Creepy Sexual Practices

Which sexual practices are creepy or unacceptable and which ones are fine? There are multiple ways how to try to answer this question, and some criteria for “creepiness” make more sense than others.

“Do I like this sexual practice and would I want to engage in it?” is the wrong question. “Does this sexual practice cause harm for any other people or animals?” is a much better question to ask. As long as people don’t cause harm for anybody else, they ought to be free to do with their genitals whatever they want, and how I personally feel about their actions is irrelevant. [Read more…]

Can We Talk About Sex? Part 3: Flipping the Perspective About Gender Roles

How humans perceive the world is subject to interpretation. The stories we tell ourselves about the events we experienced or witnessed are distorted, biased, conveyed with an arbitrarily chosen vocabulary. Whenever some interaction between two sentient beings happens, both of them will interpret it so as to suit their own preferences. If it is an interaction between two humans, both will use arbitrarily chosen words in order to create fictional and inaccurate portrayals of what just happened. We aren’t thinking or talking about reality as such, pure and unbiased, instead we are filtering what we just witnessed, we are distorting our perception of reality. For example, “a man penetrates and conquers, a woman gets penetrated and surrenders?” Or maybe, “A woman engulfs and conquers, a man gets engulfed and surrenders”? Theoretically it would be possible to say it either way, it’s the culture that favors and enforces one possible interpretation over the other. [Read more…]

Can We Talk About Sex? Part 2: Clueless Adults and Safe Sex

How do people find information? When it comes to safe sex, people are pretty much self-taught. Some had abstinence-only sex education at school. The few of us who got lucky to have evidence-based sex education probably only learned about how to avoid STIs and unwanted pregnancies. “Use condoms. If you are in a monogamous relationship and both people are STI free, you can use other contraception methods instead,” this was pretty much the extent of the sex education I got at school. And I was lucky. I know many people who, unlike me, weren’t taught even the very basics. At school nobody even mentioned lubricants and how to pick ones that are body safe. I wasn’t taught which sex toys are safe or dangerous to use. Nor did anybody tell me how to have anal sex without pain and injury. [Read more…]

Can We Talk About Sex? Part 1: Sex Education for Children

Can we talk about sex? No. Just no. It doesn’t matter what you want to discuss or why, the answer is always no. Polite people don’t talk about sex in public. You rarely hear a casual conversation between acquaintances discussing their favorite vibrators. And it’s not just sex as such, even a part of our bodies, our reproductive system, is shrouded in secrecy. It’s dirty, it’s private, it has to be kept hidden. Don’t even mention it. If you have a problem, ask your doctor. If you are religious, ask your pastor instead. Religious authorities mandate that people shouldn’t even think let alone talk about sex before they are married.

In my opinion, a refusal to have open, casual, and normal conversations about sex is harmful. Whenever I try to suggest that the society should stop treating this subject as taboo, somebody will say: “Think about the children. If they overhear our kinky conversations, they will get traumatized.” This is going to be a multiple part series of blog posts. The first part is about children, because their wellbeing is generally considered the number one reason why people shouldn’t publicly talk about sex. [Read more…]

Doing it like Monkeys

Bonobo Ape Sexual Behavior

Bonobo Ape Sexual Behavior

The sexual behavior of bonobo apes is pretty fascinating. They have lots of sex. They masturbate. They have homosexual sex. They seem to really enjoy it. In other words—they resemble humans a lot. This is a photo of bonobo apes. I took this picture in Frankfurt Zoo, Germany. And, yes, they are doing exactly what you think they are. [Read more…]