Must-read for the straight men: Flirting.

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From Charlie Glickman, and continuing on a theme from previous posts this month:

Something I Want Men To Know Before Flirting With Women

There’s been an important shift in several different communities and scenes lately. In the kink world, in atheism circles, among feminist folks and their allies, in pagan communities, I’ve been seeing more people than ever before talking about the effects of sexual coercion, assault, harassment, unwanted attention, and other related topics. Of course, none of this is particularly new and women have been talking about it for years. But what’s different is the nature of the dialogue. More men who want to be allies to women are speaking up, and thanks to the potential of the internet and social networking, more people are seeing the patterns than ever before. There are plenty of folks with lots of great stuff to say, and I don’t feel the need to repeat their words here. Instead, I want to address something that I wish I’d understood much earlier than I did.

Many of the reactions to this growing awareness that I’ve seen from men is some form of resentment that they don’t get to flirt with, cruise, or attempt to pick up women whenever they happen to see someone attractive. Leaving aside the underlying assumption that men should be able to express their sexual desire any time we want, I want to talk about the general cluelessness of most men around the incessant sexual intrusion that most women experience and the effects that has on flirting.

I’m writing this specifically for the men who want to flirt with women, whether the hope is for a one-night stand, a relationship, a conversation, a date, or simply to pass the time. What happens when the intention is to harass, stalk, annoy, or get any other reaction from women is a different thing. But right there, that is the root of the problem. A lot of the time, it’s difficult, if not impossible, to tell the difference. That sucks for the guys who genuinely want to connect with someone. And you know what? As much as it sucks for you and me, it’s many, many times worse for women. We can decide to deal with this situation or not, but women don’t get that choice because they get harassed all the time. So the first thing we need to wrap our brains around is that expecting women to have sympathy for how we feel when this is unpleasant for us is like expecting someone with a broken leg to have sympathy for someone who’s got a sprained finger. If they have the bandwidth and interest, that’s great! But resenting them when they don’t isn’t helpful. We need to stop expecting women to coddle our feelings and take care of them for ourselves.

Please go read the rest here.

The science behind GGG.

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From Dr. Debby Herbenick at Salon.com:

Five years ago, sex columnist Dan Savage suggested that, when it comes to sex, we should all aim to be GGG (“good, giving, and game … Think ‘good in bed,’ ‘giving equal time and equal pleasure’ and ‘game for anything – within reason’”). Long embraced by his readers, the GGG approach now has support from a new scientific study published in the Journal of Sex Research.

Of course, we’ve known for years that technique (for example, clitoral stimulation for women, incorporating certain sexual behaviors for either sex) matters to couples. And certainly inequitable pleasure is never a good thing, even though it persists (as I discussed in last week’s column, research shows that women are particularly prone to getting shafted in the orgasm department during hookup sex).

What this new study from researchers at the University of Arizona and Hanover College adds, at least from my perspective, is the additional layer of understanding of how being “game for anything – within reason” contributes to intimacy and satisfaction.

To be fair, the researchers didn’t actually examine the GGG phenomenon. They didn’t use the term “GGG,” nor did they use the phrase “game for anything” anywhere in their research paper. Rather, they studied what they call “sexual transformations” – sexual changes that people make for the sake of their partner or their relationship. But as a scientist myself, I’m going to go out on a limb and pronounce the term “sexual transformations” to be the nerdier first cousin to the slightly cooler third G in the trifecta: “being game for anything – within reason.”

[...]

So what did they find? Interestingly enough, participants’ own sexual transformations weren’t linked to their relationship satisfaction. In other words, being game yourself wasn’t the key to your own satisfaction. Rather, women and men reported higher levels of relationship satisfaction when their partners said they’d made more “sexual transformations” (when their partners had been game for more- or less-frequent sex, trying new sexual activities, etc). I’m going to guess that, at least in part, this may be because when one’s partner adapts to your needs, you’re likely to feel heard, special, rewarded, valued, or – at the very least — you get to do the things you want to do, sexually.

Feelings about sexual transformations mattered, too. Men and women who felt more positive about the sexual changes they made generally reported higher levels of relationship satisfaction. To me, this aspect of people’s feelings about their changes goes back to being game – after all, being “game” for switching up one’s sex life isn’t about begrudgingly going down on someone or role-playing with a bored look on one’s face. Being game is about being willing to give something a whirl, and happily so. It’s about bringing your A-game to bed, about not knowing how you’ll end up feeling about it but being willing to give it your best shot, with an open mind and heart.

[...]

The bottom line seems to be that there’s much to be gained when it comes to sex if one keeps an open mind, is willing to try new sexual things for a partner, and if a couple can express their affection with each other. The authors note, too, that even small changes may ultimately help to enhance a couple’s relationship.

Read the rest of the article here.

NFL players in support of gay marriage.

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This story has lit up the wires, especially the letter from Chris Kluwe (at the bottom of this post).

It all started when Brendon Ayanbadejo, a Baltimore Ravens player, publicly threw his support behind gay marriage equality in Maryland - there's currently a ballot initiative that would legalize gay marriage.

Professional athletes publicly offering support for gay marriage is a new phenomenon, and likely represents and major shift in the public's attitudes towards sexual orientation and civil rights. This trend will continue and I doubt it will be too long before gay professional athletes in the most popular North American sports (e.g., hockey, baseball, football and basketball) start publicly coming out. The impact of this cannot be understated. Not only that, the first pro athlete from one of the four majors to come out is going to go down in history as a hero to the majority. I'm hoping it's a Canadian hockey player on a Canadian team. Call me patriotic.

In response to Ayanbadejo, a Maryland state Democratic legislator named Emmett C. Burns Jr. wrote a an official letter from his office to the Baltimore Ravens requesting that the organization muzzle Ayanbadejo.

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Emmett-Burns-letter-jpg_203633

Here's the letter in all its glory (click to make larger):

Not one to back down, Ayanbadejo called Burns Jr. out and the story blew up. At one point Ayanbadejo tweeted:

Football is just my job it's not who I am. I am an American before anything. And just like every American I have the right to speak!!!

Since this all went down, others have come to the support of Ayanbadejo including the president of the Ravens and the NFL Commissioner.

Another NFL player, Minnesota Vikings punter Chris Kluwe, also took up the cause, writing Burns Jr. a scathing letter which was distributed to the media:

Dear Emmett C. Burns Jr.,

I find it inconceivable that you are an elected official of Maryland's state government. Your vitriolic hatred and bigotry make me ashamed and disgusted to think that you are in any way responsible for shaping policy at any level. The views you espouse neglect to consider several fundamental key points, which I will outline in great detail (you may want to hire an intern to help you with the longer words):

1. As I suspect you have not read the Constitution, I would like to remind you that the very first, the VERY FIRST Amendment in this founding document deals with the freedom of speech, particularly the abridgment of said freedom. By using your position as an elected official (when referring to your constituents so as to implicitly threaten the Ravens organization) to state that the Ravens should "inhibit such expressions from your employees," more specifically Brendon Ayanbadejo, not only are you clearly violating the First Amendment, you also come across as a narcissistic fromunda stain. What on earth would possess you to be so mind-boggingly stupid? It baffles me that a man such as yourself, a man who relies on that same First Amendment to pursue your own religious studies without fear of persecution from the state, could somehow justify stifling another person's right to speech. To call that hypocritical would be to do a disservice to the word. Mindfucking obscenely hypocritical starts to approach it a little bit.

2. "Many of your fans are opposed to such a view and feel it has no place in a sport that is strictly for pride, entertainment, and excitement." Holy fucking shitballs. Did you seriously just say that, as someone who's "deeply involved in government task forces on the legacy of slavery in Maryland"? Have you not heard of Kenny Washington? Jackie Robinson? As recently as 1962 the NFL still had segregation, which was only done away with by brave athletes and coaches daring to speak their mind and do the right thing, and you're going to say that political views have "no place in a sport"? I can't even begin to fathom the cognitive dissonance that must be coursing through your rapidly addled mind right now; the mental gymnastics your brain has to tortuously contort itself through to make such a preposterous statement are surely worthy of an Olympic gold medal (the Russian judge gives you a 10 for "beautiful oppressionism").

3. This is more a personal quibble of mine, but why do you hate freedom? Why do you hate the fact that other people want a chance to live their lives and be happy, even though they may believe in something different than you, or act different than you? How does gay marriage, in any way shape or form, affect your life? If gay marriage becomes legal, are you worried that all of a sudden you'll start thinking about penis? "Oh shit. Gay marriage just passed. Gotta get me some of that hot dong action!" Will all of your friends suddenly turn gay and refuse to come to your Sunday Ticket grill-outs? (Unlikely, since gay people enjoy watching football too.)

I can assure you that gay people getting married will have zero effect on your life. They won't come into your house and steal your children. They won't magically turn you into a lustful cockmonster. They won't even overthrow the government in an orgy of hedonistic debauchery because all of a sudden they have the same legal rights as the other 90 percent of our population—rights like Social Security benefits, child care tax credits, Family and Medical Leave to take care of loved ones, and COBRA healthcare for spouses and children. You know what having these rights will make gays? Full-fledged American citizens just like everyone else, with the freedom to pursue happiness and all that entails. Do the civil-rights struggles of the past 200 years mean absolutely nothing to you?

In closing, I would like to say that I hope this letter, in some small way, causes you to reflect upon the magnitude of the colossal foot in mouth clusterfuck you so brazenly unleashed on a man whose only crime was speaking out for something he believed in. Best of luck in the next election; I'm fairly certain you might need it.

Sincerely, Chris Kluwe

P.S. I've also been vocal as hell about the issue of gay marriage so you can take your "I know of no other NFL player who has done what Mr. Ayanbadejo is doing" and shove it in your close-minded, totally lacking in empathy piehole and choke on it. Asshole.

And Chris Kluwe interviewed about his letter on CNN:

altimore Raven's linebacker Brandon Ayanbadejo recently caught the ire of State Rep Emmett C. Burns, Jr for having the temerity to speak out in favor of Maryland's ballot initiative for marriage equality. Rep. Burns even wrote a letter to his boss, the team owner Steve Bisciotti requesting that, and I quote, "I am requesting that you take the necessary action ...


Must read lesson from Stoya: Not-cool things to do, bro… Part 2.

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If you haven't already read Part 1, scroll down about 6 posts or click here first.

The fifth paragraph of Part 2, in particular, should be required reading:

It seems like women have been sharing their experiences with sexual harassment all over the place in the past few weeks. That’s what prompted me to share mine. As Jen Bennett said on twitter, there is clearly something in the air. It should be in the air. Speaking up is the only way that we can help people understand that something is an issue. Sharing is how we let each other know that we are not alone. Open discussion raises awareness of things likehttp://www.slutwalktoronto.com/ and http://www.ihollaback.org/.

Street harassment is not a rare or isolated occurrence. It does not only happen in America. It does not only happen to young or traditionally-considered-“beautiful” women. It does not only happen on public transit or in low income areas.

We shouldn’t have to have a big angry dog named Funster to protect us. We shouldn’t have to carry Mace or a knife, hoping that we’ll be able to use it properly if necessary or investing hours of our lives in self defense courses (something a lot of women have neither the time nor disposable income to do). We shouldn’t have to travel in packs to feel safe (again, something that isn’t really feasible).

Men have been responding saying that they want to divorce their gender. That they didn’t realize, until we started sharing our stories en masse, what it is like to be a woman. That they wish there was something they could do. That they’re sorry for the way other men treat people. Men shouldn’t *have* to feel like they need to apologize on behalf of their gender, or feel ashamed of being male. Unless they’re one of the ones doing the harassing, I don’t think they should apologize.

There are things that can be done. When someone you know engages in inappropriate or harassing behavior towards a woman, let them know they did something totally not cool. Like: “Actually, that woman had a right to be upset when you chased her down the street. She was completely accurate when she called it creepy.” or “Hey, this story you’re telling me about putting your dick on a drunk stranger’s face at a party when she clearly didn’t want it there but was too sleepy(2) to fend you off, that was a totally not cool thing to do with your penis, bro.” Teach every moldable male(1) mind (brothers, friends, sons) that treating women (humans) with respect is the right thing to do. Don’t have sex with jerks. Don’t blow them, don’t give them a handjob, don’t give them your phone number. If you hear a woman asking a man to leave her alone or calling attention to the fact that he’s whacking off in the train station, add your voice to hers. Say “This is not ok. This is not cool. We see what you are doing and it is unacceptable.”

(1) I’m focusing on the men here because I’ve never experienced or heard of a case of menacing street harassment by a female. I could be misinformed. Could be. Possibly.

(2) EDIT: By “sleepy” I mean “incapacitated by being potentially drugged or just being a poor judge of her alcohol tolerance.”

Stoya's blog, with other tidbits of wisdom, can be found here.

Photo from G4TV.com.

Multi-vaginaed kangaroos.

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We interrupt your regularly scheduled news programming to bring you this wonderful piece of trivia about kangaroo genitals.

Regular readers will know of my love for Inside Nature’s Giants, the British documentary where anatomists cut up large animals to examine how their bodies work and evolved. It’s a truly incredible show, combiningunbridled joy at the natural world, drama, and solid educational value.

So far, it has brought us the horrifying throat of a leatherback turtle, the mysterious bloodsweat of a hippo, and the exploding insides of a beached whale. But this week’s episode may have topped all of that with the triple vaginas of the female kangaroo. The diagram above (an annotated screengrab from the show) explains the complicated plumbing.

This set-up is shared by all marsupials – the group of mammals that raise their young in pouches. Koalas, wombats and Tasmanian devils all share the three-vagina structure. The side ones carry sperm to the two uteruses (and males marsupials often have two-pronged penises), while the middle vagina sends the joey down to the outside world.

Note that the ureters, which carry urine from the kidneys to the bladder, pass through the gaps between the three tubes. In placental mammals, like us, the ureters develop in a different way, and don’t go through the reproductive system. As we develop, the precursors to the reproductive tubes eventually fuse into a single vagina. In marsupials, this can’t happen.

The programme also suggested that this might explain why marsupial embryos are born at such a premature stage of development. A kangaroo’s joey is about the size of a jellybean when it leaves the vagina, and it must endure an arduous crawl into the pouch. It’s possible that with such a narrow tube to go down, it couldn’t get any bigger before its birth.

With its complicated reproductive set-up, a female kangaroo can be perpetually pregnant. While one joey is developing inside the pouch, another embryo is held in reserve in a uterus, waiting for its sibling to grow up and leave. Indeed, a mother kangaroo can nourish three separate youngsters at a time – an older joey that has left the pouch, a young one developing inside it, and an embryo still waiting to be born.

New exercise machine.

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Skip to the beginning at 30 seconds. 

From Korea, for those who like to ride the horse in front of TV and in home comfort of their own space. For all family member, this home mechanical equestrian system will meet for all the family need. It help device to fitness you up! And reach the health goal!

Must read lesson from Stoya: Not-cool things to do, bro… Part 1.

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It'd be nice to think that we're making progress on gender equality and that straight male sexual entitlement is on the decline. But the reality is, we've still got a very, very long way to go.

From Stoya, porn uberstar:

I can actually remember every time a person at a convention or trade show has touched me inappropriately. My first year at the Venus Fair in Berlin there was a man who shoved two of his fingers into my panty-covered vagina. It was really fast, like he was standing there one second and the next I was trying to figure out how the gusset of my underwear had ended up *in* my vulva. There was a man in Texas who rather violently squeezed my ass while we were taking a picture and then laughed at how I’d “squealed like a piglet”. Seriously. I’m kind of disappointed by how much of a stereotype he was. At AVN this year, a guy grabbed my forearm while I was walking from the elevators to Digital Playground’s booth. He let go when I punched him in the testicle area. There’s an average of three people per convention who try the more subtle approach of sliding their hand a *bit* too far down my back when I stand next to them for a photo. Every single one of them apologizes when I gently put their hand back where it belongs and ask them to remember that I am not a blow up doll.

The above paragraph is absolutely nothing, NOTHING, compared to what it’s like to be a girl or woman walking around in public in broad daylight. With dirty hair up in a ponytail or bun, no makeup, and baggy clothing on. With headphones in, sitting in a coffee shop or on the subway with your nose in a book, or talking on the phone.

Men have followed me down the street poking me in what one can only assume is an attempt to get my attention. Men have grabbed the cord to my headphones and ripped them out of my ears. Multiple times. Men have grabbed parts of my body, or my coat or purse strap. Twice, when I was transporting my Lyra (the three foot metal hoop/circus apparatus I do aerial work on) they have grabbed the hoop and refused to let go until I threatened to kick them. They’ve blocked me into corners on mostly empty subway cars, followed me for blocks and then stood outside whatever shop I duck into for absurd amounts of time. They stop their cars in the middle of the crosswalk to stare and yell things out of the window. Years ago, in Philadelphia, one man walked around my neighborhood asking people if they knew where this blue-haired white girl lived because he wanted to return her phone. Fortunately my neighbors were too smart for that trick.

They say I have a sweet ass, nice tits, a real pretty dress. They say I’m their future wife, or I’d look good with their dick in my mouth. They try (and probably succeed at times) to take pictures down my shirt. They ask if they can get my number, they ask where I live, why I’m not smiling, why my boyfriend lets me walk around by myself. Then they ask why I’m such a bitch, if my pussy is made of ice. They say that they never do this, as though I’ve somehow driven them to inappropriate behavior and deserve it. They say they’re just having fun, trying to pay me a compliment. Pretty frequently they get mean, slipping into a loud tourettes-like chant of bitch-whore-cunt-slut.

Before you try to tell me that it’s because I take my clothes off for a living, let me tell you that this started way before I was 18. Let me tell you that every single woman I know has at least one truly terrifying story of street harassment and a whole bunch of other stories that are merely insulting or annoying. Let me remind you that in a room of pornography fans, who have actually seen me with a dick in my mouth and who can buy a replica of my vagina in a can or box, I am treated with far more respect than I am walking down the street.

Stoya's blog, with other tidbits of wisdom, can be found here.

The Kinsey Reporter.

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Introduction of this new app has been making the rounds on the web over the last few days. The new app has garnered so much attention that the news release on the Indiana University website is inaccessible (link here, if you can manage to view the page). However, ScienceDaily published the original news release. Here are some snippets:

Indiana University has released Kinsey Reporter, a global mobile survey platform for collecting and reporting anonymous data about sexual and other intimate behaviors. The pilot project allows citizen observers around the world to use free applications now available for Apple and Android mobile platforms to not only report on sexual behavior and experiences, but also to share, explore and visualize the accumulated data.

"People are natural observers. It's part of being social, and using mobile apps is an excellent way to involve citizen scientists," said Julia Heiman, director of The Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender and Reproduction. "We expect to get new insights into sexuality and relationships today. What do people notice, what are they involved in, and what can they relate to us about their lives and their communities?"

[...]

"This new platform will allow us to explore issues that have been challenging to study until now, such as the prevalence of unreported sexual violence in different parts of the world, or the correlation between various sexual practices like condom use, for example, and the cultural, political, religious or health contexts in particular geographical areas. These were some of our initial motivations for the project," he said. Users simply download the free app and begin contributing observed information on topics such as sexual activity, public displays of affection, flirting, unwanted experiences and birth control use. Even though no information identifying users submitting reports is collected or stored, the time and general location of the report is collected and input into the database. Users also have the option of selecting their own geographic preference for the report by choosing city/town, state/region or country.

Jezebel has published a short piece about the app, with some of their own commentary and an update on the status of the project:

New App Helps You Keep a Log of All the Nearby Boners

Kindly monitor the boners, please! For science!

A new mobile app from the Kinsey Institute encourages users to (anonymously) report and share sexual activities that they witness or participate in—aggregate data which will then be logged and analyzed by Kinsey researchers. The goal is to hopefully map geographical trends and cultural phenomena ranging from flirting to birth control, that might enlighten some dimmer corners of human sexuality. It's like sexting your professor! Kind of! If your professor was the entire internet.

In the project's first hours after launch, people from all over the United States and Europe had added tags about sexual activity, ranging from subjects as innocent as "man" and "woman" to more provocative phrases like "increased desire" and "infidelity."

The project doesn't collect identifying information from users, but does store the time and general location of the report. That means if you comment about "man flirting" in Portland, as one subject did, the project will be able to collect both that tag and the city, but won't display a name.

"This new platform will allow us to explore issues that have been challenging to study until now," said Filippo Menczer, director of the Center for Complex Networks and Systems Research, in a press release, "such as the prevalence of unreported sexual violence in different parts of the world, or the correlation between various sexual practices like condom use, for example, and the cultural, political, religious or health contexts in particular geographical areas. These were some of our initial motivations for the project."

I'm not sure how accurate a bunch of self-reported, crowd-sourced sex data will be (specifically, the sexual observations of adults affluent and idle enough to have both smartphones and time for this project), but it's a pretty amazing idea. At the very least—not even mentioning the implications for public health and sexual violence research—it just backs up the notion that sex is normal, sex is everywhere...

All sorts of wrong.

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From the Huffington Post (thanks Laura!):

ANN ARBOR, Mich. -- Police in southeast Michigan say a man called to complain that a woman he had agreed to pay for sex unexpectedly increased the price.

Police say the woman was arrested. The man wasn't taken into custody.

According to investigators, the man and woman gave vastly different accounts of what happened. The case is under investigation and prosecutors will determine any possible charges.

The woman was arrested but the man wasn't???