Gertsamtkunstwerk

And here's to you, Mrs Robinson

I am always of the view that if politicians screw around outside their marriage, so be it. It isn't normally relevant to their role as politicians, and shouldn't be regarded as any more heinous than any of the numerous other things that imperfect human beings do.

I also think that any politician who has cast judgement upon the sex lives of other people has surrendered the right to privacy in their private life.

So there is a large dollop of schadenfreude hovering over the revelations about Iris Robinson, considering her views in the past, in particular on homosexuality, but also on adultery.

There is a little part of me that is hesitant to wade into this: I am pretty damn certain that if it had been Peter Robinson having an affair with a teenage woman, there would have been less scurrilous sniggering. If women in private life are judged more harshly than men, then this goes with spades for women in public life*.

The 'Mental Health' card has been played, and it's wise not to wade into that minefield. For example, there was a ridiculous slur campaign a few months ago that 'insinuated' that the wifey of Oik Osborne has mental health issues. I believe that Oik's wife - who seems to stay well out of visible politics - is not a legitimate target, regardless of the incompetence and arrogance of Oik himself. I also believe that to using someone's illness, whatever the nature and cause, as grounds for attack is neanderthal.

For all I know, Iris Robinson may have a history of depression. It's not improbable - isn't 20% of the population at any time; also, with a husband away from home for long stretches, while she's stuck in some dreary backwater bringing up the children, and her being all into religion and that, it's almost a classic textbook case.

That having been said, it's almost like now we are supposed to be all sympathetic and understanding of mental ill health, it's become a convenient excuse.

During the Expenses Scandal, there were reports of MPs feeling suicidal. I can't really feel sorry for them, even though I (probably less than many people) know too well how awful it feels when the bills and debts are piling up and you can't see a way of settling them. Doing something wrong, and being found out, is never a good feeling. So I shall wade into that area!

It always makes me feel good when I see some self-righteous religious nutter - and the DUP epitomises religious nuttery - being hoist by their own petard.

It's easy when you have the nice life, the uncomplicated marriage where the man is successful in his career to be all smug and idealistic. I guess we all have some ideal of how life should be lived, but most of us acquire, from experience and observation, the wisdom that rarely do lives fall into the category of ideal. I suppose the religious nutters would condemn me for having an 'anything goes' mentality, and, actually, yes, I do more or less (with the usual caveat of consenting adults).

We are also the products of our society. Among my friends and peer group, there is a general acceptance that people's lives are messy. That isn't to say that there is endorsement of the messes that people make; there is also an absence of condemnation, because we all do stupid things.

I don't just mean sexually. Many of us have done messy things with career, finance, family/friendships and so on. Because we are human, we can't see into the future and know the consequences, because we are weak and give into temptation, because not having the affair would cause us to feel so miserable. And so on.

I guess that in the society they live, the knowledge of the wife having an affair, the husband being a cuckold, is hard to bear. Perhaps in other circles, it's one of those things that acknowledged but deemed diplomatic not to discuss at dinner parties. I wonder how much her contemplation of suicide was due to the knowledge that her public reputation would be ruined for ever. I have to say that as an MP she had barely scraped my radar at all. I remembering noticing that his wife had been elected, a rare woman from Northern Ireland, but I assume that she is a big cheese that matters in Northern Ireland.

I haven't even mentioned the financial impropriety which is, actually, the nub of the matter. No doubt some religious nutters would use this as proof that nothing good ever comes of extra-marital flings. They would say - perhaps with justification - that Iris Robinson wouldn't have made this misjudgement if she hadn't been blinded by the euphoria of a fling. But I would respond that plenty of people have shown themselves to be venal and corrupt without sex being the motivation. 

I would hope that some of these born-agains and rigid fundamentalists would use this incident to pause and reflect, and remember that we are all human, that human beings have human instincts, and that, often, to deny those instincts is to deny our essential humanity. Most of us try to muddle through, generally trying to avoid harm to those who haven't harmed us, and we all behave in ways that seem irrational to others.Creating an ideal and condemning those who fail to meet it makes all our lives more difficult. Ironically, it hits hardest those who have created and maintained the ideal, in their smugness, absolute conviction, and sheer stupidity, they don't realise that one day they will be killed by the sword they have yielded.

* Women politicians are criticised far more frequently for their appearance; my observation is that there are far more casual comments accusing women ministers eg of being 'annoying' or 'patronising' or 'in it for themselves' than of men; and the personal, domestic, family etc arrangements of female politicians are scrutinised more thoroughly than men. In the Great Expenses Scandal, the ghastly Julie Kirkbride was subject to far more (justified) criticism than her odious husband, who was complicit and equally guilty. (as an example)

Religious nuttery and bad journalism combine in one article

Teenage girls to get contraceptive pill in pilot scheme

In a nutshell, there is a small pilot in Lambeth and Southwark to make oral contraceptives available from pharmacies rather than via a doctor.

I have read the article several times and I cannot find any specific reference to there being an upper age limit. Clicking through to the Q&A, I find that the scheme is available for any woman for whom an oral contraceptive is medically suitable. It doesn't take genius to work out that probably a 41-year old smoker would be refused oral contraception - but would be advised on more suitable methods. The Q&A says it isn't particularly aimed at women who don't have existing arrangements with their GP or Community Sexual Health team, so, in practice, it is aimed at much younger women. But there is nothing that specifically prevents a 30 year old accessing it, or even a 45+ woman, if they don't have existing contraceptive arrangements.*

I have several concerns that are partly addressed in the Q&A but not at all in the BBC article. This service is actually a contraceptive advice service which may lead to prescription of oral contraceptives. My instinct would be to say that for teenagers and any women who absolutely don't want to be pregnant under any circumstances, probably an injection or implant is more sensible than remembering to take a daily pill; also, it is extremely important to advise about barrier methods, for prevention of STIs which may cause infertility or other gynaecological malfunctions. None of this is discussed in the article.

Instead we get a rentaquote from the 'Christian Medical Fellowship', a self-appointed guardian of morals - in reality, some perverted dirty man who wants to control women's bodies, sexuality and fertility (sort of creep who ought to be locked up). He cites the lack of evidence that this will be effective. Gosh, it's a new scheme, it's being piloted! I guess that part of the pilot is to assess evidence which is yet to be collected.  (I hope - one has little faith in post-implementation reviews actually happening!)

Before the quote attributed to him is the following paragraph:

The pilot project is likely to attract criticism from those concerned that making contraception more readily available to 16-year-old girls might encourage them to have sex.

To which I can only say - your point is?

The age of consent in England is 16 (in fact, careful reading of the statute makes it 13 in certain circumstances). I fully accept that fear of an unwanted pregnancy is a major obstacle for many women, but the quote assumes or implies that 16 year old women having sex is a bad thing. 16 year old women having sex under duress and with inadequate contraception and/or STI prevention is definitely a bad thing, but this paragraph implies that basically 16 year olds shouldn't have sex, shouldn't have contraceptive advice and shouldn't be on the Pill.

If there are persuasive arguments to suppress the sexuality of 16-year-olds, legislate it. I think in practice the Christians actually don't want people to have sex unless married (and probably then only for purposes of breeding) and they will do anything to chip away at the freedom we have nowadays to express and fulfil our sexuality.

Back in the real world, teenagers have sex absolutely irrespective of the law, and Religious Nutters. I welcome any move that tries to make this safer.  I hope that there will be a full review of the pilot to see if, in practice, it has made the difference that is hoped, and whether it is cost-effective. I want it to determine which factors make the difference:  opening hours and proximity of appointments, or are there more profound reasons eg scared of going to a judgemental GP who is a friend of the parents or whatever.

It seems that the BBC, in its efforts to be impartial, whenever there is an article on sexual health and reproduction always have to have refer to religious-oriented pressure group obsessed by other people's sex lives (one suspects as a result of their own sexual frustration).

Where's the quote from Lambeth Youth Council, where's the investigative reporting on the possible drawbacks of the scheme, some of which I have outlined? Oh, wait, that would require more effort than merely rewriting the Southwark PCT Press Release and reproducing** a quote from this CMF that was probably spoonfed to them.

It disgusts me that an issue that is complex and important is reduced to a trade of sound-bites. It's a disservice to accountability and democracy and ultimately does nothing to advance the cause of sexual health.

* I realise it will be rare but not freakish for women to embark on their first sexual relationship with a man late in life, or maybe they're in a new relationship after being with a man who is sterile (through vasectomy or chemotherapy, say) or maybe they've been using condoms to prevent STIs but are now in a stable relationship and want to rethink their options

** see what I did there!

Sex blogging

A year or two ago, I had a phase of looking at a number of sex blogs. What that taught me quite quickly is that there is little less erotic than reading mediocre writing of someone else's erotica, real or imagined. I even set up a sexblog of my own which I soon abandoned, started again,and abandoned again. I soon learnt that reading or writing about sex cannot be done in isolation; it requires a level of pre-existing arousal, and ultimately it fails to satisfy that most basic of physical need.

One by one, and then more quickly, most of the sex blogs I had added to Bloglines were removed, until only one remained:

Pretty Dumb Things NSFW/NSFU-18s. She writes about sex, she writes about her personal experience of sex and related emotions. But there is an extra element there which is missing in most sex blogs. She sets sex in a wider context, makes it something that isn't just a messy private personal thing that happens in bed, but a vital part of modern civilised civic society:

nine relationships even worse than yours

on his royal highness's royal boxers

a pervert's guide to good grammar: part 3, subordination and coordination

3 examples of how sex-blogging can teach me things I didn't know that I didn't know!

What people do...

Jimmy has some friends we'll call Bert and Sid, to protect their identity.

One day in the pub, Bert happened to mention that he often walked round naked at home. Now, I don't find anything remarkable about this. I don't tend to very often, except for a few moments trivially, although I often walk round half-dressed. I find it to be of no interest whatsoever to know this about Bert; I would prefer not to see him naked, but I assume that if I went round his house, I would expect him to be dressed. However, Sid seems to find this extraordinary and freakish behaviour, unusual and puzzling.

One evening Bert heard a clattering noise outside his house and went out to investigate. To his surprise, he saw an over-turned bin and a grounded Sid. It did not take much deduction to work out that, for some reason, Sid had been climbing onto his bins.

On later questioning, Sid admitted that he had been trying to get a peek of Bert walking round naked.

A couple of weeks ago, we realised there was no beer in the house. As it was past closing time for the convenience mini-supermarkets, I suggested to Jimmy that he went to one to one of the local pubs to get carry outs. He said he didn't fancy going to a particular pub because there was a party going on. The part was for a chap we'll call Pat (to protect his identity, he's a postman). I said that maybe Jimmy could go to the party. He said he would rather not, because Pat and his wife are involved with this couple from Doncaster. Every other weekend either Doncaster comes to Brixton or Brixton goes to Doncaster for what Jimmy calls 'wife-swapping'.

Ugh, I said, I can't say I'd like to shag that Pat. I mean, I've never really thought of him as ugly or repulsive, but it's just struck me that he really isn't attractive in any way.

And his wife's ugly, too, commented Jimmy.

I have never done any swinging and I can't say it particularly appeals in practice, but there is a lingering attraction about it, one of those 'never say never' things like parachute jumping or snowboarding. But I suppose I have always assumed that if I were swinging it would be with a gorgeous couple. Or, at the very least, a couple with comparable gorgeousness to me (of course, I regard myself as well above average attractiveness; I suppose we all have to, don't we). It has only just struck me that probably the majority of people who actually swing are ugly, or rather repulsive, or not particularly attractive, or simply not attractive enough. Perhaps the reason that I don't swing is much the same as the reason that I have never been promiscuous, even when single, is that I am very very fussy, and couldn't shag anyone I didn't find extremely attractive. There are plenty of people, knowing them platonically or as friends, I will concede them to be presentable, good-looking, not bad-looking. But as soon as I consider them as theoretical sexual partners, my stomach churns, and I go right off sex.

A few years ago we were in a pub at Gypsy Hill, and this woman started talking to us. She struck me as dowdy, plain and rather mousy in character. She wasn't particularly interesting, but we were quite bored, so didn't mind a change of company. Slowly it began to dawn on us that she was trying to entice us back to her place for a spot of swinging. Soon, her husband arrived, and oh god, he was hanging. Again, mousy and insipid, a faint aura of anorak and nylon, and utterly lacking in charisma. We swiftly made our apologies and found another pub.

Many years ago a friend and I were in a City Centre Manchester pub. A woman started chatting to us; slowly it began to dawn on us that she was trying to get us interested in a threesome. Back then, I was lot more naive, and although I politically supported Gay Rights, I had never been chatted up by a woman and didn't even know any dykes. With the benefit of hindsight, experience etc, nope, I still wouldn't have responded positively. (I always have difficulty with the 'no, I'm not homophobic, it's just I could never fancy you').

I suppose out there are beautiful people wanting to have beautiful swinging sex, where I could enjoy both man and woman, without strings or emotional ambiguity, but somehow, I don't think I'll find them in seedy pubs in Central Manchester or suburban London. And as I'm not looking, it's academic, anyway.

I'm a sex addict!

The other week I was surfing teh intertubes and, for some reason, I got diverted into following links about sex addiction. After a while, I came to the startling conclusion that I am, in fact, a sex addict. This came as some surprise to me because I previously imagined that sex addiction, like other addictions, involves an excessive consumption of such product - an alcoholic drinks too much alcohol, a drug addict takes drugs etc.

I read on further and learned that addiction isn't necessarily measured by the amount that one consumes but about the control it has over one's life. I also learned that sex addiction, in common with over-eating addiction (and presumably other compulsive behaviours such as shopping and cleaning) in that it is necessary to find a suitable level, whereas it is possible to live without any alcohol, drugs etc.

What made me conclude that I am a sex addict is not that I am out screwing anything that moves, because I'm not. In fact, I do not think that I am revealing anything particularly personal by observing that I have been in a monogamous relationship for seven years.

What makes me a sex addict, apparently, is that I can tick the box for a number of questions. One of those is whether I think about more sex more frequently than actually doing it? Do I get aroused by pornography (bearing in mind that pornography doesn't just include pictures but also words - hmm, does it also include music?). Do my fantasies extend beyond the reality of my life. Well,yes...Oh, they mean specifically sexual fantasies? I'm not sure that one fantasising about fictional situations involving sex is radically different from one fantasising about fictional situations not involving sex, like, right now, I am fantasising I am lying on a yacht in sunny warm climes with a steady supply of low-alcohol cocktails.

I have to say that having read quite a lot of stuff available on the internet, I am unconvinced of the existence of such a thing as 'sex addiction'. At worst it is a way of saying "I am not responsible for my behaviour cos it's an addiction" or a way of saying "I behave in a way that is at odds with the dominant ethos of my community." I think in general most people behave in ways that they know is not their ideal. I did read one paper by a clinical psychologist who used case studies of actual sex addicted patients. This psychologist made the point that 'sex addiction' is often seen alongside other behaviours such as drug addiction, and that the drug addiction cannot be cured unless the sex addiction is. Or that many people who are diagnosed as sex addicts have a history of being abused. She cited a woman who during her residential treatment discovered that she was pregnant for the third time by someone other than her husband to whom she had been married also for her other adulterous pregnancies. I don't need it spelling out to me that that is a massive problem, but other stuff on the internet suggests that it's fairly common amongst women who just have a fling from a stale or disintegrating marriage (not that I'm condoning, but that appears to be factual).

I suppose what struck me most was the connection with religion. A great number of the solutions appeared to be based in religion. I know that many of the mainstream religious organisations do a great deal of excellent work in the field of substance abuse and other connected problems and I also know that quite a lot of the whacky ones are pretty good at getting people to relinquish their alcohol/sex etc crutch. But I do feel that they are simply replacing one crutch with another. And yes, we all need crutches, and they are only problematic when we rely on them too much to the detriment of other aspects of our lives.

What shocked me most was the subjective nature of a sex addiction diagnosis. I read one case study of a man who was diagnosed because as a teenager he thought about sex a lot, once got aroused when he saw his teenage cousin naked. At 20 he gave up Christianity and started masturbating, sometimes as much as twice a day. Then he got a girlfriend and wanted to have sex with her on a daily basis. He also used pornographic magazines (unspecified but I inferred we are talking Playboy or Penthouse rather than Illegal Hardcore). He got married and wanted sex with his wife. But then he got god again and no longer thinks about sex as much. I couldn't help thinking that he was at his most 'normal' and 'healthy' during his period of so-called sex addiction.

I'm not trying to trivialise the problems that people find in overcoming compulsive behaviour, and I would be naive to suggest that the solution is to do it a bit less. But I just think that the convenient labelling of unacceptable behaviour is just that - a labelling. If one feels that one's behaviour is out of step with the norm, it may be worth examining whether the norm is actually desirable. But it seems that certain behaviour - such as so-called sex addiction - is an attempt to mask other problems such as low self-esteem. I'm not sure that the best solution for deep-seated problems is curing the symptoms. And sometimes, people behave in a way that is almost deliberate in its capacity to hurt others. In fact, we all do up to a point. I am writing this on the computer while listening to music. That is time I could be spending being nice to my partner.

Oh heck, maybe I'm an internet addict, maybe it's a displacement activity for the rampant prolific varied sex that would scare me stupid if I had the opportunity to pursue.

Quote of the day

There are theories that Lewis Carroll knew what he was talking about when he had Alice eat pieces of mushroom, as advised by a hookah-smoking caterpillar, which made her grow and shrink.

Well quote of the day of 18 months ago. Made me laugh...

And another thing: Crystal meth made class A drug

I have to confess this covers two areas about which I am very hazy - drugs use and male sexual performance - but my understanding is that drugs like Crustal Meth enable three day sexual orgies. Every man I've ever met claims to have been a 7-a-nighter at 17, from which point it was downhill all the way. Past the age of, what, 19?, a major obstacle to male sexuality is recovery rate.

If drugs like 'crazy medicine' can address this obstacle, I would have thought there is a potentially enormous market for a fully researched, trialled and tested version of this drug.

So, (and don't feel shy to answer anonymously) does anybody have any experience directly or vicariously of how these clubbing drugs enable three day orgies - do they enable recovery and, er, stamina, and all that?

Meanderings

Pensioners' wish: to have had more sex

The survey of more than 1,500 pensioners reveals a desire for a more carefree and rebellious lifestyle if they were allowed to time-travel back to their 20s and start again. Typical comments include "I wish I'd stood up to bullying bosses" and "More sex - why did we let them tell us it was wrong?"

Ellie links to the rules for Fever swinging which inter alia state

(On the continent it is widely believed that maybe 80% of women are potentially bisexual whereas at least 80% of men are not).

Last week I left a comment on Clare's teenage diaries

About ten years ago there was a programme on the TV about a lesbian soldier in Northern Ireland. I didn't see it but the next day I was on the train back from an out-of-town client meeting. Halfway along the journey the carriage filled with girls, all about 14 years old it seemed, from a Convent School on that line, a school with a good reputation etc.

They were discussing the programme and exclaiming "It was filthy disgusting the disgusting bitch" etc which depressed me.

Then I remembered back to that age and realised that probably our reaction would have been similar because we assumed we didn't know any dykes, they were 'other'.

Looking back I regret that lesbianism/bi-sexuality was so frowned upon. I think if it had been encouraged, or accepted/tolerated as inevitable (as with heterosexual relations), we could have had a lot of fun.

Societal conditioning is strange. I think it's important that there is some adherence to societal norms, eg where it comes to behaviour in public places, and understanding that my freedom only extends as far as where it starts to impact on the freedom of others.

Now, that 80% of women being bi-sexual, I'd like to see the evidence. It was years ago that I read that sexual orientation is a continuum, where very few people are completely straight or completely gay...this was in Guardian Women, and it made sense to me at the time, and it continues to make sense to me. At least in regard to women; male sexuality is as much as mystery to me now as it was when I read that, age 15 or whatever.

If I wrote on this blog, now: "I am bisexual" I don't suppose many of my readers would have a heart attack. That doesn't mean that I have ever actually had sex with a woman, or even snogged a woman, and I am not sure how most of my female friends/colleagues/acquaintances would react if I said "I'm bisexual, are you?" I think a few might say "Yes, but you're only saying that to me so that you can use me." And anyway, what does my 'bisexuality' actually mean? I am in a heterosexual relationship in which I am happy, and have every intention of staying in that relationship for ever. I do not want to embark on a 'bit-on-the-side' relationship with anybody, male or female, except for the curiosity value (and there's also the 'celebrity get out clause'*), and I don't have a burning desire to have sex with any specific woman, but wouldn't necessarily say no to an exploration of bi-curiosity.

I enjoy looking at people whom I find aesthetically pleasing sexually attractive. I don't especially mean people that I know...off the top of my head I can't think of anybody (except my fiancé) whom I find sexy and I have conversations with. Then there are celebrities and chance encounters with random strangers. If I see someone on the Tube or sitting in a choir on a concert platform, I might enjoy looking at them, male or female, but I hardly think it's the basis for saying I fancy them. And there are acquaintances eg colleagues whom I objectively regard as being physically attractive with engaging personalities, but I don't fancy them (I know that because my definition of fancying is either feeling a frisson of sexual tension, or else looking at them/being with them and feeling an exquisite lurch of desire in the pit of my stomach). I often have fantasies about sex with women, but then, I also have fantasies about orgies, and I have no cerebral wish to attend an orgy. I have a theory that if, in the course of conversation with a bloke, I said "Shall we shag?" the bloke being a bloke would say yes (in practice, this doesn't happen, for some reason blokes I have known over the years don't want it handed to them on a plate). They certainly wouldn't be offended, at worst they'd think i was a scary predatory type, and wouldn't be man enough to deal with that. At best they'd be flattered and apologetic. But if I said the same to a woman, I am absolutely certain that her reactions would range from "I didn't know she was a dyke" to "Oh god does she think I'm a dyke" to "I better avoid her in the future" to sheer utter embarrassment.

I ought to write a conclusion, summing up to this post (beginning, middle and end), but I can't think of one. But we are only 27 comments away from the magic 10,000, so the conclusion may be supplied by you...

* shagging a celebrity does not count as infidelity, because they are celebrities (unless you meet them on a friend-as-a-friend basis, and they just happen to be celebrities)

That Silver Ring Thing

Banned

Don'tcha just love the Religious Hypocrites?

When I was in Sixth Form, and the equivalent of a Prefect, I was asked by the Deputy Head, Mrs Q to remove my CND badge, as it was against school rules. It was. I replied that I would remove it only when some of my classmates removed their SPUC* 'feet' badges, which were surely equally against school rules. I wore my CND badge for the remainder of my school career.

Fast forward seven years, when Doctor Little Brother was merely Head Boy Little Brother, and he chose to wear a Red Ribbon on World AIDS Day. He was reprimanded by his Opus Dei headmaster, on the basis of it being disgusting and of no relevance to 'any of our pupils'. Head Boy Golden Balls retorted that he was in the process of applying for Medical School and expected that during his career he would treat patients with HIV/AIDS (he has actually practised in Africa, although I am not sure whether HIV/AIDS figured largely in a region where cholera was the big challenge).

Mother was furious, reflecting that Deputy Head was, in his spare time, quietly nursing a former pupil dying of AIDS-related illness.

Silver Ring Thing is critical of contraception, suggesting it is dangerously fallible - which critics say only encourages teenagers who do break their pledges to have unprotected sex.

A few years ago I backed away from a discussion between two neighbours. One works for an NGO which promotes "natural contraception". In fairness, she is trying to get a programme in schools to make teenagers more aware of their bodies, which I think is a good thing, but she has strange and squeamish ideas about sex, even recoiling in embarrassment when she saw Hamish and Anita in a vaguely compromising position. The other neighbour, now moved away, is a doctor at one of the big London hospitals, specialising in Sexual Health, particularly HIV/AIDS, and is passionate about the need for full and frank information about sexuality. (I recounted this conversation to the gynae-specialist at my GP's practice; she was doubled-up laughing).

The issue of teenage sexuality is a complex one, but a lot of these religious extremists seem to want to deny that teenagers have, and are entitled to, sexual feelings, and that sexuality in general is a natural (and morally neutral) thing. I personally think that PHSE programmes that stress issues such as personal autonomy, resisting peer pressure, building self-confidence, relating as people, and being active in leisure activities are far more useful than the posturing of the Jesus Brigade.

* Society for the Protection of the Unborn Child, quasi-fascist anti-abortion/contraception movement

Sex over forty...

...bring it on!

Women say good sex begins at 40

The golden age of Sex

When an increasing number of college girls are apparently so desperate to get chopped about, I must cast some doubt on their ability to survive as doctors, lawyers or businesswomen, let alone enjoy actual sex.

Faced with these choices, if we are honest with ourselves, I suspect that the sexual future of the forty-something woman involves having more than one partner at all times. As I've still got a year to go, I'll just call that a hunch for now.

I can't see myself acquiring a toyboy, or going down the multiple partner route.

But do check back in 2008. Who knows...?

I will say that being in one's Twenties seems really crappy in retrospect...all that wasted effort to achieve - what?

As for made up statistics, how about

69% feel more adventurous in bed

Voting Time

Both Mike T-D and Chasing Daisy have run polls of who you would snog, or fancy, of the same sex, if straight, or the opposite sex, if gay.

That's not a very good sentence. I'm straight, and so's Daisy so I need to identify a woman. Mike's gay, so he needs to identify a woman. Straight men and gay women need to identify a man.

On T-D, I said Anna Friel, but I was not entirely convinced, so I didn't comment at Daisy. Someone else suggested Audrey Hepburn, who might do, only she died ten years ago.

Meanwhile Scaryduck has already second guessed this blogpost. Perhaps it was my comment

For the one and only time in my life can I vote UKIP.

I want a poo, you see.

I was thinking of asking to be tied up under your stairs. Then I remembered. I like Billy Bragg's songs. I don't want to shag him. Specially not with pink and Tessa Jowell watching. Hmm, I'm feeling like I want a bit of girl-on-girl action. Although maybe not with Tessa Jowell. Or Pink.

Goes away thinking- who would I want the girl-on-girl action with.

Forget the Poo bit, we can't have more than one person in Gert Cottage fancying Paula Radcliffe.

You know me, you know my tastes. Suggestions, rather than pure voting. Consultation I think is the word. With whom should I go girl-on-girl?

Sex

Who needs this when the classics are already bursting with sex? asks the Telegraph, sick and tired of the talentless playing the mediocre being 'sexed up'.

Classical music is mostly full of sex, or to put it better, eroticism - it's just that it's hidden, buried in music's grammar.

Every time you hear a dissonance (a tense-sounding interval or chord) melt into a consonant one, you're hearing the basic erotic pattern of arousal and relief. That's true even in the chaste polyphony of Renaissance church music (which is why some of it doesn't sound half as chaste as it ought to).

But where that pattern is spiced up with really grinding dissonances, or where it's repeated in ascending sequences, each repetition more intense that the last, then the sexual connotation becomes blindingly clear.

There are moments in Wagner's Tristan and Isolde where it seems as if all the eroticism of humanity has been poured into one super-charged phrase. The tension, the agonised delay, purges the erotic quality of any sense of the body.

The sexiness of Bond or Vanessa-Mae seems manufactured. Only a culture that could routinely use the word "sexy" in antiseptic contexts (a "sexy" company logo, for example), could possibly find these vapid creatures alluring.

Definitely worth a read.

Evil woman kidnapper made me a vice slave

Runs the headline in the News Of the World

I do not know what to make of this story at all. Remind myself, never blame the victim.

But it just doesn't seem to add up. Okay, she was unwise to go back to their house initially. But we have all probably acted unwisely from time to time. She was drugged and raped. Horrible. Helpless.

When Jenny...woke the next morning she was told she was going to London. First they stopped at her flat to collect her things and then threatened to hurt her and her family if she tried to escape. "My son was staying with my mother at the time. But I knew he would be there if they came back to get me. My greatest fear was what they would do to my son." She was taken to a flat behind Victoria Station in London and in the next four days was kept drugged and forced to work as a prostitute. Jenny said: "They would find the punters for me.

I'm sorry but this makes no sense whatsoever. It seems that she just meekly complied, okay to protect her son, but was he really in any danger - he was at her mother's? If she really feared for her life, couldn't she have gone to her mother's, couldn't she have gone to the police? After all she had been drugged and raped, and she feared for her life and that of her son.

I will accept however that she believed that she and her son were in danger and that was why she complied.

But to me the clincher is

Jenny is epileptic and, with no medication, twice ended up in hospital during the four days after suffering serious fits.

I do not believe in blaming the victim; how can I possibly begin to imagine what she went through. But there is a concept in English Law of contributory negligence. it was discredited twenty years ago when some evil arsehole judge found a rapist not guilty on the basis that the woman was wearing a mini-skirt and thus was asking to be raped - contributory negligence.

Couldn't she have appealed to the medical staff? Couldn't she have tried to explain what was happening? I just don't understand it.
In my view, that couple should rot in hell for the initial drugging and raping. Whatever happened later, I do feel that there was a very large degree of contributory negligence. Nevertheless, it still makes them evil.

And I can't decide whether a little part of me believes that a little part of her went along willingly, or whether I just want to bang my head against the wall in exasperation that a woman of 38 in the 21st century can be so lacking in autonomy.

A question of sex education

There was a girl in my class at school, X. She came from a respectable family - pillars of the church, mother was a nurse; father, I think, was in the building game. She had two brothers a couple of years older and younger, and a sister five or six years younger. Comfortable, even affluent, without being filthy rich. I think she went on to be a nurse.

When we were maybe twelve or thirteen, we were chatting, at Break, or maybe just as likely in a lesson. Casually she mentioned that the previous evening her mother had called her upstairs, where her father was in the bath, and told her that it was about time she knew what men's bodies looked like. And while her father was in the bath, she learnt a lot more about men's bodies.

She then casually mentioned that her mother had bought her a sweatshirt at the weekend, and it was really nice wearing a sweatshirt round the house because of the softness of the lining.

Then the conversation moved on to something trivial.

I didn't think it was weird at the time. Unusual, but not creepy. I don't think I think it weird now. But I'm not sure.

What do you think?

Spam comments revisited

I have been relatively fortunate of late in not having spam comments. And then overnight, I was bombarded by over 200 of the nastiest. Generally, I delete these in batches through the php management facility, rather than through Moveable Type which is a slow process. But sometimes the server doesn't respond, so it has to be done individually, which is tedious, to say the least.

I have said before that I find it objectionable that someone is using my hobby/fun website as a tool for advertising their, presumably for-profit site. I'm not naive, and I know that in the cut-throat world of (unethical) capitalism their reaction would be to say 'so what'.

I also object strongly to the nature of the adverts. The pharmaceutical or debt management ones are by comparison innocuous - although anybody who buys medication or seeks to manage their debt by following such links is a fool: I would immediately assume the purveyors are at best charlatans, and more likely con artists and fraudsters. Still, where there is greed and desperation, charlatans and conners will prosper. Cave canem, I say.

I have a broad and open mind. As far as pornography is concerned, I am not against it as such. I am against any pornography that involves coercion, especially of minors, but also I know enough to know that much of porn involving adults involves a degree of coercion or force. Additionally, many women who enter the porn industry do so out of financial desperation, which reflects on the wholly inadequate ability of society to provide a viable economic alternative. Others are persuaded in because of promises of proper modelling or film work.

I am broadminded enough to know that there are people who get sexual pleasure out of practices that leave me cold. If two consenting adults want to piss on each other, so what? Not my idea of a good time, but, if done responsibly, with due consideration of kidneys, soft furnishings and public sensibilities, what harm does it do?

I also know that porn serves to fulfill fantasies that people would baulk at actually doing. For example, I get turned on by reading (well-written) accounts of consensual casual group sex. Would I ever do it? No. Do I want to do it? No. But fantasy is a whole different world. Porn can also open ignorant minds to activities they may enjoy (who can ever forget the story about Norman Fowler, Health Secretary during the 'Don't Die of Ignorance' campaign? Some official mentioned oral sex, and NF, a happily married man, enquired what that was, and the officals, deeply embarrassed had to explain delicately.)

Many people use porn occasionally and intermittently. Sometimes it can assit a relationship, or assist someone in getting off in a safe environment.

However, I am also aware of the compulsive nature of porn. Many people can't just use it occasionally. They have to keep getting more and more. And soon they tire of erotica, vanilla, soft porn. It's not enough to see people naked, they have to have live action videos. Then that fails to satisfy, so they move into the nastier bits - animals, children, force.

The more obsessive they become, the less they are able to separate fantasy from reality. They become desensitised. I've seen it happen. In Sixth Form, one of my friends discovered her brother's stash of Penthouse Variations, and a group of us worked our way through them. What a revelation, an eye-opener. These were stories, and all emphasised consent, generally between people in an already existing relationship. They involved bdsm, role-playing, outdoors, watersports, swinging. All the sorts of activities that are never mentioned in Just 17 and rarely in Cosmopolitan.

I have subsequently regarded these activities as 'normal', even if 'not for me'. I have no doubt that intensive exposure to pictures or writing of non-consensual sex can easily make one start thinking that this is 'normal', and soon, 'yes for me'.

Even the most vanilla of fiction available on the net assumes a whole group of people just wanting it, desperate for it, their whole being focused on sex. It's easy enough to write such a story. You don't have to worry about rounded characters. Who cares if that attractive target happens to have financial problems, or is worried about a family member, let alone more abstract problems.

What a shock it must be for some men, feasting on a diet of this, to find that the attractive, enticingly dressed woman in a bar is either not interested in pulling (she likes being single, she's on a girl's night out with the boyfriend at home, she prefers to meet partners in a less artifical environment) or is interested in pulling, but wants someone who is attractive physically and in personality.

I know of men, typically older men 'who live with their mother', who actually seriously believe that all women are up for it. They regard it as a compliment to the woman to ask her out - the subtext being I'll buy you a cheap dinner and you'll spread your legs. As they get rejection after rejection, they become bitter towards women, and resort even more to the fantasy world of pornography, where all women are up for it all of the time, and if not, might is right.

I haven't explored the depths of the internet, certainly nothing that involves handing over credit card details, but I do know that there is a lot of free stuff out there, and a lot of the free stuff really pushes the bounds of legality. Not to mention infinite number of pop-ups and god knows how much spyware. It's obviously a lucrative business. I just wish they wouldn't use this little site to peddle their disgusting wares...

10 questions about sex

Asked to and answered by Dear Deidre

Well, I say 'answered' but only in soundbite micro paragraphs that Sun Readers can cope with...

Strangely coy, I don't seem to have a blog category for 'sex'.

Update: I do now...

Wankers

Cardinal's anger at sex lessons

Guess what folks, at my Catholic Primary School, with an old-school traditional headmaster (retired 1979) we had sex education. They didn't call it sex education. They called it Nature, and we learnt about the life cycle of the butterfly, and the tadpole. I don't think we did mammals until secondary school. Then we had our Rubella jabs - girls only. Nobody bothered to explain to us why it happened like that - it just seemed that we were randomly singled out for an assault by a needle.

Times have changed; many girls are now reaching puberty at Primary School. Presumably the arsehole cardinal expects them to bleed in ignorance of why. Does he know anything about women bleeding? Does he know how important it is for girls to understand why before it happens?

Nursery school kids want to know where babies come from. It's actually very relevant to their lives; if they're not getting new siblings, many of their friends are.

Of course all sex education, just like Reading, Riting, Rithmetic and the Rest should be age appropriate.

When will the Catholic Church get itself out from up its own arse? It seems exponentially worse in Scotland than in England and Wales. I wonder why.

Yet otherwise intelligent people still regard them as having credibility.

One for the leddies...

And for the gay men. And for the straight men/gay women with a butch partner... (see, this is a Valuing Diversity weblog...)

Want to make your man feel strong, animalistic, brutal?

Today's society prefers men to be gentle, sensitive, and calm, forcing your guy to constantly fight against hundreds of thousands of years of conditioning.

Wouldn't it be liberating to let his inner beast out, just once?

Help him realise his secret, unrealized fantasies of rape and sheer, overpowering, atavistic he-man behaviour by playing it to the hilt.

As soon as he walks in the door tonight, scream as loud as you can, claw him across the face, and run into the bedroom. Slam the door, draw the children close to you and call the police.

If he gets in, make him fight for every pleasure.

Throw all the fixtures at him, kick him in the goolies, and above all, never stop screaming. He'll get an incredible rush of alpha-male dominance, briefly, until help arrives.

Search request special

I seem to have had a lot of requests for DVDs featuring nudity. I would recommend Rigoletto, where nakedness is used intelligently in an overall satisfactory dramatical and musical presentation, and Alcina, for its gorgeous music and its erotic - bordering on pornographic nudity.

I have also read a recommendation for Thaïs -

...a lot of flesh is on display here, the entire female corps de ballet is topless, save for necklace
chains, and Thais has a topless doppleganger who gives a radiant
performance of the Meditation (Though Mei's costume leaves little to the
imagination)...William Joyner's bright tenor rings nicely and in Nicias's
brief time onstage, Joyner creates a vain but imminently likeable fellow.
His mini-skirt almost has one fearful of seeming something revealed that
shouldn't be.

You know I'm just being provocative, don't you...?

Horrified their men went to prostitutes

What we did when our men used hookers

One used prostitutes on a business trip to Amsterdam; another whilst on a lads' night out. And they split up.

The third happened because "we had less sex because I was tired." And they worked out the problem and their relationship is stonger.

I wouldn't like to guess at how many men use prostitutes. I am aware of a fair few because all the time I have lived in London has been in a 'red light area'. (Streatham used to be the place, and about the time I moved up to Brixton Hill, the activities moved up, and changed their nature). I don't think the £10-a-time crack whores on the street are typical of the business, and I think most of the men of the men who go with them are dirty and ville, and a basket of issues.

But the more 'respectable' end of the market - the escort agencies and Soho walk-ups etc - are different. In a parallel theoretical existence, I would be a lot less concerned about a man using a prostitute than engaging in a fling. The latter suggests an emotional involvement, the former does not. Especially if the man is working away a lot. And very especially if it's a lad's night out.

And there is a diference between impersonal sex, and lovemaking as part of a rounded relationship. Of course, it goes without saying that any playing away without a condom is infinitely worse than safer sex.

Still, if my man did it, I'd bloody kill him. (His main concern now is that our local crack -addicted prostitute-using millionaire plumber has bought a car of the same model and colour as ours).

Perspective

It is, however, somewhat reassuring that within minutes of the match ending, my Sitemeter page is full of searches for 'dogging' in various English towns.

I think it somehow displays the Blitz Spirit that all around England people are standing up from the sofa, draining the last dregs of piss poor lager (or, in our case, Chablis Premier Cru) and saying, "By 'eck England lost in a plucky fight against the Portuguese. Ay up me duck, let's cheer usselves up with a spot of exhibitionist random group sex in a car park. Let's see what Lush Gert has to offer us today..."

How Gay Are You?

How disappointing! This quiz is aimed at men. I want to know how gay I am.

For many years I have been fascinated by the attitudes of straight men to gay men. The attitude I like is epitomised by my partner. He really does not like the idea of having sex with men, but is entirely comfortable in the company of gay men, and rather enjoys being a bit of a gay icon. I have found this attitude in a number of straight male friends over the years. And, coincidentally, they have always struck me as being the 'real men'.

Whereas the blokes who strut their masculinity, express horror at the thought that a man might fancy them, and are generally knocking homosexuality, however benignly (if that's possible...) are the ones that I see as being less masculine, and, ultimately, less attractive.

I don't know if this thesis will stand close scrutiny.

I once described myself as bi-curious without the curiosity. A friend of mine described herself as a gay man in a woman's body.

Overheard

Twenty-something man at the next table in the restaurant.

"And I was quite shocked to discover that my parents still, y'know, do it..."

The resturant went quiet.

The not-so-fat slags

There are two women in Britain who make Victoria Beckham look the soul of discretion, refinement and good taste, and the Currant Bun brings them to youJordan and Titmus.

Now I put on my feminist hat. I notice Abi Titmuss is described as a 'slapper'. Katie Price escapes that but I promise that you really have to have a look at the outfit she is wearing.

Newspapers like the Sun, and conversations up-and-down the country have very clear views on women like these two. These are quite different from views on Pat Cash, who 'may or may not' have slept with David Beckham's Rebecca, but he had so many he can't remember. The subtext is 'ooh, Pat, you're such a lad', whereas Jordan, Abi, Rebecca and the rest are slappers.

I don't suppose that societal attitudes will ever change. Subconsciously, we judge 'it *okay* for Alpha Males to put it about, but not for women. Intellectually I baulk at the double-standards; however, I am as guilty as the next person. To me, they are slappers.

When it boils down to it what anybody does in the privacy of their own bedroom, or carpark, is their business, and I'm not going to pass judgement. Until they start talking about it. I'm fortunate in never having worked with anyone who talks at length about their sex life. People I know have had colleagues like that, and it is truly cringeworthy. You don't get a lot of it on blogs; at least not on the ones I read. The TD guest month was an exception. That worked, worked incredibly well. Otherwise, other than the odd oblique reference people don't blog their sex lives. Thankfully.

Last night we did it. This was the twenty-seventh time this year. It started with me doing [deleted] then he rolled over and did [deleted]. Eventually, we [deleted]. I stopped halfway through for a cigarette, then he did [deleted]. It lasted x minutes. We have marked in our diaries to do it again on Saturday afternoon. This time it will be on the kitchen table.

How utterly, utterly tedious.

The fat lady won't sing

Covent Garden drops Deborah Voight for being too large to wear a little black dress in Strauss's Ariadne auf Naxos.

As a side point the article contains the phrase

Nowadays, however, we expect Tristan and Isolde to look shaggable as well as sound it

I am fascinated by the evolution of the word 'shag', and its derivatives. I'm sure it's a recent development. For example, I think when I was a student (86-89) the mot de jour was bonk, which seems to have fallen out of usage. The tabloids use the word 'bedded' which I hate. In intimate surroundings I like to use the good old Anglo-Saxon word 'fuck'. I think, however, shag is acceptable in polite-ish company, although I don't think that it has quite the acceptability yet of 'crap' which I have encountered in formal work situations.

There are so many euphemisms for the act of sexual congress. I suspect if someone said "Let's have sexual intercourse", certainly if they said it without irony, I would immediately turn frigid.

'Going to bed with' or 'sleeping with' are way too euphemistic, and miss the point. 'Screwing' seems a little too aggressive. 'Making love' works in some contexts - you know, men who say "I don't have sex, I make love" (again, a slight sense of irony helps!). But, for example, in the novels of Jane Austen 'making love' has different connotations, perhaps somewhere between flirting and whispering sweet nothings.

And what is flirting? Does it always have to be sexual, or is it okay to flirt, for example, with colleagues, or shop assistants, or with child relatives, when there is absolutely no sexual intention.

I like the word 'shag'. It has no sense of obscenity, and enables one to establish the fact without going into details.

Whether Wagner intended Tristan and Isolde to look and sound shaggable is a whole other question.

Education by spam

This is one of those posts you may rather not read. I'm waffling a bit to give the skim-reader time to decide that they don't want to be offended, disgusted etc.

Had enough time yet?? BTW, the digits are not out of prudishness but out of a desire to deter search engine spiders.

Spam mail comes in phases. Although the ones for various dodgy medication are perennial, there often seem to be bunch all at once for cheap mortgages (actually at higher rates than I'm paying....!), or for genuine fake Rolex watches. The past week has seen a whole bunch inviting me to view c(m-splattered girls or sp3rm-soaked models.

Let's briefly explore the fact that it is not actually possible to see sp3rm-soaked anything, because sp3rm are those tadpole-shaped gametes that require a decent microscope to view, whereas the visible ejaculated fluid is s3m3n.

A few weeks ago Channel 4 ran a series about women who work in the porn industry. I didn't watch it but, perhaps foolishly, read a TV review in a reputable national newspaper. One of the programmes featured a woman whose job was go to parties and let men ejaculate over her. Perhaps I am being pedantic but I suspect that probably makes her closer to a prostitute than a porn actress. The point of the story is that sometimes the venue has no shower and she has to get dressed and go home by public transport.

I can understand the attraction for a man to ejaculate onto a woman - first, there's the physical pleasure and then there's the visual pleasure.

But I absolutely cannot understand the attraction of seeing some other man's product photographed (or Photoshopped) onto an anonymous *model*. But if my inbox is any judge, there's clearly a big call for it...

Breasts, boobs, tits...

Confession time. I absolutely adore breasts, me. I love my own. I love looking at other women's. I was in the hairdressers last week, getting shampooed, and directly in my line of vision was a twenty-something woman in a moderately low cut top and very pert medium-sized breasts. I love it in summer when women display their silhouette. I can totally understand men who are breast-fixated, even though it can be irritating in a work context when they direct their eyes at my boobs rather than my eyes (look, I'm 5'2", isn't it easier to look at my gorgeous eyes than my boobs). I find the following in an interview with a fave celebrity crush to be a turn-on:

His charm packs more calories per square inch than clotted cream, but it is at least more winning than the usual lardy showbiz schmooze. Indeed, you are helpless before it; in all the interviews where the female journalist has been wooed, her assets covertly assessed and her hand warmly overgripped, nobody in this politically cautious age has ever minded in the least. People threaten legal action for less than his dark devouring eyes insinuate...

In my world, it would be socially acceptable for women to walk around topless in all the places men walk around topless.

I would be quite happy walking around my house topless except I don't have nets in the front window.

I've just been watching Gangs of New York. One scene stuck - in the whorehouse where the whores are wearing dresses that 'forget' to cover their nipples. For me, seriously erotic.

Then we get the Janet Jackson furore. If it was a publicity stunt, it was incredibly bad taste. Notwithstanding that, the reaction has been unbelievable. The contrived shock-and-horror doesn't seem to be about the cynically manipulative publicity stunt but simply about the unspeakable horrors of a bare breast being exposed -

a show that requires parents to send their kids out of the room is unconscionable.

Sure, anything sexual on telly has an uneasy inter-generational tension. I feel uncomfortable watching sex on the TV with my mother. The Christmas 98 special of Men Behaving Badly with Martin Clunes wanking into a Kleenex drew complaints, not because of the subject matter per se but because, as my incredibly liberal cousin put it, she's watching it with her then seventy-something mother and teenage sons.

I just kind of wonder - I'm more-or-less straight, but I am definitely turned on by breasts, naked or otherwise. I feel comfortable with that because I understand my sexuality. All my lovers, past-and-present, have been candid about their fascination for breasts; I know the power of lifting up a t-shirt, especially after I have removed my bra. I remember when Engand lost on penalties to Germany in Euro 96 and a crowd gathered in Trafalgar Square, and the BBC Nine O'Clock News showed a woman lifting her t-shirt and her partner fondling her boobs - what a way to mark defeat...! I would love to do that...

Breasts are powerful, and I suspect that many who complain about Janet Jackson do so because they are uncomfortable with their own reaction. Men, I don't really understand - I am puzzled at straight men who aren't turned on by breasts. Maybe a lot of the complainants were women who don't understand that being turned-on by breasts doesn't make you a lesbian.

Perhaps it's the penultimate taboo. Perhaps if it were socially acceptable for women to go topless wherever men go topless, naked breasts would cease to have their erotc appeal. Maybe it would be empowering, but perhaps it would be a matter of regret.

Dammit, I so don't fit the feminist stereotype...

Purity Day

US teens celebrate 'purity day'

I love the quote

US teenager Melissa Millis, who says she will wear a white t-shirt to promote the Day of Purity at her Michigan state school, (said) she was tired of feeling pressurised.

''The way sex is talked about, it's so casual, like it's an everyday thing, like going to McDonald's."

I know this subject has been done to death, and I personally think that sex is wasted on the youth, plus I have concerns about unplanned pregnancies, STIs and coercion, but I also think that this sort of thing is just storing up trouble for later.

A friend at mine at Uni believed that sex was only for marriage, although she never tried to impose her view on anyone else. When she split up with a boyfriend she posed the question, "How much worse would it have been if we had had sex?" I didn't answer, but I felt it an irrelevant question. Break-ups hurt, if you're emotionally committed. If having sex makes it more of an emotional wrench, surely that proves that sex is something that strengthens emotional attachment, and, is, therefore, a Good Thing.

Mind you, I noticed the front page of the Daily Star yesterday: "Abby Titmuss Why I Love Having Sex!"

Classy, I thought.

And I thought some more. I feel a slight contempt for minor celebrities who sell their sex secrets to the Press. On the other hand, I regularly read Cosmopolitan from mid teens to late twenties, and found the candid articles about sex immensely helpful. Not so much in 'put this limb here and move that one there' but in psychological terms, countering the prudish atmosphere of my upbringing which acknowledged that married people had sex in order to procreate, and for other reasons, it was, nevertheless, something that wasn't really talked about. A schoolfriend's mother used to warn darkly, "Even ladies can fall off their pedestal" and a former colleague was not allowed to have her boyfriend in the bedroom after 7pm (because, obviously, that is the time that sex begins...). The first time I saw a naked aroused man I was a little taken aback, not really knowing what to expect.

I'm all for open and candid discussion but I feel there is something desperately narcissistically attention-seeking in wanting to tell everybody so many details.

Like so many things, there is a balance to be struck to achieve moderation and even equilibrium.

Sensationalism

From time to time I peruse the fronts of magazines in newsagents. Such as today. I justified my browsing by purchasing next week's Radio Times and a bar of Green & Black's Dark 70% (20g).

On the front of Woman magazine is a headline "Pregnant at 12 by an internet lover." You have no idea how furious this has made me. I know for an absolute fact that it is impossible to get pregnant by surfing the internet. I know for absolute certainty that to get pregnant requires sex, or, at least, the introduction of bodily fluid into bodily cavity, which is impossible to do via a set of fibre-optic cables and a pair of PCs. I have a hunch that the twelve-year-old got pregnant by having sex in the flesh, off line, with a male person.

Then I surf the Sun, and find out that Jordan is claiming to have had an affair with David Beckham. I think this is unlikely. But I wouldn't rule it out. I think the onus will be on Jordan to prove this to be true; obviously, David can't prove the negative. However, I am slightly bemused by the Sun's use of "The model's outrageous lie" and "Show bosses heard every lying word". Even in the context of

England skipper Becks, 28, has vehemently DENIED any affair with Jordan and promised to sue if she repeats the claims in her book.

If I was the Sun I would have been a bit less dogmatic in assuming it's a lie.

But then, I really don't understand the likes of Jordan. Or Victoria Beckham. Or Jennifer Aniston.

A long time ago my friend and I agreed that there was something distasteful about discussing our sex lives even with each other. Sure, we usually established early on that I/she had slept with 'him', whoever he may be. Sometimes it is necessary to mention sex as an adjunct to the story - you know, the "and it was so embarrassing because we were having sex at the time" eg when my bed collapsed. Or just as a bit of conversation. "Ooh, we didn't get any sleep last night!"

But there is a point beyond which it is really distasteful to go. I would say that, if you are a celebrity, telling details to national newspapers is way too far. I think it takes away the intimacy of what should be private. Not because I'm a prude, but because, surely, that's part of the fun of having something private and personal just between the two of you. And if you're in the public eye, I would expect you to value your privacy even higher than us mortals.

I have a feeling that people who feel the need to tell the world about what wonderful sex they're having, or how many people they're having it with are suffering from issues in their background or upbringing. I probably had some of those issues myself. In the time before I lost my virginity, and at another time when I went through an extended desert, I did get a bit paranoid and almost obsessive.

But I realised at some point that most people have sex, at least sometimes, or at least at some stage in their life. In many ways there's nothing special about it all. Although in many other ways it can be very special. A bit like food, really.

Maybe there's a flaw in my argument. Maybe I'm writing out of my bottom. But the whole Jordan thing leaves me with a bad taste.

Oh my god! Yes! Yes!

Did you know it's possible to have too many orgasms - have too many orgasms and they can have bad effects upon the body, up to and including brain tumours.

Quack Quack

More on BJ

What consenting adults do in the privacy of their own home is their business etc. There is a danger if one condemns prostitution that one is seen to be on the side of the right-wingers who can’t bear the thought of anyone having sex.

Unfortunately, this idea that prostitution falls neatly into clear-cut categories of high-class tarts and crackwhores, and they have nothing in common. The truth is somewhat different. The relationship between prostitutes and punters is one of ‘use’. Perhaps, because they’re both using the other, it shouldn’t matter.

Being all liberal, we should applaud the so-called ‘Plat du jour’ because, obviously, she is a free person making a free choice. In endorsing this behaviour, we are, arguably, endorsing that which is far more exploitative. For example, child prostitution. Child prostitution covers both the teenage ‘crackwhore’ on street corners and the child smuggled in from Eastern Europe and Africa to be act effectively as slaves. You may argue that they’re not really connected – the key thing is the difference between consenting adults and exploited children. But a society that condones the objectification of women and the commercialisation of sex is not a society that makes me feel comfortable.

BdJ is all very peachy clean and non-threatening, unlike the existence of most prostitutes, even the ‘high-class’ ones. They are at high risk of being attacked and even murdered by punters, frequently raped. Furthering the myth that these women do it out of joy and pleasure is an easy way to relieve one’s conscience of the desperation that forces women into prostitution and absolves of us any responsibility. Whilst we endorse the transactional nature of high-class prostitutes I think we are also condoning the street prostitutes who proposition children, rob and blackmail random passers-by, and encourage pimps in their destructive behaviours.

And regardless of how well the writer of this work can use English, I don’t think it’s a blog and I think that anybody can write tillating stuff for a period. Keeping it up is much more difficult. So, jolly good fictional website, and let’s not allow any moral considerations interrupt our hedonistic twenty-first century existence. I know morality is passé and considered to be right wing, but the award to that site is a clear sign from the Guardians of their contempt for the weblogging community, such as it is.