Sex on Fire

I have a total weakness for flow charts, if you hadn't noticed. I think it's because I'm a visual learner, and pictures make things easier to understand and remember. Or simply because I find them hilarious. 

Anyway, on the topic of lube, this flow chart is pretty brilliant. Also, has anyone else heard that a company dropped a bacon-flavored lube on the market this week? No kidding. Personally, it's not one of my kinks. But if it's yours, then more power to you. 

(This is the incredible aerial view of the city I got as I flew out of SFO to Denver)

I'm back from San Francisco, which I swear is one of the sexiest cities on this planet. I don't say that because I spent most of the weekend at the Center for Sex and Culture or because pretty much everything I did there over the weekend somehow related to sex and sexuality. San Francisco has a unique energy that pulses through the city. I'm not sure what to compare it to. I'd say NOLA's energy is the equivalent of a second line brass band. But damn. Just walking the streets there, it's a bit magical. I've never seen so much public art in my life. San Francisco has the energy of a thousand paintbrushes, of rock bands in underground bars, of streetcars flying down hills, of radical creation and destruction. 

I ate massive amounts of Thai food and soaked in a hot tub and walked the pier in the pouring rain. I slept with the windows open. I witnessed some really transformative conversations, rituals, and actions. I got fucked in a lot of really interesting ways, and I don't just mean in the physical sense. I met some amazing people. I rediscovered the power of building community.

Also, can I just say, I love how people in California, and especially in kinky/queer/poly communities, use safe sex as a default. What a world of difference from Louisiana, where the culture is so anti-safe sex. There's no question there. Everyone just carries (or buys) lube, gloves, condoms and uses them. End of story. 

I expected to come back feeling different. I expected to have my mind and senses exploded. I expected to breathe and to listen and to think differently. But the tricky part of these workshops is, there's no way of knowing what "different" is until you experience it. Even as I'm going through it, I don't realize how incredibly intense and radical everything is. It's an incredible offering, to just let go and act... think later.

I cried saying goodbye to San Francisco. I'll be back, I promised the city and myself. But I have work and a life here in NOLA, a home and friends and two cats whom I missed terribly. A part of me hurts realizing that I probably won't see most of those people again. To have such intense contact for three days, to let people touch you, emotionally and physically, in ways I sometimes won't let friends and lovers touch me... and then to just let go.  I am immensely grateful and thankful for everyone I met, for everything I learned and felt. I still have so much work to do. I realize how closed off I am at times, how much I don't acknowledge my own feelings -- hell, I don't even let myself feel them. Someone asked me, "Where do you feel that in your body?" And I truly couldn't fathom that other people feel emotions physically. I've just shut that possibility out for too long. 

I am in this crazy, energetic, expanded state. I get overstimulated easily, but I'm so fucking happy. I'm like over-the-moon happy. I wish I could bottle this energy and breathe it in whenever I most need it. Instead, I'm just going to ride it. I'm still processing, slowly, but that feels healthy. 

How do I feel? Strong. Beautiful, though very much not in a physical way, but in an energy-glowing-kind-of-way. I feel calm. Scared of the paper I have due. Blessed. Unsure of what comes next. Open to the possibilities. Driven to let myself explore. 

Come On Over

Outside the Boxes: Celebrating the Queer Body Erotic

November 11-13, 2011 - San Francisco

Your gender. Your body. Your energy. Your beautiful self. How often has the world tried to force you into the gender binary, asked you to assure it that your pronouns matched what it saw rather than what you felt, required that your genitals conform to expectations, demanded that you deny the complexity of all that is you?

What if you could come into a community in which all expressions were possible? Where gender, sexuality and expression were aligned according to your truth? Where no one assumed what parts would go where? Welcome to Outside the Boxes: Celebrating the Queer Body Erotic!,

Come explore your erotic potential through the mind, the body and the heart using conscious breath, movement, process work and massage. Awaken the erotic energy that lies within all of us. Through a queer tantra lens, explore archetypal masculine and feminine energies and the myriad ways they can be expressed. Break down silos of gender and sexuality.

This workshop focuses on the entire body and is conducted in a container that is playful, safe and reverential. Using carefully designed experiential embodiment practices participants will:

• explore the innate wisdom of your body
• expand awareness, sensation and pleasure through conscious breath, movement, touch, and communication, where each person's choices and rhythms are honored
• learn how to more deeply tune in to your body, mind, heart and spirit
• to receive more fully from yourself and others, and to give without losing yourself
• learn to give and receive full-body massage and to focus on the healing potential of sensual/spiritual energy
• learn from your own and others' unfolding, and feel awed witnessing and supporting our uniqueness and commonalities

Outside the Boxes: Celebrating the Queer Body Erotic is a 2 1/2 day workshop (Friday evening, all day Saturday and Sunday), often clothing-optional, for those who are ready to vigorously explore new levels of feeling and aliveness, both within themselves and within a community of queers.

*************

I'm heading here in three weeks, and I couldn't be more excited. I went to a similar workshop in upstate New York last November, and it was a life-changing, amazing experience. I haven't seen San Fran in three years, either, so I can't wait to   fall in love with the city again. It's one of the few places I would consider living, other than New Orleans. I know, I know, that sounds like cheating in my head, too. If this interests you at all, check out the website. And hit up the coordinator, Amy, with any questions or concerns. I might can help, too, so feel free to comment here if there's something you'd like to discuss about the workshop. 

A Step Forward

I remember this fear like it was yesterday. I remember the feeling like I might burst open, any moment, and expose this secret -- and I trembled at the thought of the reaction. It dominated my every thought, pushed me deeper and deeper into this hole in my head. So I let it out.

And even though the reaction wasn't anything like this man's father, nine years later, I'm so glad I did. 

I cried watching this. I cried for my own experience, how much it hurt, for the wrecked relationship I have with my own family, for how very much I wanted (and still want) to hear this exact reaction. I cried for this man, thousands of miles from his family, for his excitement at the end of DADT and the fear in his voice as he asks, "Can I tell you something? Will you still love me no matter what?" I cried for that Alabama accent, and for the people who make the South a place I love to live. I cried for those of us who didn't get that reaction, and those of us who feared the worst but instead found support and love. I cried for those who spoke to me this week, telling me the mean, painful, and antagonistic comments their parents and friends made in reacting against their gender identity and sexual orientation. I cried because somehow, coming out gets easier with each successive person. But you never forget that first time. You never forget that first family member.

I send my love to Germany tonight, and to Troy Davis in Georgia. 

Girl From the Gutter

I left class tonight with every intention in the world of coming home and writing. I've got a few stories on the backburner, and really, sometimes I just have to push myself to write.

But then.

I laid in bed and started reading Autostraddle, as I am wont to do sometimes, and stumbled upon Slate's six-part series on the past, present, and future of gay bars. And because I'm a huge queer history nerd who is absolutely fascinated with the history of the gay bar scene in America, I got sucked in. Hardcore. I mean, who doesn't want to read an account of Alison Bechdel's first experience in a lesbian bar? (Tell me you know who she is because her graphic novel and comics are fan-fucking-tastic.) Who isn't shocked to learn San Francisco had 118 gay bars in 1973 and 33 in 2011?! And, and, and, oh.my.god there is a black and white photograph of queers dancing at a NOLA bar named Dixie's in the 1950's.

Um. I could go die happy now.

So, while I really want to talk all about my week and about the fucked up gender things I can't seem to ignore, and I really want to write fabulous erotic stories for you... instead, I'm going to relive a bit of my own history.

((Musical Interlude))

http://youtu.be/8sPw_yUeD7M

((this song will always make me cry in a gay bar))

Technically, my first time in a gay bar was in Houston, Texas, in June 2006. Four of us -- me, the girl I'd broken up with a month before, my best friend, and her girlfriend -- went to a concert in Houston. Before we got on the road, I looked up every lesbian bar I could find online, and made it clear to them that, as the volunteer driver for the weekend, I was requiring at least ONE trip to a lesbian bar. At least one.

We went to Sue Ellen's, a lesbian establishment in Houston, but we weren't 21. So the butch checking ID's sent us around the corner, to a smaller, unmarked bar.... which happened to be the only African-American lesbian bar in town.

Wow, we stuck out like sore thumbs.

We couldn't drink, so I think we stayed like 15 minutes. Maybe 20. The place was empty. Instead, we took off to try to get tattoos, which also did not happen. Two of us got piercings instead. Thankfully, my ex and my best friend talked me out of getting a rainbow women's symbol tattoo.

(Dear lord, I really was that gay. I guess we all have to survive the baby dyke phase. My first reaction is to think that would have been a huge mistake, and my second reaction is to wonder if it's easier to get laid with a rainbow tattoo. I'll never know the answer to this question.)


Anyway. I don't really count that.

I first went to a gay men's bar on August 12th; I rang in the first hour of my 19th birthday in the bar. It's a tiny place, maybe the size of my living room and kitchen combined, and very rarely does anyone check an ID. The crowd is predominantly white gay men 35+, though there's some give and take. Though I wasn't legally supposed to be in the bar until I turned 21, I grew up going there because it was so easy to get in. Many of my coworkers, fellow college students, former teachers, old high school friends, and old family friends have haunted that place at one time or another. I've seen holidays and funereal celebrations and birthdays there. I feel like I'm going back to visit family when I make it back a few times a year.

But my first real experience in a queer bar was a few nights later. My girlfriend snuck me off campus during orientation, and I talked a fellow staffer into covering for me. I was an anxious ball of freaking-the-fuck-out. I'd never been within 100 feet of the place. I had no idea what to expect. I'd been carefully schooled on what to wear: jeans, no rainbows (do you wear the band t-shirt to the band's concert? No.), a t-shirt or a button-up, no makeup, chucks or tennis shoes, a color-coordinated leather belt, and no jewelry except a men's watch and maybe something leather. We had a plan. I knew the layout of the bar, how to slip past the doorman while my then-girlfriend created a diversion, who to look for once I got in, not to order my own drinks.

By some miracle, though I thought my heart might explode out of my chest, I made it through the door unnoticed. I felt so young, terrified, out of place. I put on my best "I belong here, so don't fuck with me" face and didn't stop to turn around until I made it halfway up the wooden staircase. I remember catching a glimpse of myself in the mirror and wondering who this stranger was. I'd been having sex with a girl since I was 16, and yet, surrounded by so many dykes, my own identity became shaky. What did I have in common with the butch women in their 40's hanging out at the bar? What did I know about the community, about being queer, about these bars and growing up queer and closeted in the south? Who did I think I was, trying to claim a place here, when clearly I had no experience? I felt like an imposter, and I was convinced everyone saw through me. The feeling didn't pass until my girlfriend pulled me in and kissed me, in front of a room full of people waiting for the drag show to begin. And then I knew I was exactly where I belonged.

I left a piece of my heart in that bar, somewhere between 4am line dances and New Years' Eve and a dance floor filled with so many of my friends. I may hate the town, but I'm damn proud to say I grew up in the queer community there.

(Mad points and eternal glory to whomever gets the post title reference.)

I'm on the Right Track

This post will be super short because I'm exhausted, but so it goes.

I spent my Pride weekend not in the streets or in a parade, not getting arrested in Russia, not having lots of sex or dancing to Lady Gaga or writing political advocacy letters, though all of those things are well and good.

I spent my pride weekend surrounded by queer family. I spent it being honest with someone I care about. I took a queer friend to the hospital. I caught up with a queer friend I haven't seen in months. 

I've been in and seen Pride parades, festivals, and marches. I've written letters and worked on political campaigns. I've done queer public health advocacy and gotten trained in conducting HIV testing and counseling. I've attended gay and lesbian weddings and raised hell in doctor's offices. I've responded with open arms and an ear to strangers who sent me emails and facebook messages, looking for someone to talk to as they came out. I've created a Safe Zone program and put on programs on safe sex and safe bondage. I've conducted three research studies on LGBT issues, and I've spoken on panels and at queer conferences and to rooms full of people I've never met about some of the most intimate details of my personal life. I've danced in queer clubs and drank in queer bars around the world and visited Stonewall and the Castro. I've gone to PFLAG meetings and gotten queer scholarships and read queer theory and become a trans advocate. I have immersed myself completely and totally in queer culture throughout my life.

But the power and the pride and the love I have for this community comes not from most of those things, but from my queer family. Some of them are very close friends; others are acquaintances that I've taken a particular affinity to. I disagree with most all of them on one subject or another. Some I see only sporadically -- at a wedding or on a fluke. Some of them I haven't seen in years (much like many of my blood relatives), but I still think of them as family all the same. A handful of them would do anything for me, and probably every one of them would, at the least, buy me a beer. 

I'm blessed, so completely and utterly blessed, to have these people as a part of my life. If I could have them all in one place, at one moment, I'd have my own damn Pride party. But they're spread across the country (and possibly the world), celebrating Pride in their own ways and raising hell and being awesome.

I don't often get the chance to pay tribute and honor to the things they've done for me. The people who've been there when I was in the hospital, struggling through a breakup, morning the loss of a friend, or fighting with my family. The people who make weekends fun, who make sex fantastic, who know how to make me smile. I love ya'll. Happy Pride. I'm proud of the community we've built, the one we're a part of. I'm proud that I can be there for you, some more than others. I'm proud to share my life with you. I'm proud of the person you've helped me become. 

So maybe I didn't do anything big and crazy this weekend. Maybe I wasn't surrounded by thousands of my lgbt friends. But I did find love and support, I did give love and support, to my queer family, and for that, I think this weekend was definitely a wonderful Pride. 

More Queer Questions

What does marriage mean to you?

It's a state-sponsored institution with a misogynist history and a lot of gendered ritual. It's a partnership between two people who care about each other. It can be a symbol of love, a sign of miserable commitment, or a partnership of convenience. It's a socially-sanctioned relationship between a monogamous heterosexual, cisgendered couple which is expected to produce children. It's a reason for lower car insurance rates. It's internationally recognized, but not universally defined. It's an institution queer people have historically been denied. It happens in Boston between lesbians. It's a gateway to health insurance in America.

I have extremely mixed emotions on marriage, but I definitely think it can mean different things at different times. It can take many forms. There is considerable beauty and power in partnerships and relationships, in the emotional and sexual bonds we have with others. Do I personally think all commitments should be for life? Probably not. Would I deny anyone else the right to commit to someone for life? Hell no. I don't really care what the fuck we call it, as long as everyone has equal access to it. I don't think the government should define who gets to take part in social rituals and social contracts. But if that's the only way everyone can have equal access, then government control may be the only way. I don't think my tax rates should be linked to my relationship status, though.

Your favorite LGBT book?

I got into LGBTQ non-fiction heavily a few years ago. I'd have to stay "Stonewall" by Martin M. Duberman (which is about the fascinating history of queer bars in New York, the mob, the three pieces of clothing law, the Stonewall riots, and much more) or "And the Band Played On" by Randy Shilts. There are others, and I own a lot of fiction, too. But those two books changed my life.

Your favorite LGBT quote?


The Bible contains six admonishments to homosexuals and 362 admonishments to heterosexuals.  That doesn't mean that God doesn't love heterosexuals.  It's just that they need more supervision.  ~Lynn Lavner


If homosexuality is a disease, let's all call in queer to work:  "Hello.  Can't work today, still queer."  ~Robin Tyler


Why can't they have gay people in the army?  Personally, I think they are just afraid of a thousand guys with M16s going, "Who'd you call a faggot?"  ~John Stewart


The world is not divided into sheeps and goats.  Not all things are black nor all things white.  It is a fundamental of taxonomy that nature rarely deals with discrete categories.  Only the human mind invents categories and tries to force facts into separated pigeon-holes.  The living world is a continuum in each and every one of its aspects.  The sooner we learn this concerning sexual behavior the sooner we shall reach a sound understanding of the realities of sex.  ~Alfred Kinsey, Sexual Behavior in the Human Male, 1948

Your first experience with an LGBT organization or event?

My first year of college someone at school told me about the local PFLAG group that met once a month on Saturday mornings at 10am. I started going, taking my then-girlfriend with me whenever she was in town. The woman who ran the group, Sherry, became like a surrogate mother to many of us. It was a varied group and an ever-changing cast, some queer, some families of queer kids or adults. We had children as young as four up to transwomen in their seventies. I don't remember my first meeting. But I do remember that PFLAG opened a lot of doors for me. It was the first time I belonged to a group where I felt welcome, safe, and supported. It was very, very powerful for me. It was the gateway to a lot of what I became involved with. They became the supportive family I needed to help me come at school and in town, when my biological family wasn't supportive.

Butch or femme?

Neither. This is a complex question for me, one I'm still learning to navigate. I respect those who find power in these terms, who identify with them. That's great, and I don't want my rejection of these terms to be taken as why everyone shouldn't use them -- I don't feel like that, at all. But I just don't identify with them. It's like sticking a round peg in a square hole for me. I struggle with how we all love to identify and label each other, and how often "femme" gets attached to me in ways I'm not comfortable with. It's just simply not how I describe my body, my identity, or my experience. As for my attractions -- I find I'm most attracted to certain personality traits, to individual quirks, and not to someone's gender expression or looks. Those are just bonus :)

Political LGBT issue that is closest to you or affects you the most?

I have a hard time narrowing out "issues" because social problems are deeply interconnected. I find connections easily. If I had to pick one political issue that's most important to me, it would probably be employment discrimination. It's incredibly pervasive. I think everyone needs food and shelter and safety from violence first, so those basic needs will always be my priority. When those needs are met, then I'm happy to put money and energy toward other issues. But without a job, those very basic needs cannot be met.

At the root of most queer "issues" is the widespread belief that homosexuality and transgenderism is wrong and queer people are less deserving, less important, than heterosexual cis-people. Why would we need to protect against bullying and against discrimination if everyone believed that queer people were truly equal to heterosexual, cis-people? We wouldn't. So anything and everything I do is not just about creating laws or political equality, but full social equality. The civil rights movement didn't end racism. The gay rights movement isn't going to end homophobia and transphobia. It's a step in the right direction, but we need to change widely held beliefs and ideas, not just the laws.

Even within queer culture, within subgroups and power structures, I often see the same play out -- men who don't see women as capable and equal, gays and lesbians who don't see trans people as equal, etc. I want a nation, a culture, and a society that values difference and uniqueness instead of discriminating against those that don't assimilate, those who aren't the majority. I don't think that's too much to ask for.

An LGBT image that makes you smile and an LGBT image that makes you cry or makes you angry?

These are images of imprisoned gay men at Buchenwald, one of the Nazi concentration camps, who are marked by the pink triangle to symbolize their group status. This image breaks my heart. 

The first two images are from the Stonewall Riots in 1969. The second two are from the first gay liberation march, on the first anniversary of the Stonewall riots. There is nothing like the power of individuals taking to the streets, to public spaces where they can be condemned, beaten, murdered, and instead, they are proclaiming the power of their love. These photos are also testimony that the Gay Lib movement was made up of a diverse group. It wasn't men or women. It wasn't black or white. It wasn't old or young. It wasn't gay or trans. It was everyone. 

I'm grateful that there are photos of history to remind us what a difference three and a half decades makes. 

Queer Questions

The school semester has ended, and in honor of this, I want to do something mind-numbingly easy. So I cut some questions from some silly survey, and here are my answers:

1) Your sexual orientation or gender identity.

(Why one or the other? Everyone has both.) Honestly, I identify both as queer. For me, being queer is about my politics and inclusion, which is the "radical" notion that all people should be treated with respect and equality. Queer is how I explain my sexual attraction, which is not limited by someone else's gender. Queer is about disrupting norms and refusing classifications, which I firmly believe in and practice. Queer is about sex and gender as shifting, fluid, and often ambiguous. I am a cisgender female, though I don't have a tight grip on that identity. It's something I'm still figuring out. I'm not genderqueer, by most people's definition of that word. But I also don't subscribe to a lot of tenets about gender, so I do queer it in some ways. Call it what you will -- I usually don't call it anything. 

2) How old were you when you knew? 

Knew what? I was 3 when I knew I hated mustard. I was 21 when I knew I wanted to live in New Orleans. I was 15 when I knew I was sexually attracted to someone of the same sex.

3) The first person you came out to and that story.

I did a couple shots of whiskey and realized I wanted to kiss my best friend. And I didn't want to stop there. A few days later, I called my most recent ex-boyfriend. We'd only been broken up for about two weeks. The break up was completely mutual; we stayed close friends until his next girlfriend got jealous of our friendship. (I miss him. Haven't seen him in years. Can't seem to find him, though) I told him about that night, and that I thought I was attracted to my best friend -- me, not the alcohol. He was completely supportive. No jealousy, no creepy "I want to watch" crap, just support. I remember him telling me to talk to her, to go for it. Even now, I'm still floored thinking back on that moment. 

4) Thoughts regarding inner turmoil about your sexuality; did you have any? Did it escalate to self-injury or suicidal thoughts?

I really didn't. Back then I followed my heart before my head. (Not till years later did that get me into trouble) I remember trying the word "lesbian" on for size, and not really finding comfort or understanding in it. Looking back at my journals from high school, I never used it. I didn't need a label. I had love. 

I was suicidal and prone to self-injury in high school, but that was not connected to my sexuality. I was severely depressed, angry, and in the middle of some fucked up family stuff. Anything I could claim as my own, including my sexuality, became a source of power -- not a detriment. I didn't give a shit. I jumped head-on into dating a girl. I had few fears. It wasn't until it started raining hell -- my parents, hers, people we knew, bullies, etc. -- that I realized I was in well over my head. But I had the honeymoon period of a relationship with a girl I adored to gloss all the rest into the background. I was very, very lucky. I can't imagine going through that hell alone. 

5) Did you face any problems regarding religion?

Personally, no. I had walked away from the church by that point. I was already on a politically and socially radical path. Like I said, I followed my heart then. '

My mother wasn't a big fan. But she had trouble with the God argument. She and God were never that close.

6) How did your parents take it?

Not well. My mother asked if we were together before we were, and I told her the truth -- that we weren't. So months later, when I decided to change that story, I knew it would be rough. I chickened out and wrote her an email; it had some other stuff in it, too. We didn't get along well. Ok, that's an understatement. We fought probably 2-3 times a week. That night, she came home, and she was dead calm, which was very unusual. She wouldn't come near me. She cried and said she would "fix this." She drove me to a psychiatrist the next day. I talked with him for a bit, and he told her he "didn't see what the problem was." I wish he had straight up told her she was the problem. 

I've had a tumultuous history with my mother. She's in a ten year divorce; they haven't handled property settlement yet. She has let it eat away at her and my family, and I wish she end it. We don't agree on much. She has never admitted I was queer out loud, not in front of me anyway. She has trouble acknowledging anyone I'm dating. We don't talk about a lot of things. It's still very contentious. I've been out to her for six years. I realized long ago that my biological family will never provide unconditional love or support. I don't even speak to half of them. I have an incredible queer family, though, who has taught me the power of giving and receiving strength and support. I love them all.  

7) Your favorite LGBTQ movie.

Oh, so many. Angels in America. D.E.B.S. 20 Centimetros. Soldier's Girl. Loving Annabelle. But I'm a Cheerleader. Bent. Queer as Folk. Hedwig and the Angry Inch. That's all I can think of off the top of my head, but there are definitely more.

8) Your favorite gay joke.

What do you call a lesbian dinosaur? A lick-a-lot-o-puss.

I know, it's ridiculous. :)

"Queerer than Thou"

This made my night.

I know all of these people. I don't think they usually all end up in the same room. But damn. This is exactly how it would go down if they did!

Believe Them When They Say...

Fabulous. A girl I know who lives in NYC posted this on her Facebook, and I'm happy to help it make the rounds on the interwebs. And I have to say, Rebecca Drysdale, if you make it to New Orleans any time soon, give me a call.

Closer

“It’s been quite a while since I’ve been topped…”

Her voice comes soft, breathless, so close to my ear. I have my hips squarely between the inside of her thighs, legs spread open, pushing her up into my headboard, two fingers inside her cunt, so tight I can barely move them. I have long ago lost count of how many times she had come, if I was ever keeping track at all. We are almost still; I’m catching my breath, enjoying the heat between our bodies, barely stroking her g-spot.

I moan deep, almost guttural, the sound I make when puzzling through my thoughts. “I don’t quite see it that way.” I try the word on for size, hesitantly. “Topping...”

“Tell me more about that.”

My thoughts race. It’s a word that didn't enter my vocabulary until I moved to New Orleans, a foreign concept I had equated up until that point only with gay men. I hadn’t come of age in a lesbian culture – I didn’t grow up in the bars, didn’t grow up with elders, didn’t become initiated into an established community. This was new for me, to meet women who identified as tops and bottoms. I had always experienced queer sex as fluid, without roles. It didn’t help that my introduction to the terms, the idea, was not born out of sex-positivity or identity. Instead, these words came to me encased in the crude language of competition and pride, masculinity and femininity, where “to top” was a status of pride and strength, and “to bottom” was an act of submission, a put down, a source of embarrassment and shame. I rejected the terms, outright and immediately, because I didn’t like what that binary implied. Not until I met people who embraced those identities and actions as a source of equal strength, as a yin and yang, did I begin to accept where those words, those identities, could fit.

I try hard to pull myself out of my head, back to the moment, before I get lost and leave her underneath me, waiting.

“I don’t know. I…” I stumble for words, for a way to express what the hell I was trying to say. I find myself burying my head in her neck. “It’s not about putting you down, or asking you to submit. It’s not about…power? Hm. Don’t get me wrong, the power is great. It’s a trip to be in this position, and I enjoy the hell out of it. But… it’s about my wanting to please you. It’s about letting go. It’s born out of a place of deep respect, because I know how hard it is to just let go. But I don’t see it as dominating you, I see it as playing with you, fucking with you.”

It’s a nightmare to navigate those emotional barriers, at times. It’s difficult, if not impossible, to leave control, to leave fear, to leave my own socialization and understanding of gender roles, of strength and weakness, at the bedroom door. I like to dominate, and I like to submit, but, for me, the latter takes significantly more emotional work. To lay out my body, my strength, and let her take me for everything I am worth requires a lot of trust.  To dominate comes almost as a default. Control is heady, easy, disconnected. But I want to approach her differently. I wanted to connect in, to work through this process with her as I work through it myself. I want to give, I want to enjoy receiving, and I want respect and consent and pleasure to guide us instead of letting our own fears and preconceptions hold us back.

I still struggle with my words. I don’t feel like I conveyed what I wanted to say, only touched the tip of the iceberg. Of course, power and submission and domination is a part of this. But those words, outside the context of kink circles, tend to imply strength and weakness, oppression and victimization. I come from a sociology background, so for me, these are buzzwords into analyzing social stratification, hierarchies, and social capital. But I’m in bed, and here, these words imply something different – consent, agency, respect. Asking for what I want, and getting it from someone who earnestly wants to give it... who might even give it to me by denying it, by not allowing me to ask.

“I trust you,” she whispers.

I skip a beat, mentally, emotionally, physically. I lay my head down on her chest, for just a moment, listening to the pacing of her heartbeat, taking in every inch of her body. And then I begin to rock her, slowly, pulling her hips deeper into mine. I love to listen, to pay attention to the very subtle ways her body responds. To feel each contraction of her cunt, to hear each breath, to feel the heat spread slowly across her skin. She reaches up, curling her body tighter around me. With my left hand, I push her back down, deep into the bed, kneeding my other hand deeper and harder into her. She moans, half in mock protest and half in genuine pleasure. I have her pinned to the bed now, arms spread across the pillows.

“Relax, and just let me fuck you.” She takes a long breath, arches her back one last time, and sinks deeper and deeper into me, into the bed, until I can feel her focusing on nothing but herself. 

Is it sex?

Back to that wonderful, always thought provoking, oh-my-god-we-are-having-this-conversation-again (so I must be surrounded by lesbians) question... what is sex? Well, Autostraddle, in their infinite brilliance, has come up with a flowchart. Just for shits and giggles. 

Thanks guys! I've never seen the show Skins, but the episode two review made me laugh really hard. It's the same writing style as the girl who does Effing Dykes, which is really one of the funniest blogs I've read. Ever. Doesn't hurt that's the author is queer and crazy and loves photos, all of which are endearing traits in my book. 

Gender Me Queer

“You should have come with me.” He sits down and takes off his jacket, placing it gingerly across the back of his desk chair.

“Why? Did everything go ok?”

“Because the manager was a lesbian. I didn’t expect that.”

I’m confused. I’m not sure what he’s getting at. “What did you expect?”

“Well, I was walking over there, thinking that when I asked for the manager, I’d probably be talking to a gay man…maybe a straight man? I don’t know. I didn’t expect for it to be a lesbian.”

I don’t miss a beat. “Sounds like you need to examine your gender assumptions.”

The guy in the desk next to me looks up sharply at me and coughs like he’s choking. He’s got a smirk on his face, and his eyes are dancing. I’ve only known him ten minutes, but I think this is a sign he likes me. Or he just finds this conversation fascinating.

I look back to him. I can see the wheels turning. He’s not sure if that was a challenge, a reprimand, or a simple statement.

I break his silence. “You’re sure she was a lesbian?” I’m curious to see how deep his gender assumptions run.

“I think so…” He looks hesitant now. He doesn’t want to get called out again.

“What was she wearing? What did she look like?”

“Short, cropped hair. She was short, I guess. Shorter than me. Had a nose ring.”

“Did she have on a polo?” I smile. I’m sorta fucking with him now.

“Yeah…”

“Probably a dyke.” 

He is not at all sure what to do with my use of that word. “Well, I mean, I think so. At least, that was my first impression…” He trails off, but picks back up quickly. “But I try not to assume. I never can tell down here, because people don’t seem to  fit gay or straight when I think they do, and I just mess it up. New Orleans is so confusing.”

I laugh. I don’t find it so difficult, but I like it when people don’t fit in boxes.

“Like you.” He looks down at his desk. “I mean, I never would have thought you were a lesbian. Or queer, whatever you identify as.” His statement is simple, almost exploratory. It’s not an insult. It’s not personal. I’m not going to shoot him down, because I’ve already challenged his understanding twice – once with my own identity, once by calling him out. This is a form of education, and I want to be careful with the lesson.

“Yeah. I know. I’ve heard that at least three times this week.” Eye roll. “Sometimes I just have to tell them. Ask me in a bar, and I'll get vulgar about it. But that's my life. You know, someone told me once that feminine women are often more vocal because they can't be visible, and butch women will always be more visible, because they don't get an option.”

He looks at me, cocks his head to the right side, thinks about this. “I guess that makes sense.”

I want to add, "But that would change if people would stop conflating gender, sex, and sexuality long enough to realize how you look has little to do with whom you fuck,” but instead, I put my headphones back on, pull up my window with fifteen tabs, and go back to work compiling LGBT resources in Louisiana. Must be nice to be skinny and cute and white and male, where all you have to do is flip a pinky and walk in a gay bar and no one questions the legitimacy of your sexuality. 

Home (after) the Holidays

I'm home in NOLA for two days, then back on the road again. My kittehs are attached to me; they insist on staying by my side and sleeping on top of me. Either they missed me or they're cold, who really knows? It's nice to have some unconditional snuggling, though. The cold is bitter this winter. It always feels like it goes straight down to my bones, and I find I struggle so much to get out of bed or leave the warmth of my house, especially after dark.

This holiday season was something between great and a mass fiasco, depending on the day. Argh. I wrote a short story back in 2006 about struggling to go home to see family over the holidays, and four years later, every word still rings so true.

My mom and I have such an on/off relationship. I'm formally estranged from over half the family -- haven't seen my father in almost ten years, and haven't seen his parents in at least five years. But Christmas usually means going to Shreveport for my mom's family, and there's a huge gap there -- they're pretentious, racist, sexist, homophobic, and always eager to put down everyone around them for their own advantage. I'm not perfect, by any means, but I try to live a life in opposition to all of those values. It's stressful and painful to be around them, to suck up my queerness and keep my mouth shut, which is mostly because if I run away or get angry, my mother freaks and our relationship unravels even more. I hate going home to listen to them bicker and moan about each other, especially on the one day of the year that everyone should suck it up and get along. I avoid seeing family for all these reasons, and it's not helpful that my mother still hasn't come to terms with my being queer, and insists that I hide that part of my life from my family. Hiding? I'm over that shit. We just don't talk about it. But of course, when my degree and my career and pretty much my whole life has to do with social justice, sex and sexuality, trans advocacy, HIV/AIDS prevention, and addressing public health disparities in sexual minorities... well, there's a bit of a gap in "approved" conversation topics. I hate that I can't be genuine around my family. I hate that being around them makes me miserable. But that's just the reality of it.

To make things more complicated, this is the first Christmas I've been single in years and years. I usually have a girlfriend to call or leave to hang out with. When I lived in Shreveport, I could check out and go home when I needed a break from too much family. But when I'm visiting and staying with my mom, I don't get that time to check out and center myself. I could justify suffering through family because I was so looking forward to spending time with my girlfriend. But this year, not having that excitement and that distraction sort of sucked.

To put it in a nutshell, my  mom got pissed at my brother and I on Christmas Eve, then proceeded to not talk to us for 24 hours. She got drunk at Christmas, acted like an asshole to everyone, refused to open her presents, told us we were going on a family trip as a gift then flat out refused to go with us, and refused to talk to us about why she was angry. To top it all off, because she's passive aggressive as hell, she left Christmas without telling us, locked herself in her room, then called me the next day to ask why I didn't talk to her on Christmas. I swear, it was like my mom was fifteen. I was so, so, so glad to leave town and head back South.

On top of all this, my cousin started asking her brother if I was queer a month ago, and he contacted me, asking if I would talk to her. So, for Christmas, I got to come out to my little brother and my youngest cousin. Thankfully, both were cool about it. My cousin is turning out to be really awesome; we had a great conversation about how she's pro-choice (yay!) and keeps getting in arguments with pro-life kids at her Catholic school. Plus she's made it a point to stand up for her gay friends who are harassed by Catholic kids and told they are going to hell. So good to know that even in the soul-sucking atmosphere of my family, my generation has some hope. It's awesome that I'm finally breaking down those walls, and I feel like I am forming stronger relationships with my brother and my cousins, even as my relationship with my mother seems to be deteriorating again. Yeah, yeah, God and windows and doors and shit.

The saving grace of this holiday season, though, has definitely been my friends. I saw so many old college and high school friends in Shreveport over the holidays, which was amazing. I'm so very looking forward to this week, but I can't write about it until after the fact. I think my real Christmas was not the 25th, but the holiday parties at friends houses, the night of Solstice at my house, Carrolling in the Square with 8,000 people and dinner afterwards at Green Goddess, Thanksgiving with friends, decorating with my roommate, and all the other moments when I could be the most genuine, when I was surrounded by people whom I adore and respect. Over coffee and drinks, over homemade gumbo and Whole Foods brie wheels, over cigarettes and movies and crab cakes and brass bands, over Saints games and phone calls, over laughs and tears and brutally honest, soul-baring conversations... that was my Christmas. A mess of holiday moments, all spread apart and unconventional, but genuine and rejuvenating in their own way.

Fort Worth, TX Councilman on "It Gets Better"

Dallas Pride was my first pride ever -- and I returned twice more. Texas, like Louisiana, gets a lot of shit for being conservative, hick states where queers aren't welcome. But the truth is, we're here and we're out and we exist -- as do our allies. Nothing melts my heart like hearing a devout Southern Baptist talk about how wonderful gay people are. There are huge pockets of support which extend even into rural areas, often in the most unexpected places. Listening to Councilman Joel Burns' speech reminds me of all this truth -- that we're here, we're everywhere, we're loved, even if some days it doesn't seem that way.

Sleep to Dream

It's almost bedtime, and my thoughts are running wild and chaotic. What a strange last few days. I have much to say here, but neither the focus or the will to really do it. I'm determined to finish writing Number 9, but after the Saints defeat on Sunday, I simply haven't had the motivation. I tell myself tomorrow, but the truth is tomorrow doesn't seem to ever come.

A friend mentioned Written on the Body by Winterson this weekend, and the book seems to have gotten stuck in my head. It's been years and years since I read it, or really anything by her, though once upon a time she was my favorite author. I credit Written on the Body as a big part of my coming out process. The book is written from a first person perspective, though the protagonist has no defined sex/gender identity. At the time I read it, I wasn't comfortable with the idea of being sexual (or even romantic) with another woman. But reading the book forced me to explore my own feelings and thoughts about gender roles, sexuality, and sex in very mind-blowing ways. Granted, I was fifteen. But it was most definitely what I needed at the time. Ironic that this has all popped up around National Coming Out Day (today).

I cried this morning, when I woke up before my alarm and read the FB and twitter updates of many of my friends. I have some friends on FB I didn't even know where queer -- old camp friends, etc. -- and seeing these people who grew up in small town Mississippi, Texas, Louisiana, proudly proclaim to 300+ people online that they're here and queer still blows my mind. I spoke with two close friends last week about the LGBTQ community in NOLA, in Louisiana, about the struggles we face and the challenges that hold back this community. On a microcosm, many are small and yet so pervasive -- one or two family members who hold someone back from being out, a boss that might or might not be accepting, a fear of the those who lurk in the French Quarter streets at night, etc. But the macrocosm is devastating in a different way -- the pay gap for women (and especially gender non-normative women), the racial and class divides in this town, the lack of a LGBTQ infrastructure through organizations and groups, the lack of venues for queer women, the lack of everything from healthcare to social support for trans people, pervasive (and often school-sanctioned) discrimination and bullying, etc.

I don't know why this year has hit hard -- I always wax poetic on LGBTQ holidays, but I guess the rash of suicides has just hit home. It's 2010, and groups like HRC and (our local) Forum For Equality and Gay, Inc, have put marriage and adoption at the top of the agenda, while teens are blowing their brains out. I get that it's not an either-or thing; nothing is that simple. But money is power, and the issues we choose to support with our time and money are the ones which get the most press and recognition. Thousands of people in California came out against Prop 8. In the last few weeks, five kids (that we know of) have committed suicide and where is outcry? It's coming, but it's not as well funded. This movement doesn't have the PR machine. But I'm grateful to see things like the "It Gets Better" Project. I'm glad people are reading, listening, hearing, and asking questions -- What can we do? What are we doing wrong? How can we give these kids hope?

I don't know. But we've got to start talking and listening. We've got to find a way to hear the stories of these kids, and not the post-mortem version. We've got to build a support system, an infrastructure, and we've got to start yesterday.

The suicides also brought up two of my own friends, both from high school, who've committed suicide. I'm certain neither of their deaths had anything to do with their sexual orientation or gender identity. But to think they both cut their lives off at 19. Argh. I wonder often who they would be if they were still here. If I'd still run into them from time to time. If they would find happiness. Death always leaves a hole, but suicide leaves a different kind of missing. It's been over three years, but damn, I still think about them. 19 is too young.

What are we doing? Not enough. Never enough, if this is still happening. Social change is slow, yes. But just as women found that Edna Pontillier's escape hatch was not the only one -- Nora Helmer was onto something -- LGBTQ teens have to discover the same. Death isn't a solution. There's so much more to find in Door #2.

Come out, come out, where ever you are. I'm grateful today, especially, for my "family." I'm grateful for my ex-boyfriend, Steven, the first person I came out to -- and a friend who gave me the support I really needed. I'm grateful to the psychiatrist who told me, contrary to my mother's wishes, that my being queer was just fine. I'm grateful to the straight allies, to groups like the ACLU and SPLC, to parents and family members of queers, to advocates, to those who love quietly and those who fight out loud. There's so much gold on this end of the rainbow.

Wound Tight

At one of the many wine-fueled living room discussions from my old apartment, I remember one of the girls asking whether we thought giving or receiving sex was more intimate. We debated this topic out, and there were mixed responses in the room. My answer didn’t take much thought. For me, receiving has always been more intimate, and, at times, more challenging.

I can bury my mouth or fingers in someone else all day. Seriously. But it’s another level to let someone else pull open the layers of my body and mind and fuck me senseless.

When I first became sexually active, I was always very dominant with men. I liked the feeling of turning someone else on until they lost control, using my own body and mind to elicit an involuntary response. That kind of power was a rush. It’s an undeniably terrifying lesson to learn at such a young age. I have often used my body, my voice, my mind, to push the people around me. Only as an adult has it become increasingly important for me to control my own tendencies to dominate. I try to fall more gracefully now, to reign that urge into becoming a healthy response, not an overwhelming one. I fail sometimes. It’s an ongoing process.

Even at a young age, being on top, being in control, was about more than power. Dominance was a protective measure. Dominance left me with the illusion that I had more agency, more control over how much of my own body and mind I was opening up to someone else. It was a false prophet, leading me to believe I could protect myself.

My attitude and actions changed drastically when I started dating my first girlfriend. For the first time in my life, I felt like I was on even ground with someone. I had nothing to prove, no role to fill – because there wasn’t a prescript for how two women in a relationship thought, acted, fucked. Or at least, I felt like there wasn’t a prescript because I had not yet been socialized into a queer community. I learned much more about giving and taking sexually. More importantly, I learned to let my guard down and expose myself to pleasure, to heartbreak, to infinite possibilities.

But the reality is, I still have a lot of deep-burnt issues about control and agency, consent and release. These concepts are so interwoven that it’s hard to imagine picking them apart.




On most cars, there’s a kill switch that kicks in when you accelerate to 100mph. Sometimes 120mph. Your car can, indeed, go faster. But manufacturers place a safety limit, so that an engine literally will not accelerate more after reaching that speed.

I’m learning that I, too, have a safety kill switch. When I’m fucking someone new for the first time, I often can’t come. The sex can be spectacular. My body can be totally aroused, and I can get so close. But, as if there’s an internal switch I can’t control, I’ll lose my orgasm just as I’m getting there. It’s incredibly frustrating, and often leaves me feeling so many things – guilty, confused, and out of touch with my body. It’s difficult to explain to a partner that it’s not her, it’s me. Really.

I’ve encountered this before, years ago, but the truth is, I had forgotten about it in the four years I was in a relationship. In retrospect, I never could come to full orgasm with a guy. It wasn't not about sexual orientation, because I was attracted to the guys I dated and screwed around with. But I wasn’t comfortable letting go of myself and my body. I faced the same issue with later sex partners (and girls before we dated), but usually I could overcome it. In my memory, this became a few separate incidents, not a pattern. But I'm obviously wrong. It is a pattern.

I’ve met quite a number of girls in my life who’ve experienced the same thing, though often in a slightly different context. Many of them have expressed that they’ve never reached orgasm ever, or never reached orgasm with a partner. I’m not in that boat. But I think there could be correlations.

I definitely think it’s deeply psychological, and it’s a remnant of protection – a way for my body to close off, to keep from sharing my own intimacy. While I love to receive, to submit, there’s a lot of trust required there. Any consensual sexual act requires trust – trust that your partner will respect your choices and request, trust that your partner will listen to your body and your words, trust that you’ll be treated the way you want to be, trust that you’ll be safe from being harmed.

Problem is, this happens even when I'm consciously consenting, even when I trust my partner completely.

But.

(Always a but.)

My body apparently feels differently.

I don’t know if it’s a remnant of being sexually assaulted. I don’t know if it’s the reason many women I know can’t orgasm. But I suspect it has something to do with letting go. I suspect it’s an internal fear – do I look ok? Does my partner judge my body? Is she/he enjoying it? Or even a more deep set, less obvious fear – one of relinquishing control of your body, your reactions. I’ve met many women who were embarrassed by the sounds or the faces they make during orgasm, the way their right leg shakes, the fact that they ejaculate, the chance that they might queef, or really, any involuntary bodily response.


Sex is messy and personal. These things are going to happen! And while I’ve apologized for many of my own reactions at different points with different partners, the truth is, those fears hold us back.

But even when I’m not caught up with these thoughts consciously, my body still cuts off. I can be completely committed and engaged in sex... and yet, nothing. This ridiculously frustrating motor kill switch is holding me back, not really protecting me. It’s hurting my ability to enjoy sex and my ability to respond to a partner. It’s fucking with my sex life, and it’s got to go.

So while I don’t really have an answer yet on how I’m going to overcome whatever is holding me back in this situation – hell, I don’t even really know for certain what or why my body responds like this – I do hope that naming the problem is step one.

In truth, I love to have my boundaries challenged. I still love to be dominant, but I equally love to submit, to be restrained, to be pushed to a grey area between pleasure and pain. I like to play with power in consensual ways, and I like to have my ideas of agency and control discussed and challenged. Sex can be as psychological as it can be physical, and I like to fuck with both – pardon the pun.

I'd even go so far as to say that at times, my own protective instinct closes me off to the point of being borderline stone -- open and willing to fuck someone else, but not to be fucked. The truth is, I don't like it there. I like to be fucked. I like my layers and complexities to be picked apart until I'm engaged in every part of sex, even the most raw and intimate and scary acts of exposing myself to someone else. That, in itself, is a turn on. Protective shields don't protect me -- they limit me from experience, exposure, opportunity.

But right now, my body is really fucking with me, in a not-so-fun way. I’m hoping this is something I can work on in Albany, as it’s definitely something I want to get to the bottom of soon.

So. Cute.

I'd say yes!

It Gets Better

Dan Savage, author of the Savage Love column and a couple books, has started a new project in response to yet another suicide by a gay teen. He created a YouTube channel where LGBT people can post their videos discussing their coming out, their lives, and how, in growing up, it gets better. It’s not always miserable and hopeless to be queer, even though it can really seem that way.

Honestly, I don’t have any experience with video. Arg. And my computer, though it claims I can video using my built-in webcam, doesn’t seem to want to. I suspect I am missing a mic.

Plus, I simply prefer writing.

In fall 2004, I was a senior in high school. I’d been dating my first girlfriend for over six months, and my best friend had just passed away in a house fire. It was a very emotionally tumultuous time in my life. Looking back, I remember only bits and pieces, like driving to school on crisp fall mornings with the windows down and having hot sex in the back seat of my Camry, parked in a dark alley. I remember my girlfriend’s parents threatening that if she came out, her mother would lose her job, and the time when her younger sister outed us to all of her friends in an attempt to fit in. We didn’t really know anyone else who was gay, and I felt very alienated – I had no idea there were ways to connect to other LGBT people. The highs were incredible, and the lows were very, very dark. I was coming off a semester of drinking and popping pills every morning before class, but my girlfriend was one of the reasons I stopped playing with drugs. I was head-over-heels in love.

I had a hare-brained notion that I should come out to my mother, in hopes that my honesty would bring us closer. God knows I was so fucking wrong. Instead, our already miserable relationship worsened. She dragged me to a psychiatrist, insisted that I was in a phase triggered by the sudden death of my best friend, and used her shame and yelling to drive me deeper into the closet. My close friends, the few who knew about us and were supportive, were a solace. But losing the last few family members I had left, after my family had already been split by divorce and rivalries, was overwhelming and terrifying. My friends who were Christian took off pretty quick, and those that stayed faced disapproval from their parents for hanging out with “gay kids.”

I remember thinking my cousins would never speak to me again. I just wanted to move out, run away, but I had nowhere to go. I counted down the days to college, when I could get away from my mother. I was so overwhelmed some days, and I really couldn’t imagine how things could get better.

And then I went to moved out, went to college, and got a job.

Practically overnight, I had a bed I could fuck in any time I wanted. I had the money to support myself – to some degree – and I could go see my girlfriend for a whole weekend without asking permission and facing judgment, shame, and anger from my mother. I could call her anytime I wanted, and not fear that if her number showed up on my caller ID that I would face another two days of fighting. I felt liberated. I could come out on my own terms, and define my life in a new place. And I did all of those things.

It definitely gets better.

I don’t have all my shit together, and I never will. I don’t want to pretend to be a role model for anyone. I still struggle with coming out, at new jobs, in unfamiliar or scary situations, in dealing with family. But not for a second would I take back being queer.

I’m so blessed. I have so many queer friends and straight allies in my life. I have stopped putting stock in my biological family, which has never been supportive for really any reason, and learned to build a chosen family of friends who I actually enjoy spending time with. I get to play any role in the queer community that I wish, and I have taken on many – as a political and social advocate, as a member of LGBT organizations, as a researcher, as a geek who loves queer history, as an employee of an LGBT org, as a protester, as a supporter of queer arts and culture, as a volunteer, and now, I suppose, as a writer. I love that everyone in this community can choose their level of involvement – but at the end of the day, being queer – from who you fuck to how you speak out and everything in between – is subversive and beautiful.

I wake up every day, grateful to have not chosen suicide when I was 15, 16, 17. I can’t tell you the number of times I faced death as a viable option.

I can tell you there is so much to come, so much that you just haven’t experienced yet. Amazing, mind-blowing sex. Visiting cities like New York and San Francisco, where the gay flags on balconies signal “home.” Pride parades. Laughing about with queer friends over a bottle of wine or a few beers. The thumpa-thumpa of the club. Drag. Watching someone open their eyes and ears as they learn about what it’s like to be queer. Movies like Imagine Me & You. Seeing a gay kiss on-stage. Falling in love. Tiny, hidden gay bars where everyone is like family. Queer theory and queer history.

And there are all the not-so-gay things. Like the chance to go to school. The jobs you could have, the people you could meet. The friends you’ll make. The chance to reconcile with family members, who often do come around after a few months or years. The places you’ll go.

There are so many possibilities, so many opportunities. There’s so much worth living for. You only get once chance, so enjoy it while you’re young. Enjoy it when you’re old. Tomorrow does get better.

Someday, it’ll be you writing to the next generation, telling them the same. 

If you're struggling with being LGBT/queer and need someone to talk to, please call 866-4-U-TREVOR. The hotline is operated 24/7 by the Trevor Project, a non-profit dedicated to crisis and suicide prevention among LGBT youth. You can find out more or donate to the Trevor Project on their website, thetreavorproject.org.

sexual freedom

It’s National Sexual Freedom Day (wow, there’s a day!), and in honor of this great day, the Woodhull Freedom Foundation is hosting a blog carnival.

So it’s time to pick up a pen (or, really, my keyboard), and get down to the dirt of why I care about sexual freedom.

This week, I watched two different TV shows, both about parenting young children – “Modern Family” and “Parenthood.” Ironically, both contained plot lines where a couple was faced with how to talk to their young child about sex. In “Modern Family,” the five-year-old (or about that age) daughter started asking her parents about sex – specifically, if she came from her mom’s vagina, how babies are made, how eggs are fertilized, what the daddy “does,” etc. In “Parenthood,” a mom found a photo of a naked woman downloaded on her computer and believed her ten-year-old son to be the culprit.

In both shows, the parents had discussions about what to say to their child, and in both shows, there was a uniting theme: shame. One couple agonized about how many years it would take for their daughter to “live down” their explanation of sex – and the father speculated that waiting another 5-6 years before talking to her would be appropriate. The mother winced at any mention of the word “vagina” and “penis,” though she did try to push for honesty, while the father kept trying to change the subject. In the other show, the father told his wife that a mother talking to a son about sex would “scar him” and embarrass him; they both avoided discussing the subject and used bad euphemisms to try to get their points across. Granted, there were some comedic moments, but both couples implied that discussions of sexually are innately scary, embarrassing, shameful, and worth avoiding.

Wow.

I’m fascinated by sex and sexuality because they are an integral part of most everyone’s lives, and yet, in America, we have such a love-hate relationship with sex. We use sex to sell everything, from cars to clothes to shampoo… and yet, many women couldn’t find their own clitoris, and most people can’t have a frank conversation about sex without using some euphemisms or making bad jokes.

Sexual freedom for me is the ability to discuss sex, to have sex, to navigate what sex means in our lives in an open and honest way. I want to live in a society where we accept sex and sexuality as a part of our lives – not dominant, not non-existent, but integral. I want to live in a society where we don’t speak of sex as shameful – where words like “slut” don’t exist, where “masturbation” isn’t whispered, where condoms aren’t behind glass lock boxes. I definitely think this kind of repression hurts. Countries like the Netherlands, where sex is discussed at an age-appropriate level with children and contraception is widely and easily accessed, doesn’t suffer the same teenage pregnancy and STI rates that America does. I think children without a sense of shame about their bodies and their desires lead happier, healthier lives. And I definitely know, from statistics and experience, that queer kids who grow up ashamed of their sexuality and their sexual practices suffer from higher rates of depression and suicide.

Sexual freedom means talking about consent – as a theory, as a practice, and as a personal interaction. It means talking about rape – and working to end rape and sexual assault. It means talking about sex in nuanced terms. It means discussing that sexuality is different for each individual, as is sexual practice, needs, desires, and expression. It means easy and affordable access to STI testing, gyno services, HIV/AIDS testing, contraception, barrier protection (like condoms), and doctors who are educated and communicative about sex, sexuality, and your body and mind. It means learning, teaching, sharing.

Sexual freedom is power. It is the right to consent or not to, to be abstinent or sexually active, to be monogamous or poly, to be queer or straight – and all of those choices and states of being to be respected and validated.

Sexual freedom is the ability to express your wants, needs, desires. To have those desires validated and met, in a healthy and consensual way.

Once a week, I volunteer with a women’s shelter in town. It’s a great place with an amazing staff, a really inspiring method for helping women and their families, and the only trans-friendly shelter in town. I could talk all day about this place. But this week, I met a new woman at the shelter. Let’s call her “Georgina.”  She’s from a small Southern Louisiana town, where the sheriff’s office flies the Confederate flag right next to the Louisiana flag. Yes, Virginia, places like this do exist in 2010. Georgina ended up at the shelter with her baby girl, “Stella,” after being fired from her job, kicked out of her home, and basically, run out of town…all because she is white and had a baby with a black man (out of wedlock), and she has continued to date black men.  Her family, friends, and neighbors put her out on the street because they didn’t agree with her sexuality due to racist motivations.

I want a society that doesn’t allow this to happen. Sexual freedom is bound up, tightly, in equality – racial equality, gender equality, and queer and trans equality. There’s a lot of emphasis in the gay rights movement on “love.” But I think for that movement to become queer – to align with Stonewall, to align with eliminating HIV/AIDS, and to align with the needs and rights of people across this country – this movement must also focus on sex. We aren’t just talking about the rights for people to get married or have children. We’re talking about the rights of people to hook up with whomever they choose, and to do so without judgment and shame. And yet, many try to distance the gay rights movement from talking about sex for fear of losing support from straight allies. Really, isn’t sex where this a lot of this started in the first place? And isn’t sexual freedom just as important as the freedom to love – as if the two can be separated?

In 2005, in Lawrence v. Texas, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that sex, in the privacy of one’s own bedroom, is not a state or policed issue. But yet, many people still enforce a measure of shame on sex – the act itself, the gender of the couple, the race/ethnicity of the couple, the marital status of the couple, and even the motivation of the couple. It’s people like Georgina and Stella (and hundreds of thousands of kids in abstinence-only classes) who lose when shame and hatred are held as more important than love, freedom, and humanity.

We all could benefit from more sexual freedom (and more sex!). :)

Sexual Healing

Decadence has come and gone, but I'm still reveling in the high of an amazing weekend. For those of you not from around here, Southern Decadence is a festival that has its roots in a party thrown by 17 friends in 1972 as a gay-going-away-costumed-gala. It's a wonderful way to end summer. Now the festival draws over 100,000 people, the vast majority gay men, though this year I'm proud to say the festival has become much more diverse. It's a weekend of events, from burlesque to hard-on contests. There are queens and kings and leather daddies and bears and freaks of all sizes, shapes, and colors living it up in a city that embraces every minute.

It's always an amazing feeling to wander the French Quarter on Decadence weekend and see the flags out, everywhere, in gay and "straight" bars. Though the best bars here are full of people who don't really care who you fuck or how you fly your freak flag, Decadence turns most Quarter bars into out-and-proud venues. I spent the weekend partying with new and old friends, many of whom are locals, though others came in from NYC, Shreveport, and Dallas to join the fun. I'm blessed to say I spent time with everyone I hoped to see.

From Ani Difranco's acoustic set (which seems like a surreal dream) to brunch with awesome Centenary alums and dancing to the beat of the brass band in the parade, this was an incredible weekend. Late Friday, when I was closing down my favorite bar with a group of friends around 4am, I heard this incredible brass band version of "Sexual Healing." I used the play the Ben Harper cover of this song when I had a radio show, and for me, this song will always be a reminder of the sun setting over campus. It's comfort and love, New Orleans-style. After so many years living in places where queer is an afterthought, a sin, a misfortune, a slur, an embarrassment... it is so fulfilling to live in a city where there is not simply acceptance, but LOVE. And freaks :)

I leave you with a photo --