F*cked: Being Sexually Explorative and Self-Confident in a World That's Screwed

by Krystyna Hutchinson

Beauty isn’t fucking everything, yet we have been taught as a culture that, especially for women and gay men, it is mostly everything.

So, what does this have to do with “loving yourself first”? Well, a lot. Much of our self-love, especially that of women, is based on how others perceive us, and others’ initial perception is based almost entirely on looks. This is all wrong. Self-love should, as the word implies, come from within; therefore the opinions of others should not be factors in the affair you ultimately want to be having with yourself, and a mirror should merely reflect your face, not your self-worth.

I think everyone has a moment like KneeSockGate, a moment when we realize there are repercussions for just being ourselves. The problem is, most people choose to make sure an incident like this never occurs again by masking their true selves rather than paying the penance for being who they are. (Cue self-hatred.)

If you find yourself having a lot of trouble with not caring what other people think of you, just remember, people, as a group, are fucking morons.

You need to include the most important individuals in your life too: friends, parents, bosses—no one gets a free pass to Fucksville.

For example, at any given time in my life I would say I care about what approximately five people think. These people have been carefully vetted through intense secret-keeping challenges, my study of their behavior during mental breakdowns I occasionally release from the vault, and my judging basically every move they make and grading them on character merit. Even after all this, I still hold complete veto power.

My efforts to cover up my lack of confidence often came out of my mouth as anger. Of course it did. Insecure people are usually the angriest, loudest kind of people.

“confidence is quiet and insecurity is loud.”

Because femininity has a very clear hierarchy of hotness, and we’re constantly reminded of our place. We see it every day in magazines, on billboards, in television and movies. And it instills this false idea that our value as women is based, first and foremost, on how we look.

I was. I put the words in her mouth and I yelled those words at myself. I was building her up in my head to be this huge bully and in a pathetic effort to feel in control, I’d think things like You’re not better than me, you’re a fucking whore. You’re just a sex worker. Those thoughts made me feel like shit. That wasn’t what I was about at all and the jealousy felt like a gross, cancerous sap that was covering my entire body.

In terms of how I treat myself and how I treat other women, I don’t want to add to the garbage. I want to be the pedestal.

“All violence is an attempt to replace shame with self-esteem.”

David Crabb, he notes that “[i]t’s strange how quickly this murderer’s father came forward to reject knowledge of terrorist connections but was sure to stress how much his son hated gay people. He hated them. And here we are . . . with news that the killer had been going to the club for three years, he’d asked men on dates, had gay dating apps on his phone . . . And now his ex-wife is speaking openly about his father screaming at him for being gay right in front of her. It’s sad and disheartening and reminds me how lucky I am not to have come from a family and a culture like this man.”

In Social Psychology and Human Nature, Roy F. Baumeister and Brad J. Bushman argue that men may actually find it harder to calm their emotions down than women, and so they tend to attempt avoiding emotion.

Men aren’t masking their emotions as a reaction to society but as a most basic part of humanity: self-preservation. Baumeister and Bushman’s text goes on to share that “[t]his pattern appears to be maintained in marital interactions: When married couples argue, husbands show stronger and longer-lasting physiological arousal than wives.”

As with most issues, the burden of being a man might be just as elaborate as the burden of being a woman.

Vaginas are complicated. If you have one, you know this. If you don’t have one but you’ve been face-to-face with one, you might have felt equal parts fascination and perplexity. Vaginas make the world go ’round. They can be used as currency. They can strike fear in societies for centuries. They’re the reason a lot of straight guys step foot in bars. They’ve inspired dramatic monologues. And I’m willing to bet they’ve started a shit ton of wars.

I want my partner to be able to tell me if I’m not satisfying him, and I’m going to want some feedback so that I can change whatever it is I’m doing. It takes a few tries to leave your ego out of this type of conversation, but you can’t get mad if someone is merely being honest with you.

Men are more than the size and shape of their penises, and I gotta say, women can be heartless about this subject, as if men are incapable of feeling insecure about themselves.

See? Penises can be complex too!

Your vagina smells. And it’s pretty loose. Your face is a mess. You look tired. And pale. And old. Cover your lips. And your eyes. And your cheeks. Actually, while you’re at it, can you just put a coat of paint over your whole fucking face? But not like “too much.” You still want to look natural. And let’s not even talk about your hair. Please straighten that, you monster. But, like, still have it maintain a good amount of volume, okay? Wait, wait, wait, are you trying to walk out of the house without your leg makeup on? Also, you look fat. Have you eaten today? How. Dare. You . . . And voilà, that’s how the beauty industry magically pulls shame out of thin air!

The next time you look in the mirror and don’t like what you see, take a second and think about if the problem is not liking what you see or what you see not matching up with what you have been taught to like.

The media creates insecurities and then the beauty industry creates products to help you deal with those insecurities. And men only judge you based on these things because that’s what they are taught. They are told what type of woman they are supposed to like, even if what they truly want is a full-bellied goddess

Remember: being unique has the most value. When being pretty is not what’s important, you end up feeling both pretty and important.

Throughout human history masturbation has been not only talked about at length but also talked about positively. In fact, it wasn’t until the early 1700s that anyone even uttered a negative word about masturbation.

Of course if a child does this, he or she just needs to have a heart-to-heart with a parent about when and where is appropriate for personal pleasure.

learning to make yourself cum will do wonders for your sexual future. If you understand how your own body works, you can take that knowledge into partnered sex and give constructive feedback that will benefit the both of you and probably make you a more relaxed and happy human, because dopamine!

Mutual masturbation is also a fun activity if you’re not ready to have sex, either in general or with that particular person. It’s a wonderful way to get to know someone’s body and how they move and how they like to be touched.

(Girls can be scumbags, FYI.)

boning while menstruating helps relieve the migraine headaches often associated with that time of the month.* So for those readers with penises: go ahead, with her consent, let your dick enter her vagina’s bloody hallways, and proudly proclaim “The doctor is in!” You can tell her Corinne and Krystyna said that was okay.

you actually have a slightly higher risk of getting an STI because your cervix is a little bit more open during menstruation so there’s more room for, um, “shit to get in.”

Rule one, in comedy and in dick pics: know your audience.

Nude photos are a form of sexual expression, and everyone has a right to privacy of that expression if they so choose.

Your nudes should be limited edition, collector’s item, Disney vault shit. Only the biggest fans get them and then they’re deleted forever.

Every nude photo I’ve sent was something I deemed okay for public consumption. Do I want my nudes to go viral? Nah. But do I wake up every day knowing that’s a possibility? Absolutely.

Just because you hit your friend’s arm with your plastic sword doesn’t mean you wanted to cut their hand off. You were just playing pretend and having fun getting lost in the imaginary world you’d created. Now just trade swords for sex.

To me, this fantasy is more about playing with the boundaries of control, and the only circumstance in which I could feel comfortable doing that is in the presence of a sexual partner I love and trust.

number”—the total number of men they’d had sex with in their lives. We have somehow convinced ourselves that quantity is actually more important than quality and that more is not better. We eagerly settle for one mediocre partner for a while instead of sleeping with a bunch of men who pique our interest in one way or another for a few weeks at a time.

You can feel like shit about a one-night stand, but don’t let it end there. Feel like shit, figure out why you feel like shit, reflect, and decide if you have valid reasons to feel like shit, then identify what you want to do differently next time so you can avoid feeling bad. And for the love of all that is sexual, use protection.

Wanting a partner to be 100 percent sexually compatible with you right from the get-go is a nearly impossible expectation and a lot of stress to put on an early relationship. That said, the more comfortable you are with your sexual partner, the better the sex is, the more open you’ll be to trying new things, and the more satisfied you both will be.

I’m talking talking. Say what’s on your mind. What are you so afraid of? Your feelings and concerns are there for a reason, and you need to talk it out to uncover why. Maybe your fuck bud really is being inconsiderate or maybe you’re projecting your feelings from a previous relationship.

Communication leads to better, more satisfying relationships, whether it’s with a fuck buddy, boyfriend, wife, sugar momma, etc.

believing in someone comes from deep down in the pit of your stomach. It cannot be concocted or fabricated or learned. And without belief in your partner or a partner who believes in you, you will suffocate your purpose, that person’s purpose, or, most likely, each other. No matter how stupid a passion seems, remember that anything someone feels passionately about cannot be stupid because it’s the reason they get up in the morning.

The reactions to the update of my Facebook status made me want to grab all my friends by the shoulders and shake them vigorously. “You deserve it!” “Congrats!!” “OMG—I knew it would happen!” “Huge—it’s brutal out there!” These weren’t messages of support for a woman who had just come home from war, kicked meth, or gotten her Ph.D. These were because I got a fucking boyfriend. As butterflies-in-my-stomach as I felt to have met James, these idiotic comments from the people in my life gassed those butterflies to death immediately.

As a culture, we have somehow come to the conclusion that the ultimate goal for everyone is to find “the one.” Bam. Pass Go, collect $200. You. Are. Done. But I think there are many people out there who actually function better solo and are afraid to try it out because we have somehow deemed being alone “giving up.” By promoting this notion of “the one,” we have bred generations of people who think there is something peculiar about them if they can’t find the aforementioned one . . . when maybe the one was you all along.

In all honesty, I was succeeding so much in my life that when I met James I was kind of annoyed. Why did the cosmos send me someone so wonderful in the middle of my career hot streak?

Yes, James and I immediately had a connection that was undeniable, but did dating him mean breaking up with myself?

We challenge each other, support each other, and cause trouble on the Internet like no other couple I know. We also live down the block from one another and have never even thrown a “Hey, why don’t we move in together?” to see how it lands.

Being single isn’t better or worse than being in a relationship. It’s just different.

No one’s dying to have their partner fuck someone else (unless they derive sexual pleasure from that, in which case it’s still selfishly motivated, and that’s okay). It’s Bargaining 101. To get what I want, I must be okay with my partner getting what they want.