I was inspired by someone’s recent post called “My polite vagina,” in which she bemoans her perfectly porn star-esk slit, wishing she had big flappy labia like other women. Her piece is funny and thoughtful and insightful and mostly I’m using this as an excuse to rant about my genitals. Because apparently I need an excuse.

I appreciate the thought that the original post has, that flappy in-your-face genitals are more fun, but I can’t help but wonder whether she’d find the cost higher than the benefit. I have a hooded clit. For those of you unfortunates who have no idea what I’m talking about, porn star clit nestles between the folds of the outer labia, making a single, clean crease. Everything is hidden until you pull back the outer labia and go hunting. Hooded clit is when the damn thing has heaved up the folds of skin that cover it and stuck them out from between the labia. It kind of looks like a little tiny penis. Or like she’s sticking her tongue out at me. So instead of one single crease, I have two; one on either side of the hood. I also have distended inner labia with purplish tips, like cabbage leaves. Even my outer labia are wrinkly and seem longer than normal. I remember when I first became aware of the fact that my bits didn’t look like other ladies’. I thought I was hideous. Deformed. I thought I had this ugly secret in my pants and I would just have to hope that whoever I fell in love with would care enough about me that they wouldn’t mind having a misshapen wife. Obviously, I know better now, but I believed this for a decade.

And don’t even get me started on the horror that is hair removal. One would think, since my vagina couldn’t be bothered to be pretty, it would at least let me groom easily. But nooooooo. That would be too easy. Not only do I have pubic hair halfway down my legs, I can’t shave. I tried. Walked around with razor burn for over a year before I finally gave up. It was like she was throwing a temper tantrum. I tried to do the “feminist” thing and let it grow, but bikini season was a nightmare, with black scratchy thatch sticking out all over the place, and I really hated getting my fingers all tangled up in fur when I went to touch myself. I tried trimming, but the stubble was weird and scratchy. Clearly, I was doomed to waxing. Over the years, I’ve perfected a home made cold wax recipe, and once a month, I rip the hair off my delicate bits.  I showed the Sir the process once, thinking maybe we could turn it into a fun power play scene, but he fled the room yelling “This is why I need feminism!” I can understand why. It hurts like the dickens, so I have to let out a long breath before each strip, and there is occasionally a bit of blood where a follicle came out wrong. But the pain means I’m finally beating the damn thing. Ha! Take that! I win, you stubborn mule.

Coming to terms with my impolite vagina has been… a process. One that involves a lot of consciously reminding myself what I like.

The large outer labia have a surprising side benefit; when I’m aroused, they swell up almost uncomfortably large and turn bright pink. I know other ladies also get swollen and pink, but mine’s like WANT DICK NOW. Frankly, I think it’s funny. As an added benefit, the Sir had a long history of trying to be with women who were trying to pretend they were asexual, so seeing undeniable, in-your-face evidence of my arousal is extremely satisfying for him.

I’ve also never had a lover who couldn’t find my clit. I mean, the damn thing is basically sitting under a big neon sign “pleasure button here.” It would take a lot to miss. But since my orgasms are heavily clit-based, this has been a major benefit.

Speaking of orgasms… I’ve never been in anyone else’s skin, so I don’t know how sex feels to all y’all weirdos, but ohmigod sex feels so good. My favorite is finding the peak of arousal, right before falling off the precipice of orgasm, and just sitting there. The Sir has learned my body so well that he can get me there and keep me there almost indefinitely. Personally, I think that if there is a benevolent Divine smiling down at us, the glorious blissfulness of sex is proof positive that he/she/it wants us to be happy.

My vagina isn’t just impolite. My vagina is the kind of lady that does what she wants and doesn’t give a flying fuck what other people think. Maybe she’ll dye her hair purple or maybe she’ll wear pearls or maybe she’ll do both and fuck your expectations. And in that way, she’s a lot like me.

Written By Pixie Pele

I can’t stand it. If I read one more piece singing the praises of blowjobs, I’ll be sick.

I hate blowjobs. I find absolutely nothing attractive about a penis. In all fairness, I find little attractive about any genitalia. They’re weird bits of skin and flesh that dangle and wrinkle in distinctly alien ways. And they’re situated on the body just right so they are almost constantly sweaty, and thus usually smell like a gym bag. Even after it’s been recently washed, a penis will still taste a little weird and the precum will be salty at best. A vagina’s smell and taste is actually pleasant if the person attached to it eats well and is hygienic, but that sweet tang quickly turns to rotten fish if not maintained.

Frankly, I don’t believe these girls who talk about how much they love sucking cock. How the fuck could they? Penises are ugly, smelly, and taste bad. The act of the blowjob hurts your jaw, neck, and shoulders, and unless you manage to tilt your head and roll your eyes really hard, you don’t even get to watch the results of your labor. You just get an eyeful of pubic hair. And if he hasn’t trimmed, a noseful too.

No, I thought to myself, it can’t actually be true. There’s no way in hell those women actually enjoy blowjobs. They’re just saying whatever they think men want to hear. They just want attention, and they’re making themselves seem attractive in whatever way they can. And those stories about women actually getting wet from a blowjob? Absolute rubbish.

Heh.

A bit of background. I’m collared. I pride myself on being able to push myself constantly. I’m not a masochist, but I take pain as a challenge, often using a meditative state to deal with it. While I derive zero pleasure from blowjobs, I do them anyway because the Sir likes them. I also have an extremely easy gag reflex.

But the Sir had expressed interest in deep throating. He’d enjoyed having other women do it to him, so I, wanting to be able to do all the things, went to the internets for research. According to some of my sources, it would be possible, with some effort, to retrain my easy gag reflex and teach myself to deep throat. I brought him the information, despite my misgivings. Deep throat training. It sounded awful.

And it was.

Acting on someone else’s advice, we stripped naked and got in the tub, the easier to clean up. I was trembling from both cold and fear. I could tell the Sir was relishing both. Bastard. Because of the hard surface, my knees quickly became very painful and I ended up squatting most of the time. In that position, it was impossible to control my bladder when I, inevitably, gagged. I pissed myself and vomited up chicken and rice. Every time I puked, I was allowed a small sip of water to wash the taste out of my mouth, but I could still smell it. I started crying, both from the gagging and from the sheer shame of it all. Crying, snotting, puking, and pissing myself, I felt pitiful and disgusting.

And he was rock hard the whole time.

I wanted to give up, but he calmed and soothed with soft voice, firmly insisting I continue. When I managed to keep him down for a split second, he praised me. When I puked, he didn’t even flinch, just calmly washed it down the drain and came back for another round. Unrelenting, unbending, unyielding, he ignored my sobbing pleas that I couldn’t do it, and made me go on.

By the end of it, I was bleary-eyed and floating in the deepest subspace I’ve ever experienced.

My Sir knows me well and knew that if he let me give up halfway through, I’d feel like a failure. When he was done, I was barely able to move, so he propped me up in a corner, washed out the tub, and ran a scalding hot bath for us. He held me in the warm water, pressing me against his chest, cooing sweet nothings in my ear or just letting the silence rest. I had no fine motor control and couldn’t speak for several minutes. When I finally started coming out of the fog, a flood of gratitude washed over me. He’d seen me broken, and had responded by loving me.

I should have known that being completely out of control would push happy buttons in my brain – my core fetish is, after all, power exchange – but I was still thinking about blowjobs and how much I dislike them. If I hadn’t been willing to push myself and try something new, I’d have never discovered this thing that arouses me at a gut level. This felt nothing like bobbing my head ridiculously over a salty bit of flesh. This was being unable to control my very bodily functions, being a complete and utter mess, being broken down to my very core. And being accepted wholeheartedly, even at my most broken, my most shameful, my most disgusting.

We’ve had several sessions since then. Turns out, I’d hit space so hard those first couple times that I didn’t even realize I was dripping wet when done. These days, I might even get orgasms during aftercare.

I still don’t really believe the girls who say they just like having a cock between their lips, but I’m starting to think maybe I shouldn’t jump to conclusions about other people’s kinks. If I can’t predict my own, how on earth can I talk about other people’s?

I may never enjoy giving head, but at least I can enjoy being throat fucked.

Written By Pixie Pele

If you haven’t read my post on my first deepthroating experience, you should. It’ll explain why I, someone who fully admits that blowjobs are boring, really enjoy deepthroat training. It’s something I can’t do to myself, so I have to be completely out of control, which pushes happy buttons in my brain.

Anyway, I thought I’d write down some advice for other people who want to do similar training. Please realize that, unlike anal sex, I’m not actually a card-carrying expert on this yet, so take my thoughts with a grain of salt. That said, I’ve tried to keep my advice to within the range of my experience so it’s actually, you know, useful.

1. Puke happens. If you or your partner absolutely can’t stand the idea of vomit, this might not be the activity for you.
2. Have patience. You’re dealing with a reflex. Like how you automatically hold your breath under water. That kind of reflex. There’s no magic button to turn off lizard-brain level programming that believes this thing is a threat and responds accordingly. Hi fives for taking on the lizard brain! Now, stop expecting immediate results.
3. Be consistent. As with most training, it’s most effective when done regularly. Maybe you can’t afford the time to have a session every other day, but find something about once a week.
4. Partner up. Some things are easier to start solo, but, again, reflex. Your body is going to fight you all through the practice sessions. It’s simply easier to have a partner do it for you. And if you happen to be like me and enjoy being not in control, that can be fun. 😉
5. Use the tub. Both you and your partner get naked and get in the tub. You might want a towel to cushion the knees for kneeling, but that’s it. This will make clean-up so much easier.
6. Make sure whatever’s hitting the back of your throat (penis, dildo, whatever) is wetted first. Having something dry back there actually hurts.
7. Find a rhythm. My partner actually times me; I get a few seconds to catch my breath and get ready, then a few thrusts, then a few seconds, then a few thrusts. The rhythm lets me go on autopilot and relax, which is absolutely necessary during sessions.
8. Partner advice. There will be tears, snot, slobber, and vomit. If your partner has to squat on his/her heels to get the right height/angle (like I do), there might also be piss. Get over it. They’re retraining a basic-instinct-level reflex, and they’re doing it for you. If you’re a penis-haver and think your penis will deflate in spite of the work your partner is doing to make you happy, you’re going to have to find some other way to make it clear that you deeply appreciate their effort.
9. Not all vomit is made equal. Wait a few hours after eating before having a session, avoid super spicy food, etc. I’ve actually found that sweetened dairy products (like ice cream) have been the absolute worst.
10. If, like me, you enjoy being out of control and hit a happy place in these sessions, you’re going to need time to come down. Personally, I recommend shower cuddles, but find the style that works for you. Even if you don’t need time to come down, washing up after is still a good idea.

That’s all for now, folks. Happy kinking!

Written By Pixie Pele

I was with a group of acquaintances the other day, and one of them launched into a humorous story about how his wife had forced him to talk about his feelings. We’ll call him Joe. Joe’s best friend had made a habit of only ever talking about his own life rather than also listening to Joe’s life, leaving Joe feeling unheard, unimportant, and uncared for. Rather than address the issue, he was just going to let the friendship die when his wife insisted that he be verbal about his feelings. He made faces while telling the story and had good comedic timing and obviously expected people to laugh.

And they did. Haha, look at the manly man being forced to talk about emotions. He must feel so uncomfortable. Isn’t it hilarious?

No, it wasn’t.

Guys, I’m so sorry. As a culture, we have failed you. We have told you that it’s not OK to feel things. Even less OK to admit it when you, inevitably, do. The manly man, we say, hides his feelings. The manly man doesn’t need to go to counseling; counseling is for babies. The manly man looks a storm in the face, grinds his teeth, and keeps going. The manly man doesn’t have complex emotions to process. He sets himself a path, and with grit and determination ploughs through whatever comes.

Professionals have a word for that kind of grayed out, emotionless, exhausted existence. They call it depression. And it’s what you’ve been taught to strive for.

We have crippled you, broken you. We have taken from you the only tools to find acceptance, friendship, and companionship in this dreary existence. We have stuffed you into a box, stranded you on an island, and robbed you of the communication tools to even ask for help.

Is it any wonder, then, that men are far more likely to commit suicide than women? We have deprived them of the tools to deal with emotions when emotions get difficult. When women feel the kind of stress or depression that often precedes suicidal thoughts, they go to friends and are encouraged to talk things through or to seek professional help.

Is it any wonder, then, that the primary reason that a man joins a gang is to find acceptance? We have robbed you of the ability to form strong friendships on your own, so you need some radical outside bond to take the place of real, deep, emotional honesty and closeness.

On a small scale, this would be abuse. On a large scale, it’s culture.

You know how you’re scrolling through the Kinky & Popular page on Fetlife, looking at the pictures, and they’re of all these sexy, sexy ladies showing off sexy curves by kneeling or crawling, in collars and cuffs and other fetish gear? It’s a running joke how common the sexy-butt-with-butt-plug-and-matching-collar picture is.

But, as sexy and enjoyable as these pictures are, do you notice something missing?

Where are the sexy guys?

These pictures are all of submissive ladies. Sure, there’s the occasional domina decked out in all her fetish attire glory, but the only men in pictures are dominant props for the submissive ladies. There are no men pictured in submissive poses. No men with perfect cane-stripes across their asses. No men kneeling in ways that perfectly display their toned bodies, eyes glassy with subspace. No delicious, well-oiled man bound and helpless….

*ahem* Sorry, got a little carried away there.

But seriously, even the writings are designed by and for male-Dominant-female-submissive relationships.

What the fuck, guys?

According to some surveys, subby-type men are the single largest subgroup among kinksters. Sure, many are being syphoned off by the pro-Domme industry, for a variety of reasons, but that can’t be the whole story.

Somehow, the kink community, the one place where we’re all supposed to be able to be our true selves with as few social rules as possible, has created a script of what is acceptable and what is not. We have subconsciously decided that submissives are supposed to be female. Submissive ladies stay home and take care of the house while the strong manly-man is at work. She makes his dinner, cleans his house, and sucks his cock when he gets home.

Can you see why some feminists have issues with us?

Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that it’s a bad thing to be a female submissive or to take care of Sir’s house for him. But I am saying that, out of all the communities in the world, this one, at least, should exemplify variety. Instead, we’ve created a norm. We’ve created privilege. And it’s time we acknowledge our privilege.

Now, don’t get me wrong. Having one kind of privilege doesn’t mean you’ve had an easy life. It just means that, in that one area, you’ve had it easier than you would have if you weren’t a member of the privileged group. It doesn’t make you a bad person. It just means that there are other ways of being that, because of the way the system amplifies privileged voices and silences non-privileged ones, you probably haven’t heard yet.

It’s time we acknowledge our own limited perspectives and expand our horizons. We’ll all be better for it.

Written By Pixie Pele

Written By Pixie Pele

“Aw, come on, smile, it’s a compliment.”

“I’m just being nice.”

“I was being friendly.”

Heaven give me patience.

        Some time ago, I asked one of my guy friends about this tendency for assholes to cloak objectification as a compliment. It was so blatantly insulting to me that I simply couldn’t believe that these guys were so stupid as to believe what they were saying. I figured they knew they were being assholes and were just trying to cover their asses by coming up with a bullshit excuse. But my friend had a different thought. “You know,” he said, “if I didn’t know better, I might think it was a compliment, simply because I’d love to have a strange lady come up to me in public and call me sexy.”

        I could feel my spine stiffening. Saying anything positive about catcalling seemed mildly blasphemous. But I was magnanimous and offered him the chance to explain himself before I crucified him on the point of feminist wit and mixed metaphors. “You’d probably think differently if you had it every day,” I grumbled.

“Well, of course. But I don’t have it every day.”

  Light. Bulb.

          Maybe I was right and these guys are just trying to make themselves feel better. But there are definitely a few who really think they’re giving compliments. What they’re lacking isn’t brain cells. It’s empathy.

          Empathy. The ability to, as Atticus famously said, “climb into someone’s skin and walk around in it” (To Kill a Mockingbird). The ability to actually feel the way another person does or might feel.

            The famous child psychologist Piaget theorized that children experience something called egocentrism, a phenomenon in which the child believes that how s/he sees things is the same way everyone sees things. He demonstrated this by arranging three differently sized model mountains on a table, sitting a child on one side, and asking the child what someone sitting on another side would see. Younger children invariably picked the picture that showed what they themselves saw, rather than what the other person would see. While this specific test looked at spatial reasoning, egocentrism applies to a variety of areas; if a child knows something, s/he assumes everyone knows it, if s/he likes something, s/he is surprised to find out that someone else doesn’t.

            In the movie Tootsie, Dustin Hoffman played an out-of-work actor who, in an effort to escape his own bad reputation, creates a female persona to get a job. In an interview, Hoffman discussed what it was like to literally walk around in a woman’s shoes. The inspiration for the movie was a question from a friend. “All sexes have asked themselves the question ‘what would it feel like to be the opposite sex.’ His question was different. ‘If you were born a woman, how would you be different?’” Hoffman’s epiphany was that, while he would have been a very interesting woman, even with the best makeup, he looked like the kind of woman he himself would pass up at a party. And the revelation made him cry.

            Empathy isn’t something we’re born with, but it’s something that is essential for a peaceful society. People with no empathy are colloquially known as psychopaths. The International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, the World Health Organization’s manual to all things health, uses the label Antisocial Personality Disorder. This name is slightly less ear-catching, but serves the same purpose, as one of the diagnostic criteria is “callous unconcern for the feelings of others.” People who qualify for these labels are often deemed dangerous and are locked up for the safety of the public.

            So back to you, jerk who just hooted at my ass. No, it was not a compliment. And the fact that you think so displays your lack of empathy. You might want to look into that.

“She was giving me such mixed signals, how was I supposed to know what she wanted?” I hear this all the fucking time. Guys, take it from a lady(ish). I’m about to drop some serious knowledge on you.

If a girl is being confusing – let’s say… her words say she doesn’t want dick, but her body language seems to say she does want dick – there are only four options of what’s going on. Only four.

1. She does want it, but not right now. In this case, don’t give her dick. Maybe she has a yeast infection and doesn’t want to fuck up the first time with that fishy smell. Maybe she believes sex should happen at X point in a relationship. Maybe she knows she’s too drunk to give consent. Give her space and let her figure her shit out and she’ll be back when she’s ready and will be thankful you gave her time.
2. She’s not actually sure whether she wants it. In this case, don’t give her dick. Maybe she’ll decide she does want it and it’ll be awesome. Maybe she’ll decide she doesn’t and you’ll be glad you didn’t make an ass out of yourself. Either way, putting pressure on her is not going to make her feel comfortable or able to make a good decision.
3. She doesn’t want your dick, but doesn’t want to offend you. In this case, don’t give her dick. Guys. You have no idea how much pressure women feel to be polite. Like, you’d think politeness were the ticket into heaven for all it’s forced down our throats. Take it as a compliment – she may not be interested in your dick, but she thinks you’re a decent enough human to go to the effort of cushioning your self-esteem.
4. She’s playing hard to get. I think this is the one guys worry about. “What if she said no, but she actually meant yes?” To this I say… so what? Guys, do you really want to be with someone who doesn’t say what she means? Who is dishonest? Who uses deceptive manipulation to goad you into doing what she wants? Fuck. That. Shit.

Have some self-respect. Insist that the women you sleep with a) really want to be there, and b) are mature enough to own up to their desires. Maybe you won’t have as many sex nights, but the ones you have will be so much better.

Happy sexing!

Written By Pixie Pele

 “We knew going in that [running a dungeon] would never make a profit, and that’s proven to be true…. But you just can’t close it…. A person about once every four to five weeks will breach the door of the dungeon… they’ll walk in three or four feet, and they’ll just lean against the wall and start crying. And you look at them and go ‘I know what this is’…. That person now realizes that they’re not a freak, and they don’t need to be locked up for the way they think and for the way they feel…. When you’re changing people’s life like that, you just can’t stop.”

-Master Cecil in an interview for the Erotic Awakening podcast

I was a baby kinkster, attending my first real event: a weekend of kinky camping. I know, jumping in the deep end. I never was good at moderation….

Anyway, a couple friends (a power exchange couple) had been poking at me to attend an event for months and had graciously agreed to truck in from out-of-state to be my security blankey for the weekend provided I get my ass out of my hidey-hole. On the last day, we had a lovely scene together during which, at one point, the subby half of the couple was bottoming to the other two of us. The Dom handed me a flogger and told me to let loose. So I did. I found myself floating in a state of strange excitement. She moaned in pain, and I cackled with glee.

When we were all done and everyone was cuddling up for aftercare, my subby friend looked at me and said, “I don’t like her. She laughs. She’s scary.”

Over the next few months, I tried playing with a few more people, and the comments continued. “You’re mean.” “You’re scary.” “I don’t think I could play with you.”

Each time, I smirked. But afterwards, I worried. The comments were joking, but only halfway. Those groans of pain, the moments when the cries burst through my partner’s walls, the visible struggle to take what I needed to give them… they hadn’t just made me laugh.

They made me wet.

Like, wring-out-my-panties wet.

What kind of fucked in the head was I? Sadist. I couldn’t even accept the label, and for months softened it to “sadistic tendencies.” I felt like I’d wakened a monster under the floorboards of my mind, sleeping for years, now stirring. How far would it go? How big was it? How ugly? I didn’t want to harm people. I didn’t want to be that thing. Sadists were sickos on crime shows who went on torture sprees and left a trail of bodies, not 20-something girls who wanted sexy fun times.

I tried to talk to people about it, and they were perfectly friendly and willing to swap stories.  It helped a little, but the other sadists were all men between the ages of 38 and 50, and all of them seemed to be perfectly OK with being the monsters they were. They couldn’t really help much.

I gave up. I stopped playing for over a year. I just couldn’t bring myself to touch that part of me. I was perversely proud of it, because, hey, who doesn’t enjoy having a dark, mysterious side? But I was also deeply, gut-wrenchingly ashamed.

Fast forward a few years. At another kinky camping event. Across the campfire was this gorgeous girl I’d never seen before. I was definitely attracted, but she was all dressed up high fem, complete with makeup, so I thought for sure she was straight.

I know, I know. Book, cover, no judge. Lesson learned.

Understand, I’m hopeless when flirting with a woman I find sexy. As long as I thought she was straight, I could keep my cool. Then I found out she was bi. And a masochist. Awkwardness to herp-de-derp levels.

To this day, I don’t know how I negotiated that one. My brain refuses to recall my own awkwardness, so the next thing I remember is being in a rather poorly heated hot tub and feeling like a 16-year-old boy staring at his first pair of boobs. Only I was pinching the nipples as hard as I could and the look on her face was pure bliss.

Afterwards, curled up in bed, we were exchanging breathy complements. She said, “I love your evil laugh.” And I melted.

Over the next year, we played every couple months. I insisted on strict rules of consent to ease my fears of being a sicko, but there was almost no such thing as too far for her; she would nearly cum when I pushed her and made delighted yumming sounds at the bruises I left on her body.

There are stories about priestesses who would use sexuality as a method to heal worshippers’ souls. She was my healing. She saw me at my most monstrous, and her eyes glazed over in happy, breathless bliss. I’m still not entirely comfortable with the monster under my floorboards, but we’re starting to have a conversation.

So. This is the part of the post where I summarize what the fuck I was talking about.

• When coming to grips with a new kink/fetish/preference, find people who are like you and talk to them. Online, in person, whatever. You need to know that you’re not alone.
• If your kink/fetish is attached to hurting people, the way mine is, impose strict rules of consent on your play. You need to know that you are not a bad person.
• Find a partner (casual or otherwise) who thinks that that kink/fetish/whatever is the hottest thing since Tabasco sauce. You need to know that you are sexy just the way you are

We’ve all seen that couple. You know, the one where the husband is a little (or a lot) henpecked and the wife leads him around by his dick. It’s so common, we make jokes about it.

“Forgot to take out the trash? Looks like you’re not getting any tonight.”

“You bought her a diamond? You are so getting laid.”

“After every fight, just apologize, and maybe then I’ll let you try and rock my body right.”

OK, that last one was Megan Trainor. But you get the picture.

“But Pixie,” you say, “A relationship goes two ways. In order to have sex, both parties have to be happy, so you’re just talking about getting your partner into a good mood.”

OK, I hear you. Sex doesn’t happen when one or both parties are in a funk. But I still argue that there’s a social script going on here – a stereotype that we expect. To test this, try this scene on for size.

The wife walks in the door, carrying a bag. Husband asks what’s with the bag, and she says, “It’s for you.” “For me?” He’s obviously excited and hurries to open it, finding an expensive watch. He admires it for a while, eyes glittering, then turns back to Wife. “I think you deserve a reward,” he says, seduction dripping in his voice. “Maybe I should do that one thing you like….”

It feels weird, right? A woman having to buy her man expensive things just to get sex? OK, maybe there are a few couples who function like that, but it’s not the norm.

That, right there, is a script at play. Men aren’t supposed to be the ones cajoled and pursued, they’re the pursuers. Women are the gatekeepers. The bankers. Sex is the woman’s currency.

When we tell women all their lives that a) their main source of power is their sexuality, b) they are the gatekeepers to sex, and c) sex is the thing they trade for emotional security, is it any wonder that they continue with this belief into their relationships? Withholding sex was, they believe, the main way they got anything they ever wanted in a relationship. And now that they’re married, they’re just supposed to, what, give up that power and spread ‘em whenever the SO is horny? Unlikely.

They’re going to hold onto that power. They’re going to continue withholding sex. They’re going to use sex in general or specific acts (like blowjobs) as carrots to “train” their men. They’re going to cling to that currency as long as they can.

When a biological need is held for ransom, every kind act becomes a bargaining chip. The man can’t do anything nice without the woman thinking that he’s just trying to get into her pants. And if she thinks he’s being manipulative then she can’t appreciate the nice thing he just did, even if it really was just to be nice.

And because sex is dirty, she looks down on her husband for wanting it.

But notice here that there’s nothing about the woman’s pleasure or sex drive or needs.

Once again, in order to be a good banker, she has to be able to give or withhold sex based entirely on her spouse’s behavior, not her own needs. She has to ignore her own health in order to obey the script she’s been taught her entire life.

Ladies, I know we’ve been taught that sex is our main source of power in relationships, but for heaven’s sake, it’s time to grow up. Would you say, “Well, you didn’t take the trash out, so I guess no one eats tonight”? No. That would be ridiculous. It’s time we treated our vaginas the same way we treat our stomachs; a vital part of our bodies, to be taken care of, maintained, sometimes spoiled, and often put good things into.

Partners-of-ladies, please be understanding. We’ve been taught that our stranglehold on our sexualities is our source of power, and we’re giving that up. It’s going to be scary. Also, those things that you’ve been trained to do only when there’s a promise of sex? It’s time to do them regardless of reward. Your partner is stepping up her game, so step up with her.

Happy sexing!

Written By Pixie Pele

OK, anyone who has been keeping track knows that I grew up super religious. I try not to harp on the subject, but so many of these posts have been about my opinions or views on things, and I’m painfully aware that my background colors my current outlook, so it would be dishonest not to acknowledge it.

This is particularly true with the phenomenon of “True Love Waits,” the commercialization of chastity until marriage and ultimate in sex-as-currency culture. (If you haven’t read my first post on this, you might want to; this one will make more sense. Don’t worry, I’ll wait. You back? OK.) My “purity ring” belonged to my mentor before me and her mentor before her. Most couples in my church didn’t even kiss until their wedding day, and this was highly praised. Because people who wanted to have sex were dirty. In fact, most of us didn’t even date; we waited until we got a “revelation” from God and then entered a formal courtship or went straight to engagement. Because a semi-arranged marriage was better than letting women make choices. A father considered himself the protector and proprietor of his daughter’s virginity, a right which he relinquished to her husband on her wedding day. Because a woman’s sexuality a) is only safe when a penis-haver owns it, and b) can be transferred to new owners. After the wedding day, it was the wife’s duty to satisfy her husband sexually.

So when I say I’m familiar with virginity culture, I know what I’m talking about.

First off, let’s get the facts out of the way. Those tacky rings that stood for the promise of chastity? Yeah, they worked… for about 18 months, on average. Still far less than marriage age. And on top of that, when the people who had taken the pledge did have sex, they were one-third less likely to use protection, putting themselves at higher risk of STIs and pregnancy. (And we all know what happens to a good Christian girl when she gets pregnant.) (go to this page if you want to double-check my data.) So the program as a whole was a total failure. But let’s talk briefly about the people for whom it worked.

A friend of mine from the Christian college I went to for undergrad had been married for six months. (There are a lot of weddings in Christian colleges. I did my best to avoid them.) I went over to her house, and because we were the “daring” girls, we actually talked about the sex. “It’s weird when you have to say no to something for years, and then it’s suddenly supposed to be OK,” she said. “It’s really hard to change your thinking.” She had yet to enjoy sex. Six months. Couldn’t enjoy sex, for all her husband’s patience (and, apparently, experience). I was horrified.

It was the first of many stories.

Over the years, I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard this exact story. These women have been told for years that the sex thing has to be traded for a good marriage. That if they have sex before then, they are no longer human; they are a piece of chewed gum that no one wants. You can’t just put a ring on a finger and think that those fears will magically disappear.

These women have an acute case of the Madonna-Whore Complex. I’ll link to more detailed discussions of it (HERE and HERE ), but it is basically the belief that women are either for sex or for respect. But not both. When those women had sex for the first time, they “lost” their virginity. They lost their hoarded treasure, and thus lost value as a human being.

Turns out, my friend had it easy. Some women go for years being unable to enjoy sex. Can you imagine that? Lying next to a partner who you love and who you know loves you, but being unable to enjoy physical intimacy? These women feel broken and worthless. They’ve been told it’s their job to satisfy their husbands sexually (frigid wives are sometimes blamed for husbands “going gay”). And yet the guilt and shame they feel for losing what gave them value leaves them unable to even get aroused.

Have you caught the wording I’ve chosen? Sex is traded for a good marriage. Having sex for the first time is losing a hoarded treasure. This system is the ultimate in sex-as-currency thinking. More specifically, it’s first-time-sex-as-currency. (Because we all know how great your first time is gonna be.) In order to treat first-time sex as the currency in relationships, though, they must cage a woman’s natural, healthy sexuality. They’re breaking the thing they pretend to treasure.

For further reading on this subject and how virginity culture puts women at risk, I recommend this article: True Love Doesn’t Wait

Written By Pixie Pele