.

In the meantime, I think I’m in a better place now, and I’m finding balance in my life, including with this site once more. It may not stick. Everything is a cycle, is it not? But I can live with this for now, and perhaps I can make a habit that enables me to stay active and in touch with this part of the blogosphere and, in turn, this part of myself.

Oh, and I also use Oxford commas more often than not, now. Gross.

How Views of Sex Have Changed Over the Last Decade

Although I won’t dive into this as deeply as some other subjects, I did want to take a look at how the world has changed regarding sex. In general, it seems to be more sex-positive and accepting of different sexual and gender identities, not just tolerant.  We’re more openly discussing sex, and for that I am grateful.

But there’s still so much work to do. For members of the LGBTQIA+ community, for sex workers, for women, for youth who are just exploring their sexuality and need factual sex education. The progress exists, but we need more.

Where Do We Go From Here

I think the last 4000 words or so have firmly established that I am not creative enough to imagine what the future might look like. I lack the capacity for big-picture thinking in a way that allows change to take me by surprise. But there are some things I’d like to see:

  • Businesses, organizations and bloggers will continue to take responsibility for their mistakes, however accidental they may be. Apologizing and striving to do better is important. None of us are perfect, but denial and willful ignorance help no one. Companies will be transparent about what they’re doing, how they make toys, avenues tapped for arts, etc.
  • USB standards will be adopted by toy makers, and rechargeable toys would not use proprietary ports.
  • Sex toy makers will work more closely with bloggers to create toys and get feedback. Toy reviewers should be involved in the process before a toy gets to the market.
  • Advertisers will pay equitable prices for spaces on our blogs and social media. If it’s important enough for you to ask, it’s important enough for you to pay. In this vein, it’s important for bloggers to get credit and respect where it’s due. The disrespect and condescension must stop.
  • Similarly,  purchasers should pay fair prices for the words we write for them. If you think our work is quality enough to use, then it deserves quality pay.
  • I want to see a stark decrease in the number of fly-by-night companies and Chinse manufacturers/retailers, even if they’re not showing up on my radar. I am not sure what might help this save for more regulation of sex toys.
  • Unsafe materials such as jelly will become defunct and forgotten.. Toy companies will use standard terminology to reduce confusion over what a toy is made from and strive to create body-safe toys without the need to lie or mislead about the toy.
  • Inclusive designs and marketing materials are a must. We’re moving away from “his” and “hers” toys, but that must continue. I want to see models of various skin colors and body shapes in ads, and I do not want to hear about the cost. If you cannot afford to do it right, you cannot afford to be in the business.
  • I’d love to see more conversations happening about sexuality in general, not sex-specific forums. I am seeing more of this and am contributing to it. Eventually, I will want to unify my online presences and write under my real name, and I can envision this being a possibility one day. Just not yet.
  • Ideally, some of the persistent cliques within this corner of the Internet would dissolve so that it would feel more inclusive.
  • I want, no, need, to see more people who are feminists, sex-positive, inclusive, and diverse in every venue, speaking and being held up and being heard.
  • Sex ed will move away from fear-based programs to factual programs that focus on more than just the risks of sex but also the benefits and the skills to have a healthy and happy sex life.
  • Sex work should be legalized and protected.
  • Birth control should be covered by insurance. All of it.
  • I want safe abortions that are covered by insurance and provided by professionals who do not demonize the people seeking out their medical services.
  • Members of the queer community should not have to fear for their safety when they walk down the street. Nor should they be denied the same respect and services as the rest of the world. They should not worry that they’ll be turned down for buying a simple cake or, perhaps more importantly, denied when they apply to adopt a child and start a family together.

There are so many things that I wish to see and that I believe can be a reality if we continue to work toward them.

My personal goals are the same as they always have been. I want to be more consistent in posting and more engaged with the sex blogosphere. I want to continue learning (perhaps by attending a sex/science event) and growing, to experiment sexually (especially with kink) and get out of my comfort zone. I hope that I will be able to do more creative writing, which is something that has fallen by the wayside this year. Time management is definitely crucial to all of my goals. Ironically, if I were having copious amounts of sex or in a relationship, I think I would have even less time and motivation to write about it.

To that end, I am focusing my 10-year anniversary giveaway on methods that will allow me to connect with my readers and other bloggers, to engage, perhaps to make a few friendships. I hope you will join me — and not just because you can win some awesome sex toys in my upcoming giveaway post!

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Categories: Everything Else

Stigma of STDs

November 24th, 2009

A while back I was reading a piece in Best Sex Writing 2009 about the advent of online dating communities for people with STDs. The article talked about these different communities, some aimed for STD sufferers in general and others aimed for folks with more specific STDs, which aid people in finding similar folks. It’s supposed to help folks in a couple ways. First, it helps to get the message across because the fact that So and So has X virus is right out in the open. There’s no third date jitters because you don’t know how your partner will react to the bad news. It also helps people look for others with the same STD/strain so they needn’t worry about giving it to someone else.

But it definitely reduces the dating pool. In the article, one of the users of such a site mentioned how there were only ever 1 or 2 folks in her location on the sites and those were not matches made in heaven. It can be difficult to find even a possibility, nevertheless a hit, on general dating sites whose users surely number in the thousands think AdultFriendFinder or a specific match sites like think Alt.com. So reducing those numbers even more can make the task of finding a partner even more hopeless, under the guise of hopefulness. To put it plainly, it’s hard enough to find someone (or sometimes several) when you’re considering all the fish in the sea but STD dating sites are just a little pond.

I’m not entirely sure that folks with STDs should have to limit themselves to that little pond. Not only are the pickings sometimes slim but it’s all too easy to write off someone because their STD status is displayed so prominently. Assuming everyone chooses their partners wisely (ha!), there are circumstances where STDs do not have to be the deciding factor of a relationship but the stigma is so high that it can even penetrate a community intended for those whose STDs run the gamut. If someone with disease X can turn his nose down on someone with infection Y, it’s no wonder there’s such a stigma around STD sufferers in general. It’s no wonder someone thought it would be a good idea to make such a dating site (not that it’s not).

And the stigma? Is there. It’s certainly real. There’s a “them versus us” mentality. I’m not proud to say that I’d had an STI invade my body and I still think that way sometimes. I try not but it comes so easily. I imagine the type of person who could possibly be so stupid or silly and I realize that.. I was that person. I start thinking about my friends and acquaintances, knowing at least 3 of them have all had at least one STD or STI. We’re not loose women – some of us have only ever been with one person – and we’re certainly not stupid. Our cabinets aren’t stocked with cocaine nor are we sex workers. Basically, no one I know with an STD has fit any fantastic stereotype of an STD sufferer.

It’s then that I realize it’s now “us” and “them” because they are us and vice versa. If I could have an STD, then so could my best friend, my mom, my coworker or my neighbor. Not only is it plausible, but it’s likely that more of my friends and family than I know have struggled with an STD and, by its nature, the stigma involved with it. Science agrees: “Among those ages 15-49, only one in four Americans has not had a genital HPV infection” and 12 million Americans contract an STD each year 1. That means the other 75% have HPV and it’s likely they don’t even know it because many strains have no symptoms even even those which do can lay low for some time. I wouldn’t have known, if not for my yearly Pap and there’s currently no test for men at all. Of course, HPV is only one of many STDs. It becomes clear; although, many people who perpetuate the stigma actually have an STD. The reality is, not only is there no way to distinguish between people, it becomes far less necessary to do so (simply to feed the gossip and stereotypes), when considering the numbers.

Of course, I don’t even realize the stigma has affect me, even as I wonder if I would ever be able to have sex with someone besides my husband (should we ever get to that point) and I cringe because I don’t know what to say about my HPV. I don’t realize how easily it is to perpetuate the problem even as I picture that stereotypical “STD-person” all covered in warts and strung out in my head. It’s a stigma that does no one any good and a stigma which could use a good boot to the butt.

So does a dating site for STD sufferers help? I guess it depends on how you define the problem.

1 – American Social Health Association, Myths and Misconceptions about HPV

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Categories: Articles

The Mysteries of Female Sexuality

April 19th, 2009

The female body, ever mysterious; men have been trying to divine its meaning and function for years to no avail. This fact is often a point of laughter among those who wear said body and a point of frustration among groups of men who share their foibles. Sadly, the mystery of the female body, while alluring, is not one to just the lesser sex (I kid) but to those who have spent their entire life in the body as well.

I can’t tell you the number of times a woman my age has shown ignorance about her own body. Worse yet, woman the age of my mother and grandmother seem to know even less and these are the women who are passing on knowledge to the woman who will come after them. Fortunately, sex and body education is growing increasingly more helpful and accurate but it means not all women have the same information regarding their bodies. Indeed, some women even have inaccurate information which was fed to them as a means of deterring them from sex. They believe their genitals and even their sexuality is something which is dirty and shameful and should be treated with such regard. They are not encouraged to explore or enjoy themselves. They are simply a receptacle for production and while I could never belittle the strength it takes to be a mother, I can also never stress enough how important those same parts and systems are to female sexuality and how beneficial it can be. Thus, it’s no surprise that I do encourage healthy sex education.

I am surprised, however, when I hear from people near my age who still carry with them inaccurate or incomplete sexual information. After all, my own sex education, while not the best ever, seemed to be far ahead of the pack in many aspects. So, when a female peer looks at me in shock when I mention that, yes, females can masturbate, I tend to return just the same look. Why is it that women seem strangers to their own bodies? What is the big gender difference that makes being a man and having a penis more acceptable than being a woman with a vagina?

I think a large portion of our misunderstanding when it comes to the female body is due to the fact that it is simply less accessible than the male body. Whereas males can easily find and manipulate their sexual parts, location and successful stimulation for females can be much more difficult. Consider that there is a generally acceptable mode of masturbation for men but not so much for females; perhaps this is simply due to the fact that it is easier to understand what we can see. After all, fear of the unknown is nothing new to humankind. Our internal parts are not the only ones difficult to spot; even our external genitals are less obvious than those of our male counterparts.

I have read, on multiple occasions, that females should take the time to get to know their body with their eyes. For those of us who are not astounding gymnasts, I would suggest using a small hand or makeup mirror to become more familiar and comfortable with our parts. If a mirror is out of the question, it would also work to take a picture. If you have a digital camera, you can examine and delete it without anyone else discovering it.

However, there’s one big disadvantage to being female and knowing your body well and that is menstruation. While I know there are some women who feel blessed to be female and are ecstatic over menstrual bleeding, I am not one. And I’m not alone in dreading the one week a month when my body seems to want to work against me and my hormones fluctuate without warning.

The drawback to knowing your body is knowing what it can do and not all of those things are pleasant. When bleeding is a prominent component, it’s easy to apply the word “dirty” to female sexuality. Even if no one around us holds those negative attitudes, it’s easy enough to think negatively about ourselves. When you add in moodiness and irritability that menstruation frequently causes, it can easily become a downward spiral and add negative overtones to our sexuality. Shame is only a short step away, especially if those about us enforce those attitudes.

Of course, this alone does not have to be a road block to exploration and understanding of our sexual selves. While I do not relish menstruation, I do not hate my body or sexuality either. If nothing else, I grew tolerant of the way my body worked despite its differences from my male peers.

Those differences can also enforce negative attitudes and the proliferation of false truths about female sexuality. Men and women have always had their differences and only in the recent past has the idea of “different but equal” arose. True, men and women excel in different ways but for too long these differences were seen as irrefutable proof that the male gender exceeded the female gender. These differences were used to control and own people in a way that most would now agree is unethical.

For thousands of years, women were told they could not work outside the home, be members of the military or even vote. For thousands of years, women were taught to be subservient and to please their husbands. Their wants and their needs always coming in second place, if they even placed at all. It took many generations for these ideals to become ingrained in countless societies and I have no doubt it will take just as many generations for new ideals to be adopted, no matter how contemporary we may think ourselves to be.

And these differences? These inequalities? They must exist for a reason. Women must suffer with the “monthly curse” for a reason. Instead of our differences being used to further society, women dealt with the stigma that they were intrinsically inferior to men because of some historic sin (perhaps the forbidden fruit?), rendering them less important, less human than men. Why would they explore these differences when they represent such shame?

At surface level, I am shocked by just how far we have to go in understanding the female body and by association, female sexuality. Still, when I consider all the contributing factors, such as how women have been regarded for thousands of years, the attitudes which have become second nature to us and how our bodies can sometimes feel like our enemies by “hiding” our most sexual parts or bleeding once a month, the mystery begins to unravel. When we see that, we can also see that there is nothing wrong with exploring our bodies and sexuality.

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Categories: Articles

Image © MisterUnlucky; used with permission.