Alt.sex.column Archives — Page 4 of 10 — San Francisco Bay Guardian Archive 1966

A friend indeed

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July 7, 2009

andrea@mail.altsexcolumn.com

Dear Readers:

I recently resurfaced on Facebook after lying low for a year or so. Participating in social media no longer really feels optional — if you want to see people, that’s where they went. I’ve also been fascinated lately by the way the new media are changing our relationships with our own histories. Never before has it been so easy to reconnect with your past, or so hard to escape it. And friending acts as a great leveler: ex-boyfriend = current book-club pal = your best friend in grade school = your mom. You have no idea what kind of person that former girlfriend — the one who eviscerated you in public and left you for dead — really is now, but there she is, posting recipes and kindergarten graduation pix as if nothing ever happened. None of these quasi-connections need feel any realer or more important than the "Which kind of dryer lint are you?" quizzes and exchanges of virtual knickknacks. That moment when her name first pops up in your Facebook e-mail, though, that’s as real as a sucker-punch to the solar plexus, and can feel quite similar. What happens after that is the story. If you’ve got a good Facebook reunion tale, please share it with the class. Here’s the first one:

Dear Andrea:

I Facebooked my high school boyfriend. I received a warm response and an update. He has a wife and kids and a finance career that sounds kind of sleazy. Way back, he was rich and I was from the wrong side of the tracks.

He PM’d me his phone number. I really had no interest in calling him, but I gave him mine, thinking if he really wants to talk to me, he can call. I’m married and have two kids and really didn’t care.

He called twice. I was surprised, but kind of enjoyed the conversations. I think my life now is a lot more interesting than his, and I’m doing just as well as he is. In high school it was always that he was going to go on to great things and I was just going to be a housewife (he told me this once). Now he sounds kind of out-of-control and I am quite satisfied with my life.

Also — he’s cheating on his wife, pretending to be single on online dating sites. Oddly, it sounds like he’s picking up working-class girls, like I was, which is weird for me. He says he doesn’t want a divorce. I told him that sneaking behind his wife’s back is wrong. I told him he should write to you although I doubt he will (and you’d hang him).

I definitely need to break the contact. But, you have no idea how empowering it is to find out I have, on my terms, a BETTER life than he has.

This is sleazy, isn’t it?

Lady Schadenfreude

PS: OMG! When I turned down an invitation to come visit while his wife was out of town, he de-friended me!

Dear Lady:

It used to be a lot harder to de-friend people when they had to actually be your friend first and then you had to break up with them. Nothing illustrates better the difference between friends and "friends" than the fact that you can make the latter go away so easily. Not that this is entirely a bad thing, mind you. I’ve had plenty of real-life friends whom I would gladly have disappeared had I had access to a magic wand, or Facebook. Anyway, in this instance, good riddance to rich rubbish. Feh.

Since you asked, yes, of course it’s sleazy. Let me count the ways: he has some sort of ill-defined, vaguely disreputable career using other people’s money. He is cheating on his wife, and lying to do so. He’s trying to corrupt you too, and let’s face it, he probably always was a sleazebag, even way back when.

And that’s just him. Enjoying the chance to crow about your own happiness in the face of his sleazy desperation is, if not precisely sleazy itself, certainly unseemly. Frankly, I’m surprised you sent him your number. I assume that you, being a nice girl, never imagined that he had ulterior motives, and clearly you were duly shocked when he revealed them. But see, that’s the thing. What’s so great about these new quasi-contacts is that they are in there, in the box, with a nice buffer between you and the real-life them. Giving out your number lets them reach out and grab you, like in Poltergeist, and that is never good. I think we will be learning more — a lot more — about the difference between friends and "friends" in the next few years, often to our sorrow.

It does appear that you’ve developed immunity to his questionable charms in the intervening years, and that’s all to the best. Next time let the software do its job, keeping haunts from the past on the other side of the screen, where they belong.

Love,

Andrea

Don’t forget to read Andrea at Carnal Nation.com.

If it IS broke, don’t fix it

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June 30, 2009

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andrea@mail.altsexcolumn.com

Dear Andrea:

I met this guy ("Dave") a couple of years ago through other friends and we became friends. I think he was attracted to me, but we were both involved in relationships. Then both of us broke up with those other people, but not because of each other. We started running into each other more and hanging out, and got to be very good friends. One night we were kind of drunk and we kissed, and then agreed that we didn’t like each other that way. And then we did it again! So after that, we had sex. It was good and I thought, OK, so Dave and I are going out. We said the "I love you’s, and then a few weeks later, he said there was something stopping him from doing it with me any more — but he didn’t know what, it just felt wrong. He still wants to hang out and maybe have oral sex or something sometimes, though, just not sex, or being in a relationship. Then he changed his mind and we had sex and then he changed his mind AGAIN. So what is going on with him? What kind of things could be stopping him from having a relationship with me?
Love,

Flummoxed

Dear Flum:

If we’re going to talk about this at all, we have to get our terminology right, so let me get schoolmarmish on you for a sec and say that oral sex is sex, so what he doesn’t feel "right" about is intercourse. And then let me turn Andrea-ish again and just say: "Run! Run for your life!"

Oh, it’s not that he rings some "that man is criminally insane" bell with me. He doesn’t. He does sound broken, though, in a way that is common, moderately inexplicable, and tedious. And if you keep messing around with him and trying to fix him you will get, if not broken yourself, certainly hurt. Why not not do that, while you still have a choice?

Here’s where I admit that, while dating advice is ostensibly part of my job and it’s my responsibility to keep up, I never could bring myself to read either The Rules or He’s Just Not That Into You. You don’t have to, either, since you had the good sense to write to me instead of spending a lot of money on gimmicky books. Here’s the secret, the nugget, the important truth buried under all the trendy exhortations to wait so many days before returning a phone call, or never to make excuses for a Person of Interest’s caddish behavior: it does not matter why someone does not behave toward you the way you would like him to; it only matters that he doesn’t.

Way back when my friends were all in law school, they named the "reasonable man" who is posited in many contracts law hypotheticals "Dave." So Dave remains for me the perfect fill-in-the-blank name, for reasonable and unreasonable men alike, like so:

Unless your Dave finds intercourse physically uncomfortable and has failed to adequately explain this, leaving you to assume that he does not want to have intercourse with you, he has some sort of intimacy issues. The act of intercourse, generally considered pretty intimate, tweaks these. Perhaps he was poorly treated in a previous relationship and fears a repeat. Maybe he was poorly parented, and thus has never been able to develop the sense of trust necessary to let down his guard and be truly intimate with you. Perhaps he has "performed" (I hate this concept, term, and usage, but it’s kind of unavoidable) poorly in the past and been jeered at or dumped for it and fears a repeat. Perhaps he .. but, wait. What did I just say, above?

None of it matters. As soon as you start thinking of him as wounded and wondering what happened to the poor lamb and how it could be remedied, you have started making excuses for his wretched behavior toward you. Unless you are both under, say, 19 (that’s majority plus one grace year I extend grudgingly), he has no business starting things with you that he is too damaged to follow through on. As an adult, it’s his responsibility to know what he is capable of and what he needs to work on before he’s in any position to promise anything.

"He’s just not that into you" may be reductivist, somewhat insultingly simple-minded, and insufficiently inclusive (what about shy guys who are that into you but too paralyzed with fear to call yet?), but the core concept is very useful: if you need to wheedle, support, excuse, or manipulate a guy into giving you what you want, he doesn’t really want to give it. It doesn’t matter why. It doesn’t matter what you do. And offering yourself to him on terms that you find essentially unsatisfactory will gradually grind away at your self-esteem and joie de vivre until you don’t have any. And you’ll need those later.

Love,

Andrea

Don’t forget to read Andrea at Carnal Nation.com.

Average Jane

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June 24, 2009

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andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Readers:

I’ve known people who have sex for money, have sex as a hobby, write about (or perform about or do art about or teach about) sex as an avocation, and still have enough interest and energy left over to have the occasional bit of relaxing off-line sex at home with a partner when nobody’s watching or reading along. But I am not one of them. I get bored. There was a play about vibrators here recently and everyone asked me if I was going, but I said, "Eh, I’d rather see Up." I like to cook and read and watch shows about things that have as little to do with (my) real life as possible — high fashion, for instance, the nuttier the better. I like it when the models wear their dresses upside-down and have monkey-fur eyebrows and a teapot on their head. You don’t?

So … I’m a huge fan of Project Runway and a lesser one of its lesser successor, The Fashion Show. Every season, though, there’s some kind of challenge involving "real women" and, while it’s fun to see the contestants, used to dressing compliant stick insects, wrestle with a mouthy client who dares to voice her own, often scandalously après garde opinions (she often just wants to look nice, of all things), it’s appalling to hear what the designers have to say about the non-model bodies. Faced with the task of dressing a modeling agency admin instead of the expected model, one of the Fashion Show wannabes pouted, "She’s very normal. I don’t do normal."

Well too bad for you, darling! Let us return the favor!

So imagine my glee upon discovering a recent study which found that regular men (as opposed to fashion designers of any gender or sexual preference) not only DO do average women, they vastly prefer us. I knew it! All these years of assuring women that jutting hipbones and sunken chests are not only not required to attract guys, they aren’t even preferred, and now I have at least this one study to back me up.

This isn’t about the "something to hang onto" hypothesis, although I do think that men in general do prefer some padding on those they plan to bump up against, and not only to avoid all the bruising. Men who are attracted to women tend to be attracted to women, and women have boobs and butts and that cunning part in between, where it gets smaller.

You’ve probably heard about the alleged universally preferred waist-hip ratio: it’ s 0.7. This shows up constantly in popular-sciencey psych articles about men’s hard-wired preference for female bodies that signal youth, good health, and fertility (they also like symmetry, even skin tone, and teeth) and depresses female readers who wonder if they measure up. Some researchers in Australia decided to take a closer look, and recruited a bunch of guys to rate line drawings of female torsos for attractiveness. (I may have read too much hard-boiled crime fiction to hear about female "torsos" without mentally adding the word "dismembered," but let’s hope the test subjects had not.) From the NewScientist article:

The work, by Rob Brooks at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, and colleagues, suggests that the popular notion that a waist-hip ratio of 0.7 is the most attractive only holds if the rest of the body is average (Behavioral Ecology, DOI: 10.1093/beheco/arp051 ).

"The orthodoxy says that you will be attractive with a certain waist-hip ratio no matter how the rest of your body varies. Our study shows this is not the case," says [researcher] Brooks…. The men showed a preference for women with a waist-hip ratio of 0.7 — but only if they had an average-sized waist, hips, and shoulders.

When compared with groups of real women, including Playboy centerfolds, Australian escorts advertising on the Internet and average Australian women between the ages of 25 and 44, the latter group most closely matched the preferred body shape.

Strike one for the average Sheila. Isn’t this heartening? Of course women who are substantially smaller or larger than average can still find plenty of ammunition here with which to wound themselves (the men liked average women, after all), and we don’t know for a fact that it applies to non-Aussie men. Even so, it’s something to remember when the heart sinks and the self-loathing rises upon looking in the mirror and failing, once again, to see Kate Moss pouting back at us. Suck it, Kate! Go eat some crisps.

In other heartening news, the editor of British Vogue put fashion designers on notice that she would no longer publish photos of ultra-emaciated models, so they’d better start sending larger clothes. Apparently the samples have been arriving at the magazines in ever-tinier sizes, until even the models we’re used to seeing, who are about 5’10 and 100 to 125 pounds, can’t fit into them. Not that the average size 14 Australian torso is going to be able to squeeze into those Valentinos, but at least it’s a start.

Love,

Andrea

Wet stuff

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June 17, 2009

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andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Andrea:

I know you’ve written about the G-spot before, but I have to say I’m still confused. I can have orgasms when my boyfriend goes down on me but not from intercourse, which I guess is pretty common. I keep wondering maybe if he could find my G-spot? I was also wondering about female ejacuutf8g. I don’t think I’ve ever female ejaculated or had a G-spot orgasm. What can I do?
Love,

Hoping For More

Dear Hope:

You and quite an army, actually. All of your desiderata are perennials on women’s must-have lists. Sadly, though, unlike the "it" bag of the season, you can’t get just get a cheap knock-off at Target and be satisfied. Oh, wait, that’s not true — it’s actually entirely possible that the right tool might get the job done, and those, you can buy.

The G-spot, as we have discussed ad infinitum, is not so much a discrete spot as it is a convenient catch-all for a bunch of associated structures, including the erectile tissue around the urethra (paraurethral sponge), and the vast internal portions of the clitoris, the body and crurae (the external part is the glans). OK. We’ve done that. You may also remember that because all that good stuff is largely above the vagina, any fingers attempting to access it are going to need to apply a firm upward pressure. Think of it as that "You! Over here!" gesture that Carmela Soprano made to Charmaine Bucco that time when Artie and Charmaine catered her party. Fingers can do this successfully, but most often those are somebody else’s. If you want to do the preliminary exploration on your own, or want to speed things along, one of the approximately 100 million sex toys made for the purpose will likely do the trick.

Now, the wet stuff. May I just say, before we get started, that I really object to the term "female ejaculate" as a verb, even though I occasionally end up employing it? Let’s try to stick to using it as a noun, the stuff in that puddle there, and use just plain "ejaculate" for the verb, figuring we know we’re talking about the women-folk here. Good. So, ejaculation has a funny sort of recent history, going from utterly obscure and unmentioned to the subject of heated argument to feminist cause célèbre in less than 30 years, starting with Grafenberg (he of the Spot) in the 1950s. By the ’90s women (or sometimes womyn) were making theater pieces and giant marching puppets about it, while others were watching instructional videos and driving themselves and their partners frantic looking for the elusive spot and its payload, the equally elusive (female) ejaculate. By the oughts, the endless stream of articles about how to get yourself an endless stream of orgasms along with their attendant rivers of body fluids seems to be drying up, replaced largely with articles about … dryness. Low sexual desire and no sexual desire and how to spark up your marriage. The audience is getting older, I guess. The how-to books and videos produced during the boom years are all still around, though, so no reason not to give ’em a shot.

Love,

Andrea

Don’t forget to read Andrea at Carnal Nation.com.

It’s Cougartown, Jake

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June 10, 2009

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andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Andrea:

I’m 19 and still a virgin. I’ve never been on a date, kissed a girl, held hands, hugged … you get the picture. I’ve never really had the time to take interest in girls, or the courage to ask one out. I’m now starting to feel pretty lonely, and tired of my lack of "experience." However, after talking with several different girls my age on different occasions, my question has come to this: are virgin guys really worthless for experienced women?

Most women I talk to say that’s the answer to the question. If this is true, I think I’m going to have serious nervous breakdown. Since this is apparently the case, and such a bad thing, I was wondering what I should do — if anything at all — to fix the problem?

Love,

Another Lonely Boy

Dear Boy:

In light of recent discussions of sexual opportunities found on craigslist, among the (barely) used fitness equipment and the remarkably ugly couches, I’m suddenly seeing your problem in a whole new light. In your usual fictional treatments of the "desperate male virgin seeks state-change" trope, you see the hapless hero attempt, unsuccessfully, to get age-mates interested, or to trick them with false-bottomed popcorn buckets or what-have-you. Then you have your prostitute scene, which never goes well. I have no compunctions about suggesting seeing a pro, actually — it may not be legal, but as far as I know I can recommend what I like as long as I don’t recommend whom I like, as in "See my friend Lavinia, she’ll fix you right up."*

In fact,I AM going to suggest you see a pro, since this has been going on way too long and I’m afraid you’re going to get what they used to call "a complex." But I do realize it’s not a solution that fits everyone’s tastes, morals, or pocketbook, and it isn’t much help if what you’re seeking is a boon companion and a chance to get your blank-blank-ed (I hate all those phrases and can’t even bring myself to type the one about cherries. Ick.

We’ll get back to craigslist, but first, no, I don’t think inexperienced men are "worthless" to women. I think very few people can truly be considered worthless (even the worst can be repurposed as mulch, for instance), and I’d hate for you to judge your own worth by what some chicks at a party said. Your "worth" is irreducible and inborn.

How useful you can be to other people may depend on things like skills and history, but probably not as much as you think. I think we’re having some confusion here about what question those girls thought they were answering. Would they really, at the advanced age of 19 or so, reject a serious and otherwise appealing suitor on the grounds of sexual inexperience? Or was it more a case of "I’d rather do it with guys who know what they’re doing"? The latter is understandable, the former a bit sad.

I really think young women of a slightly less hardened persuasion are your best bet, for many reasons, but there is that craigslist option (craigslist is in some senses sui generis, but it could also be considered to stand in here for any online meeting place where "casual encounters" ads are acceptable). I’m thinking that your chances of a cute 19-year-old picking up on your ad in a place like that and thinking, "Sweet! He doesn’t know a thing!" are virtually nil. But if there really is such a thing as a "cougar," then … mrowr.

I am personally still unconvinced that any such widespread social phenomenon of older, slightly stringy but glossily well-preserved ladies prowling for young man-meat yet exists, or ever will. You couldn’t prove it by the presence of the stereotype, though. Not only is there the SNL sketch and a number of ad campaigns featuring "cougars," there’s even an upcoming series staring the ancient and wizened Courteney Cox (I believe she’s 45) in something called Cougar Town. This is not good.

Reservations about the designation and the ugly light it casts on women over, say, 35 who still like sex aside, this could all be good news for you. Try running an ad that says "19-year-old virgin seeks cougar for important life lessons" and see how that works out for you. While it’s true that most female grown-ups are not seeking utterly inexperienced partners half their age, there are certainly some who would find you an interesting experiment.

All this nonsense about pros and ladies on the prowl aside, I do have two other suggestions, both of which seem to have escaped you. One, you can talk to girls and even ask them out without revealing a certain embarrassing biographical fact upfront and, two, you could date virgins.

Love,

Andrea

* No, I don’t know anyone named Lavinia.

Don’t forget to read Andrea at Carnal Nation.com.

Objects in mirror

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June 3, 2009

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› andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Readers:
Since I can’t write this week, I thought I could at least rerun a letter germane to recent discussions.

Dear Andrea:

I met a guy through his very explicit and fun Craigslist ad describing the weird-ass kinky sex he wanted. So we e-mailed, met, and had a great time. He’s handsome, intelligent, artsy … totally my type. We end up in bed, he gives me some quality oral sex, and then he ejaculates within two minutes. He makes no move to get me off either, just makes some remark about that being "my random Craigslist hookup." I’m too flabbergasted to ask for more oral sex. And then he wants to spend the night and cuddle. I’m frustrated and confused, but let him, and don’t comment on his premature ejaculation for fear of damaging his ego. Later we have sex again, and again he ejaculates within minutes. What do I do when he calls? What should I have said at the time?

Love,

UnListed

Dear List:

I once sat on a panel with Craig from Craiglist and I’m imagining him being mortified by this entire story. He’s a shy boy. I would also dearly love to link to the offending ad, but it seems faintly unethical, although it’s often said that once you post something on the Web, it’s public, period, and ripe for linkage. He’s probably taken it down by now, anyway. I can attest that the ad was lengthy, floridly descriptive, occasionally inept ("Bring your noble breasts"), and kinky in a cutely sophomoric, let-me-mash-grapes-in-you kind of way. It certainly did not read it as an offer of a two-minute, one-night stand complete with sexual frustration and dismissive jokes.

What to do if he calls? Doesn’t that depend on whether you wish to see him again? If you do, you will have to say, "But I want to do the stuff you said in the ad! Not five minutes of sex and then goodnight. OK?" If you don’t want to see him again, you say "no thanks."

There are ways to ask for more without bruising a boy’s ego — some boys, anyway. The ones to whom one is not allowed to say anything but "Wow! That was the best sex ever!" are not worth playing with. Yours doesn’t sound at all like the brutally macho type, more like your typical under-experienced urban dweeb-boy, so you would be quite safe in expressing an opinion, especially if you’re upbeat about it: "That was hot! I’m still hot! C’mon, let’s do some more." Not: "Well, that sucked. In fact, you suck." I can’t see the point of accusing him of premature ejaculation specifically, nor was that his greatest offense. What was, then? False advertising, of course. He proposed lengthy, goofy, sexy fun to ward off the looming, glowering gloom of autumn. Did he deliver any of that? No, he did not, and you would have been within your rights to point this out. On closer reading of his ad, though, I notice that he included an escape clause: "Not looking for mind-blowing, end-of-the-world sex."

I fear we shall all end up bringing our lawyers with us on first dates. End-of-the-world sex, indeed.

Love,

Andrea

Dear Andrea:

I recently hooked up with an inexperienced 23-year-old man. Sex has not been great for him in the past. With his ex, he always initiated, she never seemed to enjoy anything he tried, she refused to offer suggestions, they both became resentful, and now he’s afraid of sex. He told me he’s nervous and insecure, and when we finally got to it, he lasted about 15 seconds.

I find this guy unbelievably hot. I wouldn’t have guessed he was so inexperienced, and I get turned on thinking about how some really great fucking could rock his world. So far I’ve tried to not judge him and to be patient. I’d like to show him how great sex makes life worth living. But I don’t want to coddle or condescend to him. I also have no experience dealing with quick ejaculators. (It only happened once, but I’d like to know some techniques for keeping it from happening again.)

Love,

Mama Teach

Dear Mama:

He is, for your purposes, a babe in the woods. Coddle all you want. I wouldn’t suggest actually condescending to him, if only because condescension, unlike, say, humiliation or scorn, lacks essential hotness. Assume that he is attracted to you at least in some part for your worldliness, and play it up. He is a tender, pink-eared schoolboy. You are Jeanne Moreau.

There is no instant technique applicable to premature ejaculation (and yes, 15 seconds is premature); it’s all longer-term stuff. If interested, he can apply himself to his studies and gradually train himself out of coming so quickly, especially since it is likely nothing but nerves. Far simpler, though, is the magical solution available mostly to very young men and their partners: do it again. And again. And again.

Love,

Andrea

Don’t forget to read Andrea at Carnal Nation.com.

Higgamus hoggamus

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May 27, 2009

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andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Andrea:

I wonder if you’ve been living in San Francisco too long? Most prostitutes are not happy grad students! Most have been abused, are addicts, or both, and it’s not a "career choice." I think the woman in your last column is a sex addict and needs therapy, not someone to be cheered on by people like you who think promiscuity is cool. I would worry that kind of behavior says something pretty bad about the emotional state of anyone who’s doing it. I usually like your column, but I do think you can get warped by living too long where being weird is cool.

Love,

I Used To Live There Too

Dear Used:

I worry about her, too! What do you think I am? The question for last week, though, was not "Is promiscuity healthy for women?" (a very complicated question indeed, and one we will get back to), but the far simpler and more specific, "Is meeting men online for sex likely to get you killed?" No matter how you feel about female promiscuity, the answer to the latter is going to have to be no. It is simply not likely, although we have seen, tragically, that it is possible.

Expensive, boutique-y prostitution practiced by sane, smart women who can afford to screen clients carefully is surprisingly unlikely to lead to ax-murder. Neither does either activity put its female practitioners at any great risk for STDs or accidental pregnancy, since these are women who own condoms and know how to use them. It’s young (and not so young) people in the fuzzy-headed throes of romantic love or lust (sure, there’s such a thing as "romantic lust") who fall prey to the "spontaneity" fallacy or simply cannot force themselves to hold back until someone has gone out and procured the necessary protective gear. Call girls don’t go "oops," and last week’s "friend" probably doesn’t either. Certainly my own friends who use the sexier personals sites (say, Nerve rather than Chemistry.com) don’t make amateur’s mistakes. They can’t afford to.

Now, "Female promiscuity — hobby or symptom?" Contemporary understanding points to neither, or both, or to questioning the entire category, since the word itself implies deviation from an assumed non-promiscuous norm. For the last 60 years or so, the basic sociobiological story has gone something like this: Men are naturally promiscuous (and interested in nubile young women) because sperm is cheap and the best route to reproductive success is to shoot (and shoot, and shoot) and run. Women, meanwhile, are naturally (if serially) monogamous because pregnancy and infancy are expensive and they will need the help of a well-to-do, physically strong male to help them achieve reproductive success. More recent research has served to completely bollux-up our tidy story, though.

"Chimpanzee males trade meat for sex!" announced pretty much every media outlet in April. No surprise there, really, but it also turned out that … female chimpanzees trade sex for meat. Lots of sex, although not on the first date, since they are not always in estrus at time of trade. Are they making bets on future help (and sperm donations) from males they are merely flirting with now? And are the males keeping a database of females who will later say yes? If they can carry on such complex sociosexual calculations, what else are they up to?

Meanwhile, our premier expert on the sociobiology of motherhood, Sarah Blaffer Hrdy, posits a revolutionary difference between ape societies and early (and modern) human ones, so big that it renders ape models even more useless than they already were as revisitable reservoirs of human history. Looking at modern hunter-gatherer societies, she sees cooperative parenting, a human invention, still in operation. It takes a village, in other words, men and women both, to raise a helpless human baby. And, looking back, the more we helped each other, the better our social and communication skills grew. Group responsibility for the children, she says, made us human.

More immediately apropos, perhaps, is the research (www.scientificblogging.com/news_articles/human_sex_roles_male_promiscuity_debunked_and_women_arent_all_picky_either) by Gillian Brown and associates, widely reported this spring, which examined mating behavior and reproductive success in 18 human societies and found that what people do depends on what else is going on: population density, differing life expectancies between the sexes, sex ratios, and a bunch of other variables made a huge difference in who was doing more or less of what with whom. Why this demonstration that humans are complex and adaptable should have come as much of a surprise to anyone, I couldn’t tell you. I admit, though, that I likewise couldn’t tell you that sociobiological research supports the innate wholesomeness of picking up men on Craigslist, and I doubt it ever will. I tend to be a worrier too, and I have certainly seen people, especially women, do a fair amount of psychic damage to themselves with ill-considered sex. But it would be pretty presumptuous to assume that last weeks "friend" is broken on the basis of, well, not knowing anything.

Love,

Andrea

P.S. Readers, what about you? Care to share your adventures in promiscuity, soul-deadening, life-affirming, or just plain OK? They would make a great column.

Don’t forget to read Andrea at Carnal Nation.com.

Don’t change a Thing

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May 13, 2009

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andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Andrea:

I found this on Craigslist. Please, please stop this poor girl before it’s too late! She should hear from a professional that she’d be sacrificing nerve endings to a bunch of dickweeds who are suckers for media standards. And they won’t even like her more. God help us.

advice please re labia — w4m

so im hearing mixed reviews from guys about a female’s labia. do guys prefer the labia minora to be big or small? because tons of my friends are seeking to have them made smaller (like by a lot) so they look like playboy types etc. is that what guys want? what turns men on? and why? any advice on what to do here for me??

‘Nuff said. Thank you.

Love,

A Concerned Citizen

(Seriously.)

Dear Concerned:

Oh, okay. Maybe she’ll see this and maybe she won’t, but obviously this is a thing, or a Thing, that affects a lot of young women, just as she says. "Tons" of her friends, though? I realize she’s posting from L.A., where you have to expect this sort of thing, but the image of busloads of girls she went to high school with or worked with at Hot Topic after school lining up for surgical "correction" is unsettling even me.

So, what is going on here? I’ve long assumed (this has been going on a while now) that women used to go a lifetime without seeing their own (it takes a mirror and the will to look) or anyone else’s labia in great detail unless they had chosen to be midwives or something, in which case they were busy.

Men used to see a few sets, all too different from each other to even form much of a preconceived notion of what they "ought" to look like. Hardly anybody used to view an endless parade of stunt labia, chosen or surgically altered to conform to a (sub)cultural standard. But since the 1990s or so, that is exactly what we are doing. The porn industry standard is tiny, close-to-the-body, and unusually symmetrical, and if that is what young men are seeing before they even get a peek at the real thing, I suppose it’s to be expected that some may be shocked or dismayed by reality’s asymmetry and wild diversity of form, and in some cases indignant that they did not get exactly what they were in the mood for. It works with YouTube and iPods!

At least with pubic hair (a similar issue with young men being shocked on first encounter), one can go with the fashion flow and change with it as it (inevitably) changes. The same cannot be said for surgical rearrangements.

Now, how do I feel about young women permanently altering themselves to suit male fancy? I think it might be a trick question, actually, since I’m not entirely sure that that many guys care that much. What if they do, though — ought a young woman scramble to put herself through a painful, expensive, dangerous (all surgery is dangerous) procedure to please guys who probably still won’t be that into her if they’re not already? Of course not. Nothing is ever that simple, though.

Most of the Web sites put up by surgeons who do these procedures talk a great deal about painful horseback-riding or bicycling or inability to wear pants, all very real if somewhat rare complications of very long or loose labia. Then they give a little nod to being displeased with the size, period, and that’s the population we’re worrying about here. A reputable surgeon is going to accept or reject patients based not only on physical factors but emotional ones as well, especially patient expectations ("this surgery will make my labia smaller" versus "this surgery will make me stop hating myself"). And I hate to say this, Concerned Dude, but there are plenty of women (and men too, of course) whose self-esteem problems really can be cleared right up with the proper application of surgical instruments. I hate to see people who undergo surgery, itself morally neutral and a personal choice, treated like brainwashed sheeple who could not possibly have had a good enough reason to go under the knife.

As for the nerve endings, while I was appalled to see this statement — There is no physiological association for sensory pleasure with the labia — that function is served by the clitoris. The only sensation elicited from labia is pain upon tearing or stretching. — on one of the surgeon’s sites, since it is obviously wrong and very condescending in that surgeon-y way as well, I think we have to concede that the labia are not the major, or even a major, route to sexual ecstasy for most women. A half-inch or so less here or there is not going to make much difference. Not that that’s any reason to go chopping them off, though, sheesh! L.A. Girl, don’t listen to your girlfriends. You’re fine. None of you knows enough yet about what men want, or, much more important, about what you want yourselves. Don’t change a thing!

Love,

Andrea

Don’t forget to read Andrea at Carnal Nation.com.

Get a dog

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May 6, 2009

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andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Readers:

The "Lonely Guy" responses are in:

I read the letter from Lonely Guy/Nice Guy and my thought is that he sounds kind of resentful and also like he wants to "get" a woman, which isn’t the same as wanting to meet women! Maybe they can tell. — Reader A

I wondered about that too. Not really liking women yet feeling compelled to seek them out (and resenting them for it) is a common pattern for straight men (and women with men; I’m not letting anyone off the hook here), but I don’t think that’s what’s going on with LG. I was reminded, though, of the way my husband used to wonder why he always had a girlfriend and at least another female or two waiting hopefully on the sidelines in case the current one got hit by a bus. There were cooler, smoother guys, he’d point out, and guys who looked more like George Clooney, so why him? After enough different women told him why — because he genuinely likes women — he finally believed us. Lonely Guy doesn’t seem like he dislikes women, and he does say he’s genuinely interested in what they have to say. My bet’s on not so comfortable with women but likes them fine. Next?

My GF and I were discussing our previous experiences dating. She sets some key criteria for the relationship she wants, and when she meets someone who meets them, she sticks with it. Of course, a deal-breaker could pop up, but she is not poised to run. My M.O. was always to bail at the slightest uncertainty. But when some stuff came up with us, she wouldn’t let me. As we’ve worked through it, we have built trust and grown closer. I know she’ll still be there tomorrow, and she knows I’ll be there too. I’m grateful that she wouldn’t let us quit. — Reader B

Actually a great point about dating in general, but not helpful to a guy who has somehow managed to get dumped by every woman he’s seen except the one who was for some reason an immensely inappropriate choice. Or do you think a serial dumpee can learn to "not let" dumping happen, as your girlfriend did with you?

My suspicion is your letter-writers lack a large network of friends, male or female. I’ve observed that people who can make friends have the easiest times getting dates. Even "boring" people can stop being boring if they develop interests they can share. When I was single, most of my dates were referrals from my social network. There is an old adage, "To have a friend, you have to be one." That sadly, must be the character flaw. — Reader C

Mmmkay. I think you’re right that having friends helps, on a practical level in that friends have friends, and probably on some sort of meta-level as well (Who saw the recent articles on how having friends, even if you don’t see them much, makes you live longer?). I was not precisely calling for people to pinpoint LG’s "character flaw" though, sheesh. Spot the flaw, win valuable prizes!

This guy spent 10 years in an unhappy relationship. I don’t think he knows what companionship really means. He also treats dating like a chore. He dates so he can … stop dating? If you are lonely, get a dog. — Reader D

Yes, LG, stop treating meeting women as the equivalent of cleaning out your vegetable drawer. Reader D is right. Once D added "get a dog" to Reader C’s suggestion about cultivating "interesting interests," though, my mind strayed to my favorite piece of dating advice ever, culled from a Mademoiselle article I read in college: "Walk an interesting dog." I have met many dogs since them, and often wondered which of them qualified as interesting enough.

I’ve never had any problem meeting women. Unlike LG, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been told I’m a nice guy, because people never tell me that. Is it true then, that women go for jerks? I don’t think so. People like me, and I’m not a jerk to women any more than I am to anyone else. I’m not attracted to doormats. What I do think is that people are attracted to confidence and are generally more interested in people who are interesting. You don’t have to be an asshole to be interesting, but maybe he has become such a good listener that the interesting things about him never even come across.

If he insists on using online dating, he should 1) try Chemistry.com instead of Match.com (look up Helen Fisher’s books), and 2) never write a profile describing himself as "nice." He should talk about hobbies or interests (if he doesn’t have any, he should get some, or at least get a dog), and 3) rent The Tao of Steve. — Reader E

Haha! OK, SG, get a life, or get a dog, and write a niceness-free profile. Reader E may be a jerk, but he gave the best answer.

Love,

Andrea

Don’t forget to read Andrea at Carnal Nation.com.

What do (people) want?

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April 28, 2009

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andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Andrea:
Have you heard of a study that analyzed biometric feedback from self-identified male bisexuals, and the notable finding was that the overwhelming majority of these men were in fact homosexual, not bisexual? The conclusion of the study was that "true" male bisexuality is extremely rare. (For what it’s worth, I consider myself a "true" male bisexual, but what do I know?)

I also heard about another study from at least 10 years ago that tracked the sexual fantasies of self-identified lesbians, and the surprising result was that some 50 percent of these women actually fantasized about men while doing it with their female partners.

Have you heard of these, and would you care to comment?
Love,

Actually Here!

Dear Here:

I have, of course, and they’re all fascinating, partly for the science (which is generally super-simple and not easily misinterpreted) and partly for the reactions in the various communities whenever one of these studies is reported, which are frankly pretty funny.

The "there’s no such thing as male bisexuality" studies have received the most press, and the biggest, most offended reactions, but it’s not like the researchers at Northwestern University and the Center for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto set out to disprove the existence of an entire sexual orientation! All they did was hook up some volunteers to a plethysmograph and show them porn. I think the first researchers were probably as surprised as anyone when the self-identified bi men failed to respond in a recognizably "bi" manner. About three-quarters of the bi men read as completely gay according to their penises (do penises lie?), while the rest were indistinguishable from the self-identified straight guys. There was no recognizable "bi" pattern of arousal, and the subjects seemed overwhelmingly to fall on one or the other end of the Kinsey scale:

Regardless of whether the men were gay, straight or bisexual, they showed about four times more arousal" to one sex or the other, said Gerulf Rieger… the study’s lead author.

So obviously, you think you exist but you’re wrong, Bi Guy!

Okay, no. What do I really think? I think, for one thing , it’s all funny since in my little bubble of not only San Francisco-ness but San Francisco sex educator-ness, fake bi guys who are actually straight but want hot bi chicks to think they’re cool way outnumber bi guys who are actually gay but closeted. Also, I do think you exist. Clearly truly bi men are rarer even than we thought, but I’m fairly certain that you are not a figment of your own or my imagination, and I think sexuality is a mite more complicated than penile plethysmography.

Another study, described here in a ScienceDaily article from 2003, and distinguished by including only people who identified as gay or straight, turned up more bisexual women than expected, but replicated earlier results where gay and straight (but not bi) men responded consistent with their self-identification: In contrast, both homosexual and heterosexual women showed a bisexual pattern of psychological as well as genital arousal. That is, heterosexual women were just as sexually aroused by watching female stimuli as by watching male stimuli.

The extraordinary article on female desire that ran in The New York Times Magazine (www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/magazine/25desire) introduced recent research by Meredith Chivers, who’s been following up on the research above with the added fillip of throwing some ape porn in the mix and requiring volunteers to report their own perceptions of their arousal levels, which proved wildly inaccurate: During shots of lesbian coupling, heterosexual women reported less excitement than their vaginas indicated; watching gay men, they reported a great deal less; and viewing heterosexual intercourse, they reported much more. Among the lesbian volunteers, the two readings converged when women appeared on the screen. But when the films featured only men, the lesbians reported less engagement than the plethysmograph recorded. Whether straight or gay, the women claimed almost no arousal whatsoever while staring at the bonobos.

Good to know!

As for the studies (self-reported behavior, no telemetry) that show a high percentage of self-described lesbians fantasizing about men while having lesbisex, eh. People fantasize about all kinds of things, particularly things they feel uncomfortable about. Are those women fake lesbians? The furthest I can go with that is to say that we’ve seen that women are much (so much!) more likely than men to be bisexual by attraction. I’m assuming that some of the women studied are physically attracted to both, but emotionally more attached to women ("Whom do you fall in love with?" is a hugely important but oft-neglected measure of sexual orientation) and some are into women but enjoy fantasies of committing unnatural acts with men. That some must be really not that into chicks but have chosen for whatever reason to live as lesbians is undeniable but just not that important. They wouldn’t be the first people to partner with someone not of their preferred gender, or the last, and their existence does not cast doubt on anyone else’s authenticity. Can anyone do that?

Love,

Andrea

Don’t forget to read Andrea at Carnal Nation.com.

I’m a lonely guy

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April 21, 2009

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andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Readers:

The letter from "Forty and Frustrated" a few weeks back got a lot of interest and at least one excellent suggestion (go out alone) from a woman who has had success following her own advice. Excellent! I also heard from "F&F’s" male counterpart (and no, sorry, I can’t match them up), and here’s what we’re going to do: We’re going to read this and figure out what’s wrong and come up with a better approach. Together. Here goes:

I’m a 44-year-old guy, single for most of my life. Aside from a 10-year relationship with someone I was not attracted to and got involved with for all the wrong reasons, I’ve never had a girlfriend. I have had a few flings, though none have lasted more than a month.

In the last year, I’ve had more than two dozen dates. All but two weren’t interested in seeing me again. The most recent split was particularly painful because she seemed to be the closest match for me yet. (She apparently felt otherwise.) It’s always the same pattern. There seems to be a strong initial attraction that quickly fades after a couple of weeks. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been told I’m a nice guy. I’m beginning to think that the few women who are interested enough to want to see me again eventually realize that I don’t have much else to offer, and lose interest. For the record, I’m healthy, fit, athletic. I have a life. I’m not aggressive, conceited, or rude. I like to think I’m a reasonably pleasant person to be around. I’m genuinely interested in what my date has to say. What am I doing wrong?

My profile on Match.com has had over 1,500 hits, I have yet to receive a single unsolicited e-mail. I’ve sent out nearly 500. I’ve had more than a few women write back, appearing interested, only to never hear from them again. When writing my profile, I made a concerted effort to not come across as pretentious or self-absorbed. I don’t have a checklist that’s a mile long. I included photos in which I’m smiling and one can clearly see my face. I would be thrilled to receive an e-mail from a woman who was interested enough to take the time to write one. I can’t speak for other guys, but having a woman ask me out on a date would be one of the most flattering things that could happen to me. And I’ve never backed out of a date at the last minute.

OK! The first thing that catches my eye is the admission, from someone who otherwise seems willing to acknowledge his own more saleable qualities, that he has "not much else to offer." Either this is evidence of a self-image badly enough distorted to cripple any attempts to connect meaningfully with women he might be interested in, or it’s true. If true, we had better hope it is fixable. What does it mean to "have something to offer"?

Well, what are those women looking for? They do want somebody solvent (did anyone else read the articles about chimpanzee chicks who have more sex with the chimp dudes who have more antelope meat?) and sane, but beyond that? Fun, yes; compatible sexually and otherwise, yes; but also, assuming he’s dating women in their 30s, a husband and kids. If women in their 40s, maybe just the former, but these days you never know. What they all probably want, though, is availability and commitment. If he is not signaling that these are on offer, and not going way too far in the other direction and offering them in his opening e-mail, he’d better get signaling, and fast.

I assume they would also like to know why he’s 44, never married, and so little-dated. He’s going to have to come up with a good spin on a sad tale. Not a lie, mind you, but a little polish.

It also occurs to me that he may be — and I hate to say this because I imagine him reading it and I shudder in empathy — boring. True, "nobody wants to date me" is not your most scintilutf8g subject and may not inspire the complainant to dazzling heights of witty word play, but come on. A little joke, some narrative flair, even a pun would help — and I hate puns. Lonely guy, spark it up. Maybe they’re not calling back because they fell asleep.

OK readers, your turn. Have at him. Female daters, would you answer his ad? And have you dated (some version of) this guy? What made you stop?

I recently bought both my kids T-shirts that say "When I Grow Up I’m Going To Save The World." (That these were available in the boys’ department only is an issue for another column.) I’m already grown up, and frankly, I don’t think I’m going to save the world, but hey, let’s save this guy.

What would it take to get him a date?

Love,

Andrea

Don’t forget to read Andrea at Carnal Nation.com.

Parts is parts

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April 15, 2009

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andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Parts is parts

Dear Readers:

These are perennial body parts questions, and I feel I would be somewhat remiss if I didn’t re-answer them every few years. Here are some that have been hanging around waiting for me.

Love,

Andrea

Dear Andrea:

I once tried for half an hour putting my index finger about two inches inside my girlfriend’s vagina, pressing with a "come hither motion" and simultaneously pressing the mound from outside. Unfortunately my partner did not experience any extra pleasure. Maybe I have to try again and again?
Love,

Willing

Dear Will:

Yes, yes, very funny. I’m not entirely sure what she was experiencing, but from your phrasing, which could have been cut and pasted from any one of a thousand how-to Web sites, I think you may have been proceeding a bit by rote there. Rather than printing out some stranger’s directions, how about following hers?

There are plenty of women who don’t have much of the spongy erectile tissue surrounding the urethra and the front of the vagina that we’ve come, for convenience’s sake, to call the G-spot. These women can lie there all day receiving simultaneous come-hither motions and external pressure and only manage to get kind of annoyed with you. If your girlfriend is one of them, I would not suggest "trying again and again" unless you want her to lean forward and swat the top of your head with the TV remote.

You can probably determine whether she is G-spot enabled by letting her guide you. Since the G-spot is, inconveniently, not actually a "hot button," but a collection of tissues sensitive to the touch under certain but not all circumstances, I cannot tell you exactly how to operate it. I’d start once she’s already well turned-on, though, and without impatience or, indeed, goal-orientation. Just kind of slip in there when things are already going well and keep your eyes on her face while you try a little deeper or a little closer in, a little harder and a little softer, a little … oh, you get the picture.

Love,

Andrea

Dear Andrea:

My penis is curved a little. Is that normal, and if not what can I do to straighten it?

Love,

Upwards

Dear Up:

Nothing! Do not do anything! Some curvatures are caused by a previous injury that heals but puts a hitch in the sheath of sausage-casing-like material that encases the spongy, sausage-like corpora cavernosa, the working parts of your penis. I don’t think that’s what happened to you, but if you want to find out how a devastating penis fracture heals, try unbending it.

Yours probably was just made that way. If we were all made in God’s image, some of God’s avatars would have a dick just like yours. Worry not, and if you have a chance check out some G-spot toys, if the curve looks familiar, boy are you in luck.

Love,

Andrea

Dear Andrea:

I am just a big chicken! How come I am afraid of sticking my finger inside of me? It just terrifies me for some reason, and I refuse to stick anything inside of me ’cause I am just so afraid!!

Love,

Chicken

Dear Chick:

I’m going to assume you are a teenager, in which case it’s pretty normal. Not only do we hear a ton about how it might hurt and bleed (and, indeed, it might), this is the inside of your body. That is, emotionally speaking, some heavy stuff. We spend our very early childhood learning the limits of our bodies — where we stop and other people begin, what goes in and what comes out. It is no small trick to relearn boundaries later and start letting new things in new places.

Take it easy, take it slow, and maybe try with something smaller, like a Q-Tip and see how that goes. Also, take a mirror and see where it’s going. Either you will learn that there is more room than you thought, or you won’t. If there’s a hymen there it will be more complicated, but it’s still meant to let things in. Just let them in on your own terms, at your own pace.

Love,

Andrea

Dear Andrea:

My wife’s ex was a "big" guy, and she only mentioned this to me while trying to reassure me that she likes having sex with me more. I don’t believe her, though. Now all I can think about is how he was bigger than me and whether she misses that.
Love,

Average Joe

Dear Joe:

Just imagine telling her all the time how you can’t stop comparing yourself to her ex, who is out of the picture, and anyway she loves you and would rather have sex with you. How does that sound? See? Now cut it out. She was telling you the truth, as you perfectly well know.

Love,

Andrea

Don’t forget to read Andrea at Carnal Nation.com.

Oprah begs for mercy

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April 8, 2009

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andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Readers:

"Oprah begs for mercy" sounds so much like the title of one of the S/M fantasy stories you can read online that I just couldn’t resist it, but honestly, read this:

Dr. Berman: … and this is a little holster that the guy can wear so this goes around his penis.

Oprah: Oh, please.

Dr. Berman: Yeah. Around his penis for hands-free clitoral stimulation during intercourse.

Oprah: OK. You have just crossed the line with me.

Dr. Berman: OK. Are you ready?

Oprah: No, you have crossed the line with me. I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.

Dr. Berman: All right, look. Here is the penis. (Makes shadow-puppet gesture.)

Oprah: I swear. I’m not ready for it. I’m not ready. I’m not ready for it. No. I am not ready for it. Let’s move on.

The doctor is Laura Berman of the Berman Institute in Los Angeles, where, between Laura’s therapy and her urologist sister Jennifer’s research, anyone female with enough money and not enough orgasms can get her bits seen to. They do excellent work. I’d be tempted to go myself out of curiosity if I lived more southerly and had more money and less doctor-phobia. Doesn’t Laura, usually so nice, seem to be getting something of a kick out of playing "torture the media mogul" there, though?

Funny, actually, since these appearances on The Oprah Winfrey Show have sold gazillions of her vibrators and carried Berman’s name, credentials, and well-tended features with them into bed with viewers nationwide and further.

These are mostly not the penis-mounted marital aides the doctor is describing above, but the Berman Center brand’s workhorse, the Aphrodite. It’s a Magic Wand-type rechargeable nicknamed "the sure thing." How sure a thing is it, and is there anything about it that should automatically win the trust of an audience presumably tuning in more for makeovers, lifestyle tips, and celebrity gossip than for "Look, Oprah, here’s the penis … ?"

I’ve been getting floods of press releases for new toys meant for a mass audience of sex-toy newbies (it’s almost always the Aphrodite — good press that Goddess gets) and I politely reply that I’d be happy to examine one but they’ll have to send me something, and I finally found satisfaction. The Earth did not move, but MyPleasure.com, the rather sober-sided, therapy-oriented sex toy store that acts as Berman’s sales outlet, sent me a selection of hot new gear, including the Aphrodite.

I have to admit that my initial reaction to the Goddess of Desire’s pleasure wand was not "Oh, oh, oh!" but simply, "Oh." It is a dull opaque purple and quite large — a lot of purple — and not much to look at. (Check out the industrial design at Jimmy Jane or Lelo for contrast, or wait till they show up in MOMA’s permanent design collection.) I set it to charge and went away and forgot about it till deadline, at which point I discovered that the vaunted infrared feature does not work on the "high" setting, which seems like kind of a cheat. Does the vibrator itself (a large round head on an articulated neck with three interchangeable silicone sleeves) work? Yes. Yes, it does.

I am not at all convinced that it’s enough better than anything else to cure an Oprah viewers’ anorgasmia all on its own merits. Rather, I bet it’s the Aphrodite’s innate vibey goodness combined with Dr. Berman’s cred and that of the kind of sexy-sounding Dr. Sandor Gardoz, MyPleasure’s resident sexologist, plus Oprah herself, combined with the awareness that thousands of other relatable married-with-children afternoon TV watchers are using it too, that’s causing (or allowing) all the orgasms. It’s an excellent beginner’s vibrator, but I seriously do believe that a lot of those women are finally getting off with this one because so many other women are. If you think about it, this is sort of revolutionary in a way that the feminist-ish sex toy industry has been claiming but not quite earning for quite some time.

I also received an unpleasantly mauve (I sense a theme here) and flowery but otherwise nice-looking insertable thing called, redundantly, Blissful Pleasures, which is very pleased with itself for having five settings — but several of these are literally snore-y, taking long, slow breaths before revving up again, which … yawn.

And there was a "Liv" from Lelo, the gorgeousness people. It is indeed gorgeous, slim and curvy in princess pink with chrome and iPod white accents. It also has a click wheel like an iPod, though, and a learning curve as well as a G-spot one, and I am not entirely sure that it likes me. I think it would make a great gift for a geeky femme with a lot of time on her hands, but it seems a bit high-maintenance — and also, it turned itself off. This is a sex toy’s equivalent of getting up to take a phone call, and it will not be forgiven lightly.

The homely therapeutic model would never do you like that.

Love,

Andrea

Don’t forget to read Andrea at Carnal Nation.com.

Cave woman

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March 18, 2009

0

› andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Andrea:

I’m ready to go live in a cave. It’s been two years since I’ve dated. Partly I backed off from the scene, and partly I’m not receiving much interest. I think I’m smart, approachable, creative, "together," nice, and passably cute. It’s starting to affect my self-confidence.

I joined eHarmony ($120!) and nerve.com, solicited friends’ input on my profiles, and followed up on every match. I got one eHarmony date (great but not local) and rarely heard back from anyone. I try to e-mail one guy a day. Either they don’t answer or our communication peters out soon after I e-mail. The ones who really get me seem very interested, ask me out, then drop it when I accept.

Why? Is this a Mars/Venus thing? Maybe online just isn’t my venue? I do several activities that attract single guys, but haven’t led to much — except maybe embarrassment on my part when I show interest and get a brush-off. Maybe try going through friends again? That worked in the past.

I just turned 40 and would like a partner. Mostly I’ve been solo, and that really sucks.
Love,

Forty & Frustrated

Dear F&F:

Before you go live in a cave, you might consider something a little less drastic, like living in a smaller, less brutally competitive city far from the coasts. It’s an idea.

Barring that, we have to subject your online interactions to the scrutiny of a girlfriend panel. Ideally these would be your girlfriends — they could make far more specific suggestions, like lose that mullet or stop telling everyone about your rectal fistula. But if you don’t have a panel, you can borrow mine. I convened one for you.

Irina: The phenomenon of guys initiating and then vanishing as soon as you try to make a date is very familiar, and probably has nothing to do with her. I could theorize all day, but when it comes down to it, they’re not ready to actually connect with people, so fuck ’em. Next!

Also, she should try free sites, like okcupid.com, which may attract guys who are more open to chicks who initiate. She should stay involved in the activities, and of course hit up her friends if that worked in the past. But she could still go online if she can let go of some of her frustration. Maybe see it as just one more tool to increase her odds of meeting guys.

Myrna: I wonder if there’s some kind of smoking-gun thing in her appearance or self-presentation that’s causing this. Maybe her desperation is showing? As far as the real-life men go, the guys may be panicking when she comes on to them, so if she doesn’t think her mutual attraction radar is good, maybe don’t do that.

Leanne: God help us all, she’s 40.

Andrea: Right, but we have seen that 40 is not an automatic dating death sentence. Also, what about the disappearing-act dudes? I assume they’ve all gone off with hotter-sounding properties, but I wonder what makes those other properties so hotter-sounding.

Lucilla: I’m fat, in my 40s, rural, and follow a weird religion — guys should be thin on the ground for me. Yet I’ve had a good many dates recently before settling on one gentleman. I also got rejected or given the silent treatment by dozens of guys. I tried to project positivity and hope, and used words like "passionate" to indicate, discretely, that I like sex. In pictures I was smiling and had my hair down. And another vote for okcupid — free and has lots of activities where you can participate and get to know people without pressure. Also Craigslist, although you have to wade through lots of awful guys to get to the good ones. As for why guys don’t follow up: They’re not into you, they’re not really committed to finding someone, or they’re married. Or all three.

Ruby: There is also a possible picker problem. My rule for online dating is "look for normal."

Andrea: I like that! FF, I do think men and women approach this a bit differently. You’re taking the rejections too personally — a lot of those guys are answering every new ad that appears. They don’t know you, so they aren’t rejecting you. Stick with the online dating if it’s at least a tiny bit fun, but pursue the circle of friends options — all the research says that we basically marry ourselves, so hang out where you already hang out, but more so. Get as much feedback as you can about your personal presentation. (Note: this is does not mean criticize every aspect of your body and find it wanting. I mean, do you seem fun, clean, sane, and at least passably light on baggage?)

You are NOT more likely to get hit by lightning while suffering a terrorist attack than you are to marry after 40. There’s nothing wrong with spending a little time alone in a cave recuperating right now if that’s what you need, though. It’s rough out there.
Love,
Andrea

Don’t forget to read Carnal Nation (carnalnation.com) for more Andrea and other cool stuff.

Shokushu Goukan!

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March 10, 2009

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Dear Readers:

It’s a dull, drippy week in California and when the weather gets like this a writer’s fancy turns to tentacles.

Manifestly untrue, I know, but mine did. Recently while researching something else (the famous Sybian ride-on sex toy, the one whose dealer claims it will "cause a female to literally explode on it" — I hate it when that happens!) I came upon a repository of tentacle porn, and boy did that take me back. Once upon a time I had somehow managed never to hear of tentacle porn until one night when I was hanging out with my friend Annalee Newitz, the high tech high-weirdness expert and she was all, "Oh, blah blah blah this weird thing and that weird thing and tentacles" and I was all, "Wait, what was that last thing again?"

It’s tentacle porn. It’s Japanese. Extremely Japanese. Innocent schoolgirl types, drawn anime/hentai fashion with giant eyes and giant boobs and teensy little bodies clad in teensy little schoolgirl uniforms, until they’re not, get non-consensually multipenetrated by … tentacles. How did you think that sentence was going to end?

Anyway, I got the idea and I stored it away and brought it out occasionally to amuse or shock people and I totally forgot I’d still never seen any myself until I went looking for something else and somehow stumbled over the tentacles (another "I hate it when that happens" thing) and it all came back to me.

It’s the dullest thing ever. I’d seen enough hentai (anime porn) to expect this (it tends to be weirdly slow and standardized and repetitive and badly dubbed). It’s not the easiest sort of porn to project yourself into, even for a person who likes porn more than I do. And that’s the stuff without tentacles. The odd thing about the tentacles, beyond the fact that they exist at all (they were invented to get around restrictions on depictions of non-tentacular intercourse), is that they are so … uninspired. They never seem to be attached to an interesting monster with any motivations besides rape, and they have a very limited repertoire of sexual acts. They’re very "bad teenage date" — stick it in, stick it in, stick it in, but unlike a bad teenage date, they can do all the sticking-in at the same time. Whoopty-do.

Here’s what I do like about tentacle porn:

1) Making fun of it has turned into a sort of online cottage industry, and if you look around you can find some hilarious examples, like the grumpy beasties at Ghastly’s Ghastly Comic: Tentacle Monsters and the Women Who Love Them (www.ghastlycomic.com) who are offended that anyone might think they’d commit an act of "bestiality." See also "How To Avoid Tentacle Rape" (uncyclopedia.wikia.com/wiki/HowTo:Avoid_tentacle_rape) or Dwight Schrute’s blog (www.nbc.com/The_Office/dwights-blog/2008/05/the-curious-rise-of-tentacle-sex-in-manga).

I think Cthulhu might like it, and whatever keeps Cthulhu happy … It has its own soda (www.tentaclegrape.com).

Love,

Andrea

Dear Andrea:

I found some very weird porn on my boyfriend’s computer (I swear I wasn’t snooping!) It’s bondage stuff with Japanese girls and really, I don’t know what’s going on. He’s never even mentioned an interest in anything like this! Does he want to tie me up? (Not my thing.) Does he wish I was Japanese? Help!
Love,

Tall, blonde, not tied up

Dear Blondie:

I‘m sorry! I don’t believe you weren’t snooping, mind you, but I’m still sorry. Please don’t take this too much to heart, though. Boys will be boys, and boys will look at bondage porn.

You have two ways to go here. The first is to ask him about it and (probably) feel better when he (probably) insists that he likes you just the way you are, and if he wanted a Japanese bondage girl he would have tried to date them back when he was dating, and he’s sorry he freaked you out. The second is to just shrug and go about your business. I do kind of have a preference for the latter, but I will understand if you can’t let it go and feel like you have to confront.

Just practice telling yourself that fantasy is fantasy and reality is reality and many people harbor fantasies they not only can’t act out, but wouldn’t even want to given the opportunity. Make sure you believe this yourself before you confront him. Otherwise your skepticism is sure to show, and he will get defensive and end up accusing you of not trusting him and going through his stuff — and that is not somewhere you want to be. See why I’d pick the second option, assuming you gave me ultimate power over your decision-making processes?

What? No, I don’t have creepy power fantasies about running your life, but even if I did I wouldn’t tell you about them, and I’d thank you not to go looking for them on my computer.

Love,

Andrea

Don’t forget to read Carnal Nation (carnalnation.com) for more Andrea and other cool stuff.

An interesting turn

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March 3, 2009

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Dear Andrea:

I am a 39-year-old straight woman having the time of my life with sex. I have two questions for you.

First, my current somewhat exclusive (28-year-old hottie — irrelevant, I’m just braggin’) sex partner and I both know that nothing that touches the anus should then touch the vagina without washing first. However, sometimes in the course of, well, intercourse, it accidentally happens, whether an accidental brush with the anus during vaginal intercourse from the back, or an accidental penetration of the vagina during anal intercourse. Is there anything that can be done to prevent weird vaginal consequences when this happens? Douche? If so what kind would be best?

Other question: My current SESP has a rather large penis (braggin’ again) with a downward bend. This makes vaginal intercourse doggy style AMAZING, but every other position from the front that we’ve tried pretty painful. Any suggestions for positions we may not have thought of that would benefit from this kink in the dink?

Love,

Ouchie

Dear Ouch:

Excellent bragging! And who could blame you?

The anus/vagina question is eternal and vexing and probably (thankfully) somewhat blown out of proportion. There is of course a subset of women (heavily correlated with that subset of women who e-mail columnists who offend them, as it happens) who have vaginas like the princess and the pea, except the pea is anything and everything that could possibly cause a vaginal infection, and the princess is a vagina. So, pace the prolifically e-mailing vaginas, who shouldn’t be taking my advice on this, many or really most vaginas simply aren’t that delicate. You should try to avoid cross-contamination, of course you should, but as long as you stick with the front-to-back wipe and other basic common-sensical hygienic measures, honestly, you’ll be fine. Has anything bad happened yet? How long have you been back-to-fronting with this wow-that’s-young-but-hey-good-for-you hot guy, anyway?

The accidental brushing-up against I imagine must happen in so many acts of intercourse that if it were a likely route to infection we’d all be … well, ew. There’s no funny, clever way to describe the state of suffering from bacterial vaginosis. Let’s just not be.

Your other accidental exposure, the "it just slipped in" part, though: really? This I don’t think I’ve ever even heard before, that he’d be going about his anal business and accidentally perform vaginal intromission now and then. That doesn’t sound like such a great idea (although, again, have you had any problems?) but I think it could be avoided. Ask him to pay attention! Maybe he could use a hand as a sort of vestibule-guard (a doorman, if you will), or you could use yours. Maybe one of you could adjust an angle to make it less likely. Maybe you could, I dunno, insert a small device to block the entrance, which could be fun anyway?

My best advice after "don’t do that," though, is just to keep everything clean. Wash before (not douche, just wash). Wash after. Pee a lot. Cleanliness is next to, well, possibly not godliness in this case, but certainly UTIlessness. If you don’t believe me, you can ask a porn star. I was looking around for one to quote on this and found one I happen to know personally (although not that personally), being interviewed at my very own home paper. It’s Lorelei Lee, in the Bay Guardian‘s sex blog www.sfbg.com/blogs/sexsf/2009/02/ask_a_porn_star: "Shower immediately after every shoot," Lorelei says. "We are probably some of the cleanest people you know. That said, sometimes we do get UTIs or yeast infections or BV, in which case we go to the doctor like everyone else. Not too sexy, but not the end of the world either."

So there you have it. Take a shower. Take two.

Now, about your bendy guy. That’s really funny, since people who talk about women’s sexual anatomy and response (that would be me) are forever pointing out that you can have things stuck up there all your life and never have an orgasm from it because that spot, you know the one, just doesn’t get enough attention unless the penetrative device has a bend in it. Fingers (crooked) work. Purpose-made toys work. That thing most obviously intended for penetrative purposes, though, that just doesn’t work. Except when it does! You’re having the time of your life? Isn’t that good enough? I’m sorry, but there really is no other fix. Your fella’s may bend, but it doesn’t want to bend back. You don’t want to be responsible for what could happen if you try to bend it back. So I think you’re going to have to count your blessings and stick with what works. At least, in your case, it works very well indeed, and that is so much better than it works for so many other couples that all I can say is keep that guy; you’d miss him.

Love,

Andrea

Check out Andrea’s new column "Now What?" in the cool new sex zine Carnal Nation (carnalnation.com). Catch Andrea’s workshop "Is There Sex After Baby?" at Recess Urban Recreation (recessurbanrecreation.com ) March 30. Andif you have wondered about San Francisco Sex Information’s famous sex educator trainings but never did anything about it, here’s your chance. Classes start soon. Info and registration at sfsi.org.

Three-way the free way

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February 17, 2009

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Dear Andrea: My boyfriend and I have talked about doing a threesome with another woman — I’m actually the one who really wants to, but he does too. Since we can’t think of anyone we know who would work, we are thinking of placing a classified ad online. I’ve never done anything like this before, and was just wondering if you have any advice, like how to make it go smoothly and not be weird. Also, do you really think dental dams are necessary to make sure we don’t get diseases from her? I am excited but also a bit nervous.

Love,

Three’s Company

Dear Three:

How … refreshing? The threesome idea usually seems to originate with the guy and have a whole lot to do with his "two chicks" fantasies and very little to do with the chicks in question, so they end up putting on a half-hearted show based on porn scenes they’ve watched, often also half-heartedly. Way to have some half-hearted sex, and often a big fight afterwards, especially if the guy manages to enjoy himself too much despite all the half-heartedness. Of course there’ll be an even bigger fight if you enjoy yourself too much and he doesn’t, which has been known to happen, so you might want to talk this through together a whole bunch before you do anything.

We would now be moving on to the safer sex part, but I’m a bit distracted by my lack of faith in your — or anyone’s — chances of finding an appealing, willing girl online you won’t have to pay. It’s a seller’s market out there,and hot girls who want to have a threesome are rarely reduced to combing Craig’s List for takers. All they really have to do is get into the habit of making goofy jokes about threesomes every time they hang out with their more attractive partnered friends, especially when there’s drinking involved. Things happen. In fact, most group sex that actually happens just happens. The "exhaustive plans were made" kind does exist, of course, but more often there’s some drinking and goofing around and some dancing and maybe a game of Truth or Dare or something stupid like that, and … things happen.

So. Are you absolutely sure you don’t know someone? Group sex is not only more likely to happen among friends than with strangers secured for the purpose, it’s also more likely to be both safe and — let’s not forget this part — fun. If there’s no chance, like because all your friends went to church camp with you and you’re positive you’re the only ones who’ve acquired new interests since then, how about making new friends? Join an erotic writing circle or go to readings or take some classes at the local nice dildo store. Go to the edgiest nightclub in your area for Fetish Night. Most of the people you are likely meet at these things will either be deadly dull or extremely yucky, but not all! I used to go to stuff like that, and I met some nutty folks but made some … friends too. Remember the old song: "Make new friends, but keep the o-o-ld. One is silver, and the others will have sex with you."

Now let’s say that works (or doesn’t, but against all odds you find an appealing prospect on Craig’s List), do you have to use dental dams? Absolutely not, but that’s because they hardly work and are horrible. You will certainly want to use condoms (and so will she — not wanting to, under these circumstances, would be a crazy-person warning sign). You could use plastic wrap for licking things, or not. Going down on girls is never ever going to be a good method for contracting or spreading HIV, but you probably don’t want to either get herpes or spread any herpes you may already have, so you’ll either have to not do anything that brings a lot of wet parts in contact (unlikely), use plastic wrap, or rely on a pre-interview, trust, intuition, and Purell in whatever combination feels right to you. I wish I could tell you exactly what your risks will be, but barring the acquisition of a long-distance, anonymity-breaching virus-detection gun (and what would I pay for one of those), I just can’t.

As for advice on how to make it go smoothly and not be weird, well, it IS weird. But choose someone sympatico, someone with whom you can discuss both what might happen and what just did happen. Give everyone the explicit power to halt proceedings for any reason at any point. Have a drink but not six, and agree ahead of time no hard feelings all the way around if it doesn’t go perfectly. Expect it not to go perfectly. This experience may bear a superficial resemblance to porn, but porn is so … porny. You should expect real life to be bumpier, less predictable and, one hopes, more fun.

Love,

Andrea

Andrea is teaching Sex After Parenthood at Day One Center (www.dayonecenter.com), Recess (info@recessurbanrecreation.com), and privately. Contact her at andrea@altsexcolumn.com for more info.

Heterosexuality on parade

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February 11, 2009

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Dear Andrea:

During sexual intercourse, what techniques can the woman do with her vagina to make sex feel really good for the man?

Love,

Trixie

Dear Trix:

Why is this question making me laugh? I’m afraid it might be — I’m almost positive it is — the indelibly etched sequence from an early South Park episode, the one where Winona Ryder shoots ping-pong balls … well, maybe you had to have been there. But it’s making me laugh, anyway.

So, what can you do with your vagina that doesn’t involve ping-pong balls? You do know you don’t have to do all that much, right, since the vagina is pretty much already designed evolved to feel good to penises? Unless there is a terrible size mismatch (in either direction, but I was thinking small M/big F), the man is not likely to have too many complaints. Aside from that, oddly, the answer actually is the ping-pong ball trick, or pretty near. Those Patpong ping-pong girls and their sisters, who made that sort of thing famous, were developing their pubococcygeus and associated muscles, doing the famous Kegel exercises. I think Kegels may be overrated — they are good for a lot, but the way they get written up you’d think they could reverse global warming, revive Britney Spears’ career (well, they might could do that), and figure out what to do about Gaza, all on their own. They can’t really do any of those things, but if you develop a whole lotta muscle tone down there, you can perform a modest version of the ping-pong trick and pleasantly surprise a boyfriend. You can add extra lube, you can try that warming stuff, you can play with ice, but mostly what you’re going to be doing is squeezing and releasing to various tempos and with varying degrees of pressure. Other than that, I’m afraid there just aren’t that many tricks the old girl can get up to. I mean, it can juggle, sort of, and do a good approximation of the squirting-flower joke, but it can’t spin plates or do a triple lutz or make an elephant disappear. And if it can make an elephant disappear, I’d really rather not hear about it.

Love,

Andrea

Dear Andrea:

Are there things I can do with my penis that will make sex feel better for my girlfriend? It’s good now, but I was wondering what could make it even better.

Love,

Eager Student

Dear Stu:

Well, look at that: a matched set! It’s like Noah’s ark, where the animals march in by twosies-twosies. What, you never sang that song at camp?

Sure, there are penis tricks, but you have to keep in mind that penises have many more unsatisfied customers than vaginas, so of course they would have to work harder. Unfortunately, most of those unsatisfied customers are not going to be satisfied by any sitting up and begging or rolling over you can teach your penis to do, because they need more and different kinds of stimulation than that sort of tricksiness is ever going to produce. There are a bunch of alignment techniques you can try, all which are aimed at giving her something to rub on — your pelvic bone is the best bet. Try a pillow under her butt, for starters. And try doggie-style with as much strong, forward pressure as you can muster. Until such time as your penis sprouts strategically placed knobs and spines, though (I saw that movie!), there is only so much it can do. This is why men (and dildo-wearing partners of whatever sex, come to think of it, although their penises often do sport strategic knobbies and such) frequently use fingers both inside and out, or apply other forms of technology you can get from catalogs. There have always been ringy-things with knobs and loony-looking Seussian things sold as "French ticklers," but the variety and ingenuity of some of the current designs is nothing short of breathtaking — and that’s just from looking at the pictures.

There’s also this fact, which always feels like a faint betrayal of the sisterhood to mention, but since it’s the truth and there are options, it’s kind of silly not to: lots of women will never come during intercourse, and lots of those don’t really mind as long as they get to at some point during the proceedings. So you can work on making it enjoyable/more enjoyable/extremely enjoyable, and your efforts will be appreciated but not necessarily pay off in the way you’d expect. Some women prefer the application of fingers, mouths, or devices (in combo or sequence) before the penis/vagina part, and some after. For some women, intercourse is foreplay. For others it’s afterplay all the way. You can’t guess, so you’d do well to ask or risk just annoying someone.

Love,

Andrea

Andrea is teaching Sex After Parenthood at Day One Center (www.dayonecenter.com), Recess (info@recessurbanrecreation.com), and privately. Contact her at andrea@altsexcolumn.com for more info.

A pox

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February 4, 2009

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Dear Andrea:

I went for a test and the nurse found a genital wart. I have had more than 20 sexual partners and enjoy casual sex occasionally, but I always use condoms (plus the pill, just in case). I feel embarrassed, like I’ve been irresponsible, but I thought I was protecting myself thoroughly. How can I get over this and feel OK about sex again? And are there ways to keep from getting another wart?

Love,

Dirtied

Dear Andrea:

I just found out I have a genital wart. It’s a really small bump that could have been there awhile without me noticing. I’ve had it treated with freezing and have cream to apply to it; but I’ve been doing research and I keep getting conflicting information about how long it will last, whether any kind of sex is safe while it’s still there, how infectious it is, and what to do if it doesn’t go away.

I feel gross and dirty about it. I always use condoms and I don’t know where I could have gotten it. To make matters worse, I have a new boyfriend who doesn’t seem to have noticed anything wrong. Now that I’ve found out about this, I am dreading telling him. Help!

Love,

Sullied

Dear Andrea:

I found out I have HPV and I don’t even know how I …

Dear Warty Readers:

OK! We have found some warts. Until someone claims to have acquired them on purpose, or to have been accidentally exposed but really stoked about it, I will assume that everyone is feeling kind of miserable and a little soiled and having a hard time coming to terms with it. This is completely understandable. Indeed, it is expected. Having an infectious disease which may affect your ability to find happiness with other human beings would certainly be harsh enough; the whole STD thing adds insult to injury.

Personally, I think STDs need an image makeover. Syphilis never seemed to shock anyone in Elizabethan literature, but everyone was poxy then anyway, not to mention smelly. We’ve had centuries of crass jokes and shame campaigns since, though: a kind of cumulative shaming which no public health department’s "it could happen to anyone" message is going to be able to alleviate. Of course you feel bad.

I would hope — I would wish, anyway — that normalization would help. This shit is everywhere! I usually go to the CDC’s site for STD statistics. Here are their latest on HPV:

Approximately 20 million Americans are currently infected with HPV, and another 6.2 million people become newly infected each year. At least 50 percent of sexually active men and women acquire genital HPV infection at some point in their lives.

That’s a lot of people feeling shamed and dirty. Maybe it’s time to just accept that the disease is out there, it’s easy to get, and even the most cautious (well, the second-most cautious; the first-most cautious stay home and order their groceries over the Internet) can contract it. Having HPV doesn’t say a thing about your self-respect, your hygiene, or anything much beyond your native level of luckiness. For the record, the CDC’s "how not to get HPV" advice is not all that helpful:

… even people with only one lifetime sex partner can get HPV, if their partner was infected with HPV. For those who are not in long-term, mutually monogamous relationships, limiting the number of sex partners and choosing a partner less likely to be infected may lower the risk of HPV. Partners less likely to be infected include those who have had no or few prior sex partners.

While safety-by-partner-choice really does work, it sure does limit the choice of potential partners, from amazing abundance (in the big cities, assuming minimum levels of datability) to one of those measly little prix-fixe menus which never have any desserts except crème brûlée. What if you don’t want inexperienced partners?

Here’s the deal: none of you was being irresponsible. The virus got transmitted not through but around the condom, which did reduce the likelihood of transmission. Your immune system may clear it (rendering you disease-free) or it may not, in which case you may always be contagious from the area of the wart. Treating the warts won’t cure you, but may lower the chance of transmission, which may in turn help to make you feel less leper-like and more like your old self. Oh, and lest we forget, visible warts are the good kind of HPV! The ones that cause cervical cancer are invisible, the bastards.

Now for the bad part — you do have to tell people. You have to tell potential sex partners. You may lose some, but people who are really interested are likely to stick around. You have to tell the boyfriend. Since you just found out, you can’t be accused of withholding important information. Normalize for him, and bring up the CDC’s statistics (50 percent! How’s that for company?). Get treated. Take deep breaths.

Love,

Andrea

Contact Andrea at andrea@altsexcolumn.com for more info.

The recipe

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January 28, 2009

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Dear Readers:

A few weeks ago, while I was writing about the sensation created by the release of the "bonding hormone" oxytocin at orgasm, I attracted the attention of a dear friend and major geek, whom we will call Bill. His wife is, um, Bachael. "Bachael and I have long been fans of the "warm gooey" feelings (as you so aptly described them) created by sex," wrote Bill. "Turns out: you can get these feelings from your partner cooking you a really, really good meal, too. Who knew?"

"Oh yeah?" I responded. "Is there research?"

So he sent this:

R___g, B., "The Way to a Man’s Heart: Field Trial of a New Stuffing Recipe," Journal of Warm Gooey Feelings, Vol. 12, No. 11, November 2008, p. 23.

Abstract:

Subject (n=1, a 43-year-old domesticated male) was conditioned with ethanol and fed an experimental diet consisting of stuffing and baked chicken to examine changes in behavior and neurochemistry. The chicken diet had been previously tested on the subject with good results but the stuffing was novel to this laboratory and was created as published in [1]. During the course of the experiment the subject was heard to make auditory noises commonly associated with sexual pleasure and exhibited "clingy" behavior toward his mate. Subject then exhibited postprandial narcolepsy and went to sleep at 8:15 p.m. while muttering endearments to his wife.

[1] "Italian Chard Stuffing", Sunset, November 2008, p. 79.

Hey. I thought it was funny. You don’t have to. Bill also sent along a New York Times article (www.nytimes.com/2008/11/24/us/24sex.html) which I had read and meant to get to. It was about a pastor in Texas who assigned his married parishioners seven days of warm gooeyness: the Rev. Young, an author, a television host and the pastor of the evangelical Fellowship Church, issued his call for a week of "congregational copulation" among married couples Nov. 16, while pacing in front of a large bed. Sometimes he reclined on the paisley coverlet while flipping through a Bible, emphasizing his point that it is time for the church to put God back in the bed.

Since I don’t believe in God, I ought to find the idea of tucking up under the covers with him no more discomfiting than cuddling up with the Easter Bunny or Harvey or any other invisible rabbit, and yet I do. Then again, if you’re comfortable with making room for invisible rabbits or comfortably capable of ignoring that part of the plan, the pastor is indubitably right. More sex does make for more intimacy, which does make for a better marriage or marriage-equivalent (you’ll notice that the latter is not included in the prescription).

"If you’ve said ‘I do,’ do it," Young said. As for single people, he said, "I don’t know, try eating chocolate cake." Lame, if you ask me. But, of course, it is not the job of a pastor in Texas to address the relationship-maintenance issues of the sin-living and the homo-sekshual. It’s mine, though, and at the risk of pointing out the tediously obvious, the same goes for all persons of coupledom.

The article cannot help but mention two books I’d been meaning to get to, 365 Nights and Just Do It, competing memoirs by members of married couples who agreed to have sex every night for a specified period (a solid year for the Mullers and 101 days for the Browns). Both couples claim that getting a book out of it never crossed their minds at first, and despite my generally jaundiced view of people who relate the super-intimate details of their lives on daytime TV, I do believe them. It’s tempting but probably unfair to lump the Browns and the Mullers in with stunt-memoirists like A.J. Jacobs, who first read the entire Encyclopedia Britannica and then followed every commandment in the Bible for a year, or Morgan Spurlock, who did the gross stunt with the McDonalds diet. Especially when considering that Jacobs shaved his beard and went back to wearing mixed fibers (and forgot most of what he learned from the encyclopedia), and Spurlock de-Supersized himself and shudders when he passes the Golden Arches, both the Browns and Mullers report greater intimacy and more (although, of course, also less) sex in the aftermath of their experiment. The Browns also reported being really, really tired.

Both books and all the participants may be eminently mockable (the couples are extremely perky and it’s easy to imagine them singing medleys of Christmas songs while wearing matching turtlenecks), but they are not stupid, and it’s not so easy to mock the results. And while I will never get a book contract for Twice a Week, OK?: The Warm-Gooeyness Method Will Save Your Relationship, I can at least try to sell it here. Hell, I may try it myself. But if I do, you won’t hear about it.

Love,

Andrea

Andrea is teaching Sex After Parenthood at Day One Center (www.dayonecenter.com), Recess (info@recessurbanrecreation.com), and privately. Contact her at andrea@altsexcolumn.com for more info.

Emily Postfeminist

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January 20, 2009

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Andrea is on vacation. Check out this column originally published Jan. 3, 2007.

Dear Andrea:

Recently, my boyfriend and I were at a strip club and bought a lap dance. My experience has been that, as a girl, the hands-off rule generally doesn’t apply to me. However, out of respect for the girl, I don’t touch until she invites me to. This one invited me to touch her. Caught up in the moment, my boyfriend asked, "Can she touch your pussy?" I was a bit shocked because I assumed that was off-limits — but she said, "She can, but you can’t." So I started touching her on the outside of her G-string. I got a little braver and went under her G-string but still stayed outside. She moved a certain way during her dance, and my thumb kind of slipped right in. A few seconds later, she stopped. She was nice and hugged me, and told us to come back any time. Did I go too far? I feel guilty that I may have made her feel like a hooker. Or is it really no big deal? I’m embarrassed to go back, and I’ve asked my boyfriend to not make that request in the future. How often does this sort of thing happen to a dancer?

Love,

Thumbelina

Dear Thumb:

Just what we needed, a new set of ethical dilemmas and moral failings to keep us awake and tossing on those long dark nights of the soul that tend to hit around this time of year.

I really don’t think this is the sort of thing that used to bother people before half the female grad students in the country started stripping and writing books and doing performance art (oh, so much performance art) about it. For that matter, I don’t think other girls used to feel as permitted or as obligated to go grope those girls for money at their places of work. I’m not entirely sure that what we’re seeing here is really an accurate demonstration of human sexual behavior in the wild — there are too many layers of politics and performance in there to tell what’s really happening — but I’m confident we’re at least seeing some genuinely new situations and their accompanying etiquette issues.

I’ve known any number of post-everything strippers, hookers, and dominatrices, but one in particular comes to mind. She’d been working at a womyn-owned, crunchy-organic peep show, but — surprise! — she could barely make her rent. So like so many before her, she’d given up her ideals and gone where the money is. Once she was hired by the grimy mainstream porn theater and Olde Lappe Dance Emporium, she was coming home with her pockets and God knows what else stuffed with fifties every night but complaining to me that some guy came while she was wiggling around on him and ew, ew, gross, yuck, how dare he? I commiserated at the time because I’m a wimp like that, but honestly, isn’t that an occupational hazard? If you’re going to be a sex worker, you deserve to be treated with respect and decency, of course, and what you say goes as far as who’s allowed to touch where with what and so forth, but come on. Into each stripper’s life a little semen must fall. If that’s absolutely not going to work for you, dance behind glass (for lower tips) or, hey, get your Realtor’s license or something.

Most of the female sex workers I’ve known have been at least passingly bisexual, but even those who really aren’t seem quite genuinely enthusiastic about female customers, both prospective and actual. There are elements of novelty to the appeal, I’m sure, just as there are elements of safety and sisterly enthusiasm. What there ought not to be, and what you ought not to worry about, is an expectation that female customers aren’t really customers — that is to say, that they’re not paying the sex worker for sex. While many women who go to strip clubs or book time with a dominatrix may be doing it to please a (male) partner, or as a learning experience or a lark, or just to make a statement of some sort, it would be pretty silly for a sex worker to be surprised when a customer, male or female, appears to be interested in having some sort of sex with her.

Your dancer granted you access. Maybe she liked you (or likes girls in general) or maybe she was milking you for tips, but whatever, she said yes. She has a sense of how sturdy or flimsy a barrier her G-string presents to curious fingers and was probably not surprised when you got where you got. The most telling thing was that she invited you back whenever, which she was certainly under no obligation to do. I think it would be fine to go back there and fine to whisper, "Sorry I got fresh last time" and fine not to. It would also be fine for her, in turn, to refuse you service, but I bet she doesn’t.

Love,

Andrea

Andrea is teaching Sex After Parenthood at Day One Center (www.dayonecenter.com), Recess (info@recessurbanrecreation.com), and privately. Contact her at andrea@altsexcolumn.com for more info.

A watched pot

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January 14, 2009

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By Andrea Nemerson

› andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Andrea:

I am gay and my boyfriend has trouble getting me off. I don’t like anal sex much because receiving or giving it usually doesn’t make me come. And my boyfriend usually can’t get me off orally, either, which means I have to resort to my own hand sometimes. I bought a Fleshlight, which my boyfriend uses on me. I can come with the Fleshlight, but now I feel disconnected from my boyfriend.

Love,

Not Feeling It

Dear It:

No doubt. That sounds a little grim and technical — plugging yourself (or getting plugged) into the sex socket a few minutes a night — and then rinsing it under the tap and going to sleep — sounds more like maintaining a set of false teeth or an ostomy than it does like having a sex life. What’s missing in your story, though, is how it has come to this. I get the feeling you’re young, but how did you operate before this particular boyfriend? And, um, what is he doing wrong?

We all have to resort to our own hands occasionally, and not only do I not think that’s a problem, I quite often consider it a solution. You shouldn’t be the only one who can do anything for you, though. I think you need to undertake a program like those followed by women trying to overcome anorgasmia. Of course, there are a lot of those women and relatively few men in the same boat, and while I know the girly experts and their work, um, inside and out, their male-oriented counterparts and clients are less familiar. Mostly, you hear about premature ejaculation and erectile dysfunction. Male lack of arousal and aroused-but-just-not-coming don’t get — rather, have not demanded — the same sort of respect, and don’t get discussed much except in the context of drug side effects, which…. Hey! You’re not taking any antidepressants or anything, are you? That would be great, actually, since if you were your doctor could probably fix this by jiggering your meds or dosages around.

Let’s assume there are no drugs involved. And you can’t have a purely physical problem, like scarring from an operation or diabetic neuropathy, or your Fleshlight (and may I say how much I hate the name of that masturbatory gizmo?) wouldn’t work either. So what you’ve got is something psychological holding you back, or causing you to hold back, however you want to frame it. You could be judging yourself unworthy of pleasure for any number of reasons, none of which really matter here.

If you are focusing on the sex you’re having as a performance instead of as an experience, you are doing what sex therapists call spectatoring — "Do I look hot when I’m doing this? Does he think I’m hot? Is he looking at my (putatively unattractive body part here)? Am I as good at this as his last boyfriend? Is he only with me because of (insert pathetic reason to be with you instead of someone better here)?" — which may sound ungrammatical but is certainly a useful concept. If you’re willing to put in the time with a therapist, or even with a bunch of self-help articles, you can probably figure out what you’re doing and learn to not do that. Since you’re gay, there’s a whole other avenue to wander down, too, the one with guilt and self-loathing and feelings of disappointing parents and angering assorted gods — all those things which have never done sexual minorities any good but can be pernicious and damned near impossible to shake if they happened to get their claws into you. Anyway, you’ll have to learn to stop watching and judging yourself, either by learning to focus on your sensations or on his — anywhere but on your own perceived suckitude, basically.

So, (1) it’s performance anxiety, and therapy, or self-help literature and then therapy if the former doesn’t work, will help. And let us not discount the possible — enormous — benefits of drugs. Say, anti-anxiety meds if it’s determined that you’ve got an anxiety thing going. Also, not that this is a common treatment protocol or anything, but I read one abstract where oxytocin, my favorite molecule and the hormone implicated not only in mother-infant bonding and human orgasm but mammalian pair-bonding and (this may be key here) our ability to trust each other, was successfully used to treat male anorgasmia. Yay, oxytocin!

Or then again, (2) it isn’t performance anxiety so much as it’s the result of initially practical but ultimately unhelpful masturbation habits — you trained yourself to respond to a very specific sort of stimulation. Since none of these other acts or orifices except the Fleshlight approximate what you’re used to, none of them are working. If it’s that, you have to retrain, and it will take a while, but women do it all the time and you can too.

My last suggestion, and please don’t quote me on this: Your boyfriend needs lessons.

Love,

Andrea

Andrea is teaching Sex After Parenthood at Day One Center (www.dayonecenter.com), Recess (info@recessurbanrecreation.com), and privately. Contact her at andrea@altsexcolumn.com for more info.

Her cheatin’ heart

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January 7, 2009

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› andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Andrea:

Three years into my relationship with my girlfriend, I found her panties stuffed in her handbag and it turned me on. When I found out she had cheated on me and the panties were worn the night she cheated, I couldn’t stop masturbating to them. We stayed together, went through counseling, and eventually got married. However, two months later, she was on a business trip and ended up sleeping with some guy she met at a bar. She’s been very apologetic and it bothered me a lot at first, but a big part of me seems to get really turned on every time I find out or suspect she is cheating. She’s never continued an affair, and unlike most women who cheat, I actually think she does it for the sex.

It sounds bad, but I know she loves me and I love her, and she is starting counseling to figure out why she does this. But it still really turns me on. I have confessed to her about the panties and she thinks I’m a dirty guy, but she deals with it well. I like talking dirty to her during sex and calling her a dirty cheating wife. She says she’s not really into sleeping with other men or the dirty talk, but I think she really is and is too embarrassed to tell me. I know that the excitement from her cheating came from her doing something I wouldn’t know about. And I have offered her the chance to have sex with other men, but she says she doesn’t want that. What do you think? Interestingly, she seems to be more into the sex and more turned on sleeping with me (even kinkier) after she has cheated. Of course, she might be thinking about how bad she just was and what she just did.

I don’t know if I can really handle her being with other men, and she’s expressed that she doesn’t want to be with other men, but I can’t help but feel like our sex is too good afterward to not try this, and that she’s only saying that because she wants to have the freedom to cheat, should the opportunity arise, without me knowing. I think it’s a turn-off and not really cheating if I were to know about it before it happens. Any thoughts?

Love,

Wearing Horns

Dear Horny:

Yeah. I’m thinking this is not going to work. Or rather, it is going to require a radical rethink if it’s going to work — any of it.

It’s not that I think your marriage is doomed — I really don’t — but I do think you’re being very silly. Just because your wife is obviously turned on by her own bad behavior, and just because you are just as obviously reaping the benefits, doesn’t make the whole thing a big nudge-nudge, wink-wink sex game. She isn’t "cheating on you" (that sort of game is pretty common and, while best left to the experts, can certainly be done without ruining a marriage), she really is cheating on you. You’ve given her every opportunity to make it into a fun consensual game and she says she doesn’t want to sleep around and she doesn’t want to talk dirty, and she doesn’t want your permission to do any of that and she really just wants to go see a therapist and figure out what’s driving her to do this stuff she doesn’t really want to do, so don’t you dare consider trying to drive her to cheat for the great post-cheating sex. I do realize you’re being given mixed signals, so it isn’t entirely on you, but I suggest putting down those used underpants and putting your energies into something more constructive for a while. Maybe the gutters need cleaning.

It is entirely possible that she does get off on being bad. I’d call it probable, even. But, at the risk of sounding like The Voice of Joyless Grown-Uppitude, so what? If we all did everything it turns us on to think about, we’d all be dead, diseased, or in jail. And besides, have you read your own letter? You say yourself that you’re not sure you can handle her being with other men. So let’s see … she can’t handle it … you can’t handle it … maybe … she shouldn’t do it?

I’ll tell you what: why don’t you back off on the dirty talk and leave her underthings alone while she goes to therapy? Maybe the two of you could go together for a few sessions. Then later, when she’s no longer mired in the self-loathing she brought upon herself by cheating on you in the first place, and you are feeling more secure because she’s not cheating on you, you can revisit the cheating-wife fantasy. Until then, everybody just grow up already. There’s more to life (and marriage) than "But I want to!" My son pulls that on us all the time, and we don’t fall for it — and he’s all of two years old.

Love,

Andrea

Andrea is teaching Sex After Parenthood at Day One Center (www.dayonecenter.com), Recess (info@recessurbanrecreation.com), and privately. Contact her at andrea@altsexcolumn.com for more info.

New news, old year

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December 30, 2008

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› andrea@altsexcolumn.com

Dear Readers:

It’s been a crappy but interesting year in sex news, which, when you really think about it, could describe just about any year you care to look at. One of these stories is probably my favorite sex/science news ever, at least since we found out that female ejaculate comes from the bladder, not the tiny Skene’s glands along the urethra. Oh, and there was the study that showed that that men who identified as bisexual were not actually aroused by images of men having sex, and the correlation of lesbianism with finger-length ratios…

My first story is actually an old one (most of the datelines for it on the Web are from 2003), but it did just land on my desk again, so I thought I’d take this opportunity to report that performing fellatio does not reduce the risk of breast cancer by up to 40 percent in women who swallow at least twice a week. As Snopes.com points out, the presence of experts such as "Dr. Len Lictopeen" on the "CNN Health" page that makes the rounds ought to serve as a hint that the page was spoofed. Sorry, fellas.

So what else do we have? Medscape published a rundown of penis news titled "Penile Size and Penile Enlargement Surgery: A Review," which was mostly unstartling (urologists think surgeons should have a good reason before performing penis enlargement procedures, many men are dissatisfied with the results, etc.), but my favorite take-away was this one: after linear regression analysis, there was no statistical correlation between stretched penile length and shoe size. So now you know.

New Scientist published an article I wish I’d read back when I was answering phones at San Francisco Sex information, where questions about sex, calories, and weight loss (or gain, in the case of fellatio-performers who worried about calorie content) were common. "Nope, sorry," I’d assure them, "You’re not going to lose weight that way (300 calories an hour is an optimistic but common estimate), but it’s good for your general health, so off you go." But now it appears that prolactin, the hormone that not only induces lactation but promotes maternal feelings and rises after orgasms achieved during intercourse — although (apparently) not through other acts — may also play a role in maternal and paternal weight gain. And since prolactin levels rise after sex, some researchers are investigating the obvious conclusion: sex makes you fat. And while they don’t ask this question, I will: is "fat and happy" really such a bad thing, given the alternative?

Meanwhile, there actually is evidence that sex, especially morning sex, really is good for what ails you. Among many other and better-known benefits, it has been shown to raise levels of Immunoglobulin A,(IgA), the microbe-slaying antibody, and thus might help you fight infections.

All of this is well and good, but I’ve been remiss in not reporting sooner the headline that really captured my attention: "G-Spot Caught on Ultrasound! Elusive Organ’s Existence No Longer In Question!"

Not that I questioned it. I was (and still am) continually irritated, however, by the constant references in the media to the G-spot’s possible apocryphal-ocity. While merely insisting that something is there cannot make it so (I am, for instance, still an atheist), this denial of the lived and reported experience of millions of women (and many of their partners) is and was uniquely galling. But now we have this story, reported as a bit of a yay/boo/yay by our friend, New Scientist:

Yay: Emmanuele Jannini at the University of L’Aquila in Italy discovered clear anatomical differences between women who claim to have vaginal orgasms — triggered by stimulation of the front vaginal wall without any simultaneous stimulation of the clitoris — and those who don’t.

Boo: Apparently, the key is that women who orgasm during penetrative sex have a thicker area of tissue in the region between the vagina and urethra, meaning that a simple scan could separate the lucky "haves" from the "have-nots."

Yay: Even better, Jannini now has evidence that women who have this thicker tissue can be "taught" to have vaginal orgasms. Ultrasound scans on 30 women uncovered G-spots in just eight of them and when these women were asked if they had vaginal orgasms during sex, only five of them said yes. However, when the remaining three were shown their G-spots on the scan and given advice on how to stimulate it, two of them subsequently "discovered" the joy of vaginal orgasms. "This demonstrated, although in a small sample, the use of [vaginal ultrasound] in teaching the vaginal orgasm," Jannini says.

I knew it! I’ve been teaching for years and years that internal sensitivity is, or at least can be, a learned response. I don’t expect that ultrasound, which is expensive and literally invasive — if also harmless and painless — is going to become part of Everywoman’s sexual fulfillment tool-kit, but how cheering is it to have proof at last? Good news in a bad year, right?

Love,

Andrea

Andrea is teaching Sex After Parenthood at Day One Center (www.dayonecenter.com), Recess (info@recessurbanrecreation.com), and privately. Contact her at andrea@altsexcolumn.com for more info.