Cory Silverberg's Blog, page 13

Chastity and Other Sexual Choices

I left the NPR window open on my desktop for a week before I finally got around to listening to Michel Martin's Tell Me More segment called Chastity: Why Wait? It wasn't the irony of waiting that kept the window there. It's become a bad work habit of mine to keep windows and tabs open of things I want to read, listen to, or watch. Over the week these accumulate and as they grow so to does my ever-present anxiety. At some point (usually every 10 days or so) the anxiety becomes overwhelming, I...

Once More With Feeling

This week's sex question came from a woman who is happy with the sex she's having but not completely happy with her sex life. The guy she is seeing says he likes the sex they are having, but she's sure he is frustrated. It has something to do with his "manly area" a term she simultaneously uses and makes fun of herself for using. The story is that he has no feeling below the waist.

I start my response to her by pointing out that oftentimes people who are stuck in a sexual quandary think that...

Sex Toy Review: Scaling Up and Getting Down

Why can't companies that mass produce products use the scale of their operations to increase not only their profit margins but also the quality of their merchandise? Isn't a happier, more satisfied customer always a better customer to have? And isn't this a particularly poignant question to ask when the products in question are sex toys?

These may be naive questions. The closest I have come to being a business person was co-founding a commie worker co-operative. When I hear the word scale wh...

Resoluationary Thoughts for a New Sexual Year

It's a funny thing about our relationship to sexuality.

 

Making it to a place where your life feels stable is a frustratingly elusive goal for lots of us. And a stable life might seem to require stable sexuality, a sense that you know what lies ahead for yourself in sexual terms.

There a lot of reasons for this, but the one that usually seems like reason enough is the story we're all told about sexual development:  When you're young you are in the process of becoming a sexual being. ...

Top Sex Questions of 2012

Regular readers will know that statistics are never the first place I turn when thinking about or trying to understand some aspect of sexuality. But since 2006 I have been compiling a yearly list of the most frequently accessed sex questions. I say accessed since I have no way of knowing how many people actual read all or part of my answers, I only know if they made their way to the page. Most years the top questions have been pretty consistent. This year for what it's worth, the big differen...

Sexual Losses in 2012

Each year, at this time, I set aside several days to research and compile a list of people we lost this year whose lives and/or work was in some way oriented toward making the world a better place in terms of sexuality and gender. I started doing it because, with a few exceptions, people who devote parts of their lives to trying to make change in the area of sexuality and gender don't get a lot of public acknowledgement for their work.

It's no small thing to try and live your life not as what...

Workplace Safety for Dancers

Since 2003 December 17th has been marked as International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers. It's a day to try in some very public ways to have a different conversation about sex work. One that is neither salacious nor shameful. One that has nothing to do with whether sex work as an employment category is good or bad and everything to do with the individuals, workers of all ages and all genders, who experience an unbelievable, and times unbearable, amount of every day violence in the co...

2012 Gift Guide: Sexy Gifts Under $25

From queer sex to straight lace, we've got choice little gifts

Whether stockings or 'stockings' it's great stuff to stuff with

So you don't need a million to heat up the night

'cause cheap sex is great sex, when it's done right.

About.com's 2012 Sexy Gift Guide for Under $25

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2012 Sex Book Gift Guide

Ten erotic book choices, your gift receivers will be elated!

Sex guides and photos and comic genitals pixelated.

An embarrassment of riches, there can be absolutely no doubt,

That this holiday season you and your lovers will read your eyes out.

About.com's 2012 Holiday Sex Book Gift Guide

Cover Image: Fantagraphics

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Stealthy Sex Toys

I'm not of the opinion that in order to enjoy sex toys you have to be proud of them, or even be willing to talk to anyone about your sex toy usage. I think one of the nice things about masturbation is that doesn't require the same kinds of interpersonal and social negotiations. Doing it for yourself should mean doing it however you want it, however you need it.

Most of us don't have the kind of privacy that would allow us to keep our sex toy use to ourselves for long. And that's where these...