My previous post featured what I thought was a good article on the positive side of mixing discussion, consent and sex. Today’s post brings you the flipside – a really stupid post on sex and consent. Other bloggers may aim to bring you only good things; I like to go with more of a harmonious yin and yang approach.
The article is (ironically) from Reason magazine and is entitled ‘California’s Sexual Consent Law Will Ruin Good Sex for Women‘. It was prompted by the recent ‘Yes means Yes‘ law passed in California, which aims to shift the emphasis in colleges from an assumption of consent to a need to actively gain consent. There’s an interesting discussion to be had about that law, but the Reason article by Shikha Dalmia certainly isn’t it. The bit that really irked me was this…
…there is usually a difference in tempo between men and women, with women generally requiring more “convincing.” And someone who requires convincing is not yet in a position to offer “affirmative” much less “enthusiastic” consent. That doesn’t mean that the final experience is unsatisfying — but it does mean that initially one has to be coaxed out of one’s comfort zone. Affirmative consent would criminalize that.
The reality is that much of sex is not consensual — but it is also not non-consensual. It resides in a gray area in between, where sexual experimentation and discovery happen.
I’m going to resist the temptation to draw conclusions about Shikha Dalmia’s sex life based on this. I can say it’s pretty piss poor logic with no apparent understanding of what consent means.
One of the great things that exploring kink has done for me is helped me to discuss and negotiate sexual activity. If you grow up watching sex in movies (both mainstream and porn) you get the impression that great sex just happens automatically. One minute the cynical private eye is trading witty barbs and smouldering looks with his femme fatale client, the next minute, just after she’s tried to slap him, they’re having amazing sex without so much as a yes, no or maybe. In reality experimentation, and the discussion that must go along with it, makes everything better. I’ve never yet had a mutual fantasy ruined by talking about it. I’ve had plenty of experiences where misunderstanding and a lack of communication definitely made things worse.
Hopefully the gentleman in this image got all his discussion out of the way up front, as his current options look decidedly limited. The image is of course from Divine Bitches.
This gentleman has a more traditional spiderman outfit. His bondage is also a little different to mine, but equally entertaining in its way. I’m afraid I’ve no idea where this is from.
