Search results for "sex education"

National Sex Study reveals what we are up to

National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior

Strand Book Store by Nick Sherman (flickr/creativecommons

Strand Book Store
by Nick Sherman
(flickr/creativecommons

A new study, the largest in 20 years, represents a clarion call for anyone having sex (or not having sex for that matter). Researchers from the Center for Sexual Health Promotion (CSHP) at Indiana University’s School of Health, Physical Education, and Recreation examine the sexual experience and condom-use in almost 6000 people, ages 14-94.

“These data about sexual behaviors and condom use in contemporary America are critically needed by medical and public health professionals who are on the front lines addressing issues such as HIV, sexually transmissible infections, and unintended pregnancy.” (CSHP Director, Michael Reece)

Here are a few things that caught our attention, but it is definitely worth a fair read because you will learn a lot and, more important, it allows you to analyze your own behaviors.

[T]he study helps both the public and professionals to understand how condom use patterns vary across these varying stages in people’s relationships and across ages, adding that “findings show that condoms are used twice as often with casual sexual partners as with relationship partners, a trend that is consistent for both men and women across age groups that span 50 years.” (CSHP Associate Director, Debby Herbenick)

Condom use is of course up to 1 in 4 sexual encounters, although for single people it is 1 in 3, and people of color in America use condoms more than their white counterparts. That may sound like good news except that that means as many as 66-75% are having unprotected sex. 

Adults using a condom for intercourse were just as likely to rate the sexual extent positively in terms of arousal, pleasure and orgasm than when having intercourse without one.

Click here to see Condom Use Graph

Sexual behaviors, from solo and partner masturbation and oral sex to vaginal and anal intercourse. Males masturbate alone more than females, not surprising. But there is near gender equity during our 40s, with males at 76% and females at 65%.

Females are having very little anal penetration, 4-5% before age 18, jumping to 18% by age 20, and then stays around 22% until age 40 and then dropping drastically after that.

Males performing oral sex on females gets into the double digits, 18%, by age 16, and steadily rises to its peak at 74% for ages 25-29, and then slowly declines after that.

Females performing oral sex on males is predictably is substantially greater but males do actually reciprocate in greater numbers only in our 30s.

Click here to see Sexual Behavior Graph

The data continues to show that adolescents are actually having less sex than previous studies (that focused only on teens) have suggested.

Photo of Roman Lesbian Statue by Rob Meredith (flickr/creativecommons

Photo of Roman Lesbian Statue by Rob Meredith (flickr/creativecommons

The study confirms that beyond the stats of sexual orientation in men and women, the numbers of American’s having had same-gender sex at some point in their lives is “higher.”

And, oh yes, the study confirms that males report the incidence of their female partners’ frequency of orgasm at 85% while females say it’s only 64%.

You can download the study’s full report by going to the National Sex Study website.

The Sexual Freedom Project: Birds and the Bees

I’ve decided to offer my take on some of the media I have come across here. There are hundreds of Sexual Freedom Project videos to choose from, each with an important message. Everyone’s invited to join the cast by submitting your personal definition of or commentary on some aspect of sexual freedom.

In this video, the speaker Ying details her upbringing, and the sex education that she received in Catholic school, telling us of the limited issues that were addressed when it came to the realities of sex.

She and I share the idea that abstinence-only education creates sexual frustration. Not only that, numerous studies back up the correlation between lack of sex ed and high numbers of unwanted teenage pregnancy (in the American South in particular). Attempting to shut down the natural desire for sex is not healthy, and is considered by some a stealthy form of child abuse whenever and wherever accurate and complete sexual health information is intentionally withheld, or sometimes replaced with outright disinformation.

Ying even speaks of her parents’ relationship in which they avoided sex before marriage, detailing how this repression did no favors for their level of intimacy.

What was your sexual education like? Send us a video or essay detailing your story for a free VenusPlusX t-shirt.

More videos here

The Sexual Freedom Project: Use it or not

Revisiting what Eneko said about generational differences in how we talk about sex, saying, for example, that the use of pornography is always a choice — use it or not.

What was your sex education growing up? Was it easy or hard to talk with your parents about sex?

Is accessibility to pornography important to you? Do you think is pornography serves society? Or helps with sex education?

Please share your thoughts with us — make your own video, write us a poem or an essay, or make us an original work of art. If your work is featured on the site, we’ll send you a free t-shirt!

Check out hundreds of Sexual Freedom Project videos, and our new Manifesto for The New Age of Sexual Freedom.

Video by Tiye Massey.

TRANSCRIPT by David Kreps

Eneko: Hello?

Food vendor: Hello, how are you?

Eneko: Lamb with rice… no, give me chicken rice please. Yeah.

VenusPlusX: So, tell me about sex education in Spain.

Eneko: *laughs*

Sex education in Spain is really bad because it’s still, I think it’s still the Spanish culure is following the Christian, the Christianists. So, for old people it’s really difficult to talk about the sex. Young people is opening, and I think that… they are not afriad to talk about sex. My parents? No, we don’t used to talk about that. I mean, it’s something that we know that we do. But, we avoid to talk about that. Pornography is something that you can use if you want. I mean pornography must be in the society. It’s nothing bad. You can use it or you can not use it. Depends, I mean if you have a … plenty sex life maybe you don’t want to use it. But if you you have some need, then you can. I think that pornography was controlled for men, and… not  the girls [who] were not in a good position [as] men’s pornography maybe. But, I know that somewhere in Spain, a lot of women directors are doing really good  pornography. With different rules, with different goals, and with different style. I mean, the pornography was controlled for the mens, but in the future they’re going to share …control. And I think they’re going to make pornography for men and for women. Because the brains of the men and the women [are] different, so I think we [get] excited with different things. So, it’s normal that …
different kinds of pornographies.


Depending on More than Faith: Comprehensive Sex Ed in Church

Although social conservatives have dominated discourse around religion and sexuality, it turns out that millions of religious and spiritual youth and adults believe that faith, and a positive approach to healthy sexuality, are not mutually exclusive. 

I never thought that I would see that day where I would come across an article discussing how Churches across the nation are moving away from the “Abstinence-only” approach to Comprehensive Sex Education (CSE). In my mind, as with the minds of many Americans, comprehensive sex education and religion seemed to be at odds, especially when it came to same-sex sexuality. So when I read that the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) published a faith-based comprehensive sex ed curriculum in 2006, AND affirms human sexuality, including the expressions of sexuality that occur within same-sex relationships, as a gift from God, my mind nearly exploded. Moreover, the United Methodist Church passed an official resolution in 2010 to encourage congregations to take up the issue of sex education.

But this revelation is about (God) damn time!

429px-Brenig_Evergislus_HillebrandFor too long, social conservatives have used religion to keep comprehensive sex education out of the classroom. They especially have a beef with condoms. They have spent more than one billion in public funding within the U.S. to promote abstinence-only-until-marriage programs that distort the health benefits of condoms. They also argued at international conferences that promoting condom use encourages teens to have sex, despite overwhelming research to the contrary: educating youth about condoms does not promote sexual activity. In fact, research indicates that young people who are educated about the health benefits of condoms are more likely than other young people to use condoms when they eventually initiate sex.

So I commend the work of religious leaders who are moving away from this restrictive, scientifically invalid viewpoint. While some religious leaders and institutions, like the Catholic Church in New York City, continue to fight against comprehensive sex education in schools and remind us how there should be a separation between Church and State (because we all know that is NOT the reality in the U.S.), at least others are tackling the issues on Church ground, such as the First United Methodist Church in Madison, WI, who will introduce a comprehensive sexual education program, “Our Whole Lives,” for the first time this year. Not only will discussing human sexuality in a positive light foster a new, cooperative relationship between faith and sexuality, but also will encourage more teens to talk to their parents and Church leaders about their issues and concerns, instead of sometimes relying on inaccurate sources or porn. There will always be barriers to comprehensive sex education to overcome, but at least this is another step towards victory in the fight for youth sexual rights.

Giulio Prisco’s incoming book examines Sex and the Art of Cosmic Governance (Part 1)

Giulio Prisco

Giulio Prisco

Our dear friend, Giulio Prisco, is writing a book entitled, tentatively, Tales of The Turing Church, and sent us this draft chapter, “Sex and the Art of Cosmic Governance,” that includes recollections of his many interactions with VenusPlusX Co-founder Dan Massey. (This post continues in Part 2 and Part 3.)  

Giulio is a physicist and computer scientist, and former senior manager in the European space administration. Giulio works as a consultant and contributes to several science and technology magazines. In 2002-2008 he served on the Board of Directors of Humanity Plus, of which he was Executive Director, and serves on the Board of Directors of the Italian Transhumanist Association.  He is often in Hungary, Italy and Spain. You can find more about Giulio at Turing Church and the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies (IEET).  

***********

Dan Masseya Renaissance man interested in everything under the stars, a visionary thinker, a relentless social activist, a scientist, a teacher, and a friend, passed away on January 28, 2012. He was persuaded that death is not the end, and expected to go on an eternal, infinite journey after death. I hope the eternal cosmic winds will be fair and wonderful to Dan, and I hope to see him again out there.

I first met Dan and his life partner Alison Gardner at Transvision, an itinerant transhumanist conference that I organized in Milan in October 2010. We became good friends and met often after the conference, both online and face to face.

I guess Dan’s talk at the conference shocked many people, used to the often aseptic tone of transhumanist talks. Here was a white-haired hippie, with a New Age messianic look, a benevolent guru of times gone by and times yet to come, proposing a new spirituality founded on transhumanist science and unbounded love including, of all things, sexual love! Quite a shock for “conventional” transhumanists from the straight and narrow path of science and engineering! Dan was an engineer himself, an MIT and Harvard graduate with a distinguished scientific career, but he didn’t walk straight and narrow paths. He and Alison founded an activist organization to create a New Age of liberty, freedom, justice, and equality for all people, centered on the intrinsic value of sex and gender expression, of personal erotic freedom, to replace millennia of unreasoned ignorance, fear, and hatred with the true joy of Love.

Here is the summary of Dan’s talk at Transvision 2010. Thanks to wonderful communication age that his work helped to come into being, the full talk is available online.

“There necessarily exists a divinely determined order throughout the universe. This order pervades and defines three levels of experiential existence – the spiritual, the mental/emotional, and the physical/sensory. The failure of humans and human associations to recognize the love of god pervasive in the sensory level of experience is the principal obstacle to individual and collective human progress, which is essential to the realization of our diverse ambitions for increasing human happiness.

This situation can be corrected by inspiring and educating all humanity to appreciate sex and gender freedom and equality as sacred gifts of god and by training individuals to appreciate the joy of their own freedom of sex and gender, enabling them to inspire, educate, and train others. The power of divine love, expressed through the physical and sensory, is sufficient to seduce humanity into a new way of living, loving, and being that will open wide the doors to our true planetary future.

We are now beginning public discussion of how life is lived in this new age, through all levels and in all areas of inspiration, education, and training. From these discussions a spiritual vision, a social agenda, and a technological program will be established to fashion a transhuman future on which we can begin work today to bring truth, beauty, goodness, and love to our worldwide life experience, building towards the full future fruition of a broad human commitment to universal freedom, justice, equality, and liberty.

The specific issue to be briefly examined is the necessary and sufficient requirements for an artificial object, one created by human vision, thought, and deed, to support the hosting of a human identity equivalent to, but apart from a human body. Even if everyone agrees that the new me is just like the old me, how do I know that I will continue to experience a continuous personal sense of consciousness as the new me?

The answer is that, as a biological human, I know that ‘I am’ by virtue of knowing that I have a personal relationship to god, though I may not consciously admit that I know this. Our bodies and brains evolved to enable this connection, which is what makes us a potentially permanent part of the universe. We can know god and know that god also knows us. While we have rational evidence of human spiritual immortality extending beyond physical life, the creation of physical immortality by artificial means requires an artifice that can, in effect, talk to god. Our brains and bodies are finite and can be fully modeled as finite-state systems; therefore, the creation of such an artifice could be possible. That does not mean it will be easy. This is something we will eventually achieve if we work on it long and hard enough, but when it comes it will surely be the crowning final achievement of human artifice. Our universe will hail this accomplishment, so great will it be, for any people that can build a machine able to know god will have finally taken up the reins of creation itself.”

Part 2 continues with a follow-up letter after this conference, and others, and  Part 3 covers Dan’s related presentation to the Mormon Transhumanist Association.

 

 

Want Teens to Have Positive Sexual Health? Sex-Positivity Can Help With That

“Informed teens are much more likely to wait for first intercourse, use condoms and other barrier and birth control methods at first intercourse, and are more likely to take responsibility regarding their own sexual health.” Emily E. Prior

But not just any information given to teens will produce such a result. For decades, sex education programming in schools across America have used an agenda of fear tactics to teach teens that sex is bad, sexual pleasure is sin, and homosexuality is a mental illness. It’s time that Americans realize this approach of scaring teens from having sex doesn’t work: 46.8% of high school students report having engaged in sexual intercourse, with the rate increasing to 63.1% for high school seniors.

Using fear tactics in sex education is like hanging on the edge of a cliff: a person doesn’t have to be forced on to the edge to experience fear to know how dangerous it is. Similarly, if teachers taught comprehensive sex education using open, honest communication, then students will stay away from the cliff’s edge and practice safe sex.

So if you can’t scare teens from having sex, what else can we do?

The exact opposite of what doesn’t work: educate teens using sex-positive approaches. Wilhelm Reich (1897-1957) created the concept of sex-positive and sex-negative when he hypothesized that some societies view sexual expression as essentially good and healthy, while other societies take an overall negative view of sexuality and seek to repress and control the sex drive. Does the later ring a bell?

Emily E. Prior, the Director of the Center for Positive Sexuality, describes being sex-positive as “not limiting sexual scripts to reproduction and procreative-only sex, but also the pleasurable, rewarding, and nonprocreative aspects of sexuality.” However, Prior warns that this does not mean educators should start “promoting” sex, but rather, “recognizing sexuality as a normal, healthy part of being a person and that everyone is a sexual being.” But this is not a new concept: just check out the Dutch.

So how can educators utilize sex-positivity in the classroom? Prior has a tip.

First, educators can create a sex-positive classroom space: “A sex-positive space,” Prior begins, “is an open and accepting space where [students] can feel comfortable to be themselves, communicate with one another, and be accepting, not just tolerant, of others’ differences related to sexuality and sexual behavior.” This means that students who identify with the lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, and questioning (LGBTQ)  community will not be excluded or stigmatized, which typically happens in a sex-negative space. Also, as Prior eloquently puts it, a sex-positive approach “allows teens to recognize their personal and sexual development as an ongoing, lifelong, and healthy process. By allowing for communication and individual expression, teens are much more likely to make healthy choices that work for their bodies.” 

The differences between a sex-positive approach to sex and the sex-negative approach to sex, with the former reflected in comprehensive sex education and the later used in abstinence-only education.

Sounds great to me! And it should sound great to everyone who wants to help teens become sexually responsible and reduce America’s high rates of unintended teen pregnancies and transmission of STIs and HIV–and who doesn’t? Let’s face it: teens are going to have sex no matter if we try to scare them or not, so we might as well suck it up and give them the information and tools they need to be safe once they decide to have sex, be it during high school or after marriage.

Creative Commons Image by: epSos.de
Creative Commons Original Image by: bluekdesign
Imaged Edited by: Alifa Watkins

What was the first law about sex? And what’s going to be the last one?

(También en español) “The ‘raging frenzy’ of the sex drive, to use Plato’s phrase, has always defied control. However, that’s not to say that the Sumerians, Victorians, and every civilization in between and beyond have not tried, wielding their most formidable weapon: the law.” From Sex and Punishment: Four Thousand Years of Judging Desire by Eric Berkowitz)

In 2007, while Eric Berkowitz was writing about legal history as a journalist, a friend posed the question, “What was the first law about sex?  Curious as always, Eric found that the first known laws, from Ancient Mesopotamia, were highly preoccupied with sex. He followed the trail and unearthed a bounty of details spanning millennia. He was intrigued, challenged, and entertained and now we all can be too with the 2012 much-lauded publication of Sex and Punishment: Four Thousand Years of Judging Desire. Check out the book’s cool website.

Eric discovered that many early sex laws sprung from the belief that the sex lives of individuals could bring risk to everyone — one person’s pleasure could be society’s destruction. And this tradition of insinuating the government into our sex lives “for the good of all” carries forth to the present day, as any glance at a newspaper shows.

After more than a year of research in Los Angeles and three years  in Paris writing the book, Eric’s joyful fascination with the subject matter permeates every page-turning chapter. We are drawn into this fascination through his scholarly but entertaining and often heart-rending analysis of  the flashpoints of sex, law, and politics throughout history. Eric fills the void between dry legal academic offerings, which no one reads, and the generally research-free books in the open market.

This book is also a roadmap of how sex laws provide a window into how societies define themselves. It’s a fresh and completely different point of view that will stoke your own desire for sexual freedom, renewing your drive to eradicate bullied and needless laws about sex, particularly the more modern regressive laws against women and other sexual minorities.

Talking recently, Eric said he’s not against laws about sex. Rather, laws should concern restricting violence and intimidation. He advocates for a world where all other laws about sex, particularly punitive sex registries marking people for life, have become part of our own ancient history.

Eric will be participating in this weekend’s Sexual Freedom Summit (September 21-23, Silver Spring, MD, produced by  Woodhull Sexual Freedom Alliance), and is slated to be a part of the much anticipated Author’s Roundtable on Sunday. Look for more about Eric and his book here next week.

“Keep pushing, and push harder,” is how Eric summarizes his call to action aimed at committed sexual freedom advocates. “Keep the pressure up [to end these laws], and especially consider that those living in poverty are always the last to derive benefits from society’s advances in terms of access to healthcare and freedom from police bias.”

If you want to find out more about the Woodhull Sexual Freedom Alliance and their views on sexual health education and other key issues of sexual freedom, such as sex work and reproductive justice, you can attend Woodhull’s Sexual Freedom Summit in September.  Also, you can attend Woodhull’s Sexual Freedom Summit (September 21-23), where Alison Gardner and Dan Massey, VenusPlusX’s founders who work closely throughout the year with Woodhull as members of its Advisory Council, will be presenting their workshop session, “Sacred Sexuality and Erotic Communion, the Human Experience.”

 

 

 

Kink Forwarding Sexual Freedom Rights

(También en español) Gay and straight Leather culture and BDSM culture combine under the mantle of Kink. Together these sexual freedom warriors are taking a machete to the underbrush of the sexual rights movement, blazing a trail that puts in play every question of civil rights and human rights in modern society, including the freedom to seek family and relationships.

When talking about trailblazers, I can hardly think of the best known ones without considering the illustrious life and work of Hardy Haberman.

Only part of Hardy’ story can be told by reviewing the awards and accolades he has received, most recently the Leather Leadership Award from the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, or his ascension in 2011 to Chairman of the Board of Directors at Woodhull Sexual Freedom Alliance. Since coming out as both gay and kink in the 19070s as a twenty-something, Hardy’s films, books, lectures, and seminars have advanced the sexual freedom movement through a cogent exposition of the inexorable connection between spirituality and politics and the kink culture, and how it defines most of the issues we face as a society regardless of our sexual or gender expression.

Hardy just returned from the Great Lakes Leather Alliance’s conference in Indianapolis where he presented the keynote address, and taught a class,”Putting the Sex Back Into SM.” Hardy is there to explain the true nature of the erotic power exchange that is often sidestepped or forgotten by everyday practitioners. His award-winning art documentary short, “Leather,” continues through two decades to be well received. And, “Out of Darkness: The Reality of SM,” a documentary exploring abuse within the SM culture, is still being used by health industry professionals, and isabout to be updated and repackaged for release.

Recently asked if the word, Kink, accurately encompasses the sometimes divergent communities of Leather and BDSM, Hardy says the differences are subtle. “There is a hyper-masculization in the Leather community that is not so apparent anywhere else. And while Leather practitioners may be considered more renegade than others, they are more closely knit. You always know everyone’s real name in the Leather community while those practicing BDSM tend to remain attached to their ‘scene’ names.”

Spanning over 4 decades, Hardy has been able to monitor the growth of the Leather community in particular, and nurture the new generation. “Everytime it surfaces in the media, for example the recent published trilogy, 50 Shades of Gray, a new influx of what I would call ‘tourists’ show up, some will hang around, and some of those will ‘get it,’ will understand what it’s all about, that ‘erotic power exchange’ and spirituality that comprise the full Leather experience. Most important these days, he urges people not to believe everything they hear or read, and rather than relying on a computer, to get out there and involved with the community. “Our strength is found face-to-face rather than the diluted messages you can catch on line.”

We will be seeing Hardy this weekend, hoping to learn more at the Woodhull-produced Sexual Freedom Summit (Silver Spring, MD, September 21-23), so we asked him to give activists and advocates a call to action, the central message we wish to bring forward. It was, simply: “Grow up, and have an adult conversation about sex!”

The Sexual Freedom Summit takes place annually in honor of radical suffragette and sexual freedom pioneer Victoria Woodhull (b. September 23, 1838), and attracts hundreds of sexual freedom scholars, educators, and activists for presentations, workshops, social events, and awards (the “Vicki”) honoring those that have made a difference.

If you want to find out more about the Woodhull Sexual Freedom Alliance and their views on sexual health education and other key issues of sexual freedom, such as sex work and reproductive justice, you can visit their website. Also, you can still register to attend Woodhull’s Sexual Freedom Summit (September 21-23), where Alison Gardner and Dan Massey, VenusPlusX’s founders who work closely throughout the year with Woodhull as members of its Advisory Council, will also be presenting their workshop session, “Sacred Sexuality and Erotic Communion, the Human Experience.”

Sexual Outlaws or Intentional Families?

(También en español) We are really looking forward to hearing from Family Law Attorney Diana Adams this weekend at the Woodhull Sexual Freedom Alliance’s Sexual Freedom Summit (Silver Spring, MD, September 21-23). Her workshop, “21st Century Families: Cultural and Legal Shifts toward Family Freedoms,” will chart the decline of heterosexual monogamous nuclear families, once in the majority, to today’s new structures and expanding options that are meeting the needs of modern society, and growing steadily in popularity, more apparent in the media than ever before.

Families of all description, co-parenting groups of more than 2, non-marital families, lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LBGT) parents and families, grandparents raising grandkids, polyamorous families, and kink families have all turned to Diana to validate their alternative or “intentional” family by helping them obtain the legal, civil, and social benefits everyone deserves.

In talking to Diana earlier this week, it quickly became apparent that her devotion to her work is deeply rooted in the spiritual journey she began as a child, a search for social justice beginning in her conservative Christian family and church that unfortunately didn’t offer her answers to her probing questions about the guilt and shame built into practically every facet of life. Once becoming a youth minister to help her church be welcoming to LGBT congregants, Diana has carried this passion forward into her work today: helping to enfranchise intentional families within the broader society and legal system. From her website, Feminist Outlaw, or representing Open Love NY, to her work as a legal activist, sex educator, and practicing attorney, Diana has become a sought-after lecturer and media spokesperson, and, for sure, a hero to many of us.

“Any family that is systematically excluded from mainstream life, and unfairly denied legal and social benefits that traditional families take for granted, deserves a legal advocate,” Diana submits. She is perhaps more well suited to this task than some, since Diana is herself a member of a polyamorous family and household.

Diana, who is a member of Woodhull Sexual Freedom Alliance’s Board of Directors, will be on hand all weekend to answer your questions. I am hoping to take away some of the themes and messages of this work, the key issues at stake, and how grassroots activists can organize to support this diverse community. “Anyone in an intentional family,” Diana said reflecting on the people she has worked with, “has common ground with every other economic and social justice advocate. We need to build allies to defend our right to create families of our choosing.”

When asked recently if she had a special message to all sexual freedom activists worldwide, Diana said, “Remember that a threat to the sexual freedom rights of any individual is a threat to us all,” pointing out the urgency and relevancy of our task. Diana says we are doing the right thing if we are concentrating on organizing the sexual freedom movement by engaging every type of activist that shares common ground with us, such as those fighting for women’s rights, including reproductive rights, and LGBT rights. “Wherever the sovereignty of our own bodies is under assault, we need to be there for each other, draw strength from each other, and work together for a better world. The rightwing is fiercely organized to wage war on sex, and we need to be organized to defend our rights to pleasure and relationship.”

The Sexual Freedom Summit takes place annually in honor of radical suffragette and sexual freedom pioneer Victoria Woodhull (b. September 23, 1838), and attracts hundreds of sexual freedom scholars, educators, and activists for presentations, workshops, social events, and awards (the “Vicki”) honoring those that have made a difference.

If you want to find out more about the Woodhull Sexual Freedom Alliance and their views on sexual health education and other key issues of sexual freedom, such as sex work and reproductive justice, you can visit their website. Also, you can still register to attend Woodhull’s Sexual Freedom Summit (September 21-23), where Alison Gardner and Dan Massey, VenusPlusX’s founders who work closely throughout the year with Woodhull as members of its Advisory Council, will also be presenting their workshop session, “Sacred Sexuality and Erotic Communion, the Human Experience.”

Sexual Freedom Isn’t Acceptable For Women?


Kai Davis takes a daring stand in this video when she challenges the misogynistic view that many member of today’s society hold. She brings up the important point that innocence and virginity are revered in women, but as soon as women take charge of her sexuality and tries to enjoy her sexual freedom, she is looked down on and considered a “whore.”

Though I agree with Davis’s overall point that sexual freedom is not always something that is given equally to women, the way that she presents some of her ideas can be a little extreme. I disagree that that it is all the fault of men that it is considered unacceptable for women to enjoy their sexual freedom; women judge other women for sleeping around just as harshly, if not more so, than men do. This is not just a problem that stems from the male population, but from society itself! I propose that if women want to have their sexual freedom accepted, they accept the sexual freedom of other women and stop blaming only men for looking down on their sexual choices.

Creative Commons: Kurt Löwenstein Educational Center International Team