Archives for December 2008

What an honor!  This summer, I was one of four students selected to serve as campus leaders of the new Campus Coalition for Sexual Literacy project of the NSRC.  Before I even left the NSRC Summer Institute I was sending out enthusiastic emails to get the CCSL chapter started at Indiana University.  A number of students shared my excitment - some feeling relieved that a group that supports their interests now exists.  And, with ease, I gained the support of the Center for Sexual Health Promotion at IU: http://www.sexualhealth.indiana.edu/.

As with any student organization, I followed the path to gaining official recognition from the university - tabled at the incoming student fair, attended student organization training, etc.  And, with financial support coming from NSRC, I began the process of creating a bank account for my CCSL chapter.  With a decent turn out at our first monthly meeting and a high level of excitment about getting the group running, it seemed that things were headed in the right direction.

The month of October and beyond seemed to prove otherwise.  I would say that my first mistake was encouraging an active component of membership, including projects that small groups of members would pursue to push our mission of sexual literacy on campus.  While this seemed to be ideal for our coalition model, it seemed to scare members away after the first meeting.  It's quite disappointing for me to see...

Near as we can tell, about 1% of the world's population doesn't like sex. Though we are not sexuality researchers, the folks from the asexual community have been working for years to create open, honest public dialogue about our orientation. You can find out more about asexuality on wikipedia or at www.asexuality.org.  Both have excellent breakdowns of the research that has been done on asexuality so far.

Recently people from the asexual community have put together a task force around the DSM V. The current DSM's definition of Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder can be problematic for asexual people seeking treatment. Under the current rules, asexual people are diagnosed as having HSDD if we experience distress or if our partners do. This raises a couple of thorny issues. Lots of asexual people experience distress when we're coming to terms with our orientation, the same way that gay, bi and pan people do. Many more of us are in relationships with sexual partners and are working through the complicated issues that that entails. Neither seems like grounds for a disorder.

We want to make certain that the subcommittee working to revise the definition of HSDD takes asexuality into account, and we'd like your help. We're trying to solicit opinions from people in the sexual health field on effective ways to account for asexuality when treating low interest in sex.

Got an opinion? Drop us a line, we'd love to arrange a time to talk. 

According to my mom, I was a "good little boy" who didn't cry much and seemed to be happy most of the time. I was a small boy with strawberry blonde hair and a smattering of freckles across my face. My mom has told me that I was very sensitive to how others were feeling and that I was always very curious.  I started talking and reading fairly young and often drove my parents and grandparents to the brink of insanity with my constant questions of hows and whys about the world and how things worked.  I remember being allowed to play dress up in high heels and makeup, and spending hours in the kitchen alternating between creating new recipes (all of which my brave grandmother willingly tasted) and dissecting the hearts, gizzards, and other organs that came with the turkeys cooked for Thanksgiving dinners.  I didn't care much for sports and preferred to spend my afternoons putting on puppet shows or switching between playing beauty shop and operating room in my grandmother's front bathroom where my clients and patients were one and the same (you always want to have gorgeous hair when having an appendectomy!).

I also remember being treated differently than other children at a very early age.  Okay, maybe I was a little weird and precocious, but I noticed that there was something about me that made parents...

On December 13 a lesbian in Richmond, CA (near San Francisco) was about to enter her vehicle as she was approached by 4 young men who proceeded to beat, gang rape, rob and leave her completely naked and bleeding to death near the Richmond BART train station. 

This heinous crime shocked even the Richmond police-- who see some of the worse cases of violence in the country. 

The attack was "alleged" to be a hate crime as the survivor claims that the attackers targeted her and used anti gay language throughout her attack.

Horrifying attacks such as this one reinforce the need for a higher level of sexuality education in this country. If we can begin to imagine a world where true lifelong sexual literacy exists....which embraces sexual human diversity and rights....we can begin to heal.

NSRC is proud to work with organizations like Community United Against Violence (CUAV) who promote education, awareness, advocacy and healing for those affected by these crimes and others forms of violence. CUAV is the local agency responding to media calls and crisis calls related to this terrifying crime. 

I would like to take a moment to remind...

It is the end of my first semester as the chapter chair of the UT CCSL chapter!  It has been an eventful first run, for sure.  There were some moments back in August when, as I slogged through the bureaucratic bog of creating a student organization, I wondered if this would ever get off the ground.  But from the safe vantage point of a nice, long holiday break, I can confidently say that the UT chapter is alive and thriving.

Our first meetings started off a little slow.  I had two very dedicated, very passionate undergraduate members, who were brimming with great ideas for our chapter’s mission and possibilities for campus interventions.  However, three enthusiastically sex positive women does not a MOVEMENT make.  Thankfully, they helped me develop a strategy to recruit more members.  First, we changed the structure of our meeting by spending 15 minutes on the procedural stuff (announcements, event organization, etc.) and then using the remaining 45 to open a roundtable discussion on a topic relevant to our mission of sexual literacy.  Second, we doled out some of our seed money to buy a ton of tacos to fuel the meeting.  There is not a student on the UT campus who can resist the allure of free Tex Mex.

The inaugural roundtable topic was “The Social Meanings of Virginity”.  We created a Facebook group for CCSL, and then a Facebook event publicizing the roundtable meeting. ...

Shout-out to all the females who want to step up and take control of your protection; your moment in the sun has finally arrived!  The Female Health Company has developed a new version of the female condom made of synthetic latex in a considerably less expensive manufacturing process--and it was approved this week by the FDA Advisory Panel.  FC2  prevents the transmission of STIs and prevents pregnancy, allowing women not only the opportunity to be in charge of their contraception, but their overall health as well.  Plus, the new device has the potential for wider acceptability and utilization since it is expected to be more affordable for individuals and programs, the latter of which might actually push it this time around.  Oh, and did I mention that it feels and sounds slightly less like a Ziplock sandwich bag?

Our own Dr. Colleen Hoff, director of the Center on Research on Gender and Sexuality, co-authored a study on the OG female condom...

Today, sex workers and allies of sex workers will march on Washington D.C. and hold community vigils and rallies in cities across the globe for the 6th Annual International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers.

In 2003, sexologist Dr. Annie Sprinkle and SWOP or Sex Worker Outreach Project, created this annual day aimed at remembering sex workers who have been murdered, ending discrimination and stigma, hate crime and all forms of violence against sex workers internationally.

Every day sex workers face social stigma, arrest, and the sheer terror of never knowing when they will be brutally beaten, robbed, raped and/or murdered. 

Society tends to say that sex workers deserve whatever they have coming to them just because they choose to engage in the work they do. This ignores the fact that people have always in all times and cultures done sex work, often but not always due to coercion. The same sort of you-deserve-it mentality is often used to justify hate crimes against LGBT people and is also used to blame women rather than the men who rape them. Organizations like SWOP work to turn this distorted, immoral and dangerous way of thinking and acting around....

Of course, I mean no disrespect to anyone who engages in sex work; I strongly support anyone who chooses to do so.  The only problem I have with any kind of sex work is the lack of rights that go along with this career that those of us who work in other areas enjoy such as insurance, nondiscrimination, and not getting arrested when we go to work.  You know, little things...In fact, we can all do our part in helping sex workers by supporting organizations such as St. James Infirmary here in San Francisco that are in danger of losing much needed funding.

So you want to work in the field of sexuality but you don't really like taking off your clothes in front of strangers or strangers with cameras...there are other options.  In fact, one of the questions that I am often asked by our students at SF State is "how do I get your job?"  Well...my job isn't vacant, so you'll have to wait until I decide to leave or have me knocked off.  Instead of plotting my death or hiring a hitman, I have some suggestions for all of you who hope to one day be gainfully...

On an online site dedicated to having sex, nothing deserves a second look like a survey that asks folks to choose between internet access and sex. Intel and Harris Interactive polled more than 2000 folks about their habits and priorities, and released the results December 15, 2008.

The data, as quoted by CNN, showed that, when having to choose between giving up sex or internet access for two weeks, that 46% of women chose the internet, versus 30% of men.

Random. Apples and oranges. Poor survey design, I say. I mean if you were choosing to be stranded on a desert island for two weeks with a computer and free wifi versus a hottie, maybe that would be a realistic question. And maybe people would have a different answer. Or maybe they wouldn't, but it would certainly be more meaningful if they preferred to chat online versus interact with a real human while on a desert island.

But who has to choose between sex and the internet--especially when you can combine the best of both worlds? What do polls like this--and polls that ask whether we have more sex than say, French people, or penguins, or how many people really do such and such--really show? That we have no idea, as a people, of what normal regular, healthy sexuality looks like--first. And second, that there is always some...

Though my internship with the NSRC doesn’t involve a blue dress or political scandal (at least not yet) it has been one of the highlights of my first semester as a sexuality studies master’s student. I balked at the idea of applying when the opportunity first came up. Along with serving tables, reading and writing for three graduate courses, and trying to not turn into a social recluse, did I really want to file papers for a semester? No, of course not! What I did want to do was gain practical experience, network (a foggy concept) with other professionals, take a break from hard core theory, and enjoy myself. Once I was over my initial fear, thought about it seriously and applied, I was actually looking very forward to seeing what it was like to work in the field of sexuality.

One of the first tasks I was presented with as the new ‘Education and Training’ intern was helping coordinate a trip to San Juan for the

A new survey by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy has found that 22% of teen girls have posted nude or semi-nude pictures online. Most important findings from the survey are below.

Also check out research that was published in our own Sexuality Research and Social Policy Journal - Journalist or Panderer? Framing Underage Webcam Sites - which talks about new technologies changing social relationships and view of teen's sexuality.

Survey Findings:(Full survey summary is here).

• One in five teen girls (22%)—and 11% of teen girls ages 13-16 years old—say they have electronically sent, or posted online, nude or semi-nude images of themselves.
• One-third (33%) of teen boys and one-quarter (25%) of teen girls say they have had nude/semi-nude images—originally meant to be private—shared with them.
• The survey of 1,280 teens and young adults indicates that 15% of teens who have sent sexually suggestive content such as text messages, email, photographs or video say they have done so with someone they only know online.
• Teen girls are not the only ones sharing sexually explicit...

In high school and college "fuck" was as much a part of my vocabulary as “dude” and “gross” and plain old “like” (as in, “like, that’s so gross, dude”). Saying “what the fuck” when I was annoyed or “fucking awesome” when I was pleasantly pleased was a bit of a rebellious act, since my home was a no-profanity zone. To me, "fuck" was blue collar, adult, and manly, and since I wanted to be a blue-collar adult man, it’s not so surprising that I loved the word. 

Apparently, Rod Blagojevich loves the word too. In building a case against the Illinois governor on corruption charges, the FBI secretly taped his private conversations. Among the things Rod was heard saying:

I’ve got this thing and it’s fucking golden, and I’m just not giving it up for fuckin’ nothing.

Our recommendation is fire all those fucking people, get ’em the fuck out of there...

Of course all the news networks and FBI spokespersons have replaced “fuck” with “bleep”, in accordance with obscenity laws and decency standards. In other words: "Our recommendation is fire all those bleeping people, get ’em the bleep out of there ... "

Fuck can evoke...

According the the U.S. Department of State Dec. 10, 2008 press statement, "Today is the 60th Anniversary of the adoption of the United Nation's Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a document that affirms the inherent rights of people everywhere and enshrines basic freedoms of thought, expression, peaceful assembly, religion, and association." The statement goes further to say, "The United States stands in solidarity with the brave men and women around the globe who work to defend human dignity and advance the cause of freedom."

Really? Most of us gay Americans would argue that the U.S. Department of State has a very long way to go within its own borders in standing in solidarity with us to affirm our human rights.

This is why today is also the perfect day to let America experience a National Day Without Gay.

In the year 2008, 60 years after Article 7 of the Universal Declaration said, "All are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection under the law....and the family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State", the State of...

Tracy Clark-Flory wrote an eh article on upskirting for salon.com a few weeks back. downblousing self portraitUpskirting is the tech-enabled 'art' of sticking your cell phone up a oblivious woman's skirt so you can catch a snap. You can figure out the definition of downblousing for yourself.

Clark-Flory's article was a rather surface glossing of the subject that had about.com's editor (and NSRC friend) Cory Silverberg lamenting the death of sex reporting. And I agree--Clark-Flory's article could have gone more in depth about how the distinctions between public and private are being erased by technology-- and by the big brother eyes of the homeland security folks-- and how sexual rights (and citizenship) are shifting.

But I was deeply disappointed by the extra-short shrift given to the topic by another NSRC ally, Dr. Marty Klein--who calls the 'controversy' a big yawn:

The election is over and I’ve been thinking a lot about something that happened back during the primaries.  I’m sure you will all remember it.  This relatively unknown governor of Alaska was thrust into the limelight as the vice presidential nominee for the Republican Party.  Remember that?  You might also remember that shortly after she accepted the nomination (I think it may have been at least a couple of days) it was revealed that her oldest daughter, who just happened to be seventeen, was pregnant, was going to keep the baby, and was going to marry the father.  Do you remember that part? 

Things got a little crazy at this point.  Some people started calling this Alaskan governor and her family, as well as the rest of the RNC, hypocrites due to their undying support for “sex education” that espouses refraining from ANY sexual activity prior to marriage and frowns upon teaching young people about methods of birth control.  Meanwhile, the republicans started shouting back about how supporting this young couple during this time was the Christian thing to do. Then, the liberals called the conservatives...

Are you surprised to see yourself here? We've re-launched NSRC and welcomed Dialogues back into the fold--now you can use even more great Dialogues community features, and access the resources at NSRC at the same time.  Log in here (or in the upper right hand corner of this page) to update your profile and explore.If you're new to Dialogues, sign up here or find out more about us.

Dialogues has added new features, including more picture and video upload options, easier to use working groups, and the option to add your own events, workshops and opportunities to our community boards.

And your community is our community—now, while you're blogging and connecting with friends and colleagues, you're just a click away from accessing the cutting-edge features and content on the NSRC site. Read and comment on new stories in American Sexuality, browse and add sexuality resources as we Map the Movement together, or view videos from sexuality heavyweights including medical anthropologist Richard Parker, sociologist Carole Joffe and sociologist Pepper Schwartz (plus some fluffy folks like Perez Hilton, Ally Sheedy and John...

I believe in sexual pleasure—yours and mine. From hawking sex toys to telling teens about the clitoris, I have spent my adult years proselytizing on the subject of pleasure. And no wonder; desire and pleasure--especially for women--are the stepping stones to sexual knowledge, rights and justice. For teen women, as Deb Tolman revealed in Dilemmas of Desire, knowing when you want to have sex is the pre-cursor to knowing when you don’t, and helps women assume self-protective behaviors. For adult women, desire and pleasure allow for a more equitable and satisfying relationship with self and others.

So let me say it again. I want you to get off, I encourage you to get off. In fact, go get off right now and get back to me.

Hi. Feels good, right? Which is why it might come as a surprise that I am so angry about a recent study looking at sexual dysfunction in women. Decreased libido=decreased pleasure=not so good, right? Sometimes, but that’s not where the real problem lies.

The study, published in the November 2008 issue of Obstetrics and Gynecology, aimed to examine self-reported sexual ‘problems,’ such as decreased desire, arousal and orgasm,...