Archives for October 2009

My partner and I come from very different backgrounds, and we were raised with different values. She was raised and is Catholic, she grew up in the suburbs of Maryland, and her parents never talked to her about sex except to stress that it was something you waited for until marriage. Oh, and that she is supposed to be in a relationship with a man, but that’s a whole different story. I was raised in the CA Bay Area in a city, being exposed to many different kinds of people, without religious influences, with a mother who was very willing to discuss sex with me, and with both parents encouraging me to move in with someone before deciding to marry them. Because of these opposing values, I often worry that we have considerably different views about how to raise our future children when it comes to sex education, but amazingly we actually we do agree on some of our core principles.

We both agree that our children should be taught how to use contraception properly, in addition to the correct success rates of contraception. At the same time, we agree to encourage our children to practice abstinence in sexual intercourse with the opposite sex. So, essentially, we both are in favor of what is generally termed “comprehensive sex education.” We both believe that no matter how much we stress waiting to have sex (until when is still up for debate between us), that our kids, and kids in general, are going to do it...

With Halloween right around the corner, I’d been seeing a video made by the satirical news source, The Onion, circulate widely on facebook. The video discusses how to find a masculine Halloween costume for your effeminate son. To start with, I promise that I get that this is a joke, I know that. Part of me thinks the video is hilarious, but part of me cringes when I watch it. Another side of me laughs at the part that’s cringing, and yet another cringes at the part of me laughing. Grad school warps your sense of humor in new and suprising ways. Anyway, the video highlights ways to quote “hide your effeminate son” with masculine costumes. Does your son prance around too much? Put him in a robot outfit that restricts movement and hides his high voice with robot sounds! Long lashes and curly hair? Prevent him from twirling his locks, and blinking visibly, with an animal suit that covers him head to toe! Is a vampire the right choice, after all, they are flashy dressers? Yes, of course it is! They dress like that to seduce women.

In watching this video, several messages are being conveyed. For example, whether or not someone is going to take this seriously, it’s clear that feminine boys are something you should hide/change. Also, the feminine boy might be gay, so...

I am lazy. I am one of those people who will sit through an episode of a TV show I hate because the remote is missing and I'm too lazy to get up and change the channel manually. I have seen way too many episodes of Two and a Half Men this way. Teaching my dog to find his own toys was my best idea ever, and I’ve totally taken the bus one block before. I know. It’s pretty bad.

The other day I was sitting on my couch, watching Simpsons, and massaging my back with my electric back massager because trying to use my hands sounded like a lot of work. I don’t have a very long attention span, and after a few minutes my mind began to wander along with the electric massager. I take off my sweatpants and was all ready to go when a certain thought crossed my mind, “Should I take off my socks too?”

This comment took me by surprise since it was just me in the room and comfort, which includes wearing socks at all times in my freezing apartment, is one of my top priorities. This got me thinking about how culture shapes ideas of what is sexy and what is not, and I came to two major conclusions: First, that people don’t really consider flannel sexy, and...

Yesterday I sent out an appeal on behalf of the National Sexuality Resource Center, asking our community to call in to reject Orrin Hatch's sneaky attempts to add $250 million for abstinence-only education into the health reform package. Thanks to all of you who made calls.

Today, I came in to work to find this email in my in box:

"Hi - I just had to comment about your cheesecake photo that went out with a letter urging people to reject abstinence-only sex education.  While I agree with the philosophy and am familiar with the research documenting the failure of that type of sex education, the style of photo you chose to include with the email was overtly sexual and undermined your message. I agree that 'sex sells' but this seems, to me, to set the wrong tone for an important issue.  A more business-like image would have convinced me, but I don't feel comfortable forwarding the letter to other friends to request their support."

I was dumbfounded. And saddened. And disappointed, that a woman anthropology professor--one who probably considers herself progressive on gender and sexuality issues (she is on our mailing list, after all)--would not take me seriously because of the way I looked. And even worse, that she would try to shame...

No doubt many will be celebrating this bill as a “great achievement for gay rights.” However, maybe it is important to consider Kai Wright’s assertion that “Hate crimes are not a criminal justice problem.” 

Quoting him at length: “Cops and courts have their place, but they aren’t a panacea. We like to think if we just ‘get tough’ on social problems we don’t want to meaningfully address, it’ll go away. But that hasn’t worked for drugs, it hasn’t worked for teen pregnancy or STDs, and it’s not gonna work for hate, of gay people or anybody else. Fixing those things takes a lot more work--work we don’t want to do... Supporters named the measure after Matthew Shepard

Passed in 1972, Title IX was legislation making it illegal for organizations receiving federal funding to discriminate against people based on gender.  The most profound effect of this legislation was the increased number of opportunities for women to participate in sports.  Many universities were forced to restructure their athletic programs to equalize the amount of funding given to men’s and women’s sports.

In the late seventies, Colorado College was forced to address the inequity between the funding it gave to men’s and women’s sports.  Although all but one of the sports at Colorado College was Division III, meaning they were not able to give athletic scholarships to student athletes, they did have a Division I men’s hockey team.  As a Division I sport, the hockey program was able to recruit and give scholarships to students based on athletic ability.  There was no comparable women’s sport.  CC had to decide whether to downgrade the hockey program to a Division III program or upgrade a women’s sport to a Division I program.  They chose to upgrade...

Today, I'm writing in honor of the the Morality in Media's (MIM) WRAP Week: White Ribbons Against Pornography, which is also supported by one of my favorite anti-gay organizations, Concerned Women for America (CWA).  According to the MIM website the event, which is being held all week from October 25 through November 1, "WRAP week is intended to educate the public about the extent of the pornography problem and what can constitutionally be done about it." The CWA goes on to point out the truth about all of us "Pornography advocates" who apparently claim that porn is a "victimless crime" are delusional and spreading lies - I'd like to point out that I am a proud advocate and voracious consumer of pornography, particularly of the online and amatuer produced variety and I have NEVER stated that it is a victimless crime.  Mainly, because pornography is no longer a crime in United States - either producing it or viewing it.  Of course, I know there are legal issues regarding the production and distribution of porn and that these laws may vary from state to state.  I'll let my lawyer friends weigh in on this one.

I want to counter their claims (and misuses of research) with the idea that pornography is actually the opposite of "dangerous" and can actually be beneficial to helping...

It's a curious affair, this whole sex thing.

It seems to be, like so many things, an activity reserved for youth. Oh, those carefree days of vim, vigor, & virility! Those days when we were young & beautiful, lazing around in the summer sun, eating grapes & getting fanned by palm--hey wait a minute!

It is misguided to think that everyone loses not only the physical capacity but also the general drive to have sex as they age. It is true that some people may have less interest or less capacity, but this is not universally true, and seems to be decreasingly 'true' as time goes on--whether that be a general cultural shift, the aging of the 'free love' baby boomers, or the invention of a bevy of medications to overcome erectile dysfunction.

When I talk to medical students about the importance of sexual history-taking, I emphasize the fact that, as much as they might not like to think about it, the truth of the matter is that none of them (or almost none, given the wonders of technological advancement in reproductive options) would be there without sex. So yes, that means that your parents did it, your grandparents did it, and all their ancestors before them did it. And thank heavens they did, or you wouldn't be here today, making that squick face that so many people do when they think about this.

So why does it freak people out so much to think about it?

This concerns me a great deal, not only...

Update on WA States R-71: Not that I can find the article again, but for now, it appears I will not get to have my witch hunt for all those family friendly folks in Washington State that follow the religious credo of "love thy (straight) neighbor". Actually, I didn't want a witch hunt, I just wanted to be able to participate in "loving" my neighbors too. And when you really love someone, it's best to be honest and tell them EXACTLY how you feel about them.

Hopefully, more to come on this.

A little about my day yesterday. It was busy, like a big long to do list that promised fun. I woke up (late; I hate mornings), went to my internship, went shoe shopping becuse I discovered I was lacking in the black heels department, ran home to get ready for the Champions of Sexual Literacy event, (this year honoring Cecile Richards, the President of Planned Parenthood), fretted over what to wear, got a run in my nylons, fretted over my nylons, dashed to the mall to get new nylons, went to class, hit up Wal-Greens so I could pick up Plan-B (babies and MA thesis' don't mix for me; I only have so much energy right now), then off I went to watch Cecile Richards get an award for being such a wonderful proponent of sexual rights. I mingled a little, drank a bit, enjoyed the potato bar, shook Ms. Richards hand and thanked her for making my aforementioned Wal-Greens trip possible (surrounded by some beloved cohort members who appreciated the...

Over the summer this year, I volunteered for a non-profit in Delhi that provides education and after care services to underprivileged children in the National Capital Region of India. 

"So, we want our teachers to talk about sex to children 12 and above", the Director of NOIDA center told me. "We've never done it before but I think it's time we incorporated it in the curriculum", she continued. 

All excited about my new endeavor, I met the two teachers designated to facilitate sex ed at the school. "We've never done this before", they both reiterated. "And frankly, I'm a little uncomfortable with this new assignment", added one of them. After talking to both of them for another 15-20 minutes, I got a sense that both of them were uncomfortable discussing sexuality issues. At the same time, they were convinced that...

I’m planning a road trip back home to Southern California this weekend since our campus will be closed on Friday and Monday. I’m trying to squeeze in a visit with as much family and friends as I can in just a couple of days. And, even though we had lost touch with each other, I thought I’d try to contact my ex-girlfriend one more time since I’ll be just a few miles away from her.

We left on good terms, but through the years and distance lost touch with each other. Even after we broke up we stayed friends and would send each other e-mails though eventually those became fewer and farther in between. The last I’d heard from her, she was battling breast cancer again, only this time it had spread to her bones.

So there I was, Sunday morning, looking her up online to see if she’d moved and to see if it would be possible to try to plan a visit. That’s when I found her contact information… in the obituaries. I read and re-read the entry. Could it be the same person? But the spelling of her name and her birth date confirmed it. She had died last April, three days after her 45th birthday.

My heart sunk. I had a moment of shock when I actually though to myself “how should I feel about this right now?” And then my body answered my question, with uncontrollable weeping.

My husband came...

Is there such a thing as a sex addict? In a culture of plenty we tend to pathologize our access to excess and any pleasure seeking behavior can be an addiction. Shopping addiction, gambling addiction, food addiction: all seemingly innocuous behaviors that can be considered an addiction if taken beyond the blurred line of social acceptability.         

Addiction is real. I have seen loved ones battle with drug addictions all the way to their graves. The successful ones went through hell while their bodies went through the painful process of adapting to a drug-free state. It seems disrespectful to the severity of addiction to lump compulsive pleasure-seeking activity into the same category.

Proponents of sexual addiction recovery insist that because sex activates reward centers in the brain, addiction is real and serious enough to require intervention. Some invoke models of psychological dependency while others argue that sexual addiction is part of compulsive behavior. The addict or compulsive person is powerless to stop the behaviors on their own.

Treatments for sexual addiction center on support groups and other therapeutic measures. The most prevalent self-help group is Sex Addicts Anonymous, a self-help program modeled directly from the 12-steps used in Alcoholics anonymous and...

"What is the G-spot?" Daniel, 12th grade student asks me in his advising classroom.

(Inner dialogue, "WHOO weee, not prepared , not prepared! No, no, I got this. I know the answer and he should too. Ok, calmly now, tell him.")

"The G-spot is an erogenous area inside a vagina that when stimulated can lead to pleasure or orgasm." I said it. 

Daniel blushes!

I work with a group of high school seniors who have no science teacher at their school. No science teacher! Injustice, anyone?! Luckily, though, down the road is a Junior college. These five students head down the road for a Human sexualities course. I looked through their reader and it looks pretty legit. The information appears to cover biology, gender, sexuality, race, culture, and class politically so. The Christian influence on the sex education that these students would have received if they had a science teacher is explored. I am pleased with the interdisciplinary nature of understanding Human Sexualities. The students are totally engaged and amazing critical thinkers.

Enter Mohammed into the G-spot conversation. Mohammed is the self assured, hoopstar, and clever as ever student- "That's the G-spot?! Hell yeah, that's what I am talking about, G. You feel me, that is the kind of G I am about to be. Naw, for real, we were talking in our class the way sex is mostly about pleasure for men. And the way men are supposed to be aggressive and stuff. But now we know, G. I'm...

I’m envisioning an auditorium filled with militant adults and youth with contrasting ideologies, backgrounds, and experiences, and yet one unified mission.  Self-appointed delegates and speakers for the cause range from secular policy makers to religious leaders to something in between.  Children, arguably more than slightly influenced by the crowd’s fervor and the adults’ accessible rhetoric and basic appeals to morality and values, are taking a stand against a society that they believe is corrupt and against their own interests in living in a nation that has not abandoned traditional and fundamental ethical principles promoted by gods and communities alike.  They are all collectively becoming very bonded, very powerful, and very pissed off.  They grit their teeth and grind their axes.  They take no prisoners and dish out plenty of shame and fear-mongering.  Tempers are flaring.  Blood is boiling.  Nerves are rising.  The auditorium feels like it’s going to explode.  Thank goodness this is just a fantasy, I’m beginning to scare myself.

Finally, the dissenters are allocated to speak.  A rain of boos, curses, threats, and slogans fill the air as the auditorium...

I sit next to my attorney silently, facing the immigration judge. I am told my case (aka my life, aspirations and my body) is under his jurisdiction. I am dressed as professionally as possible to aptly represent my "Alien of Extraordinary Ability" status. I nervously look around the room. My dark eyes catch another attorney behind us signaling me to take off my hat. Promptly I take off my favorite accessory (my only sign of faggotry) to show my compliance with the US judicial practices. The judge begins his inquiry, to which my attorney reveals my HIV status, and my inability to adjust my status even though my petition for permanent residency to the US was granted on the basis of my claim as an "Alien of Extraordinary Ability" in February 2002.

The pain of hiding underground, days of unemployment, hunger, fear of accessing treatment leading me to near death flashes across my mind. Where would I turn for the wasted seven years of my life? Will this judge be able to understand the lost wages, aspirations, depression and most of all the psychological violence of being separated from my beloved parents? It is clear my journey to justice is only beginning.

This blog post is my first public step in ending isolation, silence, fear and their antecedent dysfunctions that the HIV ban on immigration and travel has wrought upon my life. It has disrupted my educational, work and all major life aspirations. I have silently watched my friends getting married, accessing green card,...

Now 42 years ago, the United States Supreme Court struck down any remaining anti-miscegenation laws in the case Loving vs. Virginia, Mildred and Richard Loving’s challenge to the state of Virginia’s ban on the marriage between people of different races.  But, a recent Justice of the Peace’s denial of a Louisiana couple’s application for a marriage license indicates that the debates over interracial marriage are hardly over.

Keith Bardwell, a Louisiana justice of the peace, denied Beth Humphrey and Terence McKay, an interracial couple, a marriage license citing concerns for their children.  The couple does not currently have children, so the justice is operating under the assumption that, once married, the couple would seek to have children, presumably through conception rather than adoption. ...

Recently I read a wonderful book for teenagers and young adults. As a teacher currently enrolled in a master’s program focusing on literacy, I read a lot of books for children and young adults, but this one stuck out to me as particularly wonderful.

The book is From the Notebooks of Melanin Sun by Jacqueline Woodson. The main character, Melanin Sun (named for his beautiful dark skin), is an only child being raised by his single mother in Brooklyn, NY. He loves and respects his mom, he has good friends, he enjoys writing, and he is just beginning to effectively flirt with girls. But then his mom tells him that she is in love with a woman, and a white woman at that, and Melanin’s happy world begins to unravel.

Because of his mom’s announcement, Melanin begins to question everything about his mom, and he can’t understand why she can’t just love a man, since she’s brought male dates home to meet him before.  Also, he’s embarrassed, and wants to make sure his friends never find out (together before his mom tells him, phrases like, “That’s so gay,” are thrown around without a second thought among them), and he is worried that his crush will find out and have no interest in him anymore. Melanin also questions his own sexuality. “What if I am like her?” he asks at several points.

I've said it once, and I'll say it again: I really enjoy bad television.  Granted bad is a subjective term, there's something to be said about realizing how bad the show you're watching is and still being unable to tear your attention away from it.  The program in question today is the Maury Povich Show and in particular his exposes on teen girls who want to have a baby.  This one is perhaps my favorite:

The general pattern of these shows is that the 'deviant' teen in question is usually booed by the audience and gently berated by Maury into recognizing the irresponsibility of their decisions or possible future choices.  What does it look like if we however maybe take a step into Victoria's shoes?  I proceed by presenting a possibly feminist re-reading of her character.  Here we go...

Clearly, Victoria is a modern girl-on-the go who knows what she wants. She is gonna have her baby.  Clearly Victoria has thought out her decision and planned accordingly.  She's been preparing herself by building up an array of baby care paraphernalia.  That's right, if her baby loses its pacifier, that's okay, she's got three more.  She also has a vivid financial plan for how to take on the monetary burden of a...

Think back to the hands-on learning you might’ve had in elementary school. What was it about the pictures, shapes, colors, and physical actions involved in putting things together that made those connections so clear? Is it a coincidence that the foundational knowledge we acquire during those early years, so integral to the rest of life-long learning, is the result of making meaningful connections between concepts? How is it that we might lose those skills through our years of continued career and interest specialization? Literally playing with ideas, moving them around, connecting them, grouping and regrouping, and trying out new links, proves to be incredibly useful when conceptualizing sex education models, something I had the opportunity to try out in class this week.

With that in mind, the question we were asked revolved around some of the current ways people learn about sex in the United States? What are the relationships between religion, culture, family, privilege and environment for instance, and what do those things have to do with the way we learn about sex? By using the graphical representation of concept mapping, connecting concepts with other concepts through linking words to create meaningful statements, these...

In “ ‘Being Masculine is not About who you Sleep With...:’,” Eric Anderson presented the possibility of a restructuring currently taking place in regard to how heterosexuality is understood in the United States. Using data from participant observation and in-depth interviews with 68 self-identified heterosexual male athletes—between 18 and 23 years of age and who were 80% white and middle class—he suggested that the culturally predominant model of heterosexuality could be changing from being dependent on opposite-sex sexual desire and practices into being determined by sexual activity-passivity. Like the Latin American sexual systems described by anthropologists and other social scientists, this configuration would allow for men to have sex with other men and still claim a straight identity so long as they are not penetrated.

It might sound odd but when I initially read Anderson’s article during my first semester as a graduate student, the idea that the conceptual category of heterosexuality could be undergoing an overhaul did not particularly grab my attention. Perhaps it was because he let his overwhelmingly white middle-class sample stand for a possible large-scale cultural shift while never engaging at length with what this means, if anything, to people of color in the nation. I mean, I remember thinking this possible transformation was kind of interesting and I made a...

Recently one of my friends suggested that I watch an episode of Glee, a new series about a high school teacher who attempts to bring some meaning into his life and the life of his students by restoring the status of the glee club. Although at times I got scared that Glee was just High School Musical but in series form, this show got my approval due to the discussions it contained surrounding sex, especially teenage sex. And because of the singing and dancing. Obviously.

In the second episode, the female lead, Rachel, goes to a celibacy club meeting in an effort to spend more time with her boy crush, even though his abstinent cheerleader girlfriend is head of the club. They start doing an exercise meant to help them practice leaving space for Jesus in between themselves using a balloon to demonstrate the appropriate distance to stand apart. Irritated, Rachel vocalizes her objection to the club in a thoughtful diatribe. She explains how studies show that celibacy does not work in...

Research has repeatedly shown that abstinence only sex education both fails to prevent teen pregnancy and STIs, and leaves young people with inaccurate sexuality information. Public opinion polls have been overwhelmingly in favor of removing abstinence only sex education. President Obama’s budget plan in May reflected both scientific and popular opinions of abstinence-only sex education, as funding for these programs was removed for 2010 with resources set to be directed towards comprehensive teen pregnancy prevention.

But the end to the abstinence-only sex education era was unnecessarily put on hold as Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) proposed a renewal of abstinence-only sex education for the next 5 years at a cost of $250 million. The proposal, an addition to the ongoing health care reform bill, passed through the Senate Finance Committee with a 12-11 vote in its favor. Debates will now begin between Senator Hatch’s proposal and a comprehensive sex education policy proposed by Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT) that  won a 14-9 vote from the Senate Finance Committee.

The Sexuality Education Month of Action is an opportunity for young people and their...

Dear Colleagues,

I am writing about an exciting opportunity to donate to the photovoice project I am conducting in the favela of Maré in Rio de Janeiro. The National Sexuality Resource Center has been so gracious to partner with me and we are raffling off two tickets to the fourth annual Champions of Sexual Literacy Awards honoring President of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, Cecile Richards!!!

I don't know if you have ever been to this inspiring event, but I have had the honor for the past three years! I have seen and met such amazing people as Dr. Jocelyn Elders, former Surgeon General Dr. David Satcher and Dr. Ruth. Of course, I am terribly sad to be missing this year's event honoring Cecile Richards, for whom I have much admiration and respect. But the good news is that you could win the opportunity to go in my place and bring a friend with you! Raffle tickets are $5 or 5 raffle tickets for $20!

Please visit our blog by clicking here to find out more information and to enter the raffle. I would like to thank you for considering a donation to this photovoice project. A project like this has turned out to be very expensive and I have already exhausted all of my fulbright grant resources. Your donation will help us buy...

I used to think that sexuality could fit on a very linear spectrum.  That it was one characteristic.  I thought I could line people up side by side based on this characteristic.  That, like eye color or height, there were small variations between people, and I could line people up lightest to darkest or smallest to shortest.  I thought at one end of the spectrum was masculine men and the other end was feminine women.  I thought everyone fit somewhere in between those bookends.  I would have put myself on this spectrum closer to the male end because I like girls and sports.   I love the shallowness of this, and the desire to make things so neat and simple. 

But now I can’t think of a way to compare people’s sexuality because it is so dynamic and multidimensional.  I have been grasping for metaphors to use to make this case stronger, but I am at a loss.  Sexuality is so complex and so individual.

In our graduate seminars, we talk a lot about race and color, including how whiteness is cherished and celebrated in and outside the United States.

These class discussions and other conversations with my fellow students and friends made me think about the various fairness products that are marketed and sold back home. (In no way am I trying to be the voice of my nation. These are just MY views on such 'beauty' products.)

Here's a fine example of what I'm talking about:

So clearly, once you're beautiful (i.e. fair, white) you can achieve anything! Name, fame, money and power! You can realize your inner dreams and talents 'cos opportunities are endless!

So what happens if you're not fair? Well, basically then you're nobody! You're boring, unwanted and invisible. Your life sucks! (and not in a pleasurable way!)

...

San Francisco State University’s College of Ethnic Studies is turning 40 and celebrating this week by kicking off a four day international conference and...

I was a little nervous and didn’t really know what to expect. Even though I’ve been “in the scene” for several years, and have attended play parties, bar-b-ques, workshops, retreats, and other educational opportunities, I’ve never been to a “munch”.  A munch is a low-key, informal gathering of like-minded kinksters. There is no overt play at a munch, and the dress code is informal. It’s an opportunity to meet local people in your friendly neighborhood kink community.

For myriad reasons, I have been less inclined to play in public spaces in San Francisco since I moved here about 2 years ago. Partly because I’ve been so busy with graduate school studying sex, who has time to actually participate in a lively sexual subculture as BDSM? So I took one more step into the scene and guess what? It was really nice. The group reserves the back room of a family-style restaurant, where the doors can be closed during the introductions. The people who attended were all very nice to me, and curious as they had not seen me at any events. The first assumption was that I was a newbie… if only they knew! But I squashed that assumption right away and explained I was from Southern California and hadn’t gotten my feet wet up here yet.

To an outsider, or “vanilla person”, it would have looked...

On November 1st, my father will turn 73. My mother turned 64 this month. It has never escaped my attention that my parents got a bit of a later start on the whole producing offspring thing. This was not for lack of trying, but in the end, it was fertility drugs that gave my parents the children they wanted. Knowing this, combined with also knowing that they almost didn't get to keep me once I was here because I was born ill, helps me to understand my parents; their concerns, their worries, their protectiveness, their lack of holding back any and all opinions about my life, (and as much as I sometimes hate to admit it, they are often right) and their willingness to do whatever they could for their daughters. In short, I would give them an "A" for excellent parenting.

In a very gender conforming society, oddly, it was my father who was the more physically affectionate of my parents. My mother certainly didn't lack in physical affection (especially when it came to making boo boos better, which was her specialty as she was a RN), but it was my father that I remeber playing with both my sister and I. My favorite was "clock", where he'd pick me up by my ankles and swing me back and forth while I giggled and he made clock noises (yes, it was an exciting childhood). As I watch my father get older, it is these memories that I hold onto, knowing one day in the not so distant future, these memories will be all I have left.

One set of...

A pharmacy in London launched a calculator that uses the six degrees of separation concept to determine your number of indirect sex partners. The idea is that every time you sleep with one person you sleep with all of their previous sex partners. I get the idea but the execution is a low-grade scare tactic rooted in false assumptions about sexual risk.

Risk of contraction is not about a number pinned to your slutty lapel. Risk of contraction is about specific behaviors. Did you use a condom every time? Was lube involved? Were there visible sores? Were you having oral, vaginal or anal sex? Did your partners use protection? These are questions that can help determine your risk, not the number of sexual partners.

I know, we like nominal figures to figure out where we lay on the sexual totem pole. A number is comforting, easy to understand but ultimately misleading. Think about BMIs or simply weight. The numbers say something but they don’t paint the whole picture.

The heart of the calculator is in the right place but the underlying assumption is that fear will motivate people to use condoms and get tested. The fear of slut shaming is an easily accessible tool. I looked around at comments from people who calculated their indirect sexual partners and one concept popped up repeatedly: EEEWW! DIRTY!!

We make the immediate mental leap from indirect sex partners...

I am a science nerd who's not very good at science.

Let me clarify.

I love science. I love understanding how things work. I love getting dirty & having my hands deep in discovery. I love putting together all the pieces of seemingly disparate things and coming to a deeper cognizance and appreciation of how this whole crazy world is stitched together by dreams and fascia.

But I’m also very much a visual kinesthetic learner. If I can’t see it, feel it, do it, it doesn’t stick. When I half-seriously told my girlfriend recently that I wished I could go back & re-do all my science classes from K-12, she helped me clarify & said what I really wanted was to go to lab & do science experiments, dissections, physics model-building, etc. It doesn’t matter how many times I read it or how many flash cards I use, it won’t stick unless I can feel it. When I had the opportunity to ‘meet’ a cadaver earlier this year, it was incredibly intense—the body that had once been a person, the flesh that had been preserved so stringently, so long ago, that it now was just meat on bones. No face, all cut up. I held a heart in my hand. I felt the sinews of connective tissue. I held a slice of brain. It was amazing. This, plus whatever spark of magic that animates us, is all we are.

I bring all this up because I’ve been thinking a lot recently about

I’ve been spending the last hour or so contemplating on what sort of sex educator Yoda would’ve been.  Would Yoda advocate abstinence-only?  Abstinence-plus?  “Comprehensive” sex ed?  I’m thinking about memorable Star Wars movies quotes, and I come to different conclusions:

“Do or do not.  There is no try.”  Hmm…okay, almost sounds like the motto of “chastity pledges.”  You either stay a (born-again) virgin or you don’t.  There is no try.  Stiff upper lip, keep your zipper up, feel the Force, and you’re a “good” teen.  Succumb to the temptations of the dark side, and you’ve crossed the threshold.

But wait: “Fear is the path of the dark side.  Fear leads to anger.  Anger leads to hate.  Hate leads to suffering.”

Yoda, the sympathetic Jedi sex master, understands the sort of fear mongering and smear campaigns that, as Judith Levine constantly attests throughout her book Harmful...

Sometimes I forget that for the past few years in both Brooklyn and San Francisco that I'e been living a sort of fantasy reality where everyone incessantly dresses up in outrageous costumes, assumes multiple made-up performance names and progressive parents bring their children to events like day-time guerilla drag shows and Folsom Street fair.  It often takes a reality check to remind me of the increasing prevalence of sex-negative discourses, particularly those revolving around sexual development.  Thank you, Judith Levine, for bringing these issues to light for me!  In reading her illuminating manuscript, "Harmful to Minors," I had to take a step back and retrospectively interrogate the 'intimate' moments of my youth which most assuredly impacted my own sexual development.  I was most struck by a survey cited by Levine of mental health and child protection professionals stating the interventions were necessary against mothers in particular who either kissed their children on the mouth, presented themselves nude to children before the age of five and hugged their children too much before the age of ten.  It's a wonder then that my family's doorstep was never overcrowded by child welfare workers.  

Yes, my mother frequented bathed with me as a child: it was the beginning of a sexual education and lifelong appreciation of women's bodies.  Yes, my mother hugged me many, many times a day before and after the age of ten: it taught...

I’ve been doing some research on K-Y Brand lubricants and stimulants on the brand’s website recently. This investigation began after seeing too many of their “Yours and Mine” commercials, which really irk me, but I couldn’t quite figure out if this was just because they were heterocentric, or if there were more deep-seated reasons I disliked these ads.

An example of one of their ads. Many more can be found on utube and on the product’s site.

 So I took a look on their website, www.k-y.com. I learned that they have been making lubricants since 1917. 1917! They make gels, warming liquids, jellies, and now even a mist-able lubricant. As I kept looking through the website, I realized that I wasn’t finding any sex, although I was finding many references to both the act and the word. In place of “sex,” “intimacy” or “intimate acts”...

This past weekend, I volunteered during the Folsom Street Fair at the transmen4men (tm4m) booth sponsored by Eros, TRANS:THRIVE, and Trannywood Pictures. Tm4m is a discussion, event, and resource program for transmen who play with men. A call for volunteers went out a few weeks ago and I’d been looking forward to participating ever since. All in all, the event was really fun. I spent most of the time handing out flyers promoting tm4m. On the flyer was a sexy cartoon transguy with the words ‘Top 5 reasons to fuck a transguy’ (that’s another blog entirely). When I handed out the flyer, I received lots of positive responses like “I only need one” and “Hell yeah!” What I wasn’t ready for, or rather, was naïve enough to think that at a sex positive space like the Folsom Street Fair wouldn’t occur, were the disgusted looks and inappropriate questions from some people. Mostly, once I handed someone a flyer, they’d read it, and maybe look back and smile, laugh, or give a thumbs up. Others took the flyer and read it, then scrutinized me with some the rudest stares I’ve ever encountered. Most of the stares, and subsequent questions, revolved around...

A few days ago I went to the GLBT Historical Society’s current exhibition named Passionate Struggle: Dynamics of San Francisco’s GLBT History. As described on the Society’s website, “Passionate Struggle traces elements of our communities’ affinities and differences. It takes you from the bedrooms and back rooms to the bookstores and bars, from Harvey Milk’s victory to transgender sex workers’ riots, from social movements to secret fantasies.” 

Despite the information provided online, which emphasizes “our communities’ affinities and differences,” I had certain expectations. After going to a couple of disappointing exhibitions about GLBT history, I have become relatively cynical about how gender, racial, and ethnic diversity will—or won’t be—represented in such public displays. It has also been my experience that a good number of texts dealing with the history of sexuality in general, and queer history specifically, will both whitewash and privilege male voices. Examples are certainly plentiful. As such, I expected something similar from this particular event, and I...