Polly Whittaker's Blog, page 5

Dixie De La Tour from Bawdy Storytelling

 






Dixie and I have been friends for fifteen years. We met pretty much immediately when I moved to San Francisco in 1999. She was one of the first core volunteers at Kinky Salon before she formed her own sex postive community, Bawdy Storytelling. In this episode of Kinky Salon Confessions we talk about early Kinky Salons, finding chosen family, and facing heartbreak. Expect lots of great stories from the origin of Kinky Salon, and lots of love and laughter.

Listen to the latest episode of Kinky Salon Confessions

Patreons and Podcasts and YouTube, OH MY!

 

I’m ready to let the world know about what we’ve been up to in this little sex culture bubble of ours. I want to shout it from the rooftops! But that’s rather impractical, so instead I’m going to start a Podcast and a YouTube channel.
On Kinky Salon Confessions you’ll be able to hear real stories of love, heartbreak, sexual liberation and personal and social transformation. I’ll be interviewing people as I travel, collecting their stories, and beaming them out to the world. If you have a good story to share, please let me know.
On the Sex Culture Revolutionary YouTube channel I’ll be posting a video diary of my adventures. You’ll be able to meet the awesome people from Kinky Salons across the world, I’ll let you into my private thoughts and hopes, I’m sure there will be lots about costumes and make up, I’ll interview cool people, I’ll do some readings from the book…
Video Diary is the new Selfie!

I’m launching a crowd funding campaign soon to support all this work. I’ll be doing a Patreon, which is like Kickstarter but for ongoing projects rather than finite goals. The rewards are going to be sick! How about never paying for a Kinky Salon ticket again? Or the chance to swan into sold out parties anytime you want? You know you need that! I’ll send you all the juicy details on that as soon as I have them.















The Kinky Salon Tour Spring 2015









I’m thrilled to announce the long-anticipated Kinky Salon tour! I’ll be hitting the road, travelling with a crew of Kinky Salon folks from all over the world, going from one city to the next, learning from the locals about each Kinky Salon.
We’ve been watching these communities grow from afar, but there’s nothing like being there in the flesh. This trip is about connecting the dots, cross pollinating, and building global community.
You should come too. I’m serious. We’re flying into London on March 19th, over to Copenhagen on the 26th, to Berlin on April 1st, and out on April 8th. I’ll post more details about themes and ticket links for the parties soon.

We’ve scheduled four Kinky Salons over four Saturday nights in Los Angeles, London, Copenhagen and Berlin. Join us for one, or for all four! It’s going to be an epic adventure…
4 cities, 4 Saturdays, 4 Kinky Salons!









STOP ONE:
Los Angeles, Saturday March 14 The first stop on the tour is the inaugural event of Kinky Salon Los Angeles!







STOP TWO:
London, Saturday March 21 Stop number two is the five year anniversary of London's Kinky Salon







STOP THREE:
Copenhagen, Saturday March 28







STOP FOUR:
Berlin, Saturday April 4

 

Sex Culture Book Fair ROCKED!










When you put the words SEX, CULTURE, and BOOKS together it makes me feel all tingly in my trouser department. Last weekend I hosted the Sex Culture Book Fair and experienced some serious vocational arousal. You can read all about my experience and check out the photos on my blog. A big shout out to Mission Control, Belle SF Magazine, and Adobe Books for helping make it all happen. We had some great panel discussions, some kinky demos, and tons of authors and publishers to chat with. The day went so fast it was a flurry of amazing connections, super interesting people, and good times. Watch out, we’re planning on doing it again next year.















On the interwebs








This image wins the internet this week:

Until next time,
P♥lly
xx

P.S.Check out my website at www.sexculturerevolutionary.com



















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The Sex Culture Book Fair

The Sex Culture Book Fair was this weekend and it blew my mind. Jeff Ray from Adobe Books and David from Belle SF Magazine first came to me in October and said, “let’s collaborate.” They let me loose brainstorming ideas, but none of us had any idea how it would all work out. First time events are always a gamble. In our first meeting their eyes widened as I reeled off the names of people I’d like to get involved. That would be awesome they said. But I really had no clue if I could pull it off. I was talking about my mentors, my heroes, the people who built the foundation of the culture in San Francisco we all love. The sex culture revolutionaries who I admired from across the ocean before I even arrived here.

I got Mission Control in on the action to represent the community. They produced the back room with kinky demos and naked girls reading. This was not your grandma’s book fair.

For me the highlight of Saturday’s event was the “Legends” panel. I invited Carol Queen, Ron Turner, V Vale, and Violet Blue to join me at a pokey little bookshop in the Mission for a conversation about sex culture in San Francisco and they all said yes. Holy shit. This is my life.

Carol Queen has been a mentor since I arrived in San Francisco. Her generosity and support have always humbled me. She’s one of the reasons I fell in love with this town. Pervy, edgy writer, and producer of pagan sex parties. My kinda lady. Ron Turner is the founder of Last Gasp, a publishing company who has been publishing the unpublishable since 1970. Sexy, nasty, weird, underground, offensive, subversive books. If you’re a friend of mine you probably have some on your bookshelves, even if you don’t know it. V Vale produces RESearch—the series that brought us Angry Women and Modern Primitives, two of the most influential books on me in my early 20s, purchased at Waterstone’s Bookstore in Camden Town and carried home in the rain to be devoured, my young mind a sponge for these compendiums of bizarre performance art. Violet Blue is the woman who was taking San Francisco by storm when I arrived here. Who was blogging about sex in the early ‘00s? She was.

So here I am sitting with this panel of unbelievably awesome people. They’re here because I asked them to be. I’m having a moment. I gather myself and try to appear professional when all I want to do is jump up and down with a shit eating grin on my face and shout “LOOK WHAT I DID, DAD!!!!” I ask about pivotal moments in their careers. The microphone is passed down and they each tell a story about a person, an encounter, an event.

Ron Turner talks about the Mayor’s party he produced where performance artists carved pentagrams on their backs, pissed on each other and were sodomized by a Jack Daniels bottle, Violet Blue pipes up, “they were my room mates!” Then she talks about the time the Billboard Liberation Front pasted pictures of her face all over town. The Chronicle had decided to launch her sex column with a whimper rather than a bang, but San Francisco wouldn’t let it happen. They talk about their heroes: Betty Dodson, Margot St James, Susie Bright, Patrick Califia.

As they’re talking I realize this is my pivotal moment.

Soak it up, Polly. Your idols have become your friends.

The Tale of a Shaved Pussy

I remember the moment I decided to shave my pubic hair. I was at an afterparty in London with a dozen or so friends. They were fetish models and photographers. I was finally hanging with the scene makers and I wanted desperately to belong. We had been out to a fetish club and stayed up all night high on drugs. As the orange sun of early morning peeked through the curtains, we still wore our fetish gear from the night before. Corsets and high heels, latex and leather. The discomfort of sweat and constriction forgotten. Cigarette butts discarded in half empty cocktails. We talked about how special we were. A few of us stood in the center of the room dancing and laughing, waiting our turn for a line of coke. We flirted and dared each other to outrageousness. Diana, with curls of shiny black hair bouncing around bright red lips reached her hand between my legs and I adjusted my hips so she could explore more easily. We laughed as she casually felt up the outside of my PVC shorts. I remember the look on her face, wide eyed and nonchalantly mocking as she tugged on a tuft of my pubic hair.

“Jesus Christ, Polly, you’ve got a such a hairy pussy.” I suddenly felt awkward. My confidence seeped away and I felt my face redden.

“I don’t like to shave,” I retorted, “stubble is nasty.”

“Check this out you guys, Polly’s pussy is soooo hairy.”

I don’t have a particularly hairy body. I’m fair and my hair is fine. I’ve never shaved my legs. My pussy hair is light with a reddish tinge. It doesn’t grow past the necessary area. I was 22 years old and had never thought of shaving. Diana tugged on the hair again and I pulled away.

“It’s so long! It’s, like, the longest pussy hair I’ve seen in years.” Everyone at the party laughed and I pretended like it didn’t bother me.

After the party I went home and considered my options. I didn’t want to shave my pubic hair off entirely like the other girls in the fetish scene, leaving them bald as an 8 year old. I didn’t like the way that looked or felt. But perhaps I could meet them half way. If I just shaved underneath then my pubic hair would be accepted. I lay back in the bath and picked up my razor, holding it in front of my face contemplatively. I wanted to pretend this was my decision, that I was a grown up, that I had learned something new about how to be sexy, and that I liked the idea of shaving. As I dragged the razor across my labia I convinced myself I was in control. Five minutes later my pussy was pink and hairless, and just a little nicked, with a triangle of strawberry blonde starting just above it. For the next couple of decades my hair stayed the same. I trimmed the sides and a little from the top to stop it from poking out from my underwear, and I shaved myself bald underneath.

I first started questioning my relationship to my pubic hair when I decided to take a break from having sex nearly two decades later. At first I continued my grooming, even though nobody would see it. But then the questions began. Why am I doing this? Who am I doing this for? Is this for me? Or for my sexual partners? Or is something else going on here? I would allow you to grow back for a while, but then hurriedly shave it off again with a pang of shame.

Then one day I thought to myself, “why do we have pubic hair anyway?” I went online and googled that very question and I discovered a most amazing fact. Not only does the layer of pubic hair help to prevent skin to skin infections like herpes and HPV, but shaving and waxing create tiny micro-tears in the skin which make infection way more likely. WTF? Really? Pubic hair protects us from STDs, and yet the sluttier we are the more likely we are to shave it off, making our delicate genitals vulnerable and exposed. This seems downright illogical.

Looking back it’s pretty clear that I allowed my vanity—my desire to belong—to dictate my relationship with my pubic hair. I followed the fashion, and I didn’t question it or look too closely at my motives. I allowed myself to think it was a personal preference. I admit, I do like I do like the feeling of slippery smooth freshly shaved labia, but I haven’t questioned why. Thinking about it now I realize that it’s pretty much all I’ve known. My entire slutty adult sex life I’ve had a shaved pussy, so of course that’s sexy to me.

So I decided to grow back my bush. It’s not super long and unkempt, but neatly trimmed and perfectly coiffed. I’m still getting used to it, but I like the way it feels. There’s a whole new sensation to nearly touching my pussy that I’ve never experienced before. The brush of a hand tickling the pubes on my labia feels good.

I’m happy to be in a place where I can finally overcome the social pressure of shaving, and make a decision based on what I want. It’s my body, my pubes, my health, my pleasure, and my choice.

2015, The Year of YES!

 

What an incredible year it’s been for this lil revolutionary! 2014 was a year of opportunities: We unveiled two new Kinky Salons in New Orleans and Portland, and watched them flourish; A dedicated team helped Mission Control survive it’s eviction; I reached out for support and found it with a kickstarter that knocked my socks off; I published my book and people like it! I’m a little blown away by the 50+ five star reviews on Amazon, each one is so thoughtful and touching. I feel humbled that my story has been so well recieved. On a personal note, 2014 was, for me, about healing. I took care of myself in a way I never have before. I started saying no to toxic behavior and old patterns, I created boundaries in ways I have never been brave enough to do before, and I learned a lot about myself. I felt simulateously more alone and isolated than I ever have, while also experiencing a depth of connection with my community that I never dreamed possible.This year has been a story of success and accomplishment for the Kinky Salon community and the Sex Culture Revolution. I couldn’t have done it without your love and support.I’m ready for 2015, the year of YES.







Sex Culture Book Fair










The Sex Culture Book Fair is a celebration of two of my favorite things: SEX and BOOKS! I’m super excited to be hosting this awesome event.

This is not a typical book fair. With saucy demos, risque readings and scandalous socializing, this is the sexiest book fair in town.

Sex culture means more than just erotica. Although there will be plenty of raunchy fiction, x-rated art, and pervy storytelling, we’ll also be delving into a more cerebral look at sexuality with sex positive writing, political manifestos and LGBTQ perspectives.

The Sex Culture Book Fair is a collaboration between Adobe Books and Arts Cooperative, Belle SF magazine, and Mission Control sex positive social club. Together they will present the past present and future of publishing and sex with a line up of presenters, readers, storytellers, and demonstrations.

FREE FOR MISSION CONTROL ALLIES
CLICK HERE TO SEE THE FULL LINE UP AND RSVP
















Write a review!








I can’t emphasise how helpful it is for me to get Amazon reviews. Independent publishing is incredibly challenging and I need all the help I can get to become more visible in the avalanche of books available. Even if it’s just one sentence saying you enjoyed the book, it will help push me up in the Amazon algorithms. THANK YOU to all the people who have already posted their reviews! I’m looking pretty good with 54 five star reviews, but I’d like to make it to 100. Help me reach my goal by writing a review now!















On the interwebs








The internet is always full of articles about finding love. Most of the time they are old paradigm, sexist nonsense. This article tickled me this week because it’s so well written, and it’s full of humor. It doesn’t tell you how to find love, it tells you how to be strong and single.
“In order to tell tepid to fuck off once and for all, you MUST recognize that life among those who don’t appreciate or understand you is bullshit. You don’t want to live that way.” Amen.
 
Until next time,
P♥lly
xx

P.S.Check out my website at www.sexculturerevolutionary.com

 

 

KEEP CALM and THANK YOU

I moved to America in September 1999. By the time Thanksgiving rolled around I knew I was home. This holiday is different for me. It’s not about going home and spending time with relatives, and it’s not about dubious historical references. The idea of a holiday where people openly express their gratitude was never a part of my childhood. It’s not very British. For me, Thanksgiving is about finding my home, and my chosen family. It’s my American holiday. Although I try to be grateful every day, for one day of the year I feel surrounded and engulfed with it.

I can’t even begin to name names of the people who I am grateful for this year, because the world swelled up and supported me in a way I have never experienced before. I was emotionally held by friends, I was financially supported by kickstarter backers, and I was creatively supported by the volunteers at Mission Control and the local Kinky Salon chapters. As a stiff upper lip Londoner, allowing people to help has been the most frightening and rewarding experience of my life. My heart has opened and my life has become infinitely more fulfilling and productive.

I’ve always expressed my gratitude to my close friends–the people who really know me–but this year I feel grateful in a whole new way to the larger bubble of people who surround me. There are so many people now playing roles in this community whose participation adds it’s magic. From the bartender at Kinky Salon Copenhagen, to the person who took out the trash in Portland, to every single person who read my book. I have so much gratitude it’s overwhelming sometimes to think about.

So this year I’m putting out a special shout to all the people at the far reaches of this incredible labyrinth of experience called Kinky Salon.

I see you, and I love you. Thank you for everything you do.

Polly

x

An Open Letter to Kim Kardashian’s Ass

Dear Ass,

Congratulations on your recent media attention. It’s a telling time in history when a woman’s ass can be more famous than the woman. With your undeniably impressive proportions and your ceaseless media exposure you have achieved a status in our culture previously only available to people. As a sexual object, oiled and buffed to perfection, your voice is now more powerful than any other ass in history. I hope you will use your fame to bring attention to the plight of your fellow female body parts whose voices are so often silenced.

Ankles, for example, are desperate for this kind of sexual objectification. For more than a century they have been all but ignored. Victorian culture did not neglect the ankle as we do now, and understood its elegance and erotic potential. Eyeballs have also suffered, with their only attention being the occasional oculolinctus. Although the women themselves might complain about this constant dehumanization and sexualization of their body parts, you and I both know that the body parts themselves crave the attention.

While some may poo poo your talents, I admire your ability to balance a champagne glass, as the famous ass of freakshow star Sarah “Saartjie” Baartman, AKA the Hottentot Venus, did before you. It’s a noble lineage of ass glass balancing.

What factors have arisen in our culture to allow your ascent into the annals of history? I believe it’s the repression of sexuality that has made way for your meteoric rise. If everyone had access to ass without guilt and shame, then we would have no need to fetishize and deify an ass, even one as magnificent as you. You would be relegated to the simple status of just another body part of just another woman, no more notable than a graceful arm or a strong calf.

Congratulations again on your unprecedented media frenzy. Never in the history of ass has an ass made such a huge impression.

Polly

Polly’s Book Party at CSC THIS SUNDAY

Center for Sex and Culture
1349 Mission St, San Francisco, California 94103









 7PM-11.30PM


Join me and legendary icon of San Francisco Sex Culture, Carol Queen at the Center for Sex and Culture on Nov 9th. Come and celebrate with us!

FEATURING SPECIAL GUEST:
MY MUM!
The original Sex Culture Revolutionary, my mother was a sex therapist in the ’70s and she revolutionized how people talk about sex in therapy in the UK. This is a rare opportunity to hear her perspective and meet her in person.

What better way to spend a Sunday evening than joining sex culture revolutionaries for an evening of socializing and revolutionary banter?



Storytelling
Gameshows
Silly skits
Questioning
Conversation
Socializing






Delve into Polly’s story as an excuse to delve into yours. Face your shame by looking into the eyes of with the Judgmental Tiger! Meet Polly’s body positive teddy bear, her sensitive, magickal unicorn sex toy, and learn how a toilet paper roll feels about being used.

Have you always wanted to hear the deeper story of the sexual revolution? Carol and Polly are multi-generational sex culture revolutionaries and they want to share their personal stories with you.
This event is FREE if you tweet or facebook a photo of yourself with your copy of Polly: Sex Culture Revolutionary with the hashtag #sexculturerevolution. Otherwise it’s $10-$20 sliding scale.
All proceeds go towards furthering the Sex Culture Revolution!











Comedian Margaret Cho says…











“Raw, untamed, emotional beauty—
Polly is a true supernova. This memoir
is as touching as it is hot, as moving as it is a masterpiece.”

I hope you own the book already, but just in case here’s the link. Listen to Margaret Cho!!

Watch This Film

Click the image above to see the amazing short film shot & edited by www.brandbarsf.com at the book launch.

Thank you to all the performers and volunteers who made the evening such a success!

 

Good Reads





If you want to support the Sex Culture Revolution there’s an easy way to do it in just a few clicks. Goodreads is a social networking website for readers, and it’s a great place for me to promote the book. You can go to the book page and hit 5 stars. Then go to my author page and become a “fan.” These two fast and easy clicks will help make the book more visible on the site. If you have a little more time you can leave a review, or “recommend this book” if you have particular friends you think might enjoy it.
There’s also a reader Q&A on my author page if you want to ask me a question about the book.




Read This Article





I met Merissa Gerson at an open house event at the Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality. Annie Sprinkle was hosting the party and she invited me to come and celebrate the new graduates of their Sexology Ph.D. I didn’t know who Merissa was, but we hit it off immediately and started talking about Kinky Salon and the book. She told me that she was a journalist and that she wanted to write a story about me. I had no idea it would be for national news! The article focuses on the safety and consent at Kinky Salon and even quotes the likes of Carol Queen and Chris Ryan!



Say What?
“Polly’s life is clearly one of adventure, love and the ongoing work of helping to liberate and connect her fellow humans. Monogamy, while possibly the right thing for some, is clearly not suited for all. Western culture is in the early throws of reacquainting itself with this age old truth. Polly’s story should prove to be an inspiration and a touch-stone for those who feel constricted by the ill fitting togs of conformity and wish more than anything to free themselves to love and live more.”
John Law, Co Founder of the Cacophony Society and Burning Man

On the Interwebs





As we move into October, let’s focus on the question everyone is asking “is your Halloween costume racist?” Well, here’s a handy dandy guide to tell you whether or not you’re perpetuating racism with your costume choices.

Until next time,
P♥lly
xx

Rally for Sex Culture

There’s sooooo much happening at the book launch party it’s going to be quite the spectacle. Don’t expect readings or traditional book launch activities. This is a celebration and a rally for sex culture.

BUY YOUR TICKETS NOW!




Join Polly and her co-conspirators at this VICTORY event, celebrating the launch of her memoir Polly: Sex Culture Revolutionary.Conspire with the revolutionaries of sex culture in an evening of renegade performances, rousing speeches, rebellious readings, and riotous revolutionary rhetoric!


RECLAIM your right to be a pervert
SMASH any idea that you aren’t a gorgeous manifestation of creation who deserves to be loved
WALK OUT and join the ironic sidewalk strike against righteousness
SIT IN on the tea party and enjoy a nice cuppa
… and let’s BURN THE BOOK in memory of all the books that have been burned out of fear of change.

UP THE REVOLUTION!


















Playing revolutionary songs to make your bum wiggle



Pounding drums and causing a ruckus













Raising awareness with low-brow sacred shenanigans



Pushing our boundaries with “performance art”













An anonymous missive from “Legion”



Recording live, capturing the evening with interviews and commentary













The DJ who makes everything Bounce



Super-Shakti Tea Ceremony




















And that’s not all!






For those of you looking for a more traditional book launch party I’ll be hosting a book reading with interactive discussions and a conversation with Carol Queen at the Center for Sex and Culture on Sunday Nov 8th. Watch this space for more details.
Have you always wanted to hear the deeper story of the sexual revolution? Carol and Polly are multi-generational sex culture revolutionaries and they want to share their personal stories with you. Come and participate in an interactive evening of storytelling, questioning and presentations. Leave with a complete picture of where sex culture has been, and where it’s going. Come armed with curiosity and prepare to be surprised.






Say What?
“So real, so raw, so revolutionary. A wonderful, beautifully written memoir”
Susan M Block, The Dr Susan Block Institute

On the Interwebs
There’s been lots of press about Kinky Salon and the book recently! A very thoughtful and analytical article was written in The Atlantic, a review of the book was included in The Sex Issue of SFBG, and I was a guest on Dan Savage’s Savage Love column! I’m excited to see where it all goes from here.

Until next time,
P♥lly
xx