Those Ladies Putting On Bravado About Their Orgasms - A Free Flow Writing

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I'm currently in between right now. I'm moved out of my fave Midwest city and won't be moved into the next Midwest city until Friday. I'm living out of an empty apartment save for 3 cats and an air mattress. So, I'm eating breakfast at Panera (my personal opinion is that the bacon egg and cheese on brioche is much nicer with an over easy egg as opposed to a scramble btw) and writing a quick blog before I go do a bunch of things one has to do in these situations.

I was gonna write a quick SSL Review of one of the many TV shows I have noted to write SSL Reviews about. Amy Schumer, Broad City, Chewing Gum, Mind Hunter, Orange is the New Black, The Americans, Girls, Workoholics, SNL, even Bob's Burgers all have SSL moments in one episode or another that I'm behind in writing about. An SSL Review sounded boring to me right now though.

So, then I vaguely looked at Twitter for a hot second, thinking that the perfect, quick n' easy topic would pop up, but it didn't and I got bored again. So then I decided to just free-flow write something.

And that is what I'm currently doing. I'm gonna experiment a bit with this post. I'm going to go over it quickly when I'm done to make sure it's readable, but I'm pretty much just gonna write what comes to my head about ladies and orgasm or any of this stuff. I'll see what happens. It'll be probably somewhere between kinda cool and really boring/convoluted. Let's hope for the best.

Orgasms are hard, my ladies. Clearly, I don't mean they are biologically problematic or fickle for females in a way they are not for males. My whole movie/blog/activism is based in pointing out that they are not, that females are biologically as capable of having orgasm as quickly, reliably, and easily as men. What I'm talking about is all the other shit in life that makes it harder for ladies to orgasm.

I guess I just want to say that if you are reading my posts, and you think I have my orgasm all figured out easy-like, then rest assured, I don't. I still have trouble prioritizing my sexual desire and needs over another person. I still have ideas in my head about what's sexy and what's not and the "sexy" stuff is often stuff that is not giving me the physical stimulation I need for orgasm and sometimes even arousal at all...and I still worry that if I don't focus on the sexy stuff that my partner will have a worse time, or that if I focus on the stuff that intrinsically feels right to my lady parts and my desires that my partner will find it less sexy. I feel like this even when there isn't evidence from my partner to make me think this way right now, and even though I logically know that's a bunch of BS. The images and ideas that shape us as we grow stick deep in us. We have a lot of shit baggage, my ladies.

I also want to say that the place I am with my own orgasm came through a lot of experimentation, self-honesty, and communication work. It was all hard. Experimentations fail often, self honesty is a journey, and clear, genuine communication is hard and needs tended regularly. Orgasm, arousal, and desire is a touchy subject - for both you and your partner(s). I feel like I was pretty lucky in all this too, and it was still hard. I have had a good orgasmic relationship to masturbation since I was a little girl, I have a partner that is kind and willing to let me be honest and experiment, and I have been able to spend a lot of time and energy thinking and investigating female orgasm.

and don't let her tell you she does

So, if you feel frustrated about your orgasm, know that every other woman you know feels that way to some degree as well. Know that we are all struggling with it in some way, even the ones that tell you they orgasm easily and have always just been lucky to have great partners. No - especially those women who put out a bravado about their orgasm abilities. I would put a lot of money down on these women being some of the least self-honest about their orgasms. I'm not saying that in a negative way, for real. I'm not shitting on women who are overly positive about their orgasms. I mean their presence in a group of women can often shut down really vulnerable, honest discussion about orgasm, but it's not intentional, and it's not any worse than all the other things in the world that shut down that type of talk. It's just not necessarily helpful, and I can't blame anyone for that.

What I am saying, though, is that maybe instead of seeing these women as the ideal of lady-sexuality, or as the thing you feel like you, like all women, should be but are not, instead of that, it's probably more realistic to view them as women dealing with the shit situation for lady-gasms in a completely different way than you. Maybe they are just really positive people who instinctively make the best out of situations and also see themselves as very sexual. So, maybe instead of worrying about why they don't experience orgasm from getting banged, they just tell themselves that since sexual women are supposed to come while getting banged, then they must be coming. They do feel something intense, and we can all convince ourselves of a lot of things - especially when the world around us is already trying its hardest to beat that into our heads anyway.

So, I believe that we women sometimes convince ourselves that our relationship to orgasm is more positive than it is, and some of us at certain times do that strongly. Be kind and understanding of those who do that, but don't fall for it. We are all struggling, and the more we recognize that, the better it gets in the long run.

1977 Hustler Review Series #6: Lady-catching Ad

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Why I'm SSL Reviewing a 1977 Hustler
So there is a fab lady named Jill Hamilton. She made it into the Orgasm Equality Allies List a good while ago for her various writings. She's awesome and she's goddamn funny. She writes the blog In Bed With Married Women, which you will not regret reading, and she's revo-fucking-lucionizing the classic Cosmo Sex Positions lists.

Now here's where Hustler comes in. She had a give away on her blog, and we readers had to comment and tell her what we wanted so she could pick randomly and ship shit out to us. I saw she had a vintage Hustler, and so I asked - nay begged - for it. I promised to SSL Review it cover to cover, and here I am doing just that.

An SSL Review is a critique specifically of discussion and/or depiction of female orgasm and/or female masturbation in media (usually I do this for movies or TV not magazines, though). I particularly pay attention to the realism and scientific accuracy of the depiction/discussion and how it fits within the larger cultural conversation about female orgasm and female sexuality.

Feel free to check out the previous SSL Reviews of the Advice Column, the Porn Movie Reviews, a Bondage article, Kinky Korner erotic story, and Sex Toy Ads.

Today I'll be SSL Reviewing one simple full page ad on how dudes can teach themselves to get themselves a gal.

A Class in Bedding A Lady
Apparently this dude named Dick Whitsom (which is just a bit too strangely close to Dick Whitman, don't you think?) was shy and shitty in bed in his youth, but read a bunch of self-help books to overcome it. He also got an undergraduate and graduate degree in electronics and computer sciences (at 5 different colleges for some reason), and thought the method 'Programmed Instruction' that he used in his courses would work well for teaching men these lady-bedding techniques because of the useful and self paced, 'try, get-immediate-feedback, check and repeat' style. Anyway, this course being advertised in this 1977 Hustler is the result, and aren't you lucky you can read about it here. Enjoy the opening description below.

You can become more successful with women. This course in seduction and lovemaking techniques uses Programmed Instructions, homework assignments and supplementary readings to teach you how to overcome shyness and pick up girls, how to recognize sexually available and high-orgasm women, how to read female body language, how to be a memorable lover and how to use computer logic to program your way to a successful seduction.

Okay, so I'll get back to the "high-orgasm" woman part, which is the only actually SSL Reviewable (because it depicts/discussedes female orgasm, female masturbation, or the clit) thing in this ad, but I just want to point out a couple other creepy parts first.

Basic Creeper Stuff
So first let me show you the ad's expansion of "How to read female body language"

What subconscious message is she sending when she strokes her hair or crosses her legs? Learn to interpret these nonverbal signals and to know her most intimate feelings, even before she herself is fully aware of them.

Well, she's probably crossing her legs because she wants to shift her body after sitting another way a bit too long, but you know, it could also mean she desperately wants to fuck you, but like doesn't realize it yet...

Ummm, so if this isn't some classic misreading of women to suit your own needs, I don't know what is. It's also got this super awesome element of putting the idea into men's heads that women don't really even know what they really want...that there's a secret code you must crack to get women to do what they don't even realize they want to do...put out. I mean it's a touch of a rapey mentality, but it's pretty common even to this day (I wrote about this recently in relation to some male comedians and inappropriate masturbating).

Secondly, let me also show you the ad's expansion of  "How to recognize the sexually available woman"

Would you like to score more often? Would you like to walk into a singles' bar and know which girls are looking for action? In this lesson you learn to recognize five female signals that shout, "Proposition me, I want some loving."

So we're clearly staying with the rapey-ish vibe. I'm oh so curious as to what these signals are that shout out at men to bother the fuck out of women they think 'want it.' I mean, I'm sure they're fool proof.

Bullshit and Scientific Tomfoolery
Okay, but back to the "high orgasm female" - here's the ad's expansion of  "How to recognize the high-orgasm woman"

Would you like fantastic bedmates, satisfying lovers and a faithful wife? All these can be yours if you search for and find the high-orgasm woman. Modern science has now provided sufficient data to enable an aware man to recognize a high-orgasm woman.

No science has not - mainly because a 'high orgasm' woman is not an actually scientifically defined thing at all. Granted, you will find plenty of science-y people and writing out there that claim some women can orgasm from vaginal stimulation without additional outer clitoral stimulation. It's quite a common claim even in peer reviewed journal articles and there is much speculation about what is different in these women vs. women who either haven't orgasmed or only orgasm through clitoral/vuvla stimulation. I think many would consider these orgasm-from-only-banging women 'high-orgasm" women. Problem is, women who can orgasm from only vaginal stimulation are merely hypothetical from a scientific standpoint. A woman has literally never been physically observed orgasming in that manner. There's no proof that's even possible except that some women say they can - which unfortunately is not the scientific proof one needs to claim it is actually a thing.

My point is, women orgasm from their clit and men orgasm from their penis. It's pretty simple and intact, healthy people all have pretty similar physical capabilities in that area. Contrary to popular belief there's no physical proof there are different kinds of orgasming women, meaning there are not high-orgasming and low-orgasming "types" of women.

What is true, though, is that women get judged on their orgasm capability for completely unscientific and unfair reasons.  A large portion of sexual interaction involves stimulating the penis but focuses on the vagina instead of the clit. Thus lots of women, who are absolutely capable of orgasming with the right type of stimulation, don't even have a chance of coming at all during sex, because the wrong thing is getting touched (well maybe banged is a better word).

So often during a sexual encounter, we ladies have 3 main roadds we could travel. We can either fake and seem like "high-orgasm" women; don't fake and seem like "low-orgasm" women, or take lots of time and energy redirecting partners to do the things we need to orgasm and be deemed any number of things including a bitch, a frigid bitch, a high-maintenance lover, a woman that doesn't 'let go' enough to come vaginally, or on the rare occasion with the rare partner sexy and knowledgeable about her body. 

I'd like to say that last one is a common outcome, but it's not. The redirecting of men away from the most common and familiar ways of having sex towards ways that actually are arousing and orgasmic to women is often met with unrecoverable embarrassment, arrogance/ignored, anger, or half-hearted half-assed attempts to do what we want before going right back to doing what they want/are comfortable with. The whole redirecting process often ends up being unarousing or maddening to us which doesn't lend itself to a good sexual experience. It doesn't have to be bad. It could be chill and reasonable, and hot to talk about our needs and wants, but frankly that is often not the environment that is created. So, we all react in whatever way makes sense to us at the time....and then we get deemed high or low orgasming as a result. It's stupid and this idea of seeking out high-orgasm women is stupid, silly, and not all that great for women's sexual experiences in general.


Vulva Rating
Seriously, this idea of a different type of women that is somehow wired differently and can thus orgasm more easily and in more ways is a sick and twisted fantasy that stems from our ignorance of how females orgasm and leads to a lot of unnecessary stress, sadness, and feelings of inferiority in both women and men.

Also, this is just kinda full of creepy advice.

This gets no vulvas

Zero Vulvas