STRUGGLE SESSION: Ass Isn’t Pussy, Straightland Isn’t Gayland, Choking Isn’t Safe (Or Is It?) and More!

...se lots more lube, but I’m tired of hearing Dan compare anuses to vaginas when he says he tells straight men that if they got fucked in the ass five times in a day (or whatever), that they might understand why women aren’t always up for PIV all the time. The vagina was designed for having penises go in and out of it; the anus was not. I don’t doubt that someone who’s vagina gets railed repeatedly is going to be sore, but it’s not comparable to someone who’s having PIB sex. It’s not an apples-to-apples comparison, I realize, but as penetration-to-penetration comparisons go, it’s a fair one and I’m standing by it. While butts require more prep before penises start going in and out — they’re not self-lubricating (lube is always necessary), they’re not self-cleaning (douching is sometimes necessary) — I’ve known plenty of guys who could easily get railed five times or more in a single night. It was almost as if their asses were designed for it… which they might’ve been. When you consider how long human beings have been fucking each other in the ass — our hominid ancestors did butt stuff in trees — both logic and evolutionary theory dictate that the same pressures we credit for “designing” vaginas to take repeated poundings also selected for (read: designed) anuses to do the same. JustMyNameTM takes issue with my response to a straight woman (Magnum Ep. 944, timestamp 23:29) who was upset — very upset — that a friend wanted to date her ex… Long time listener and love Dan, but I gotta say… Dan needs to be a bit more understanding of things that are characteristically part of “straight” culture. For the caller whose friend wants to date the caller’s long-term ex, I do agree that she cannot keep them from dating each other, as they are both consenting adults who make their own decisions. But the “get over it” response from Dan was too harsh. I understand that Straightland is different from Gayland in that Gayland is much smaller, making it impossible (and impractical) to avoid friends dating exes. But that isn’t the case in Straightland, and a friend dating an ex remains much more taboo. The cultures are different — neither is worse or wrong, just different. Straightland and Gayland are different in lots of ways and for lots of different reasons — mostly related to sex, not numbers — and some of those differences are morally neutral: neither right nor wrong, just different. But the norms in Gayland around friends dating exes and vice-versa are superior in every way to the norms in Straightland. This is a hill I am prepared to die on: Straight people should be encouraged — to the point of being bullied — to drop their psychotic, controlling, irrational, self-defeating norms where friends dating exes are concerned and immediately adopt the gayest possible norms instead. Inspired Desires is with me on this: As a bi guy who has lived in both worlds, you couldn’t force me to go back to the jealousy, possessiveness, insecurity, and lack of connections of the straight world with any amount of money. The ability to be friendly with exes, connect them with friends, to be connected with their friends? It is so, so, so much better. More chance to grow, to better navigate negative feelings, to meet new people. It’s so good. What exactly is the advantage here to straight culture? Not having to confront things that make you feel insecure? Being able to avoid dealing with negative emotions? Michael Dad DeCrow didn’t post this over on BlueSky — where I’m suddenly very active (follow me there!) — in response to a question about hands-free orgasms in this week’s column but he could have… It’s so cute the way some of you boys are jacking your cocks furiously until you’re ready to cum, letting it go and calling that a hands-free orgasm. That’s an ABANDONED ORGASM. A hands-free orgasm is one that is typically generated thru prostate work and muscle control. They are NOT the same! Abandoned orgasms! I love it! But how does one distinguish between abandoned orgasms and ruined ones? I was asked (Q&A #21) to reflect on what I may have gotten wrong during the 30+ years I’ve been writing Savage Love. Instead of answering the question myself (or deleting it), I stupidly invited readers to share their thoughts. The usual suspects were mentioned — mistakes (and apologies) have been made — but Thingamajig cited something that doesn’t usually appear on my list of sins… What you got wrong: There are practices like choking and “nullification” where you will sometimes give a long and articulate description of the risks and strongly encourage people not to do it, then close with a qualifying, “Buuuut… you’re an adult, and if you really wanna take the risk…” You should just tell people not to do things that can kill or maim themselves or others! I think the consenting adult thing is a red herring because people are bad at judging their own tolerance for risk. It’s easy to say, “I’m willing to risk death for sex,” because people who took that gamble and lost aren’t around to express a dissenting opinion. Someone who experimented with choking and died may not be around to warn us, Thingamajig, but most examples of fatalities during sexual choking sound less like kink and more like murder. (And most fatalities during breath control play are among men who were playing solo, something I’ve repeatedly begged people not to do, Thingamajig, without qualification.) Men who’ve undergone nullification surgeries on the other hand, aka “nullos,” are giving interviews to Vice. Since we do hear from nullos (whether we like it or not), your choice to lump nullos in with stranglers signals a discomfort (an understandable one!) with the extremity of the practice rather than a dispassionate assessment of the risk of death. People should be conscious of whatever risks they’re running and realistic about them — whether they’re interested in risky kinks or risky sports — but adults get to make their own choices. Our bodies are ours, they’re ours to use, and they’re ours to use up. And different people come to different conclusions about what does and doesn’t constitute a reasonable risk. Some people have piss-poor judgment, of course, but people with good judgment — most of us, one hopes — shouldn’t have to pretend adults can’t or shouldn’t take risks (even extreme ones) in pursuit of pleasure. And even if we did walk around pretending no adult could or should, Thingamajig, that wouldn’t protect idiots from their own idiocy. (And for the record: not every death during a risky activity is proof of recklessness or bad judgment; most backcountry skiers who’ve died out there, for example, had beacons, shovels, etc. Sometimes a person’s judgment was sound but their luck was bad.) Inspired Desires was inspired to jump in… I still think we have reached a moral panic level of fear about choking in the BDSM community. Choking is claimed to be incredibly deadly and risky. It’s also shown to be very common. We are constantly told that people don’t know how to choke safely and do it in unsafe ways constantly, and are told there are no safe ways to do it. Where are the bodies then? If is incredibly dangerous, incredibly common, and practiced in very unsafe ways, everyone in kink communities, and even outside of them would know people who had been hurt or killed…. I’ve never met anyone who has ever known someone personally who was killed or seriously injured by consensual partner choking. Autoerotic asphyxiation? Definitely incredibly high risk and dangerous, lots of people died from that. There are bodies. I’ve put that exact question — where are the bodies — to guests who came on the show to talk about sexual choking. If the practice is widespread and dangerous (and not just traumatizing), where are the bodies? (To hear their answers, listen to this episode with Dr. Debby Herbenick and this one with Peggy Orenstein.) Perhaps accidentally killing someone during sexual choking is best understood as a low-probability, high-consequence event — an extremely high-consequence event. Says Zoftig… From what I’ve read, there does seem to be some longterm neurological impact from choking. Depriving the brain of oxygen can cause damage and that damage will cumulate. Football also causes a lot of longterm damage to the brain. Individual results may vary and lots of things fuck up our brains. It would be interesting to know whether the long-term neurological impacts of choking and other forms of breath play are worse — cumulatively — than the long-term neurological impacts of, say, moderate alcohol consumption. If it poses a similar or lesser risk, the moral panic Inspired Desires perceives could be an example of something I talked about on this week’s show with Leigh Cowart: a cultural bias against risk taking for reasons of sexual gratification. We let people ski, we let people jump out of airplanes, we let people walk down the street, etc., without churning out a lot of hand-wringing think pieces about the risky choices people make every day in pursuit of pleasure. We’re all aware — to take Zoftig’s example — of the neurological damage football does to players. While those harms get discussed, we accept the risks (if we wanna play ourselves) and allow others to assume those risks (if they wanna play themselves) in part because no one gets off on football. (The games, I mean. Some people do get off on the gear.) Alright, here’s the question that I won’t be able to squeeze into the column this week… I’m a cis/bi woman married to a cis man, with two school-aged kids. I’ve been slowly coming to a “should I stay or should should I go” point in my marriage. Basically, I feel starved for affection and sex and my husband is very critical and irritable. I feel at best like an irritating roommate and at worst like his least favorite coworker. I’d reached a point where I was planning to ask him to pursue either couples therapy or an amicable mediated divorce — his choice because I think the discord in our home is hurting the kids and I just can’t get through to him. Here’s the kicker: I wanted to wait a few months to give myself time to reflect on this decision and to quietly grieve the potential end of the relationship. However, my husband suddenly found out that he has a job opportunity that will lead to travel all over the world, with moves every couple of years. He thinks this is a great opportunity to see the world and that it would be an unforgettable experience for our kids. I told him that my condition for going would be working on our marriage first. That’s just lead to more fighting. It’s clear now he’s unwilling to provide me with more emotional support and affection. As for sex, he says he’s “just not that interested.” In the meantime he’s constantly talking about how great this would be for the kids. It’s clear he wants me to come to facilitate bringing our children along, not because he wants to go on this adventure with me. He talks about it constantly though and the pressure is making me feel panicked. I don’t want to prevent him from taking this job, but I’m tired of feeling like the bad guy for sticking to my guns. He can ask me to uproot my life for this job but he severely bristles when I ask for him to initiate sex with me. He’s making me feel like I’m crazy for not being completely on board with his new life plan. How can I get through to him that while I’d love to see the world with someone who treats me like they love me, I don’t think our marriage is going to survive anywhere if he doesn’t stop taking me for granted. What should I do, Dan? He’s Hoping To Keep Me The answer seems obvious to me, Strugglers, but I’m going to let you have the first crack at it. What would you advise HHTKM to do? Share your best advice in the comments!