› andrea@altsexcolumn.com
Dear Andrea:
As long as I can remember, I’ve had a fascination with gyno play and playing doctor. I had never acted upon it until meeting my current boyfriend. We’ve begun experimenting with speculums, various insertable objects, vibrators, etc. We are always very careful to be sterile and safe.
I’ve grown more and more interested in the idea of cervical dilation and cervical insertions but have been unable to find any literature on the subject. Apparently, I am the only human alive with such a fascination. I have looked online and found several varieties of uterine sounds but always in context of urethral play, not cervical stretching.
I understand that any cervical penetration has the possibility of causing cramps or other pain, but I am anxious and willing to experiment with this aspect of such play. My concern is safety. Any information?
Love,
Stretch me
Dear Stretch:
Questions like this always remind me of a kids’ science show I used to watch, starring the performance artist Paul Zaloom and some guy in a ratty old rat costume. Seriously, this existed. I’m not making it up. In one episode Paul was explaining how to grow a particularly odoriferous bacteria colony in an old tennis shoe when he broke off midsentence, looked directly into the camera, and said, “Don’t even do this.” That’s how I feel when people ask me about certain extreme and possibly harmless but just a little bit potentially fatal practices. Do something else. Don’t even do this.
Cervical stretching and sounding are, of course, accomplished every day in thousands of gynecologists’ offices and with no lasting harm to the patient. That’s how you get IUDs in and unwanted tissues out, provided, of course, that “you” are a trained medical professional. It isn’t the pain that worries me. I understand that you’re up for that, and, you know, go crazy, although having been the recipient of several antepartum “internals,” I can assure you that the sensation is … let’s call it “challenging” and leave it at that. You know that’s how they determine how close you are to going into labor, right? A doctor or midwife rummages around in there, eventually emerging to announce that you’re only “a fingertip” dilated. Guess what high-tech, finely calibrated device is used to determine that? No, really. Guess.
So, yes, cervical stretching hurts like 12 kinds of mofo, but that’s not our concern here. I’m afraid of you perforating something, introducing outside-world bacteria to your insides, or both. I don’t need to tell you how badly that could go for you, and only you can decide if it’s worth the risk.
It isn’t true that there’s absolutely no information on this out there — there’s just very, very little of it. There’s probably something in BME, the Body Modification Ezine, although you may have to join to get to some of their more esoteric content. I imagine the extreme practitioner C.M. Hurt knows something about cervical play if anyone does, but the closest thing I could find among her writings was an article (on dungeonmagic.com) about female catheterization play that you might enjoy. A place called Eros Boutique carries every conceivable type of sound and catheter, and medical books and sites with instructions for inserting an IUD could walk you through the steps necessary to prepare for messing with your cervix. That’s all I’ve got. I could tell you that in order to introduce something, say, a little catheter full of sperm for intrauterine insemination, into the uterus, they sometimes have to grab the cervix with a clawlike thing called a “tenaculum” (Could that word be more vivid? Half tentacle, half speculum?), but I’m afraid that given your proclivities, it would only encourage you.
This is very strange for me — up till now, whenever someone has asked me about inserting things into the female urethra, I’ve said, in a word, “don’t,” and for good reason. Unlike the longer and hardier male version, the female urethra is only a few inches long and kind of fragile. It’s a very short trip to the bladder, which really doesn’t want you dragging in dirt all over its nice clean floor. So while I generally counsel people, especially beginners, to leave the urethra alone and go play someplace safe, like the vagina, I’m going to take a flyer and suggest the urethra as a slightly safer alternative to the cervix if you absolutely must go poking in places where you’re not invited. At least you can sort of resanitize it by peeing afterwards. You may also feel free to be cranked open with a speculum, even a cold speculum for that frisson of gynecological authenticity, and prodded about the cervix with a gloved finger. It is possible — oh, so very possible — to create some quite intensely painful sensations in that region without ever attempting entry. I can’t, in good conscience, support your friend playing doctor in the sanctum sanctorum there. I just can’t.
Love,
Andrea
Andrea Nemerson has spent the last 14 years as a sex educator and an instructor of sex educators. In her previous life she was a prop designer. And she just gave birth to twins, so she’s one bad mother of a sex adviser. Visit www.altsexcolumn.com to view her previous columns.
Volume 41 Number 05
November 1 – November 7, 2006
At your cervix
Winning in 2006 — and beyond
EDITORIAL There are plenty of Democrats running for the House and Senate this fall who don’t exactly qualify as liberals. Howard Dean, the (somewhat) grassroots-oriented, progressive party chair, has been largely aced out of a meaningful role in the fall campaigns, which are being run by Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.) and Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY), who have said repeatedly that they’re willing to eschew a coherent program or ideology because what they want to do is win. In fact, there isn’t much of a clear Democratic Party platform at all.
But in a way, that doesn’t matter. The Nov. 7 midterm election is all about President George W. Bush, the war in Iraq, and the precarious state of the US economy. The (ever more likely) prospect of the Democrats taking back both houses of Congress would be a clear and profound statement that the country wants a change.
This year’s Democratic Party is not about fundamental social and economic change. Rep. Nancy Pelosi, who will likely be the next House speaker, has said she won’t consider hearings on or an inquiry into the impeachment of Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney. The Democratic leadership under Pelosi and Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.) would likely be far more bipartisan than the Republicans have been. And there are a lot of things that just won’t be on the agenda.
But there are some very strong Democrats who will be in position to chair powerful committees. Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) and Rep. Maxine Waters (D–Los Angeles) would be in line to run the House Judiciary Committee. That committee would never allow another PATRIOT Act to emerge. But even more important, Conyers and Waters would likely launch detailed investigations into a long list of Bush administration misdeeds. And with this congressional committee using the investigative authority and subpoena power it holds, the White House would lose a lot of its imperial immunity.
But if the Democrats are going to emerge from the next two years of leading the national legislature with the kind of momentum they’ll need to field a strong presidential candidate in 2008, they’ll need to do more than serve as the loyal opposition. Democrats need to take on some big issues — and the first one is the war. Congress can effectively end the war any time, simply by cutting off funding for it — and while that’s not likely to happen in the first 100 days, the Democrats can and should demand that Bush offer a clear and acceptable timetable for withdrawing from Iraq — and prepare to start cutting appropriations on that schedule.
That would tell the public that the Democratic Party believes in something — and is willing to listen to the large and growing majority in this country who are sick of Bush’s pointless war and want it to end, now. SFBG
Prosecute election theft
EDITORIAL There’s no doubt at all that a group of downtown businesses operating through a series of supposedly independent political committees organized in part by attorney Jim Sutton have used every tool at their disposal to influence the outcome of the District 6 supervisorial election. And there’s no doubt that what these folks have done violates at least the spirit of the city’s election laws, which were designed to offer, as much as legally possible, a level playing field for candidates and full disclosure of campaign expenses.
There’s also no doubt that Sutton has been willing to bend and at times break the rules: in 2002 his law firm was fined $240,000 — the largest penalty of its kind in city history — for failing to disclose late contributions from Pacific Gas and Electric Co. to a campaign to defeat a public power initiative.
At some point this sort of conduct rises to the level of a crime — and at least some respectable, credible activists and observers think the attacks on Sup. Chris Daly have reached that level. In a letter to the Guardian, published on page 8, former ethics commissioner Joe Lynn argues that Sutton and his allies are guilty of attempting to steal an election.
There’s no crime in the books called “Grand Theft, Election,” although there probably should be. But Lynn says that what’s happened here — unregulated committees raising and spending tens of thousands of dollars and not fully disclosing it until late in the cycle — is not merely sleazy and unethical but criminal.
We’re always nervous about bringing the criminal justice system into political disputes (we still remember how then-mayor Art Agnos pushed the district attorney into conducting a witch-hunt investigation into the opponents of a downtown ballpark ballot measure). But we’re also sick of seeing the likes of Sutton, Don Fisher, and SFSOS operate with virtual impunity when what they are doing comes very, very close to a conspiracy to subvert local election laws. The Ethics Commission needs to conduct a full investigation here, but that body can impose only civil penalties, which means cash fines — and for billionaire Fisher, whose money is behind a lot of these shenanigans, a stiff fine is just the cost of doing business.
District Attorney Kamala Harris ought to look into this. The problem is that Sutton was her lawyer in a heated campaign in 2003 during which her opponent, Terence Hallinan, raised similar charges. So Harris is conflicted; the best solution would be to appoint outside counsel — a special prosecutor, to use the Washington terminology — to investigate whether Sutton, Fisher, SFSOS, or anyone else ought to face criminal prosecution. The sooner that process gets started, the better. SFBG
EDITOR’S NOTES
› tredmond@sfbg.com
There’s a certain brilliance to the Proposition 90 campaign, perhaps more than the right-wing ideologues who conjured this up even realize. The measure raises a profound, powerful question — and judging from some of the unlikely supporters of this horrible plan, the answer isn’t pleasant.
As we report in this issue (page 20), most people wouldn’t support the measure if they really understood what it meant (no more zoning, no more rent control, no more environmental laws, etc.) But for a lot of Californians and some San Franciscans in places like Bayview–Hunters Point, the real question seems to go like this: do you trust the government to protect you from the private sector — or do you see the government as such a problem, such a threat, so historically untrustworthy that you’ll take your chances with unregulated capitalism?
There are good people, well-meaning people, who are taking the wrong side on this one with potentially terrible consequences, and it’s largely, I think, because they don’t see the public sector as their friend.
I understand how anyone who’s fought redevelopment in the past 40 years can feel that way. Just about everything the San Francisco Redevelopment Agency did in this city, particularly in African American neighborhoods, has been a total disaster. Black support for Prop. 90 is the legacy of generations of corrupt urban politics.
The problem is that Prop. 90, which allows private developers to operate without regulation in urban areas, will be even more of a disaster. And if it passes, it won’t just be Republicans who vote for it. I hope I’m not the only one who finds this deeply frightening. SFBG
The risk of honest planning
OPINION At the Nov. 1 meeting of the land use committee of the Board of Supervisors, a seemingly straightforward statement of policy will be heard. It simply requires that the city apply its own General Plan guidelines to future development in the eastern neighborhoods.
But the legislation, proposed by Supervisors Sophie Maxwell, Jake McGoldrick, Aaron Peskin, and Tom Ammiano, is creating quite a furor. A senior planning official has testified that if it’s adopted, the entire development boom in the eastern neighborhoods may be halted. The mayor has threatened a veto.
The policy in question calls for city planners to show how they intend to ensure that 64 percent of all new housing development is affordable to moderate-, low-, and very low-income San Franciscans. That’s what the housing element of the master plan says is needed.
Land use development policy lies at the very heart of San Francisco politics. It’s dangerous work for supervisors to attempt to determine that policy, especially if it calls for protection of existing neighborhoods and their residents.
Just ask Supervisor Chris Daly.
Don’t for a minute believe that he is in the fight of his political life because he’s rude, because he doesn’t care about law and order, or because he prefers dirty streets upon which to raise his son. These petty and silly charges mask a far more serious objection: the way his opponents see it, Daly has been too slow in adopting the massive wave of market-rate housing slated for his district and is far too protective of lower-income residents in District 6.
Never mind that since Daly took office some 3,000 units of housing have been built in the South of Market portion of his district alone or that an equal amount wait in the pipeline at the Planning Department. Mayor Gavin Newsom and his market-rate developer allies are simply not satisfied with Daly’s pro–housing development approach — because Daly has sought some balance in that development.
Likewise, the Maxwell resolution calls for plans that will be balanced, contain sustainable development policies, and guarantee a voice for residents against the headlong drive of the current administration to convert the eastern neighborhoods (South of Market, Potrero Hill, the Mission District) into vertical gated communities for Silicon Valley commuters. It states that it shall be the policy of the city that future plans explain not only how they will meet the affordability goals of the housing element but also how they will meet policies of preserving the arts and other productive activities; providing for public transit, pedestrian, and bike rider needs; protecting employment opportunities for current and future residents; and keeping families with children in the city.
There’s a working majority of the Board of Supervisors willing to fight for current neighborhoods and residents and a future that includes them. The battle in District 6 shows that the fight is not without risk. Do the rest of us realize it? SFBG
Calvin Welch
Calvin Welch is a community organizer in San Francisco.
WEDNESDAY
Wed/1
Music
Justice and MSTRKRFT
Justice, the Paris-based electronic duo, churn out club jams that sound like Daft Punk on Viagra. Their infectious electro disco has been vibrating the walls of many a hipster club from Europe to the Bay. Catch them at at Mezzanine along with fellow remixers Canadian twosome MSTRKRFT, featuring Jesse F. Keeler, formerly of Death from Above 1979 (“Romantic Rights”). (Hayley Elisabeth Kaufman)
9 p.m.
Mezzanine
444 Jessie, SF
$12
(415) 625-8880
www.mezzaninesf.com
www.myspace.com/etjusticepourtous
www.mstrkrft.com
Performance/Music
Hecho en Califas Festival
By themselves Jaime Cortez, Aya de León, Guillermo Gómez-Peña, Marc Bamuthi Joseph, and Marcus Shelby are powerful. Together? These la Peña veterans are liable to blow the roof off of the cultural center that gave them a start – in addition to packing it as only a fraction of the bill for the kick-off event of this year’s Hecho en Califas Festival. Break out the old country tuxes in honor of a communal poetics that’s only growing larger and louder. (Johnny Ray Huston)
6:30 p.m. reception; 7:30 p.m. show (through Sun/5)
La Peña Cultural Center
3105 Shattuck, Berk.
$10-$12
(510) 849-2568
www.lapena.org
The 2006 political candidates let loose with us
(For our 2006 endorsements, click here.)
Guardian endorsement interviews are, well, unusual: We bring in candidates for office, set aside as much as an hour or more, and quiz them about local issues. Sometimes we argue; sometimes the candidates yell at us. Nobody pulls any punches. They are lively political debates, fascinating discussions of political policy – and high political theater.
For the first time this year, we’re posting digital versions of these interviews, so our readers can get front-row seats for all the action.
Participants include Editor and Publisher Bruce B. Brugmann, Executive Editor Tim Redmond, City Editor Steven T. Jones and reporters Sarah Phelan, G.W. Schulz and Amanda Witherell. If you’re confused about who’s speaking, here’s a handy guide: If the question is long and involved and about tax policy, it’s probably Tim. If it’s about an incumbent’s record or personal style, it’s probably Steve. George asks about criminal justice a lot; Sarah has a British accent. Everybody knows Bruce’s voice; you can’t miss it. Enjoy.
Sup. Sophie Maxwell
“Redevelopment in the Bay View is different.”
Listen to the Maxwell interview
Sup. Bevan Dufty
“I’m willing to piss people off on both sides of the [landlord-tenant] issue.”
Listen to the Dufty interview
Jaynry Mak, candidate for supervisor, District 4
“I would have to look at it.”
Listen to the Mak interview
Alix Rosenthal, candidate for supervisor, District 8
“We’re going to make it extremely expensive to build market-rate housing, in terms of the community benefits.”
Listen to the Rosenthal interview
Mauricio Vela, candidate for school board
“I probably would lean toward getting rid of [ROTC} … but it would be difficult.”
Listen to the Vela interview
Marie Harrison, candidate for supervisor, District 10
“The one thing I did learn from Willie Brown is that an MOU means I understand that you understand that I don’t have to do a damn thing on this paper.”
Listen to the Harrison interview
Starchild, candidate for supervisor, District 8, and Philip Berg, Libertarian candidate for Congress
“Nobody will invade Switzerland. Everyone has guns, M-16s and AK-47s and grenade launchers in their living rooms.”
Listen to the Starchild-Berg interview
Bruce Wolfe, candidate for community college board
“When you ask where the money is, you want a trail where the money is, the answer you get is it’s in a fungible account.”
Listen to the Wolfe interview
Kim-Shree Maufas, candidate for school board
“My kid was in JROTC …. I like the community, I liked the structure, I liked the commitment to family… I absolutely could not stand the military recruitment.”
Listen to part one of the Maufas interview
Listen to part two of the Maufas interview
Hydra Mendoza, candidate for school board
“There are some schools that are not serving our children.”
Listen to the Mendoza interview
Krissy Keefer, Green Party candidate for Congress
“I’m running against a ghost”
Listen to the Keefer interview
John Garamendi, candidate for lieutenant governor
“Phil Angeledes is wrong [about taxes] in the context of our time.”
Listen to the Garamendi interview
Dan Kelly, school board member
“I don’t think JROTC is a terrific program … it doesn’t teach leadership skills, it teaches follow-ship skills.”
Listen to the Kelly interview
Rob Black, candidate for supervisor, District 6
“Developers have fancy lawyers and they know how to get around things.”
Listen to the Black interview