Secret Confessions of a Smart Girl

***Warning: I wrote this post while wearing my ranty pants, and it is coming off somewhat more intolerant than I really intend***

Lately I seem to be surrounded by an epidemic* of heterosexual people who have decided they want to try being bisexual. In other words, although they are not particularly romantically attracted to individuals of the same sex, they think they might enjoy having sex with them. As it turns out, many of them do enjoy it enormously, but they’re still not particularly interested in same-sex romance… just same-sex nookie.

Although I’m fine with a little same-sex experimentation, and am all in favor of people trying to address any latent homophobia and expand their sexual boundaries, the truth is that this drives me a bit crazy. Why?

1. Because they think that’s what bisexuality is. People who are living bi-design tend to think that those of us who are actually bisexual are doing the same thing. They don’t understand that we want to, can, and do form romantic, emotional partnerships with people of either sex. They assume that we’re just like them and are primarily interested in romantic relationships with one gender but enjoy putting out with both.
2. Because they don’t say that’s what they’re doing. If you don’t think other bisexual people are interested in deeper emotional relationships, then there’s no reason to be explicitly clear that you’re bi-sexual but not particularly bi-romantic or bi-relationship oriented. Thus these people, quite often, do not make it clear to the people they’re interacting with - once, twice, or repeatedly - that they’re not really interested in anything other than friendship and/or sex. This can lead to fundamental miscommunications and fucked up expectations.
3. Because they’re giving bisexuals a bad name. The women who use other women as holdovers between men are one big reason why I have such a hard time finding lesbians who are actually willing to consider a relationship with someone who identifies as bisexual - i.e. me. I assume them men who do this cause similar problems for bi-boys, but there I cannot speak from experience.
4. Because it encourages people to think of sexual orientation as a choice, when for most of us it’s simply not. You just choose how to act on it.

I know a lot of lesbians who occasionally enjoy sex with men and don’t identify as bisexual because they’d never have a relationship with one - men aren’t what they want as partners. On the other hand, most of the (wo)men who I’d consider to be straight, but occaisionally enjoy sex with (wo)men, call themselves bi**.

What’s the divide? I suspect it’s that murmers of bisexuality could hamper your chances of getting laid among the lesbians but enhance it around the heterosexual crowd. Or possibly it’s that lesbians understand that many queer people think of avowed sexual orientation as also speaking to relationships, where heterosexuals - who have never needed to question how their relationships fit into society - think it’s primarily about who you like to fuck.

The problem is that, by and large, discussing these topics leads to varying levels of communication fail, because the labels we use are useless***. We assume that the meaning we ascribe to the words we use to describe our relationships and sexuality is the same as the meaning assigned by the person we are discussing them with… and we are very often wrong****.
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_{*This has come up at least three times in the last month with different people, so if you think I’m talking about you… you’re wrong. Or, possibly, you’re right, but I’m not only talking about you.}

_{**I don’t actually know any gay men who occaisionally like to fuck women, but I assume they’re out there somewhere.}

_{***There isn’t one sexuality spectrum. At least three easily come to mind.}

1. Interest in sex - from asexual to hypersexual
2. Gender of who you like to have sex with - from heterosexual to homosexual (and I suspect there are branches off of this for people who are attracted to something that is not primarily gender based.)
3. Gender of who you like to have relationships with - also from heterosexual to homosexual with a possible orthogonal spectrum looking at innate relationship structure orientation from monogamous to polyamorous.

_{****To provide a BDSM-related example, the other night I was talking to someone about scene negotiations and he kept saying that the women he plays with won’t admit they want to do power exchange, but that they want all the elements and he finds that aggravating. Since we had negotiated a scene a while back and he was putting the same statement on me - when I had negotiated what I considered to be a very power-exchange-y scene with him, and never denied that aspect of it - we finally figured out is that we were talking about two different things. When we were thinking of power-exchange, I was talking about the emotional content of the scenes that I liked and wanted and he was talking about very specific language he wanted used. For him, it’s not power-exchange without that language. For me, power-exchange is about the dynamic and the things that go on during the scene. We had both thought that we were being perfect clear when, in truth, we were having completely different conversations. It was… enlightening.}

The Bush administration is at it again, trying to stealthily pass a rule that would allow providers to class contraception as abortion and extend the aggravating mockery of “moral” legislation known as “conscience clauses”. Please consider signing the Planned Parenthood campaign, or otherwise speaking out. Want to know why this is an issue? Here’s what I wrote about it the last time they tried to sneak this under everyone’s radar.

***Note: This piece has plot spoilers about the show Spring Awakening. If that is going to upset you, don’t read it.***

A kinky friend and I went to see the Broadway musical Spring Awakening the other day, and I was reminded both about how mainstream some BDSM is and how little that means people actually understand it. There is a scene in the play where Wendla, a young woman, talks about how she fantasizes about being beaten and then begs her friend Melchior to beat her with a switch so that she will “feel something, anything.” He eventually acquiesces and hits her. When he does, she repeatedly begs him to hit her harder until he ends up beating her with his fists and then, filled with horror at his actions, running away. This, by the way, is the controversial scene that got the original play banned for many, many years, although in this political climate I think that an earlier scene where the mother refuses to teach her daughter where babies come from may actually ring more true. But I digress…

What I found really fascinating about the scene was the audience reaction to it. A small minority of the audience - including my playmate and I, as well as the gorgeous pair of British queens sitting behind us - spent the scene giggling in recognition. We’d had that conversation, that experience, from one direction or the other. We’d fantasized about pain, understood that desire before or after we grasped our bodies’ longing for gentler sensations, and seeing it on stage was a revelation not because it was unfamiliar but because it was so completely on target. “For every masochist, God makes a sadist,” indeed. The vast majority of the audience just seemed vaguely mystified or uncomfortable, which was what I expected. Then there was the other group. The group, like the couple in front of us who were so disgusted that they talked, loudly enough for us to hear, about whether or not they should get up and leave.

I forget, sometimes, that this is often the reaction to my sexuality. Horror, disgust, derision, and an unshakeable belief that there is something wrong with me because one of the things that most profoundly sexually excites me is pain. It is bad enough, to much of society, that I am a woman who admits to liking sex, that I am aggressive about it, that I approach men, and women, with prurient intent. Still, for most of them, there is something about that they can at least understand. I may be improper, in their eyes, not womanly, not genteel, or whatever, but sex is a sensation they can generally understand desiring. The quest for the holy orgasm is sacred, or at least comprehensible. Seeking out pain, however, must be a sign of some fundamental deviance or flaw. It is proof that I am broken, and allows those who would find other reasons to despise me an easy nail on which to hang the less acceptable placards of their disgust (too smart for her own good, too loud for polite society, not pretty enough to get a normal man, too fat, too weird, too…)

The thing that sometimes makes it difficult to argue is that I am broken, and in the past I have used my masochism as a way to handle it. For a long time I found vanilla sexuality far more stressful than BDSM when it came to addressing my issues of risk vs. reward. In addition, I felt prettier, sexier, and more accepted in the kink community than I did among my more vanilla peers. I had discovered a community that valued differences, girls who were smart, loud, alt-pretty, weird, and ridiculous as much as those who were quiet, beautiful, normal, and sane, and I liked it. It was a glorious place to be, in part because of my flaws. But the counter-intuitive thing is this: in no way has my masochism ever rendered me broken, or wedged itself into little cracked pieces of my soul and forced them open the way that mainstream expectation has so often done. If anything, it has made me stronger, more self confident, healthier, and closer to whole. Still, the fact that I am broken makes it harder to convince people that my being a masochist has nothing to do with flaws in my character or my upbringing, holes in my psyche, active abuse, or benign neglect. It gives them an out from believing that I am just wired to like pain. That, for me, being beaten so hard I can’t sit down comfortably for three days is simply a remarkable amount of fun.

I was listening to the Spring Awakening soundtrack and thinking, earlier today, about how joyful masochism can be. Reminiscing, really, about recent experiences, playing masochist-in-the-middle, ending up in a pile of giggling, writhing, screaming biters and bitees on a floor, laughing hysterically from pain, and grinning shamelessly while cursing my head off. I don’t think most people get that - that for some of us, at least, there can be a connection between a love of pain and the possibility of simple joy (to quote another musical.) I don’t like stubbing my toe or walking into a wall* any more than anyone else does, but the skillful application of pain or other intense sensations is often the most direct neurological highway to a grand old time.

Submission often comes from a darker place in me, a place of untamed longing or restless discontent, but pure masochism is usually straightforward, light, and untainted joy. It’s transporting in the same way as getting caught up in beautiful, intricate music - some small amount of which I experienced when listening to Spring Awakening**.

*Shut up. I know it happens to the rest of you too.
**Full disclosure, I enjoyed the show a lot, but I do not think it was the brilliant masterpiece that so many reviews have implied. It was a good show with some very good music and some very strange staging and choreography - one really annoying bit of which was explained by a remarkably useful review. Since I should not have to rely on written analysis to enjoy directorial choices, I actually think I may like the soundtrack better than the performance, but I am very glad I got to see it before it closed. I have access to cheap enough tickets that I might even be convinced to go again. Especially since I now know to think of it more as a play and concert than as a standard musical, something which will drastically change my experience and expectations.

My local corner of the sex blogosphere has been ringing, lately, with a discussion of money and gift giving. It all started with a post by Axe that furthered my profound disillusion with much of humanity, and then I was turned slightly on my head by my much adored Eileen’s response - which came entirely out of the left field of expectation. As usual, whenever Eileen writes something profound it pokes something in me that makes me want to respond. She’s just that good a writer. Plus, she has a knack for posting about an issue that’s been knocking around in my brain just waiting for an opening to come out.

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I recognize that I have a privileged relationship with money. I have always been financially comfortable, and in most of my relationships I have been the person who is more financially solvent. Because of this, and for numerous other reasons, I tend to be very uncomfortable when people spend money on me, especially if they’re doing it to try to impress me.

It doesn’t. If anything, it does the opposite. It, most often, makes me feel like they’re trying to buy me because they don’t have anything real they can offer to the relationship - interest, intelligence, humor, affection, love, or time. I can buy myself things, but I can’t buy myself what I value more. It horrifies me to think that someone might ever think I wanted them solely because of things they could purchase me.

Which isn’t to say that I don’t like gifts. I love gifts, but the gifts I love cost not money so much as thought. The presents that partners have given me that I treasure, even after the relationship is over, are the ones that say something about our relationship or about how well the person in question knows me. A book, an inexpensive pin from a craft fair that is still my favorite piece of jewelry ever, a dog toy for my boo (when she was still alive), a home cooked meal, uninterrupted cuddling time. I also love giving gifts, and love it from the same perspective. It’s only when I don’t care about someone that money comes into the equation, and I think, “I should spend X much on them for this holiday.” For the people I love, it’s about finding things that speak to me about the person, whether they’re 50 cents or 50 dollars. I buy my best friend presents throughout the year when I find things that want to be hers. She does the same, but it has nothing to do with money. It has to do with making each other smile. Expensive jewelry doesn’t make me smile. A light-saber umbrella, on the other hand… every time I carry it outside at night I can’t help but grin.

It’s hard for me to even let someone buy me dinner if I don’t feel like they’ll let me reciprocate in kind. With the exception of relationships (friendships, lovers, spouses, whatever) where there is an extreme financial inequity, I tend to feel like financial burdens should be shared. I never feel like they should be taken on because of gender. Someone I’ve been seeing lately has said repeatedly, “I hate shopping, but I like shopping for _you_,” which, quite honestly, makes me like them less each time they say it - although the motivation has become clearer lately and therefore somewhat less repugnant to me (I’m beginning to think it stems from an enjoyment of female fashion, which makes it okay with me. I’m fine with someone taking me shopping because they want to play dress up - in fact, that’s both fun and kind of hot. I’m _not_ fine with a person I barely know talking about buying me clothes.)

Really, the “men spend money on women and in exchange women provide sex/home cooked meals/arm candy” concept is one of the things about traditional gender roles I find most appalling. When it was based in the reality that men were making substantially more money than women, it was bad enough. It still treated women as a commodity, but at least there was some logic behind it from a purely practical perspective. Today, when that may or may not be true, it’s simply insulting. It reinforces the paradigm that women have to be bribed for sex, or attention, and negates the idea that they could choose to desire these things on their own. In particular, in situations like the one Axe describes, it’s setting up a very clear business model for relationships. “You buy me X, I will give you sex.” That’s not dating. That’s sex work. Which would be fine, if what both people wanted was simply an exchange of services, but if it’s not business, it shouldn’t be about money. If you’re not involved with someone because you value them and want to be there, then you shouldn’t be involved with them at all… unless the two of you are equally cognizant of the practical nature of your relationship*.

And, if you think about it, it is about gender roles (male/female), not about sex roles (dominant/submissive). If a dominant man went out shopping with a woman, picked out some expensive shoes (or a suit, or a briefcase), and told her she should pay for it as a sign that she saw him as a god, he’d be laughed out of the pretentious assholes club. The common expectation seems to be that dominant men will buy submissive women tokens for pleasing them and that submissive men will buy dominant women gifts to entreat them. In other words, men buy things for women in order to acquire sex. As an ardent feminist, and a sex-loving one at that, how could I not find this offensive?

It’s insulting to women, both the idea that they need to be bought and the impression that they can be**, but it’s also dehumanizing to men. Men are not walking wallets to be appreciated simply because they can purchase you things or give you access to a certain lifestyle or the social elite. Men are human beings, with thoughts and feelings, who deserved to be valued for who they are instead of what they can afford - just like women deserve to be valued for who they are instead of what they look like.

There is an extraordinary weight placed on money in American culture, and it’s also a very gendered issue. It makes it hard for people, myself included, to be able to look at it objectively. I like to, at least, take gender out of the equation, to ask myself “would this bother me as much if the genders were reversed?” Axe’s example would. Eileen’s question about quitting a job and being financially supported by a partner, however, wouldn’t. Why? Because men could do that just as well as women. When you have an artist in a household, or a person who prefers to parent while someone else prefers to work outside the home, gender is irrelevant. I know numerous couples where there’s, essentially, a stay-at-home dad and a corporate mom. I think that’s great, and when people can work it out it works out brilliantly - no matter what the genders of the people involved.

I’m a knee-jerk feminist and an ardent, privileged

liberal, but having thought through my knee-jerk, I think I’m standing by it. I can’t respect any woman whose first substantive interaction with a man is a request to buy her expensive things, and who harbors a belief that a man she chose to go out with should be paying for her time. Hell, if I subjected someone to hours of shoe shopping, I’d feel like I should be paying them***. My time is valuable, and gods only know that I get supremely pissed if it is needlessly wasted, which is why chronic lateness is so infuriating to me, but my partner’s time is valuable too. If we don’t think it’s worth spending time on each other then we should be spending it on someone else.

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*I.e. I have no problem with someone using their partner for sex/status/etc. and their partner using them for money/a place to live/etc. if both people recognize that an exchange of commodities is occurring. It, however, disgusts me if one person is simply using the other for something and their partner thinks they’re there for love.

**And every woman who makes this not an impression but a reality, without the honesty of doing so as a part of sex work (or conscious sex play), makes me shake my head and mourn for the collective self-worth of my gender. For gods sake, if you’re selling sex for money, jewelry, or privilege at least admit it to yourself.

*** Mind you, I can’t imagine putting anyone through that unless they were a foot fetishist. At least that way _someone_ would be enjoying the shoe shopping experience.

The government is pissing me off again, by trying to introduce a policy change at HHS (health and human services) that will turn what is already a non-trivial problem (conscience clauses) into a full on nightmare for women’s health. (the New York Times coverage, if you prefer)

Basically, for those of you who don’t want to end up with an overwhelming desire to throw your computer through the nearest window and then stomp off to hit a politician over the head, what the proposal amounts to is as follows:

1. People can decide use their conscience to decide what constitutes abortion as long as their decision is reasonable - and hormonal contraception is explicitly included as an example of something reasonable people might equate with abortion.

2. Organizations can not refuse to hire people who refuse to provide abortions (see above) and still accept money from the HHS. In fact, they must sign a certification saying that they will hire anyone regardless of their views on abortion. And granting organizations are similarly not allowed to discriminate in their provision of funds.

This may seem harmless, on the face of it, but it’s not. Conscience clauses, which is the general category of laws into which this falls, kill people. When doctors are allowed to prevent a woman from getting proper care because their morals do not allow them to provide that care, women die. Not all abortions are elective. Sometimes they’re medically necessary, and sometimes women still are denied the care they need - or it’s withheld until it’s too late.

Don’t believe me? The ACLU report on religious refusals and reproductive rights, reports on, among other incidents, the case of a Nebraska woman was admitted to a Catholic hospital in 1994 with a life-threatening condition that was aggravated by her pregnancy. She was given two choices - a 6+ month hospital stay, or a first trimester abortion. She chose the abortion so that she could go home to her 2 year old child, but then the hospital lawyers refused to provide it. Despite the enormous risk of moving her, the fact that the doctors agreed that the procedure was medically necessary, and the fact that even Medicaid agreed the abortion was necessary, the hospital stood its ground. She was eventually taken to another doctor’s office for the procedure to be performed, but the fact that she didn’t die during the move was more luck than anything else.

Rape victims who are refused emergency contraception by the ER, or not even told it’s an option.

Doctors who refuse to tie a woman’s tubes after she’s had a c-section.

Pharmacists who refuse to fill the prescriptions of women seeking contraception or emergency contraception.

Hospitals that don’t allow physicians to practice life saving techniques.

Nurses who refuse to scrub in on procedures required as part of their jobs, and leave patients bleeding on a table waiting for care.

These things aren’t myths. They’re not exaggerations. They happen in states with Conscience Clauses and now the federal government wants to make those travesties a requirement to get health care funding?

It’s inexcusable. It’s unjustifiable.

It’s appalling.

The Bush administration has systematically undermined the use of science in the formation of public policy when it comes to issues of reproductive and women’s health. From putting out inaccurate data about condom efficacy, to promoting abstinence-only education in the face of overwhelming evidence that it doesn’t work, to this ridiculous bastardization of an “anti-discrimination” policy, the administration has consistently shown that when it comes to reproductive rights (not to mention other issues) science isn’t nearly as important as what the pissy little popinjay wants.

I’m willing to admit that I’m wrong. In the face of overwhelming scientific evidence, I will change my opinions and dearly held beliefs. That is part of being not just a scientist, but simply a rational and good human being. It’s a shame that none of those adjectives can be used to describe our current president.

I read Dev’s recent post on her feminist issues with female submission with a combination of aggravation and agreement. It made me want to write about why, for me, submission is an empowering choice, and not at all in disagreement with my feminist nature.

The key word in the above paragraph is choice. What seems to bother Dev, and some of her commenters, is the worry that women have ended up in the submissive role by default. I agree, wholeheartedly, that that is a problem. Sexual roles, or any societal role, should never be assumed on the basis of gender. Men should not be assumed to be dominant or want sex all the time. Women should not be assumed to be submissive or pushovers who are just giving in to their partner’s will. What is good for the goose should be good for the gander, and vice versa.

Sadly, this is not always the case. Many women have been socialized to deny their interest in sex or to deny their assertiveness in general. That can make it easy for them to take on the submissive role without choosing it. That kind of submission is not empowering. But, really, no kind of sexuality that isn’t chosen is empowering. Going with the tide is easy. Easy doesn’t require strength. Choice requires strength, and it’s in the need for strength that helps people empower themselves - no matter who they are. Choices don’t have to be hard, but not making them… makes it hard to develop self respect. After all, who are you if you always do what is expected without either consideration or intent?

I have no doubt that I am a strong woman. I am successful and I choose my own way. I may occasionally be hampered by the instinct for politeness, but no one makes me do anything I don’t want to do for long. When I choose to submit to someone, I do it because I want to do it. I choose to do it because I like it. I choose to do it because, quite honestly, having one area of my life where I don’t feel like I always need to be in control and on top of every little detail is an enormous relief. I choose to do it because sometimes it’s nice to let go. I choose to do it, and by choosing it, by making a conscious decision to give my power into someone else’s hands, it becomes an empowering choice.

Feminism, to me, is the right to stand on equal ground with any man. The right to earn the same opportunities. The right to be treated with the same respect. The right to choose how to live my life - both within the bedroom and without - with the same freedom. Yes, male submission transgresses against the established order, but, while I’m all for battering the established order with a stick until it runs away crying, just doing something because it’s transgressive doesn’t make it an inherently more valid choice. It just, in some ways, makes it a more acceptable one.

Lots of us in the scene - in the queer community, in the sex positive community, in liberal blogger land - pride ourselves on our differences and on the way we subvert the dominant paradigm. I know I do. I’m proud to be a queer woman. Making out with my girlfriend in the park used to have an extra spark of hotness because I was showing my pride in my differences to the world. I was being visibly subversive. I was kissing her because she was hot and I wanted to get my hands on her, but it was also nice to, at the same time, be giving a big “screw you” to people who think homosexuality is wrong. To shove my transgression in their face.

Sometimes when I’m with a man, I feel sad because my queerness is invisible. The fact that I have chosen to live my life in a way that is true to my spirit and my identity is hidden. The same thing happens to me as a submissive - whether I’m submitting to a man or a woman. How do I show the world that I’m not on my knees because I think this is the place where women are supposed to be? How do I show people that I’m on my knees because it is the place where I have chosen? And why do I care so much that they know?

I care because I am a feminist and because I put choice on a pedestal that most people reserve for their gods. I don’t want people to look at me and think “that poor girl, following the role society has shoved her into” or “she’s just doing what some man wants her to” or in any way pity me or find me weak. I am not weak.

I am as strong and as empowered as any person who chooses the way in which they live. I swim against the currents because it’s the best way to build up my strength in case one day I have to fight for my rights. Even if the right I’m fighting for is the right to do exactly what’s expected.

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Oh, and as an aside to Dev… I have absolutely no problem with your post, and totally understand where you’re coming from, you just pushed my rant button. Ranting is fun! Thanks!

I don’t have a problem with prostitution. In my ideal world it would be legalized, or at least regulated, so that public health concerns could be addressed with some level of sanity and the women and men who sell their services could have some protection from dangerous nutcases, but I don’t have a problem with it even in the current East Coast political climate. Which is not to say that I don’t think Eliot Spitzer was a hypocritical ass. You can’t have it both ways. If you take a moral, or even a political, stance against something then you don’t get to participate in it. Not if you want to keep your job. Not if you want to keep your self respect*.

But I couldn’t wrap my mind around the thought of paying for sex. It was not, in the least, a moral thing. Instead, other than the purely practical financial concerns, it came down to three issues.

1. I may want to have a lot of sex with people, but there aren’t a lot of people I want to have sex with.
   I can enjoy getting beaten by random strangers, but even most of the people I’m physically attracted to I don’t actually want to sleep with. I can’t quite explain what the difference is between “Gosh, you’re pretty and shiny and smart and I like playing with you and looking at you and find you hot” and “I want to rip your clothes off every time I’m near you.” but there clearly is a difference. There are just some people who inspire jumping and some who do not. **
2. When it comes to sex, I kink hard on doing what my partner wants.
   Although I do have certain fantasies and predilections it seems like it would be difficult to hire someone for something and say “but pleasing you is what turns me on.” I feel like if you’re going to hire someone to perform a service for you, you should be able to express in clear terms what you want to be buying. Which is why I feel like it would be easier to pay someone for a scene than for sex, and why when I initially wrote about this (in someone else’s blog), that was the exception to the rule. I kink on expertise, and I could totally see paying someone to experience something that I would not be able to experience safely or sanely in another context. Like flesh hooks. Maybe. One day. Or not.
3. I’m insecure enough about my attractiveness that I’d hate to feel that someone was sleeping with me when they didn’t want to. Even if I were paying them. I don’t mind being a job, but I don’t want to think that they’re going home and writing in their blog about the horrible person they just needed to do.

Still, over the past few weeks I’ve been thinking more about the whole concept of paying for sex, and I have begun to see its appeal. Given the presence of sex workers who I actually wanted to sleep with and enough excess cash that I didn’t feel like I was giving up something I love (like circus classes) to get something I could conceivably get for free with some compromises and work, it would be really nice to be able to get demand-free sex-on-demand. The concept of sex*** , when I wanted it, with no worries about whether I’m just using someone for their body, if it’s going to be rude if I kick them out afterwards to work, or that one of us wants something from the other that the other doesn’t… is really kind of awesome.

I suspect this is just one of the many ways I am not a “typical girl” (although I don’t think this view is at all atypical among my circle of friends.) I was out at an audition the other day, and I was arguing about TV shows and bitching about how dull network Sex in the City is with all the sex removed. The woman I was arguing about said “Oh, so you’re thinking about it like a man,” and I said, “No, I’m thinking like a horny woman in her 30s who really likes sex and who will take it on the TV if she can’t get it into her bedroom. Women like sex too, many of them like it A LOT, some of my friends like it more then their male partners, they’ve just been trained by society not to admit it.” She gaped at me like a fish for a few minutes. I was amused. Because, really****, fuck that, I say. I admit it. I like sex. I’d like more of it. And, although in the real world I can’t actually see it working for me, I totally understand why some people use prostitution to get it.

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*I think politicians can have self respect, it’s just harder for them than ordinary mortals. After all, when you’re spending all your time trying to sell yourself to both the highest bidder and the lowest common denominator it’s very difficult to stick to your guns. In that it’s not unlike acting, or prostitution, or any other profession where day in and day out you have to market yourself to survive. Still, I know plenty of actors and sex workers with self respect, so it shouldn’t be that much harder for politicians…

**Although, as I’ve mentioned before, this difference is more profound in men. Women, as a group, are just a hell of a lot more fuckable.

***Preferably violent kinky sex, but if I’m paying for it I can presumably ask for that, yes?

**** I use this word way too often. Really, I do.

An offhand comment on MayMay’s excellent post about meeting and playing with people in clubs got me thinking about the politics of politeness. Specifically, Dev said

A guy (a dom) at my club once yelled at me and called me a “fucking idiot” when I expressed my dislike for men holding doors open for women.

My initial reaction to this was, “Huh. I wonder why he dislikes it,” and then I remembered that I have mixed feelings about it myself.

I don’t believe that politeness should have anything to do with gender (or dominance - unless it somehow fits into your role structure). The vast majority of the time, I think that, when physical ability doesn’t play into it, whoever gets to the door first should open it and hold it - regardless of the gender or even species of the individuals following them. If someone is encumbered, by object or ability, then you make an effort to be the person who gets the door to make their life easier, but it should not simply be based on gender. This is true for any gesture of politeness. You hold a person’s coat while they get into it to make their life easier, not to make a gendered statement (although in that case, sometimes it is female clothing restrictions that may make such help more appreciated, but I have helped older men into their coats on countless occasions as well)

All of that is relatively straightforward, so why is it worth posting about? Because sometimes its not. In my day, I have experienced gestures of politeness that were, on their face, identical, but which prompted strong and opposite reactions. Lets go back to the original example - men opening doors for women. Most of the time, whomever gets to the door opens it, holds it for their companion, their companion enters, and it’s no big deal. Some men, however, make a point of always opening the door for a woman, and do so in a way that it is difficult to take as anything but insulting. Usually these men are doing it in a way that makes certain it’s noticed, and it comes across as incredibly patronizing. “Look,” their grand gesture says, “I am doing this for you. After all, as a woman, you are weak and need to be taken care of and so I gladly take that mantle upon my shoulders.” To which my response is generally rolling my eyes and making certain that they never get the opportunity to make a similar gesture again. Mind you, most of the time I think it’s incredibly rude to take insult at something someone is doing to try and be polite*, but when they’re being aggressive about it (or actually making your life more difficult with their actions), sometimes it’s a difficult desire to repress.

On the opposite end of the spectrum**are those men who can, somehow, make those tiny gestures (door opening, holding a coat, seeing you into a car) insanely flattering and not insulting at all. In my experience, most of these men are older, and from other countries***, although I have to say that I think it mostly has to do with the fact that such gestures are so ingrained into their being that they don’t think about them at all - and yet they otherwise treat women as equals. I used to work with a very high level official in a major international health NGO who just oozed gallantry. In every interaction I ever had with him I somehow ended up feeling both incredibly valued for my intelligence and skill and ridiculously female in an utterly non-patronizing or insulting way. I never figured out how he did it. I kept feeling like it should bother me, but on him it worked. I never felt patronized. I never felt that he didn’t value me as an intelligent colleague first-and-foremost. I just felt appreciated as a woman as well. A fact which I felt I ought to find somewhat anti-feminist, but could never bring myself to since our interactions were always utterly and completely positive (and, I should mention, not even remotely sexual). I miss working with that man. I don’t think I’ve ever had a boss or colleague who made me feel as good about my work as he did, not to mention myself. (His male subordinates loved him just as much, by the way. He was just a good man, generous with both his praise and instruction. He made you want to do your best for him.)

Really, though, I think it should come down to the golden rule - treat others as you would wish to be treated yourself… or possibly even better. Don’t adjust your behavior to suit the gender, adjust it to respect the individual.
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* The breed of feminist who yell at any men who hold open doors for them piss me off. If you don’t like something that someone is doing out of politeness, at least accept that they are doing it because they are trying to be nice. If the gesture is misguided, perhaps it is worth mentioning to them, but taking insult at kindness is terribly poor form. I really can’t support encouraging rudeness, when conversation could accomplish the same goal. Perhaps saying “Thank you for the gesture, but I don’t feel comfortable accepting it because…” would accomplish your goal more effectively than encouraging them to think of you as some alien species.

**There is a middle ground here, men who are simply being generous when they look at you to ask “do you want me to take that door you’re holding from you,” and accept without question your head shake of “no.” That’s… polite. Especially when it feels like they’d make the same gesture to anyone regardless of gender who had been standing holding the door while 15 people walked into the store ahead of them :).

***Mirehn makes the excellent point that this also may be a matter of my perceptions, and that the behaviors I am perceiving as gendered politeness may not be gendered by the people performing the behaviors.

The title of this post could be my middle name. Put on a sweater, and I start to feel cold. Yawn, and I yawn too. Mention something even remotely sexually exciting, and I go off on flights of fancy that leave me shivery. The impression you get, from popular media, is that an obsession with sex is somehow the province of 12 year old boys. That may be true, but it doesn’t belong to them alone.

One of the many hats that I wear is that of a sex educator. Because of my job, I frequently get to hear about my friends’ sex lives. I do have female friends who aren’t all that interested in sex, but they’re the exception not the rule. The main difference between my male and female friends is less the extent of desire than the lack of opportunity, or at least an unwillingness to act when the partner is less than ideal. To be blunt, I know a lot more men who are willing to fuck someone they don’t particularly like than I do women. As a rule, given a choice between sex with a person we’re not terribly attracted to or a good book and a vibrator, I, and most of my female friends, will take the second choice. On the other hand, I have heard more than one male friend say some variant on, “I didn’t really want to fuck her, but she was there so I did.” This is a choice that remains mind-boggling to me. I’d rather have good sex with myself than bad sex with someone else. Often, sadly, rather than having great sex with someone else. Even when I’m feeling so horny that I really do want to fuck anything that moves. I want to, but I don’t. I choose, instead, the safe road.

Earlier today I was trying to figure out why it is so difficult for me to cross the divide between want to and will. I want to a good fraction of the time, but I don’t. I don’t go to the handsome stranger’s house, even though I want what will happen when I get there. I want to show up at his door and have him treat me like a whore. I want him to casually order off my clothes. I want him to push me to my knees, have me suck his cock until I gag, and then with a firm grip on my hair force me to take more. I want him to make me dance for him, until he recovers, and then fuck me in every hole. But I don’t, because that’s not who I am. Instead I stop taking his phone calls, because he’s gotten a little too close. I’d rather regret the choices I don’t make, than be horrified at the ones I do.

I do think about it, though.

I get an e-mail in my box, and I invent scenarios. I think “this could happen,” and it’s twenty minutes later before I drift back to what I was working on. I shake it off, but wonder “is it so impossible?” and then, imagining the answer, get lost again.

I zone out during a class, picturing the professor lifting me onto his desk, while I wrap my legs around his hips, his lips tight against mine, and daydream until I’m brought back by hearing my name a second time as he asks me to define the quantities involved in uncertainty.

Well that’s easy, I think. The more you know about position the less you know about speed. I’m right here in my seat, so you can’t tell how fast I’d move straight into your arms.

What were we talking about again? Oh yes, I remember. Those 12 year old boys have nothing on me.