Podcast — Page 24 — Pleasure Mechanics

Sex and Social Justice with Aida Manduley

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Sex and pleasure matter far beyond your bedroom. Sexuality is part of your social body, how you interact with and are treated by the world. Sexuality is deeply interconnected with race and class – so when we call for more sexual pleasure we must recognize that call is ultimately for social justice for all.

In this episode we cover:

Intersectionality, and how it informs our sexual experience
The importance of understanding the history of racial and sexual oppression
How self care can be an act of resistance
The difference between self care and numbing out
Radical love as a guiding framework

Find more about Aida’s work and therapy practice on her website: www.aidamanduley.com

Aida is also part of the Women of Color Sexual Health Network: WOCSHN

Resources mentioned:

Liberation Health

“This radical love fosters community and emerges through it. Radical love is a love that gives the benefit of the doubt, that affirms and questions, that holds its skepticism at bay to allow a raw thought to develop, that understands accountability not as a zero sum game, that doesn’t draw lines in the sand, that doesn’t believe in (to borrow a phrase from Edward Said) solidarity without criticism, that understands that rifts can heal and that we need not divide ourselves from one another during that healing. It also understands that there may be moments when toxicity reaches such a level that, out of self-care and self-love, one has to pull back and find new alliances. A radical love can foster and enrich community.” — Ralph Rodríguez (source)

The Gender Galaxy

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The gender galaxy is expanding – and opening up opportunities for us all. Learn all about transgender, genderqueer, genderfluid and cisgender identities, and find yourself in the gender galaxy!

Learn all about the gender galaxy:

what is gender?
what does it mean to be transgender?
what does it mean to be genderqueer how is it different from identifying as genderfluid?
what can you do to support gender non conforming individuals?
what does it mean to be cisgender?
how does the expanding gender galaxy offer us all more freedom and opportunity?

Gender Galaxy Language

Here are some ideas to orient you in the gender galaxy!
Please note: this language is a living, breathing cocreation – if you think about one of these terms differently, or have a different experience to share, wonderful! Be in touch with us and share your thoughts.

Gender Identity: how you think and feel about yourself

Gender Expression: how you behave and express yourself socially

Agender: someone who identifies as having no gender

Androgynous: identifying as having both masculine and feminine traits

Bigender: some people use this term to mean having different genders depending on social contexts

Cisgender: someone whose gender identity and expression matches their assigned birth sex.

Genderqueer: someone who actively mixes and matches gendered traits to create a unique gender expression

Gender Fluid: someone who moves along the gender spectrum and is comfortable with this shifting identity

Gender Nonconforming: someone whose gender expression doesn’t match the social expectations based their assigned birth sex

Gender queer: someone who feels their identity doesn’t match “male” or “female” but feels somewhere in between

Transgender: an umbrella term that can apply to anyone whose current gender identity is different from what would be expected based on their assigned birth sex, or anyone who has made a transition along the gender spectrum. While no specific medical interventions are inherently a part of a transgender identity, some transgender people use hormone therapy, surgery or other procedures to make their outward expression more closely match their internal identity.

Pronouns: when in doubt, check in with the individual about what pronouns they prefer. Some options, familiar and new:

She – Her – Hers – Herself

He – Him – His – Himself

They – Them – Their – Themself

Ze – Zir – Zirself

Ze – Hir – Hirself

E – Em- Eir -Emself

Lust Vs. Disgust

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Arousal makes us do crazy things, right? Even simple sex acts like open mouth kissing and oral sex seem strange if you think about them rationally for too long! Things we would never normally want to do can suddenly become intensely pleasurable with the right person and the right amount of arousal.

It turns out that disgust and lust have an intimate and complicated relationship in the human brain.

This relationship can work both ways. If you experience disgust before trying to get aroused, it can be way harder to get turned on. But if you get really aroused first, then things that would ordinarily disgust you won’t bother you at all. Knowing how these emotions work in your body can help you manage your disgust so you can get more aroused, and get more aroused to become more sexually adventurous!

Sexual arousal is a motivational state that moves humans toward situations that inherently pose a risk of disease transmission. Disgust is an emotion that adaptively moves humans away from such situations.

These two experiences can interact in strange and important ways in your sex life. Tune in to find out what happens when lust and disgust meet in your erotic mind.

We cover:

how to minimize disgust to maximize arousal
how arousal minimizes disgust
why you need to figure out your personal disgust triggers
communication skills to help navigate the tricky terrain of disgust in your relationship
how disgust interuppts arousal, even more so than fear!
why women are more likely to struggle with disgust in their sex lives

Here are some scientific studies about lust vs. disgust:

Feelings of Disgust and Disgust-Induced Avoidance Weaken following Induced Sexual Arousal in Women

Disgust versus Lust: Exploring the Interactions of Disgust and Fear with Sexual Arousal in Women

“Women [who] were sexually aroused were more willing to touch and do initially disgusting tasks,” study co-author Charmaine Borg, a researcher in the department of clinical psychology and experimental psychopathology at the University of Groningen in The Netherlands.

Playful Sex

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Many people take sex way too seriously! Here’s how to make sex more playful, joyful and creative.

Playful sex brings us back to the creative freedom of pure pleasure seeking play. When we can laugh and enjoy sex more freely, we can let go of some of the shame and anxiety that make sex feel so serious sometimes.

Playful sex requires a certain level of sexual confidence. Play requires flexibility and creativity, the ability to respond authentically in every moment. Playful sex invites us to leave our scripts and routines behind and simply ask “what would feel pleasurable in this moment?”

Think about going to a playground with a kid. You don’t plan out exactly how many times you go down the slide, how high you’ll go on the swing and how many times you’ll throw a ball. Instead, you do what feels good in every moment, dynamically exploring the available options and making the most of your time at the playground. What if we brought this attitude to our sex lives?

In this episode, we talk about how to make sex more playful. We cover:

the attitudes of playful sex and how they will benefit your entire relationship
the emotional and hormonal benefits of playful sex
how to create more anticipation and excitement with playful sex
games to play together, in and out of bed
erotic touch games
the 5 minute game and how to make it work for you
sensation play, storytelling and other kinds of erotic play
how kinky sex can be playful, but why all playful sex doesn’t have to be kinky

We’d love to hear from you! Click here to send us an email or leave a voicemail

Building Consent Culture with Kitty Stryker

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Without consent, desire cannot flourish ~ Carol Queen

Consent is far more than the absence of “no” – and is a vital social skill in and out of the bedroom. Consent culture is a critical piece of remaking our sex culture to be healthy, happy and pleasurable for us all. Consent culture is about empowering ALL of us to authentically navigate social and sexual situations with our boundaries respected and our dignity maintained.

On today’s episode we talk about building consent culture – and why consent is a vital erotic skill for all of us, even in long term relationships. Joining us is Kitty Stryker. Kitty Stryker is an outspoken writer and activist. Most recently, Kitty was the editor of “ASK: Building Consent Culture” a book featuring the voices of marginalized people on various intersections of consent and daily life.

In this episode (click play at the top of the page to start listening!) we cover:

Working definitions of consent and consent culture
Why consent has to go beyond “no means no”
How to create and give ongoing, enthusiastic and active consent
How systems of power complicate what we can say yes and no to.
The role of consent in long term relationships
How practicing consent in the bedroom can empower you in other parts of your life
How to create more opportunities for consent in your interactions

Content warning – while this episode is focused primarily about consent and how to build a consent culture that benefits us all, we will also briefly touch on sexual abuse and rape – if these subjects upset you I encourage you to listen to this episode at a time when you can get extra support from those you love and trust.

One definition of consent is called FRIES, which was coined by Planned Parenthood.

According to Planned Parenthood, consent must be:

Freely given. Doing something sexual with someone is a decision that should be made without pressure, force, or manipulation, or while drunk or high.
Reversible. Anyone can change their mind about what they want to do, at any time. Even if they’ve done it before or are in the middle of having sex.
Informed. Be honest. For example, if someone says they’ll use a condom and then they don’t, that’s not consent.
Enthusiastic. If someone isn’t excited, or really into it, that’s not consent.
Specific. Saying yes to one thing (like going to the bedroom to make out) doesn’t mean they’ve said yes to others (like oral sex).

It’s not just freedom from rape, freedom from abuse, freedom from fear. It is also “freedom to”—freedom to express desire, to explore pleasure, to seek intimacy and adventure. ~ Laurie Penny