Q Ever since hearing you say on your podcast that all men use porn, I have had a burning question: What about us women? If all men get a pass to have this whole other sex life, which is (mostly) external to their partnerships and is sexually satisfying, then I think all women should have a pass as well. Ideally, it would be a pass to enjoy something universally arousing to all women, something that would sexually satisfy us, but it wouldn't be something that turns most men on, perhaps it might even repulse them.
If there were something that met my criteria, I wonder how it would play out in our relationships? Also, I am not sure what it could be. --Desires Erotic Balance
A Something women enjoy but men do not...something erotic...a free pass for just the ladies...something that repulses men...
Cupcakes? The now-ubiquitous cupcake isn't explicitly sexual, I realize, but our culture does encourage people---women in particular---to sublimate their erotic desires by stuffing their faces with food. And most of those squat, round and pink-frosted things look, to my jaded eyes, like so many squat little cocks, DEB, so many growers-not-showers with pink sprinkles, and most of those cupcocks are inhaled by women. So, cupcakes.
But if cupcakes don't do it for you, DEB, then how about a free pass to enjoy, I dunno, porn?
"We're actually in the middle of a porn-for-women revolution as millions---yes, millions---of women are loudly, even proudly, proclaiming their interest in porn," says Violet Blue, author, blogger, activist and tireless foe of anti-porn boneheads everywhere. If you were reading Blue's blog---tinynibbles.com---you would know that one out of every three consumers of internet porn is female, according to a Nielsen NetRatings report released in 2007.
"What's interesting isn't just the growing number of women using porn," says Blue, "it's that they're doing exactly what DEB suggests. It's part of their own private sex lives that are mostly external to their relationships; they're using porn as reliably as their favourite vibrators."
What women have lacked up to now is the same "free pass" men enjoy.
"Guys are encouraged to have this other sex life with porn," says Blue, "that's seen as normal and healthy. But despite the numbers, our culture is having a hard time admitting that women like porn. Anti-porn feminists ignore the female viewer. The only people, besides Oprah, acknowledging the female viewer are the anti-porn Christians who see it (and female masturbation) as a disease they can cure!"
Q I am a man who has been in an open marriage for 10 years. My wife dates men on her own, and I get to enjoy the occasional threesome with her and one of her partners. (We had no luck dating women or couples.) The problem is, she is clearly more interested in "her" dates than in "ours," probably because the hotter guys are more interested in her alone than in us together. My wife is GGG, but it is hard for her to persuasively feign interest in the guys who are interested in us both. I can tell she would much rather be out on one of her dates. And it is frankly depressing to watch her go through the motions with one of "ours." Does being GGG require her to be a good actress, or does it require me to pretend I believe her when she claims she enjoys our three-ways? —Is This A Silly Problem?
A This isn't a silly problem, ITASP, not at all. Open relationships only work---closed relationships only work---when they make both people happy. You're not happy, ITASP, which means your open relationship isn't working.
Time to renegotiate terms. Tell the wife to stop fucking other people for awhile. (And, yes, you should have the authority to do that---both partners in an open relationship should be able to call a time-out.) If your wife balks, concede that there are lots of hot guys out there who want to fuck her and that you're asking her to pass up on some opportunities for hot sex. Then remind her that you're the guy she married, that you're the guy she's hoping will stick around once hot guys aren't lining up to get in her pants anymore and that there will still be hot guys out there who want to fuck a year from now.
While you're not fucking other people, fuck each other, fuck a lot, work to re-establish your sexual connection.
Then when you're ready to start fucking other people again---and you're not ready until you're both ready---your wife should agree that over the next year she will fuck only guys who are interested in fucking you both. That's going to mean passing up on some hot guys who are only into her, of course, but that's a sacrifice she should be willing to make in order to save her marriage. It also means that she'll have to work harder to find hot guys who are into you both---do whatever you can to help---but she's likelier to make that extra effort if it's the only way she gets to fuck a hot guy who isn't her husband.
Q What is your favourite kink? What does Dan Savage get up to? --Nosy Reader
A My marriage vows specifically forbid me from disclosing that sort of information.
Here's something interesting: "A Palestinian man has been convicted of rape after having consensual sex with a woman who had believed him to be a fellow Jew," the Guardian reported last week. After the dude "introduced himself as a Jewish bachelor seeking a serious relationship," the two "had consensual sex in a nearby building." The woman reported that she had been raped only after she learned that the man wasn't Jewish.
I don't think there's anything wrong with one-night stands or being a slut, but I gotta say: When we have consensual sex with strangers we're not just taking a chance on a person we know little about. We're taking a chance on our own bullshit detectors. And no one's bullshit detectors are 100 percent accurate. So someone who can't bear the thought of accidentally fucking an Arab or a Republican or a married man really has no business fucking strangers. That person owes it to him/herself to get to know people better before visiting any nearby buildings with them. Not because it's OK to lie. But because people do lie.
