[SSEX BBOX] is an ambitious documentary project, headed by Priscilla Bertucci. Their goal is to explore sex-positive communities in San Francisco, São Paolo, Berlin, & Barcelona (hence, the SS BB in the name) and explore the different ways that people in these locations are examining and discussing sexuality. By looking at how people are using sexuality as a means for social change, [SSEX BBOX] will help connect different movements and offer inspiration for new ideas.

Priscilla Bertucci and Carol Queen at the SSEX BBOX premiere

I’ve spoken with sexologists from around the world and one of the challenges we face is that cultural differences and variations in language make it hard to translate concepts from one country to another. [SSEX BBOX] aims to bridge some of those gaps and show us different approaches to some of the same questions, as well as to demonstrate the various topics of interest in different locations.

Their goal is to post 15 episodes every two weeks, along with subtitles in English, Spanish, Portuguese, and German. Right now, Episode 1 in English has been released, with others in the works. I was honored to be one of the people they interviewed me for this one, along with Jessi Fischer, Dossie Easton, Maymay, Chris White, and others.

You can get more info about the project on their website, and follow them on facebook and twitter @SSEXBBOX. They also have a really great magazine, available online here. And if you want to contribute to the project, they’re looking for funding, art or writing submissions, and volunteers.

Here’s episode 1, for your viewing enjoyment!

Ask our Docs: Prostate Play and Pleasure
January 25, 7-8 pm, Free
Good Vibrations Valencia St., 603 Valencia St. (at 17th), San Francisco
The prostate is one of the most overlooked sexual organs, but it can bring you amazing pleasure. With a little know-how, you can have lots of prostate fun, on your own or with a partner. Charlie Glickman, Ph.D will tell you everything you need to know to get started, what toys work best for prostate play, tips for making it easier, and more. Whether you or your partner are new to prostate fun or you’re looking for some new ideas, come get your questions answered and discover how amazing it can be!

Film Screening & Reception to benefit Advocates for Informed Choice
January 26, 6-9 pm
Suggested donation: $50
Congregation Sha’ar Zahav, 290 Dolores Street, San Francisco
Please join us for a 10th anniversary retrospective of the award-winning documentary, “XXXY”. Q&A will follow with filmmaker Porter Gale and Anne Tamar-Mattis, Executive Director of AIC.

Filmmaker Magazine calls “XXXY” “essential filmmaking” as it “concisely and powerfully conveys horror, injustice and tremendous personal fortitude.” This 13-minute documentary features two adults, Howard and Kristi, who were subjected to extensive nonconsensual cosmetic genital surgery as infants and teenagers because they were born with intersex conditions.

Founded in 2006, Advocates for Informed Choice is the only organization in the U.S. to undertake a coordinated strategy of legal advocacy for the rights of children with intersex conditions or DSDs (differences of sex development).

Garage parking is available at Hoff Street Garage (16th/Mission). Also, MUNI underground and the 16th St. BART station are very good transportation options.

Sex Positive Discussion Panel- Let’s Talk Consent!
January 27, 7-10 pm, $7.50 in advance, $10 at the door
The Mills College Community Health Resource Center is proud to present our second annual Sex Positive Discussion Panel! This year, our speakers are:

Carol Queen
Jiz Lee
Charlie Glickman
Krista Smith
Dossie Easton
Shilo Mccabe
with more to come

This year’s theme is consent. How do we give and get consent? What does this mean in terms of BDSM? How do we enact consent when dealing with sexual assault? How can consent be eroticized?

Mills students get in free, with current ID at the door. Tickets for non-Mills community members are $7.50 if purchased before the date and $10 at the door. Coffee and cookies will be for sale in the lobby afterward.

Good Vibrations New Store Grand Opening Party!
January 28, 6-9 pm, Free
Good Vibrations Oakland, 3219 Lakeshore Ave.
Join us as we celebrate the launch of our 6th store on Lakeshore Avenue in Oakland, California. Plus, meet very special guest Kandi Burruss, Grammy-winning songwriter, singer, producer, and Real Housewife of Atlanta, presenting her new intimate luxury line “Bedroom Kandi!” Enjoy free sexy prizes from the Wheel of Pleasure, including several Burguss’ own Bedroom Kandi line from OhMiBod, along with tasty treats, and keepsake photos from the Good Vibrations custom photo booth.

Prostate Play with Charlie Glickman & Aislinn Emirzian!
The Looking Glass, Oakland, CA
January 29, 2-4 pm, $20 or $35/pair
Purchase tickets and find location info here
The prostate is one of the most overlooked sources of sexual pleasure but with a little know-how, you can tap into its amazing sexual potential. Sex educators Charlie Glickman and Aislinn Emirzian will make sure you have all the tools you need to make your prostate play as fun as it can be. They’ll talk about the three most important ingredients for anal play, the physiology of the prostate and how it affects pleasure, tips for prostate massage, using toys, incorporating prostate play into other sexual activities, and male multiple orgasm. By the end of the workshop, you’ll have all the tools you need to have plenty of prostate fun!

(Note- if you’re wondering what the difference is between this workshop and the free one on 1/25, this one goes much longer, gives you a lot more info, and has plenty of time for Q&A. The 1 hour version at Good Vibrations is a lot faster and has less time for discussion.)

[SSEX BBOX] Premiere!
January 30, 7:30-11 pm, Free
The Center for Sex & Culture, 1349 Mission Street, San Francisco
[SSEX BBOX] is a social justice web series and documentary that aspires to create sexual awareness worldwide. We believe that sex should be discussed, explored, felt and consciously experienced more “outside of the box”.
[SSEX BBOX] expands consciousness by examining and challenging two dimensional, archaic and obsolete understandings of sexuality and gender. Constructing community, education, & dialogue – dismantling ignorance, isolation & shame…

This event will screen the first and second episodes of the [SSEX BBOX] documentary series.

Explore the world outside of your sex box through thought-provoking interviews with nationally recognized sex educators and sex-perts , such as ; Dossie Easton, MFT (Psychotherapist & Writer), Chris White, PhD, Charlie Glickman, PhD (Sex Educator & Sex-Positive Activist) Jessi Fischer, MA (Writer & Sex Educator) and more…
and conversations that matter!

Meet the director and [SSEX BBOX] crew after the film!

Advocates for Informed Choice, an amazing organization that advocates for the civil rights of children who are born with variations of sex anatomy. It’s estimated that 1 in 2000 children are born with reproductive or sexual anatomy and/or chromosome patterns that don’t fit the usual definitions of male or female. And in most cases, the medical response is to perform surgeries. In fact, many doctors view children born with DSD (differences in sex development) as an emergency that requires an immediate response. This often results in pressuring parents to make quick decisions about things that they might not even have heard of before. Fortunately, AIC is working to change that and there’s been some progress.

On January 26, 2012 in San Francisco, AIC is hosting a benefit and screening of XXXY, a documentary film that takes an “intimate look at the long-term emotional, psychological, and physiological effects of being born “intersex,” or with ambiguous genitalia.” The film focuses on two people who between them have undergone over two dozen surgeries to “correct” their ambiguous sex organs. They speak quite honestly about the ways in which their experiences, including ” a wide array emotional issues, including shame, secrecy, gender identity, depression, intimacy, and the feelings of disempowerment that come from having no role in the decisions made regarding their gender identity.”

Following the screening, there will be Q&A with the filmmakers Porter Gale and Laleh Soomekh, and Anne Tamar-Mattis, Executive Director of AIC. You can purchase tickets here. And here’s the Facebook event page- even if you can’t make it, please help get the word out.

Just helping get the word out. See below for details, and please pass it on.

• Are you a female-to-male transsexual age 25-45?
• Have you been on testosterone for five years or more?
• Do you live full time as a man?
• Were you primarily sexually attracted to women before transition, and now have a primary sexual attraction to men (after transition)?

Dylon is a graduate student studying clinical psychology at the California School of Professional Psychology, and he is recruiting participants for a confidential study about their experience of sexual orientation in relation to their transition. It is his hope that this project will increase trans visibility, and consequently increase the availability of resources to our community.

If you would like to participate in this confidential study, or if you have questions, please contact Dylon at ftmresearchstudy@gmail.com or (415) 548-1001. Please provide a name and phone number along with a convenient time to reach you so he can schedule the initial screening phone conversation.

On January 30, the Center for Sex & Culture will host the premiere screening of the first two episodes. It’s a free event, from 7:30-11 at 1349 Mission St. in San Francisco. It’ll be a really wonderful event and I definitely encourage you to come, if you can.

Here’s the Facebook event link, along with the flyer, and one of the youtube preview videos. Enjoy!

One of the things that Kesler points out (rightfully, I think) is that the word empowerment has been co-opted by a variety of people and forces that don’t have our best interests at heart. Rather than the original definition as “a multi-dimensional social process that helps people gain control over their own lives,” it’s often used in ways that control, limit, and shame people for their choices. For example, I see a lot of articles and debates online about whether a particular sex act or body modification practice is empowering. I think that highlights how little we understand what power is.

Some Definitions of Power

In Truth or Dare: Encounters with Power, Authority, and Mystery, Starhawk describes three types of power: “power-over,” which is domination and control; “power-from-within,” or personal ability and spiritual integrity; and “power-with,” which has to do with social power or influence among equals. While I think that those are useful definitions, I also find that power-over, power-from-within, and power-with seem like distinct experiences to me. Using the same base word and changing the preposition attached to it masks the fact that they have some fundamental differences.

I much prefer to think of power-over as control or force because that’s what it’s really about. Power-over is a process of making people do what you want them to do, whether it’s what they want or not. There might be a degree of regret or the controller might not care, as long as they get what they want. At its most extreme, this manifests as slavery and rape (among other things).

Most of us move through our days navigating these dynamics of control in a variety of ways. One of the mechanisms of privilege is being able to exert more control over others than is exerted over us, though few of us are entirely free from being controlled. And of course, when we have internalized the ways in which we’re controlled, we might not even see our chains. When we lack the language to describe them and when we can’t imagine any other possibilities, it’s much harder to get free of them. Newspeak, the language created by the Party in Orwell’s 1984, is the best illustration of that I’ve ever seen.

This notion of control lines up pretty well with Starhawk’s definition of power-over, but I find that the mechanisms of that are very different from power-from-within, or what I think of as empowerment. Empowerment isn’t about controlling other people or getting them to do what you want. Instead, it’s the ability to respond to their actions in whatever way you choose. It’s being able to consider their desires as information that you include in your decision-making process, and then acting in whatever way is most authentic to your own needs, goals, and wants. I also recognize that there are some people whose authentic desires are better left unmet.

Asking the Wrong Question

From this perspective, the question of “are blowjobs/porn/open relationships/etc. empowering?” makes no sense because the empowerment doesn’t come from the action. Instead, being empowered means you can make your own choices and then go from there. In many ways, it’s a blend of Starkhaw’s power-from-within and power-with. First, we figure out what actions will be aligned with our personal integrity and authenticity. Then, we (often) engage in communication and negotiation with another person (or other people) before doing whatever it is we want to do.

For example, if you’ve been told that giving blowjobs is not acceptable, then choosing to do that can be the result of your empowerment. On the other hand, if you’ve internalized the idea that you have to give your partner blowjobs, then empowerment could mean that you choose to not do it. In these cases, the actions are very different, even though the underlying processes of empowered decision-making might have been similar.

But the difficulty is that those motivations are often invisible. How can you tell that someone who wants to give a blowjob or get spanked or try anal sex is doing it because it’s what they genuinely desire? In a world in which our likes and dislikes are shaped and limited by the world around us, how do we know whether our choices are empowered or not? Most people will say that they’re making their own choices, even as they move with the herd. I’ve seen this happen around sexual decision making often enough to wonder if there’s any way to know for sure.

I’ve decided that, on a good day, the most that I can do is assess it for myself. Empowered choices leave me feeling joy. Not just the pleasure of the moment, but an ongoing sense of happiness when I reflect back on them later. Empowered choices result in a lightness in my heart, a feeling of satisfaction with myself and pride (not to be confused with arrogance). Even when the experience wasn’t what I’d hoped it would be, I don’t second guess myself. Instead, I take it as an opportunity to grow and use that information for the next time.

There’s a much different sense than I get from making decisions in order to comply with external directives. Those situations often result in feeling like I’m settling for less than I want or deserve. They’re making the best of a bad situation or accepting the lesser of two unpleasant options. Afterward, I might feel sadness, regret, or shame. Instead of a lightness in my heart, I feel heavy or compressed. And sometimes, I might talk about how amazing my decision was in order to convince myself and others that I’m pleased with how things turned out. Instead of feeling joy, I’ll act happy, but the mask doesn’t fool anyone except, perhaps, myself.

Where this can get even trickier is that if I’m talking with someone who’s triggered or squicked or simply confused by my choices, it can be hard for them to see past their discomfort and believe that my choice was empowered. They might not believe me when I tell them that I feel joy around it. Or they might tell me that I’m kidding myself, that I’ve bought the cultural messages that encourage or force people to act in certain ways. I’ve seen this play out in plenty of discussions, both in-person and on the internet.

How Do We Know?

This topic has come up in my personal life lately because my partner loves to cook and bake, while I really dislike it. I can do it, but I’m much happier with our division of labor: she cooks and I do the dishes. And although we both enjoy this dynamic, there was a time when we had some resistance to it. We talked quite a bit about the socio-cultural messages that define cooking as women’s labor and discussed whether we were buying into that or reinforcing them.

whisk and measuring spoons not included

One day we realized that actually, Elizabeth enjoys cooking and that’s ok. She likes reading cookbooks and figuring out the chemistry behind food. She loves getting kitchenware as presents, so I got her a saucier and a cookbook for Solstice this year. (The pan, not a professional chef.) And we decided that it doesn’t matter that traditional gender roles dictate that women cook. In our house, we do plenty of things that break down or ignore those messages. The fact that Elizabeth gets joy out of cooking is what matters, so we stopped worrying about it. If she didn’t enjoy it, it would likely lead to resentment and that would be a problem, but we’d find ways to deal with it. Most likely, we’d split the cooking more evenly, just like we do with the house cleaning.

This experience makes it easier for me to understand why some people have concerns about empowerment and sexual decision-making, especially for women. There’s intense pressure to have sex in specific ways. Lots of people are cajoled or convinced or forced to do things that they don’t want to do, so it can be hard to see past that and accept that other folks actively choose to do the exact same activities. And for women in particular, the mixed messages that one hears create situations in which it seems like no matter which way one goes, empowered sexual choices are impossible.

Making things even more complex is that it’s often hard to determine the relationship between the person and the act from the outside. It’s not always possible to know what that is without asking them about it and creating a safe space for them to give an honest answer. And much of the time, our agendas get in the way of that. When we pay attention to their stories and set aside our preconceived notions, we’re more able to honor their choices and their empowerment. Or we can bring some fierce compassion to the conversation and support them as they explore their experiences and look for ways to make different choices in the future.

A Fictional Perspective

In his classic 1951 science fiction story And Then There Were None, Eric Frank Russell described a planet that had been settled by the Gands, a group that created two tenets for maximizing personal freedom: Mind Your Own Business and Freedom- I Won’t. The first one highlights the idea that as long as someone’s actions don’t involve or affect you, it’s none of your concern. I don’t actually think that applies to Earth 2011 because I believe that we have an ethical responsibility to serve as allies to people who are being harmed. But in the story, genuine and authentic freedom was woven into the lived experiences of every single person through the second one, which I think changes the utility of that maxim.

The second one points out that freedom isn’t simply the ability to choose what to do. It’s also the freedom to say no, or in Russell’s story, I won’t. He illustrates it elegantly because freedom means being able to say both “I won’t do that” and “I won’t not do that,” as you choose. It means having the capacity to identify all of the possible choices and the room to make your own decision. It means the ability to say no, yes, maybe, tell me more, or anything else. It means having both the option to do something and the option to not do it.

This is what’s often missing from discussions of whether a particular sexual act is empowering or not. Arguing about whether anal sex or sex work or performing in porn or non-monogamy is empowering is pointless because the question isn’t whether those things are or aren’t. The question is what the relationship is between the person doing it and the act. Do they see it as one of several choices they can make? Are they dealing with any coercion if they choose otherwise, including the threat of social stigma, physical/emotional/sexual violence, or shame? Do they truly have the freedom to say “I won’t” without fear of reprisal? No matter how it looks from the outside, the only person who can actually make that assessment is the person making the choice. Defining it for them or in contradiction to what they say is the height of arrogance.

Of course, this gets more complex in the real world. What about the situation in which a partner says that they’ll end the relationship if they don’t get what they want? Is that a boundary or an ultimatum? How do we know whether they’re exercising their own freedom to say “I won’t” or trying to limit the other person’s ability to say “I won’t”? Each and every situation is unique, so I don’t have any answers. But I think that this way of thinking about it helps us frame the questions that need to be asked.

What Next?

I’m hardly expecting this post to change the ways in which people debate fight about whether a sexual practice is empowering or not. But I am going to exercise my freedom to say that I won’t get caught up in them anymore. I might point out that the arguments are missing the point, or I might not. I’ll see when I get there. But if you find yourself getting pulled into these sorts of disagreements, I invite you to step back. Though of course, you’re welcome to say “I won’t.” In the words of one of Russell’s characters, that’s freedom, isn’t it?

In my experience, the more we develop the capacity for self-possession and empowerment, the more we can support other people and bear witness to their individual paths, even when they look totally different from our own. That’s one way for our individual empowerment to expand and change things on a larger scale. I don’t think it’s enough to only work on my own empowerment, but I do think that’s the first step. Or as Thorn Coyle phrased it, put your own oxygen mask on before helping others.

I find that the more I move through the world as a sexually empowered person, and the more I share my experiences with the people around me, the more inspired they become to lean into their own edges and discover how to overcome the barriers to their own empowerment. I owe a debt to the elders of my communities who modeled for me what it means to be relentlessly yourself, and I do my best to pay it forward and pass it on. And in the meantime, if it means that we can fuck the way we truly want, then I’m ready for that revolution.

My friend Anna (all names changed to protect privacy) is married to a man who feels it necessary to make random and unprompted comments about her weight. Whenever she gets upset or frustrated with his insensitive comments, he responds in the same, defeating way, “You’re so sensitive. I’m just joking.”

As Ali points out, this sort of behavior is “gaslighting,” a term which comes from the 1944 film Gaslight. In the movie, a man manipulates his wife into thinking she’s crazy by making small changes to things in order to make her doubt her senses. When people deliberately provoke a reaction and then tell the person that it’s just a joke or to not take it so seriously, that’s gaslighting.

But I think that Ali makes a mistake when he conflates gaslighting and something that may be more common in male/female relationships: men telling women that they’re too sensitive because the guys don’t know how to handle big emotions.

Just to be clear, I’m not denying in any way that this is a form of emotional manipulation. I know full well that it can cause the recipient to doubt themselves, and that it can make a bad situation worse. I’m not making excuses for it. Instead, I want to suggest that the reasons for men doing this are more complex than Ali describes and I think we need to look at them more clearly if we want to change things effectively. So let’s leave aside the men who are purposefully using phrases like “don’t make such a big deal about it” in order to abuse someone, I want to take a look at what might be going on when it’s not a deliberate act.

One of the common challenges in m/f relationships is that, generally, boys and men don’t have the same tools to talk about emotions that girls and women often do. While girls are more commonly taught how to navigate the sometimes-rough waters of feelings, boys are usually denied these skills. In fact, boys are often shamed for any expression of emotions in order to force them into the Act Like a Man Box. As a result, lots of them grow up into men who have little capacity to make room for strong feelings (theirs or other people’s). When women express big emotions, especially anger, many men feel anxiety because they don’t know how to respond. Or they might feel shame as a result of past experiences that have bound that feeling up with other ones. Or they might feel anger, whether that’s in response to their anxiety or shame, feeling like they don’t have any control over the situation, feeling blame from their partner (or self-blame), or for a number of any reasons.

Given that these guys are in this place because they don’t know how to manage emotions, it’s easy to see how this can spiral out of control. Some men will try to avoid that by withdrawing. (Can you say man cave?) Some will attack and blame in order to deny responsibility for the situation that has resulted in their discomfort. And some will try to control their partners’ emotions by minimizing them, shaming them, or denying their importance.

Without excusing any of these forms of manipulation in any way, I think it’s important to recognize that most people have done something along these lines, regardless of their gender or sexual orientation. I know that when I was younger and less practiced at juggling big feelings, I tried to get other people to “not feel bad” because I didn’t know any other way to make my discomfort stop. While I didn’t ever tell anyone that they were being too sensitive (as far as I can recall), I know that I tried to minimize the impact of whatever it was that had bothered them, especially if it was something I had done. I wasn’t doing it in order to make them think that they were crazy. I was doing it because I felt fear and wanted to make it stop.

Of course, it’s much more effective to learn how to work with those uncomfortable feelings. It’s much better for the relationship to find ways to hold space for those difficult emotions and listen to what they have to say, rather than running from them or trying to control them. And it’s also unrealistic to expect that someone who has been denied those skills and/or has been shamed away from them will be able to use them. Further, when someone doesn’t think that they have the capacity to deal with what feels like a scary situation, it’s unrealistic to expect them to not try to change it. You can call it “manipulation” if you want, but I think it’s fundamentally different when it’s a defense reaction than when it’s an act of abuse, even if they look superficially similar.

None of this changes the fact that women have often been trained to respond to accusations of sensitivity by silencing themselves. Nor does it deny the impact that has on women’s well-being or on male-female relationships. I think that Ali hit the target when we wrote:

Whether gaslighting is conscious or not, it produces the same result: It renders some women emotionally mute.

These women aren’t able to clearly express to their spouses that what is said or done to them is hurtful. They can’t tell their boss that his behavior is disrespectful and prevents them from doing their best work. They can’t tell their parents that, when they are being critical, they are doing more harm than good.

When these women receive any sort of push back to their reactions, they often brush it off by saying, “Forget it, it’s okay.”

That “forget it” isn’t just about dismissing a thought, it is about self-dismissal. It’s heartbreaking.

No wonder some women are unconsciously passive aggressive when expressing anger, sadness, or frustration. For years, they have been subjected to so much gaslighting that they can no longer express themselves in a way that feels authentic to them.

…

From the way women are portrayed on reality shows, to how we condition boys and girls to see women, we have come to accept the idea that women are unbalanced, irrational individuals, especially in times of anger and frustration.

At the same time, I think that our strategies for dealing with these behaviors need to reflect the fact that the underlying causes can be more complex than we often acknowledge. The difficulty, of course, is that assuming good intentions that don’t exist is a great way to get stuck in an abusive relationships. But assuming bad intentions that don’t exist doesn’t create the kinds of change we need to see in the world.

I learned a useful tool for this sort of thing from Thorn Coyle: don’t coddle weakness. We can confront people who act in ways that harm themselves or other people (including emotionally manipulating them) and look for a good faith effort towards change. If we don’t see it, we can set boundaries or disengage from them. We can even support them as they move through whatever changes arise, if we want to. But if we don’t create the opportunity for them to start that process, we can hardly be surprised if they don’t. I find that bringing some fierce compassion to the conversation can help, too.

Since lots of boys and men are stuck in these cycles, simply because they don’t know how to get out, here’s some language that I’ve found helpful in situations that feel like they’re bigger than I could handle:

Instead of saying “don’t make such a big deal out of it” or “you’re being too sensitive,” try saying something like “Your feelings are bigger than I know how to deal with. I need to step back for a moment so I can keep from feeling overwhelmed.” You might even add, “I want to be able to focus on what you’re saying and my feelings are getting in the way. Can I have some time to calm them down?” You might move across the room while maintaining the conversation. You could step out of the room for a couple of minutes, calm down, and then return. You could even take a break for an hour or two, a few days, or even longer. The important thing is that you’re taking responsibility for your reaction, you’re communicating about your needs, you aren’t disconnecting or attacking, and you’re coming back to finish the conversation.

And guys- no matter how much it might feel like it, you aren’t going to drown in someone else’s emotions. You can learn the skills you need to make room for them and for your own feelings without getting lost. You’ll need to let go of the idea that that’s for women and sissies. You’ll need to get over the idea that emotions are a sign of weakness. I strongly suggest that you get some support for the from someone who isn’t your partner. Lots of men have been trained to get all of their emotional needs met by their girlfriends or wives, which can be a disaster when we’re struggling with issues that relate to them. Get a therapist, find a men’s group, talk to someone else. Take off the armor and learn to open up.

Maybe if enough men can let go of the defensive reaction that prompts them to tell women to stop being so sensitive, the men who are doing it in order to abuse won’t be able to camouflage themselves anymore. If the only men who are saying things like that are deliberately manipulating others, it’ll be a lot easier to call them out. To help make that happen, we also need to teach boys how to use their words when they’re experiencing big feelings. Adults of all genders need to model it so that kids have role models and they can learn to manage their own emotions.

The more we can each take responsibility for our emotions and our reactions, the more graceful our relationships can become. And the payoff from that is well worth the effort it takes to get there.

true. “@hotaction: Everyone should spend some time looking at photos of naked old people because that’s what the future looks like.”

— Dr. Debby Herbenick (@mysexprofessor) December 18, 2011

Today is the 20th anniversary of the date that I met my partner. In the last two decades, we’ve both changed a lot. We’re both much more secure and solid in who we are. We’ve grown and challenged each other to overcome many of the habits that caused friction in our lives and in our connections with other people. We’ve learned many, many ways to support our relationship. And yes, our bodies have changed, too. While I’d love to have the physical resilience that I used to have, I wouldn’t trade my current life for the one I had back then. I needed that ability to bounce back- without it, I never would have survived the drama I caused myself and others.

After two decades with Elizabeth, I think she’s more beautiful than ever before and I’m more drawn to her than I could have imagined when we first met. And I think about the many people who stop being attracted to their partners and trade them in for someone younger. This seems to be more common for men, but I’ve also seen women do the same thing in increasing numbers. While I’m fully supportive of people creating the relationships they want and ending them when they no longer serve them, I can’t help but wonder about our tenacious grip on the idea that younger is better and how that affects things.

Maybe I’ll have something different to say in another 20 years. But right now, I think that the physical expression of experience and growth is incredibly sexy. It’s an outward manifestation of the individual’s evolution. Personally, I find that much more attractive than someone who strives to look like they’re still 23. This is something that many of us have to practice. When the only images that we see define attractiveness as equivalent to youth, it can be difficult to not make comparisons.

I’ve spoken with quite a few people who are convinced that nobody will want to have sex with them because they have grey hair, or wrinkles, or scars, or stretch marks, or health concerns, or any of the other effects of age. I feel sadness that they’re so sure that they’re unattractive to others because they’re unattractive to themselves. I wonder how much of that comes from never having thought of people over a certain age as desirable. I wonder how much of that comes from the fact that so much of the breathless commentary about attractiveness (especially female attractiveness) is tied up in how young someone looks. What a waste of the incredible beauty and wisdom that surrounds us, if only we could see it.

If Elizabeth & I are fortunate, we will have lots more time together. And someday, we may get to be like the people in this photograph. I look at it and see something to be celebrated. I also know that many people will look at it and feel disgust, shame, or squicked. So what are you going to do when you get to be that age? How are you going to feel about yourself or your partner(s)? Will you be able to be naked with your partner without feeling self-disgust or shame?

The time to start thinking about older people being sexy is right now. This is the time to stop shaming elders who express desire or who want to have sex. This is the time to stop mocking their bodies or describing them negatively. When you get older, you’ll be struggling with a lot of cultural momentum and the longer you go along with it, the harder it’ll be when you finally get around to resisting (if you do). That’s especially true for women and their partners, given the extra pressure and judgement attached to youth and attractiveness for women. But really, we’re all affected by the idea that younger is better.

Instead of thinking of someone as “looking good for their age,” how about simply letting them “look good”? Instead of telling someone that they look so young, compliment them on something specific like their hairstyle or their outfit. And instead of saying insulting things about older people’s sexuality, acknowledge the feeling as your own judgment. There’s a huge difference between “that’s gross” and “I feel discomfort.” The more we can change how we think and feel about elders and sexuality, the better off we’ll be if and when we get there.

I also highly recommend Joan Price’s book Naked at Our Age: Talking Out Loud About Senior Sex. Even if you’re not there yet, there’s a good chance that you will be and many of the sexual concerns that can arise are much easier to deal with when you aren’t surprised by them. Joan interviewed and quoted lots of medical professionals, sex educators, and therapists, so it’s like you’re getting the benefit of a whole panel of experts in one book. It’s amazing.

I don’t recall when I first heard about AIDS.I was 11 when the first cases were documented by the CDC in 1981, but it took a while before the news percolated down to me. I remember being 12 or 13 and the panic that hit everywhere. Suddenly, there was a sexually transmitted disease (as they were called then) that was killing people and nobody really knew how it spread. The complacency around STIs that penicillin gave us for a few decades suddenly evaporated and freaked out doesn’t even begin to cover it.

There were people who refused to shake hands or even be in the same room as people with AIDS. There were people who were worried about sharing food or kissing, just in case. Of course, the fact that AIDS was linked to homosexuality (at first, it was called Gay Related Immune Deficiency since the early reported cases were gay men), and then drug users, was part of that. And making it even harder was the fact that President Reagan didn’t even say the word “AIDS” until 1987. Surgeon-General C. Everett Koop’s article The Early Days of AIDS, as I Remember Them is really worth reading.

In many ways, AIDS is part of why I became a sexuality educator. I came out as queer in college and joined the campus peer outreach group. Naturally, I got a lot of questions about HIV and safer sex. When I learned about those topics, I discovered that I needed to find out about sexual communication and negotiation, which got me into relationships and sexual practices. The next thing I knew, I was a sex educator!

It’s hard to explain how scared people were back then. The stigma people with HIV face is still really strong, but this was before any celebrities like Magic Johnson, Freddie Mercury, or Rock Hudson came out as HIV-positive. Living in the suburbs of New Jersey, I didn’t know anyone with HIV and as far as I knew, nobody I knew did, either. And politicians like Jesse Helms blocked funding for research because they were convinced that AIDS was God’s punishment for homosexuality.

I was in San Francisco for a couple of weeks during the summer of 1990 and even in the face of the decimation of the gay community and the deep grief that went along with it, there was still a certain sense of excitement. Groups like ACT UP and Queer Nation had come together to develop strategies for political action. Although to be fair, a lot of folks got involved because it was a great way to develop some horizontal networks. The slogan “An Army of Lovers Cannot Fail” was definitely put into practice.

Safer sex parties like Carol Queen’s & Robert Morgan’s “Queen of Heaven” gatherings became another form of community activism. They weren’t just places to get laid. By creating rules and expectations around safer sex, they helped people see that condoms, gloves, and dental dams didn’t have to get in the way of having a hot time. Participation also became a badge of defiance in the face of lackluster or absent information about safer sex from medical or governmental sources. Communities formed with the intention of helping people stay alive, despite the official silence that was costing lives. Groups like the Safer Sex Sluts created live demos of safer sex techniques to show how hot safer sex could be.

Eventually, of course, some medical treatments were developed. AZT and then protease inhibitors became available, at least for people with the money and/or insurance to cover them. And the government finally got behind safer sex messages, schools created curricula (though we’re still fighting to make them accurate, non-judgmental, and inclusive), and more people came out as HIV-positive. Attitudes are slowly changing.

But there’s still work to do. There are still plenty of people who think that HIV and other SITs are a punishment for sex. (It makes me wonder if they think that the flu is a punishment for riding public transit.) Funding for research is still scarce. And lots of folks are willing to keep their heads in the sand as long as it’s “those people over there,” even though we’re all just a few degrees of separation away from each other. For that matter, we’re still struggling to get safer sex education to young people, despite the fact that it decreases the rates of STI transmission (not to mention, it’s much more cost-effective to prevent disease than it is to treat it). And this school rejected an application from a 13-year old because he’s HIV-positive. So we have a long road ahead of us.

Safer sex is still a really important topic. Even if you’re in a monogamous relationship and choose to not use condoms or other barriers, the more you know about safer sex, the more you can help the folks around you protect themselves, especially teens and young people. It’s only a hindrance or an interruption to your hot fun if you let it be! Check out our how-to articles, with lots of info about choosing condoms, tips for making them more effective, ways to use gloves and dental dams, and more. Remember, safe sex is hot sex. If you’re doing it right.

So one method for spreading the word was posters. They’d show up in bars and community centers when non-profit organizations took the lead, wheat pasted to walls and bus stops when activists took over, and even on buses, trains and other public places when public health departments and other governmental agencies got involved. Many of these posters were funny, some were challenging, and a few were thought-provoking.

30 years into the AIDS epidemic, Dr. Edward Atwater (a retired doctor) is sharing his poster collection through an online catalog hosted by the University of Rochester. So far, only 1917 of his total collection of over 6200 posters from around the world have been uploaded, but they’re working on it. And this interview at The Atlantic is really worth checking out. Here’s a quote:

The reason it’s…important as social history is because, if you look at a whole lot of the posters, you will see how different countries approached the subject. Here you’re dealing with a new disease, dealing with the closeted subject of sex, and it was really amazing to see the variation from country to country and even from groups within a country. To me, that’s by far the most striking thing about the collection.

Generally speaking, in the United States, the posters were less interesting because they had to be neutral. They had to be careful not to offend some group or some sensibility so the best American posters were usually put up by private organizations. Abroad, that wasn’t quite as true.

Here are a few examples from the collection. Go check the rest of it out. It’s a really amazing project.