What’s in your bedsider drawer? Show, don’t tell;)
If your desire for sexual activity is overriding your commitment to personal safety, you have to deal with that. From STIs to criminal activity, out-of-control sexual behavior can put you at risk for injury, illness, arrest, or harm.
In search of: Better everything (including sex)
We know you’re amazing just as you are, but in case there’s anything in your life that could use a little improvement, yesterday’s Frisky Friday had some pretty awesome resources to get you started.
Sex and Song: Madonna, “Like a Prayer”
You don’t need to be a musician to appreciate the connection between sex and music. Still, we thought it would be fun to hear what they have to say about it. In our “Sex and Song” series, curated by drummer and producer Katy Otto, musicians share a song about sex, love, or both, and what it means to them.
*****
I was raised Catholic.
Not really, deeply Catholic. I didn’t go to Catholic school. We didn’t even go to church every week. But Catholicism and its associated guilt was sort of always… there. It hung in the air like cigarette smoke after you’d go to a show. You’d come home and your clothes would smell and your hair would smell and the next morning, you’d wake up and your pillow would smell like smoke. You could leave the church, but, like the smoke, the guilt would follow you home.
I went to CCD (also referred to as “Catechism”—like Sunday school, but on Wednesdays) from elementary school through Confirmation in high school. There I learned the difference between a mortal and a venial sin and I learned that if I committed a sin it was okay as long as I managed to go to confession and forgive my sins sometime before I died. If I accidentally died some time before I confessed that sin, it was off to eternal damnation.
None of this made a lot of sense to me, but it still managed to make me feel scared and bad. About everything.
It was 1989 and I was 9 years old. I knew absolutely nothing about sex, except that it was bad and that it should only happen when you are married…and maybe a penis was involved, but I wasn’t really sure how. I knew that sex was only for creating babies and that having sex for any other reason, or even just acting “sexy,” was wrong.
So, when my 9-year-old self saw the video for “Like a Prayer” by Madonna, I was entranced. It was clearly religious…but sexy, too! My brain didn’t know how to comprehend this.
Madonna is dressed in a skimpy black slip, with the straps falling off her shoulders. There is a black Jesus statue and burning crosses. Is this about race? (I grew up in Fargo, North Dakota, and could easily count the number of black people I knew on one hand.) Madonna keeps looking longingly at Jesus. What if they have sex? They aren’t married, are they? Can Jesus even have sex? (I won’t even go into the story line about man-Jesus getting framed and going to jail.) There were so many unanswered questions!
And that’s what was great about it. The video helped me to think outside the box and see a way that religion and sex and race could interact, when previously they’d been in very discrete silos in my 9-year-old brain. I didn’t quite understand it—not sure I do now—but it somehow made things less scary. I don’t think that clinging guilt will ever go away completely, but I felt when I saw “Like a Prayer” (and still feel now) that Madonna was there to shepherd me into a new, more nuanced and complicated world.
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Hilary Jones grew up in the Midwest but now lives on the East Coast. She has been playing in bands since she was 16, but is now more than twice that age. She currently plays guitar in the feminist rock band, Whore Paint, who you can find on Facebook, Tumblr, or Twitter.
Sex and Song: Björk, “Cocoon”
You don’t need to be a musician to appreciate the connection between sex and music. Still, we thought it would be fun to hear what they have to say about it. In our “Sex and Song” series, curated by drummer and producer Katy Otto, musicians share a song about sex, love, or both, and what it means to them.
*****
“Cocoon” by Björk is one of the most perfect songs I’ve ever heard. It seems almost otherworldly in its mood and atmosphere, but as the title implies there’s something in it that always makes me feel warm and safe. I was obsessed with Vespertine when it was first released, but I don’t think I actually heard most of the lyrics on the album until well after I started listening—I was too focused on the entrancing music and vibrant production.
The sounds of “Cocoon” are seductive—the fluttering percussion works as a subtle sedative while the gentle and vulnerable timbre of Björk’s voice seem to peel back the layers of the world, inviting you to be vulnerable as well. I was so mesmerized by the sounds of the song that it took me probably a year to hear everything it was actually saying. I don’t know of another song that so compellingly describes the vulnerability and intimacy of lovemaking. There are thousands of songs that talk about fucking and remind us how much fun that can be, but “Cocoon” talks of sex the way Romeo and Juliet talks of love. It makes you desire and hope for the best of it.
“Cocoon”—especially the repeated lyric “who would’ve known”—leaves the ego out and focuses on the hazy high we feel as lovers. There’s a sense that the singer has reached the heights of love and sex all at once, a moment of complete bliss and perfection where two people are entirely lost in each other. Some of us have felt this with a lover—pure ecstasy, trust, love, desire, and the reciprocation of all these things. I’d guess that for most of us the combination of all these things at once, in harmony, is rare. “Who would’ve known?” is a reminder that moments like these can take us by surprise.
To be touched or even looked at in a way you weren’t aware that you desired, to exhaust each other and fall asleep entangled, these are the things we hope for in the same way we hoped to find a Romeo or Juliet when we were young. “Cocoon” is a memory of every time I’ve felt complete with someone, falling asleep fulfilled, feeling that death could scoop me up and whisk me away and I would just smile because I had shared this moment with the creature beside me.
*****
Brendan Ekstrom is the guitar player for the band Circa Survive. He enjoys sandwiches and always knows where his towel is.
Curvy, skinny…a shark? Whatever your shape, please remember that you are unique and fabulous.
(via mscoolcat)
Sex and Song: Salt-N-Pepa, “Push It”
You don’t need to be a musician to appreciate the connection between sex and music. Still, we thought it would be fun to hear what they have to say about it. In our “Sex and Song” series, curated by drummer and producer Katy Otto, musicians share a song about sex, love, or both, and what it means to them.
*****
“Push It” is one of my all-time favorite jams. It was my ringtone for years (“pick up on this!”) and always puts me in a good mood. Plus, I can’t not dance when I hear it (and we all know dancing is like sex with clothes on).
While I don’t think we can take any song or video too literally—or else we might never find a video that exhibits healthy and positive sexuality, since without drama there is no story—I think the general vibe of this song and video are rather feminist. Which is a very good thing in my book since, real talk here, feminists do it better. They know what they want, they’re not afraid to ask for it (or give it to themselves while you wait) and, therefore, they are more genuinely happy to reciprocate. If you want to help us feel good, we’ll help you. Two-way street.
So here are Salt, Pepa, and Spinderella dancing, taking charge of the crowd and their crew, and being sexual because they like sex, not because they are being objectified. They are communicating their needs (“Can’t you hear the music pumping hard like I wish you would? Now push it.”) And they’re having SO MUCH FUN. That is what sex should be! Full of communication, fun, mutual pleasure and a little bit of naughtiness… like when that bass drops in.
*****
Shawna Potter is a member of War On Women, a punk band from Baltimore. She also runs Big Crunch Amp Repair with Brooks Harlan (War On Women, Office of Future Plans), heads the Baltimore chapter of anti-street harassment movement Hollaback!, and is ordained to perform wedding ceremonies. She loves love and hates hate.
In the age of skinny jeans, it may not always be easy…but we hope it’s always worth it! (And that you’re covered on the condoms/birth control front.)
(via mindalyn)
Yes, it can be hot to star in your own private sex tape with someone you’re attracted to. Yes, it can feel harmless because you trust this person and believe it’ll never be seen by anybody else. But life happens. And when you create something that can be shared, stolen, found, used against you, sold, and/or viewed by anyone, you are at risk for exposure. Intimate, WTF-was-I-thinking exposure.
From yesterday’s Frisky Friday, “Lights! Camera! Action! Is making a sex video ever a good idea?”
We’re all about the sexy adventures (especially on Sexy Saturday), but documenting it for future viewing is where we recommend drawing the line. Anyway, read our take and please do share yours in the comments.
Some Sexy Saturday inspiration as you’re planning for a sexy, fabulous Sunday. Our challenge to you: have a Sunday this sweet or sweeter! (And log it, of course.)
