stillness is a lie, my dear
This spring, the thing all the kids were doing that everyone had something to say about was the #aftersex hashtag, which apparently originated on Instagram. Oh, those wild kids, taking pictures of themselves in bed! The hashtag is a mixture of images, including people who are sweet, sultry, sleepy, and more, sometimes with pets along […]
One of my favourite sexual education resources for teens and young adults is Scarleteen, and not just because it’s extremely comprehensive and very inclusive (though it is both of those things). It’s also because the site assumes, straight up and without comment, that teens have sex. That might seem like sort of an odd thing […]
I’ve written here before about the very specific brand of sex-positivity I loathe, in which people seem bound and determined to press their sexuality on other people, insisting that sex is fantastic for everyone and everyone enjoys sex, creating a hypersexual, charged environment that refuses to acknowledge the complexities of human sexuality. Sex is awesome, […]
Many people seem very taken with the idea of ‘sex positivity’ these days, which people seem to define in different ways; under a generous definition, I’d say that it translates to being supportive and respectful of the varied manifestations of sexuality, including respect for all consensual sex acts and individual sexual preferences. Essentially, if someone’s […]
One of the ongoing cultural and social clashes in the United States seems to be centered around the idea that people never change, instead reaching adulthood and becoming frozen in a fixed and stable existence. If someone grows up as a girl and into a woman, for example, then she’s always a woman, and if […]
I’ve been thinking a great deal lately about rape culture and masculinity, which is hardly a new topic for me to explore, let alone the rest of the world, but occasionally I get an idea in my mind like a raspberry seed in my teeth, and I have to worry at it until it finally […]
One of the oldest surviving pieces of literature in the Western world is Aristophanes’ Lysistrata, a play about women who go on a sex strike to end a war. The result is a ‘war between the sexes’ which is usually played as a comedy—and it’s a comedy that’s endured through the centuries through numerous performances […]
Now that Inheritance has finally been out for several months, I can at last run my promised followup post on The Thing. If you haven’t read the book yet, you can check out my older spoiler-free review to tide you over until you have a chance to crack the covers; you definitely don’t want to […]
I’ve been rewatching Six Feet Under (yes, again), and I’ve been struck by the character of Melissa, who appears in the second season during Brenda’s ‘dark sexual journey’ (as described by the producers and writers in the DVD commentary—yes, I listen to the commentary). She starts out as a client of Brenda’s who starts seeing […]
I’ve been thinking about Cherice Morales a lot lately. Perhaps it would be better to say that she, and her case, are haunting me. This bright, promising, talented Latina committed suicide at just 14 in the aftermath of a rape; a rape committed by her 49-year-old teacher. He was sentenced to just 30 days for […]