Input:
Title: Ethical Sluts: Our Beliefs

Prompt: Write a chapter about the beliefs of ethical sluts, focusing on the importance of consent, honesty, and respect. Discuss the idea that sexual energy is everywhere and that sex is not just a discrete, definable activity. Address the idea that self-denial is highly valued in our culture, but that shame-free access to all sorts of consensual sex is extremely nice for the world. Also, explore the idea that happy, free, guiltless connection is the cure for wounds caused by fear, shame, and hatred of one's own sexual self.

In this chapter, ethical sluts value consent above all else. They believe that when they use the word consent, they mean an active collaboration for the benefit, well-being, and pleasure of all persons concerned. If someone is being coerced, bullied, blackmailed, manipulated, lied to, or ignored, what is happening is not consensual, and therefore, it is not ethical.

Ethical sluts are honest with themselves and others. They take time to figure out their own emotions and motivations and share that information openly with those who need it. They recognize the ramifications of their sexual choices and make a conscious commitment to supporting themselves and their partners as they deal with those conflicts honestly and honorably. They also respect the feelings of others and ask if they are unsure how someone feels.

Ethical sluts also recognize the difference between things they can and should control and things they can't. While they may sometimes feel jealous or territorial, they own those feelings and do their best not to blame or control but ask for the support they need to feel safe and cared for.

In this chapter, discuss the idea that sex is everywhere and that sexual energy pervades everything all the time. Challenge the idea of sex as a discrete, definable activity like driving a car, and instead argue that sex is part of everything. Use examples to illustrate this idea, such as the deep breath that fills our lungs as we step out into a warm spring morning, the cold water spilling over the rocks in a brook, and the loving tenderness we feel toward our friends and relatives and children.

Also, address the idea that our culture places a very high value on self-denial, which is fine when there is hard work to be done, but that all too often, those who unapologetically satisfy their desire for pleasure in their utterly free time are seen as immature, disgusting, even sinful. Argue that this leads to self-loathing, hatred of our bodies and our turn-ons, and fear and guilt over our sexual urges. Make the case that happy, free, guiltless connection is the cure for these wounds, and that sex and intimacy are vital to peoples sense of self-worth and their belief that life is good.

Finally, explore the idea that you don't need a reason to have sex. Argue that people have sex because it feels very good, and then they feel good about themselves. Pleasure is a complete and worthwhile goal in and of itself, and the worthiness of pleasure is one of the core values of ethical sluthood.

Response:
# 3

# OUR BELIEFS

We are ethical people, ethical sluts. It is very important to us to treat people well and to do our best not to hurt anyone. Our ethics come from our own sense of rightness and from the empathy and love we hold for those around us. It is not okay to hurt another person because then we hurt, too, and we dont feel good about ourselves. We dont want to live in a world where people treat each other with callous disregard.

Ethical slutdom can be a challenging path: we dont have a polyamorous Miss Manners telling us how to do our thing courteously and respectfully, so we have to make it up as we go along. However, being a slut doesnt mean simply doing whatever you want, whenever you want, with whomever you want.

Most of our criteria for ethics are quite pragmatic: Is anyone being harmed? Is there any way to avoid causing that harm? Is anyone feeling hurt? How can we support them? Are there any risks? Is everybody involved aware of those risks and doing what can be done to minimize them?

On the positive side: How much fun is this? What is everybody learning from it? Is it helping someone grow? Is it helping make the world a better place?

First and foremost, ethical sluts value _consent_. When we use this word—and we will, often, throughout this book—we mean an active collaboration for the benefit, well-being, and pleasure of all persons concerned. If someone is being coerced, bullied, blackmailed, manipulated, lied to, or ignored, what is happening is not consensual. And sex that is not consensual is not ethical—period.

Ethical sluts are _honest—_ with ourselves and others. We take time with ourselves to figure out our own emotions and motivations and to untangle them for greater clarity when necessary. Then, setting aside any bashfulness we may feel, we openly share that information with those who need it.

Ethical sluts _recognize the ramifications_ of our sexual choices. We see that our emotions, our upbringings, and the standards of our culture often conflict with our sexual desires. And we make a conscious **commitment** to supporting ourselves and our partners as we deal with those conflicts honestly and honorably.

We do not allow our sexual choices to have an unnecessary impact on those who have not consented to participate. We are _respectful_ of others feelings, and when we arent sure how someone feels, we ask.

Ethical sluts recognize the difference between things they can and should control and things they cant. While we sometimes may feel jealous or territorial, we _own those feelings_ , doing our best not to blame or control but asking for the support we need to help ourselves feel safe and cared for.

Dont panic—the rest of this book is about how you can learn to be such a fine sexy grown-up. Your authors are here to help. Here are a few of the ideas and beliefs that have helped us get here and might help you, too.

Rethinking Sex

Are you having sex right now? Yes, you are, and so are we.

Perhaps youre looking around you in bewilderment: You still have your clothing on, and maybe youre sitting in a restaurant or a crowded bus. How could you be having sex?

We think that the question of when youre having sex is actually sort of meaningless. Sexual energy pervades everything all the time; we inhale it into our lungs and exude it from our pores. While its easy to determine whether or not youre engaging in a particular sexual activity at any given time—neither you nor we are probably having intercourse at this moment—the idea of sex as something set aside, a discrete, definable activity like driving a car, just doesnt hold up very well.

We think erotic energy is everywhere—in the deep breath that fills our lungs as we step out into a warm spring morning, in the cold water spilling over the rocks in a brook, in the creativity that drives us to paint pictures and tell stories and make music and write books, in the loving tenderness we feel toward our friends and relatives and children. In our combined three-quarters of a century of work as sex writers and educators, weve found that the more we learn about sex, the less we know about how to define it, so now we just say the truth as we know it: sex is part of everything.

Right now, were writing about sex, and youre reading what we have to say about it. Youre having sex with us! Was it good for you? It sure has been for us.

More pragmatically, we have had long, intense intimate conversations that felt deeply sexual to us. And we have had intercourse that didnt feel terribly sexual. Our best definition is that sex is whatever the people engaging in it think it is. For some people, spanking is sex. For others, wearing a garter belt and stockings is sex. If you and anybody else involved feel sexual when you eat ice cream sundaes together, thats sex—for you. While this may sound silly now, its a concept that will come in handy later in this book when we discuss making agreements about our sexual behaviors.

"Youre having sex with us! Was it good for you? It sure has been for us."

Denial vs. Fulfillment

Dossies bachelors thesis was called "Sex Is Nice and Pleasure Is Good for You." Even if any given person doesnt find sex to be nice for them at this time in their lives, we believe that shame-free access to all sorts of consensual sex is extremely nice for the world in which we all live. This idea is as radical now, in the twenty-first century, as it was back in the 1970s when Dossie first wrote about it.

Our culture places a very high value on self-denial, which is fine when there is hard work to be done. But all too often, those who unapologetically satisfy their desire for pleasure in their utterly free time are seen as immature, disgusting, even sinful. Since we all have desires, puritanical values lead inevitably to self-loathing, hatred of our bodies and our turn-ons, and fear and guilt over our sexual urges.

We see ourselves surrounded by the walking wounded—by people who have been deeply injured by fear, shame, and hatred of their own sexual selves. We believe that happy, free, guiltless connection is the cure for these wounds; we believe that sex and intimacy are vital to peoples sense of self-worth, to their belief that life is good.

You Dont Need a Reason

If you walk up to a randomly selected individual and propose that sex is nice and pleasure is good for you, you will probably hear a lot of spluttering, argument, and "yeah-buts"—STDs, unwanted pregnancies, rape, the commodification of sexual desire, and so on. None of these changes the core idea.

There is nothing in the world so terrific that it cant be abused if youre determined to do so: familial connections can be violated, sexual desire can be manipulated. Even chocolate can be abused. Abuse doesnt change the basic wonderfulness of any of these things: the danger lies in the motivation of the abuser, not the nature of the item.

If there were no such thing as sexually transmitted disease, if nobody got pregnant unless they wanted to, if all sex were consensual and pleasurable, how would the world feel about it then? How would _you_ feel? If you look deep inside yourself, you may find bits and pieces of sex-negativism, often hiding behind judgmental words like _promiscuous_ , _hedonistic_ , _decadent_ , and _not productive_.

Even people who consider themselves sex-positive and sexually liberated often fall into a different trap—the trap of rationalizing sex. Releasing physical tension, relieving menstrual cramps, maintaining mental health, preventing prostate problems, making babies, cementing relationships, and so on are all admirable goals, and wonderful side benefits of sex. But they are not what sex is _for_. People have sex because it feels very good, and then they feel good about themselves. Pleasure is a complete and worthwhile goal in and of itself: the worthiness of pleasure is one of the core values of ethical sluthood.

Love and Sex Are the End, Not the Means

Our monogamy-centrist culture tends to assume that the purpose and ultimate goal of all relationships—and all sex—is lifelong pair-bonding, and that any relationship that falls short of that goal has failed.

We, on the other hand, think sexual pleasure can certainly contribute to love, commitment, and long-term stability, if thats what you want. But those are hardly the only good reasons for having sex. We believe in valuing relationships for what we value in them, a seeming tautology that is wiser than it sounds.

A relationship may be valuable simply because it affords pleasure to those involved; there is nothing wrong with sex for sexs sake. Or it might involve sex as a pathway to other lovely things—intimacy, connection, companionship, even love—which in no way changes the basic goodness of the pleasurable sex.

A sexual relationship may last for an hour or two. Its still a relationship: the participants have related to one another—as sex partners, companions, lovers—for the duration of their interaction.

One-night stands can be intense, life enhancing, and fulfilling; so can lifetime love affairs. While ethical sluts may choose to have some kinds of relationships and not others, we believe that all relationships have the potential to teach us, move us, and, above all, give us pleasure.

Dossie remembers an interview with a young flower child back in 1967 who made the most succinct statement of ethical sluthood weve ever heard: "We believe its okay to have sex with anybody you love, and we believe in loving everybody."

You Are Already Whole

We believe that the fundamental sexual unit is one person; adding more people to that unit may be intimate, fun, and companionable but does not complete anybody. The only thing in this world that you can control is yourself—your own reactions, desires, and behaviors. Thus, a fundamental step in ethical sluthood is to bring your locus of control into yourself, to recognize the difference between what is yours to control and what belongs to other people. With practice, you can become able to complete yourself—thats why we call this "integrity."

When you have built a satisfying relationship with yourself, then you have something of great worth to share with others.

"The only thing in this world that you can control is yourself—your own reactions, desires, and behaviors."

Abundance Is Entirely Available

Many people believe, explicitly or implicitly, that our capacities for love, intimacy, and connection are finite, that there is never enough to go around, and that if you give some to one person, you must be taking some away from another.

We call this belief a "starvation economy." Many of us learned to think this way in childhood, from parents who had insufficient affection or attention for us, so we learned that there is only a limited amount of love in the world and we have to fight for whatever we get, sometimes in cutthroat competition with our siblings.

People who operate from starvation economies can become very possessive about the people, things, and ideas that matter to them. They see the whole world in that limited light, so that anything they get comes from a small pool of "not-enough" and must thus be taken from someone else—and, similarly, anything anyone else gets must be subtracted from them.

It is important to distinguish between starvation economies and real-world limits. Time, for example, is a real-world limit: even the most dedicated slut has only twenty-four hours every day. Love is not a real-world limit: the mother of nine children can love each of them as much as the mother of an only child loves her one.

Our belief is that the human capacity for sex and love and intimacy is far greater than most people think—possibly infinite—and that having a lot of satisfying connections simply makes it possible for you to have a lot more. Imagine what it would feel like to live in an abundance of sex and love, to feel that you had all of both that you could possibly want, free of any feelings of deprivation or neediness. Imagine how strong you would feel if you got to exercise your "love muscles" that much and how much love you would have to give!

Openness Can Be the Solution, Not the Problem

Is sexual adventurousness simply a way to avoid intimacy? Not ordinarily, in our experience. While it is certainly possible to misuse your outside relationships to avoid problems, or to reduce intimacy with your life partner, we do not agree that this pattern is inevitable or even common. Many people, in fact, find that their outside relationships can increase their intimacy with their primary partner by reducing the pressures on that relationship.

This chapter contains some of our beliefs. You get to have beliefs of your own. What matters is not that you agree with us but that you question the prevailing paradigm and decide for yourself what you believe. Exercise your judgment—isnt exercise supposed to make you stronger? Thousands and thousands of ethical sluts are proving every day that the old "everybody knows" myths dont have to be true.

We encourage you to explore your own realities and create your own legend, one that spurs you onward in your evolution, supports you as you grow, and reflects your pride and happiness in all your relationships.

On Love

As our relationships blossom all over the rainbow of possibility, each one may inspire different feelings of love. When we learn to recognize and welcome love as we find it in our hearts and in all of its many and marvelous manifestations—sexual love, familial love, friendly love, passionate love, gentle love, overwhelming love, caretaking love, and millions of others—we discover a river of nourishment that can flow through our lives in a constantly replenishing stream.

But like a real river, this source can contain many currents. The way to feel solid enough to swim in that ever-changing river is to learn to love yourself. Some people believe that to love yourself is selfish and to spend some part of your life focusing on yourself is narcissistic. This question is more easily answered by doing than by thinking. We believe that self-nurturing can get you through hard times and guide you into a loving relationship with yourself. When you follow through with a simple act like comforting yourself with homemade soup, spending time deep in a beloved book, or taking a sweet solitary walk in a beautiful place, then you get an experience of being kind to yourself that can answer all those questions about "What do they mean, love myself?"

Another way of discovering self-love is to go love someone else. If you have a hard time feeling valuable when no one is around to tell you that you are, then why not do something that is valuable to others? Many unhappy sluts with no date this weekend have gone off to serve dinner to the homeless at a local church and come back filled to the brim with good feeling about all the pleasure they were able to give.

Once you have a handle on loving yourself, you can practice sharing that love with others. Youve probably been taught to reserve the language of love for when youre feeling overwhelmingly tender and passionate and only for those who have made huge commitments to you. Maybe youve been taught that using the "L-word" implies that you are making some large commitments. Wouldnt it be better to ask ourselves _how_ we love any particular person rather than worrying about whether we do or not?

Imagine how youd feel if all the people who care about you made a practice of telling you so. Imagine what the world would be like if we allowed ourselves to recognize and acknowledge and communicate all the sweet feelings, to make the little gestures that may not be life changing or passionate but that nevertheless make life worthwhile.


Input:
Title: Slut Styles

Prompt: Write a chapter about the various styles of ethical sluthood, highlighting that it is a house with many rooms, from happy celibates to ecstatic orgiasts and beyond. Discuss the history of ethical sluthood, including ancient cultures, utopian sexual communities, artists and freethinkers, and the love generation. Also, explore the current state of sluthood today, including the diversity of cultures, religions, and lifestyles of sluts.

In this chapter, discuss the many styles of ethical sluthood that have worked for people throughout history. Start with ancient cultures, such as the temple prostitutes of ancient Babylon and Mormon polygyny, noting that the prevailing cultural values of twenty-first-century North America seem to date back to the Roman Empire and early Christianity, which recommended monogamous marriage only for those who couldn't manage celibacy.

Next, discuss the history of utopian sexual communities, such as the Oneida community of nineteenth-century Ohio, Rajneeshpuram in India and Oregon, and Kerista in New York, Belize, and San Francisco. Note that these communities are often built by one leader and may falter when the leader is no longer available, but their philosophies live on, adding new visions and practices to the mainstream culture.

After that, explore the role of artists and freethinkers in ethical sluthood, such as the Bloomsbury group in early twentieth-century England and freethinkers like Vita Sackville-West, Harold Nicholson, George Sand, H. G. Wells, Simone de Beauvoir, Alfred Kinsey, and Edna St. Vincent Millay. Note that while there may not be records of other nonwriters who were also building sexually open lives, it is safe to assume that a significant minority of people have always gotten their needs met through ethical multipartner living.

Then, discuss the impact of the love generation on ethical sluthood, noting that many ideals of that era, such as nonconformity, exploration of altered states of consciousness, equality of race and gender, ecological awareness, political activism, openness about sexuality, and the possibility of ethical and loving nonmonogamy, have permeated the greater culture.

Finally, explore the current state of sluthood today, noting that sluts come in all forms and styles, from all cultures, religions, and lifestyles, rich and poor, with formal and informal education. Discuss the importance of building communities of support, such as conferences, meetups, munches, conventions, and parties, to mitigate isolation, facilitate the exchange of information and support, and expand intimate circles. Also, note that while most sluts live in mainstream, monogamy-centrist culture, some drop out of mainstream culture to live in communities composed of people whose values are like their own.

Throughout the chapter, emphasize the importance of consent, honesty, and respect in ethical sluthood and note that happy, free, guiltless connection is the cure for wounds caused by fear, shame, and hatred of one's own sexual self.

Response:
# 4

# SLUT STYLES

Ethical sluthood is a house with a lot of rooms: it shelters everyone from happy celibates to ecstatic orgiasts and beyond. In this chapter, well talk about the many styles of sluthood that have worked for us, for the people we know, and for happy sluts throughout history. Whether or not any of these scenarios fits you, we hope they will offer you some ideas about where to start your exploration or perhaps the validation of knowing that there are others like you out there.

Relationship Pioneers

Although the phrase "ethical slut" is relatively new—Dossie coined it in 1995—the practice is not. Cultural acceptance of practices outside monogamy has roller-coastered up and down from acceptance to stern rejection, but regardless of the opinions of church and state, there have always been those who have found happiness and growth in sexual openness.

ANCIENT CULTURES

You could spend your life as a cultural anthropologist trying to describe the innumerable ways that human beings have chosen to be together sexually, romantically, and domestically—from the temple prostitutes of ancient Babylon to Mormon polygyny and far, far beyond. So, rather than trying to list them all, we just want to note that the prevailing cultural values that twenty-first-century North America inherited from Europe seem to date back to the Roman Empire and to early Christianity, which recommended monogamous marriage only for those who couldnt manage celibacy, the ideal state. Cultures without those influences have developed all sorts of ways for people to bond—polygyny (many wives), polyandry (many husbands), group marriage, arrangements in which marriage is fundamentally a domestic business relationship and sexual dalliance takes place elsewhere, ritual group sex, and pretty much any other configuration of human hearts and genitals that you can imagine.

UTOPIAN SEXUAL COMMUNITIES

History is dotted with experiments in creating intentional sexual utopias, often with a philosophical or religious basis: if youre curious, read up on the Oneida community of nineteenth-century Ohio (or see the sidebar); Rajneeshpuram in India (from the late 1960s) and Oregon (in the 1980s); and Kerista in New York, Belize, and San Francisco from the early 1960s through the 1990s…to name just a few. Such communities are usually built by one leader and may falter when the leader is no longer available. However, their philosophies live on, adding new visions and practices to the mainstream culture. Many practitioners of Western tantra today, for example, can trace their practice to the teachings of Oshō, the guiding spirit behind Rajneeshpuram.

ARTISTS AND FREETHINKERS

Its easy to point to artists and writers who have built their lives around intentional exploration of alternative relationships. If youre curious about the ways in which these relationships played out in times when there was even less support than there is now, you can read up on the Bloomsbury group in early twentieth-century England and about freethinkers like Vita Sackville-West, Harold Nicholson, George Sand, H. G. Wells, Simone de Beauvoir, Alfred Kinsey, and Edna St. Vincent Millay. What we cant know is how many nonwriters were also building the kind of sexually open lives that worked for them, because there are no records of such lives. We feel safe in supposing, though, that a significant minority of people have always gotten their needs met through ethical multipartner living.

THE LOVE GENERATION

Dossie came of age surrounded by the utopian concepts of the 1960s, and Janet did shortly afterward; both of us have been greatly influenced by those days of radical exploration. Many ideals of that era—nonconformity, exploration of altered states of consciousness, equality of race and gender, ecological awareness, political activism, openness about sexuality, and, yes, the possibility of ethical and loving nonmonogamy—have permeated the greater culture. We doubt that we could have written this book or published it in the 1950s, so if youre reading and enjoying _The Ethical Slut_ today, thank a hippie.

Sluthood Today

Sluts come in all the various forms and styles that humans come in: in all cultures, from all parts of the world, of all religions and lifestyles, rich and poor, with formal and informal education.

"We doubt that we could have written this book or published it in the 1950s, so if youre reading and enjoying _The Ethical Slut_ today, thank a hippie."

Most of us today live in communities of nonsluts, with only occasional or limited contact with other people who share our values: some groups host conferences, meetups, **munches** , conventions, and parties, all of which can mitigate isolation, facilitate the exchange of information and support, and expand their members intimate circles. These conferences are very important in bringing sexual undergrounds into the view of those who are looking for them and building institutions aboveground that can better support their members. Other sluts drop out of mainstream culture to live in communities composed of people whose values are like their own.

A slut living in mainstream, monogamy-centrist culture in the twenty-first century can learn a great deal from studying other cultures, other places, and other times: youre _not_ the only one in the world who has ever tried this, it _can_ work, and others have done it without harming themselves, their lovers, their kids—without, in fact, doing anything except enjoying themselves and each other. If you go online and search for "polyamory" plus the name of your city, youll be surprised how much shows up, even if you live in what you thought was a conservative community.

Pioneering sexual subcultures with extensive documented and undocumented histories include communities of gay men and of lesbian women, trans groups, bisexuals, asexuals, the leather communities, the swing communities, and some spiritually defined subcultures of pagans, modern primitives, tantra temples, and Radical Faeries. And thats just in the United States. Even if you dont belong to any of these sexually oriented communities, its worth taking a look at them for what they can teach us about our own options through the ways they have developed of being sexual, of communicating about being sexual, and of living in social and family structures that are alternatives to **sex-negative** traditions in America.

Dossies favorite dance club in 1970 was a remarkable miniculture of polymorphous perversity. She remembers:

> The Omni, short for "omnisexual," was a small North Beach bar whose patrons were men and women, straight, gay, lesbian, bisexual, and often transgender. The sexual values were very open, from hippie free love freaks to sex industry professionals, and most of us came there to dance like wild women and cruise like crazy.
>
> Thanks to the large transgender faction, there was no way of pigeonholing a person into your categories of desire. You might dance with someone you found very attractive and not know if they were chromosomally male or female. Its difficult to get attached to preferences like lesbian or straight when you dont know the gender of the person you are flirting with.
>
> The results were surprising: I patronized the Omni because it was the safest environment available to me. Because there was no way to make assumptions, people had to treat each other with respect. And if you were, as I was, a young woman in your twenties, to be approached with respect was a most welcome relief from straight social environments where it was customary for men to prove their manhood by coming on too strong.

Since we see some of the problems in attaining a free and open expression of our own individual sexuality as having to do with living in a sex-role-bound culture, we have found it useful to learn from people who have shifted the boundaries of what it means to be male or female, or what it means to choose partners of the same or opposite sex or with ways of approaching sex that go beyond the genital. Thinking about different ways of living and loving can help us as we consider whether we want to change anything about how we go about living as men, women, and/or somewhere in between.

LESBIAN WOMEN

In the lesbian community, we get to look at what happens in a world consisting almost entirely of those who identify as women. For women, relationships can get confused with their sense of identity, especially because our culture in its most tradition-bound form hardly allows women any independent sense of identity at all. Thus, many women, who may have been raised to believe that their identity depends on their partnered status, act as if they would lose their entire sense of themselves without their relationship. The most common relationship sequence, as we see it magnified in the lesbian community, is the form of nonmonogamy known as serial monogamy. Often the connection to the partner of the future precedes the breakup with the partner of the past, with accompanying **drama** that presumably feels safer than the vast, empty, unknown, and terrifying identity void of being a woman living as a single human being.

Younger lesbians are questioning these traditions, and often that questioning includes looking into nonmonogamy as a way to form less insular relationships. Lesbian polyamory is characterized by a lot of serious thoughtfulness and attention to consent and thus by tremendous openness about processing feelings, an area in which the womens community excels.

Our lesbian sisters also have a lot to teach us about new ways of developing a womans role as sexual initiator. In heterosexual culture, men have been assigned the job of initiator and trained to be sexually aggressive. In the world of women who relate sexually to other women, it rapidly becomes apparent that if we all see ourselves as Sleeping Beauties waiting for Princess Charming to come along, we might indeed have to wait a hundred years.

Womens style of coming on—when shyness doesnt get in the way—tends to be forthright, with respect for consent, and is unlikely to be intrusive or pushy, as many women have had too much experience with being violated to want to go down that road. Women have strong concerns about safety and so tend to move slowly and announce their intentions. They may be shy in the seductive stages and bolder once welcome has been secured. Women often want explicit permission for each specific act, so their communication could serve as an excellent role model for negotiated consent.

We would like to draw your attention to another illuminating difference about sex between women. A sexual encounter between two women rarely involves the expectation of simultaneous orgasm, as many people believe penis-vagina intercourse should, so women have become experts at taking turns. Lesbians are world-class experts on sensuality and outercourse, those wonderful forms of sexuality that do not rely on penile penetration. When penetration is desired, the focus is on what works for the partners: we have yet to meet a dildo that got hung up on its own needs. And you get to choose whatever size and shape you want!

GAY MEN

The gay male community reflects some of the traditional images of male sexuality in intensified form. While some gay men are interested in long-term relationships and settling down, others have set records as world-class sluts. The gay baths are the ultimate role model of friendly group sex environments and easy sexual connection for its own sake.

Gay male sex, as a rule, starts from a presumption of equal power, without the dynamic of overpowering and withholding that often pervades male/female interactions. Thus, men do not generally try to get consent from each other by manipulation and pressuring: a straightforward approach meets an easy response and no need to ask three times. Gay men give each other a lot of credit for being able to say no, and for meaning it when they say it—this makes coming on very simple, because you are never trying to sneak up on anybody and you are not required to be subtle. It is always okay to ask as long as it is okay for the other person to say no. This admirably simple approach to consent cannot be recommended too highly.

Men in general have had less reason to fear sexual violation than their sisters. Although it is true, and terrible, that boys do get molested and men do get raped, men seem to have more confidence than women in their power to protect themselves. Men also tend to get a lot of cultural support for being sexual. So, although the forbiddenness of homosexuality may give many gay men a lot of questions (about being okay or having something wrong with them or having other forms of internalized homophobia), this is less often reflected in sexual dysfunction. Gay men as a group are really good at finding out what feels good to them.

Gay men have established most of our understanding of safer sex. In the face of the AIDS epidemic, where many people might have retreated into sex-negativity, the gay community held its ground and continued to create environments where hot, creative, safer sex could be learned and practiced.

BISEXUALS/PANSEXUALS

Often stigmatized as "gays unwilling to relinquish heterosexual privilege" or "hets taking a walk on the wild side," bisexuals and pansexuals, starting back in the 1970s, have developed their own forceful voice and their own communities.

Some people prefer the term _pansexual_ to _bisexual_ because theyre uncomfortable with the etymology of "bisexual," with its implication of only two genders. We like bi activist Robin Ochss definition: "I call myself bisexual because I acknowledge that I have in myself the potential to be attracted—romantically and/or sexually—to people of more than one sex and/or gender, not necessarily at the same time, not necessarily in the same way, and not necessarily to the same degree." Use whichever term you feel more comfortable with, but be prepared to hear from others who have made different choices than yours.

Looking at the theory and practice of bisexual lifestyles offers opportunities to explore our assumptions about the nature of sexual and romantic attraction and behaviors. Some folks have had sex only with members of one gender but know that they have within themselves the ability to connect erotically or emotionally with more than one gender and thus consider themselves bisexual. Others may be actively having sex with someone of a gender that is not their usual choice and still consider themselves heterosexual or gay. Some bisexuals prefer different types of interaction with different genders, while others consider themselves gender-blind. Some can be sexual with any gender but romantic with only one, or vice versa, and so on, throughout the universe of bisexual attractions and choices. Bisexuals challenge a lot of our assumptions about gender, and many bisexuals can tell you what is different for them between sex and relationships with one gender and with another. This interesting and privileged information can provide all of us with new stories about sex and gender.

The increasing visibility of bisexuality has led to some challenges to traditional definitions of sexual identity. Specifically, we are having to look at the fact that our sexual attractions may say one thing about us, while our sexual behaviors say another, and our gender identity says yet a third. Questions like these are eating away at some of the traditional boundaries we place around sexual identity, much to the dismay of purists of all orientations. Your authors, sluts that we are, enjoy this kind of fluidity and appreciate the opportunity to play as we like with whoever looks good to us without relinquishing our fundamental sense of who we are.

Janets path toward her current identity as a bisexual has been a confusing one: it was nearly a decade after she began having sex with women before she started to feel comfortable using the term to describe herself:

> I felt turned off by the trendiness of "bisexual chic." And at the same time, I was hearing some genuinely cruel and ignorant judgments from both heterosexuals and homosexuals about bis.
>
> As a result, it wasnt until I knew for sure that I was capable of having both sexual and romantic feelings for both men and women—and until I felt strong enough to claim the identity in the face of all those negative judgments—that I finally began calling myself "bisexual."
>
> I look back on my life now and see that Ive generally expressed my domestic urges toward men but that my romantic and sexual feelings are about equally likely to be inspired by a man, a woman, or someone in between. The bisexual community also offers more support than either straight-land or gay-land for my rather ambiguous gender presentation: some days I like to wear red lipstick and jewelry and other days mens trousers and oxfords. So "bisexual" is the identity that fits me best and where I intend to stay.

HETEROSEXUALS

In bygone decades, there were few role models for heterosexual interaction in mainstream culture: an Ozzie and Harriet household, monogamous, patriarchal, and focused on conformity and childrearing, was presented to us all as our sexual and romantic ideal. Your authors are very glad to have outlived this era.

Modern heterosexuality offers a plethora of options for happy sluthood, from long-term "vee" triads, where two partners are both sexual with one "hub" partner but not with each other, to orgiastic recreational sex—with lots of possibilities in between, including open relationships, triads and quads, poly pods, and intimate extended families we sometimes call _polycules_ or _constellations_. (Janet implores you, by the way, not to assume that any couple that appears to be a man and a woman is in fact a heterosexual couple. One or both of them may be bisexual, trans, or queer in any number of other ways. As always, if you wanna know, you gotta ask.)

There has been a major change in the culture since the last edition of this book: now people of all genders can marry the person they love and raise a family together if thats what they want. What this means is that many people are now looking to the accumulated wisdom of heterosexual sluts to figure out how to reconcile their parenting obligations with their goals for their sexuality and relationships.

Its also worth noting that heterosexuals are perhaps subject to even more gender-role-based pressure than the rest of us. So those hetero folk who somehow manage to break through those confining roles—who have succeeded in building lives in which the man stays at home with the kids while the woman is the breadwinner, or the woman cuts her hair short and stomps around in heavy-soled boots while the man struts his stuff in colorful silks and velvets, or who have formed ranks to protect kids whose gender presentation is atypical but who still need to function in an otherwise conventional life—have much wisdom to share.

TRANS AND GENDERQUEER FOLKS

Trans and genderqueer people form a variety of communities, all of which have much to teach to those who are interested in transcending their gender-role programming. Dossie, in the early years of her feminism, found friends and lovers among trans women who became her wonderful role models for how to be female, indeed often ultra-feminine, and still be assertive and powerful.

What we can all learn from our trans friends is that gender is malleable. From people who take hormones to express male or female gender, we learn about how some behaviors and emotional states may be hormone-related. People who have lived parts of their lives in different gender modes, physiologically and culturally, have a great deal to teach us about what changes according to hormones and what does not, and what gender characteristics remain a matter of choice no matter what your endocrine system says. Genderqueer and nonbinary people—those who choose to live their lives somewhere between the usual gender roles—are softening the boundaries of gender and demonstrating what life without binary gender might look like.

"What we can all learn from our trans friends is that gender is malleable."

If you think this doesnt apply to you, that you are certain of your gender and that its immutable, please consider that a great many people are born with characteristics of both genders: depending on whose definition you use, anywhere from two to seventeen babies out of a thousand are born with chromosomes and/or genitalia that place them somewhere between the extremes of the gender continuum. These conditions are collectively called **intersex**. Intersex support organizations have arisen with the goals of preventing surgeries on infants to make sure they conform to some gender or other, condemning them to a long series of surgeries and hormone treatments. It appears that Mother (Father?) Nature doesnt believe in only two genders and neither do your authors.

Moreover, a great many people whose genitals and chromosomes are all lined up with biological norms nonetheless feel strongly that they would live more happily and appropriately when presenting as a different gender than the one the doctor assigned to them at birth; you may have such people among your friends and family without knowing it, unless they choose to tell you.

Trans folks can tell us a lot about how differently other people treat you when they see you as a man or as a woman. Perforce, they become experts at living in a very hostile world. It takes a strong-minded person to stand up to our cultures rigidity about "real men" and "real women." No other sexual minority is more likely to suffer direct physical oppression in the form of queer-bashing. It was mostly genderqueer people—butch women and drag queens—who rebelled against police brutality in the famous Stonewall riots of 1969 that initiated the gay liberation movement.

Since our last edition, there has been a lot of media coverage of transgender people and enormous progress in acceptance of gender variance. Important transgender legal rights are increasingly considered human rights. With the support of mainstream pediatricians, in many places, children are allowed to attend school in the gender they feel themselves to be. Famous people may transition publicly, and a rich library of films and television shows are presenting fascinating stories about lives that transcend gender. Trans people can teach us a lot about the determination to be free.

TANTRA AND SPIRITUAL SEX PRACTITIONERS

Celibacy is not the only sexual practice of the spiritually inclined. Early examples of religious communities based on nonmonogamy included the Mormon Church, the Oneida community (see sidebar), the practices of _maithuna_ in tantric yoga, and the temple whores of the early Mediterranean goddess worshipers. Tantra as we know it today is actually a Westernized form of classical tantric practice, which uses breath, eye contact, and physical movement to attain altered states of high erotic consciousness; it is taught in workshops in most major cities and in many excellent books and videos. Other classical spiritual/sexual traditions have been updated for Western consumption in practices like Healing Tao and Quodoushka. Pagans and Radical Faeries come together for festivals and gatherings to celebrate ancient sexual rites such as Beltane, or to make up their own rituals that are appropriate to current lifestyles, like the open sexuality of Faerie gatherings or the more subtle eroticism of sacred dance and drumming.

These practitioners understand that sex is connected to the spiritual. As we said in _The New Bottoming Book_ , "Every orgasm is a spiritual experience. Think of a moment of perfect wholeness, of yourself in perfect unity, of expanded awareness that transcends the split between mind and body and integrates all the parts of you in ecstatic consciousness….When you bring spiritual awareness to your sexual practice, you can become directly conscious of—connected to—that divinity that always flows through you….For us, sex is already an opportunity to see God."

KINK, LEATHER, AND BDSM

Many cultural anthropologists believe that contemporary leather culture got its start in the wake of World War II, brought home by soldiers who came back from war with a taste for power and authority exerted by and for men. We note, however, that many forms of kinky play predate this phenomenon by centuries or even millennia: the Greek philosopher Aristotle is known to have enjoyed being ridden like a pony by his female acquaintances, and sexual bondage is the subject of Japanese art dating back to the seventeenth century.

Todays kinksters offer tremendous knowledge of how eroticism can be awakened with or without going for the genital, as well as ways to play with the outward appearance of inequality while staying well within the boundaries of negotiated consent. Polyamory and open relationships are very common in most kink communities, as the chances are slim of finding one partner who is open to all your fantasies and whose company you can tolerate on an ongoing basis. Both of your authors learned many of their sexual values and behaviors within the kink/leather/BDSM communities.

SEX WORKERS

Despite what you might have learned from the TV or the tabloids, sex workers really are not all desperate drug addicts, debased victims, or predatory gold diggers. Many healthy and happy people work in the sex industry, doing essential and positive work healing the wounds inflicted by our sex-negative culture. We know them as friends, lovers, colleagues, writers, therapists, and educators, as well as performers and artists. These folks have a great deal to teach us about boundaries, limit setting, communication, sexual negotiation, and ways to achieve growth, connection, and fulfillment outside a traditional monogamous relationship.

Sex workers may be people who exchange genital sex for money, but professional dominants, porn performers, erotic dancers, phone sex and webcam providers, sacred intimates, sexual surrogates, and many other erotic professionals are also considered sex workers. Do not imagine that connections between sex workers and clients are necessarily cold, impersonal, or degrading, or that only losers frequent these businesses. Many client/sex worker relationships become a source of tremendous connection, warmth, and affection for both parties and last many years.

CULTURAL DIVERSITY

While we are looking at sexual diversity, lets remember that we live in a multicultural society and that every culture in our world, every subculture, every ethnic culture, has its own ways of creating relationship, connecting in sex, and building families. All are valid and valuable.

One of the great joys of living as a slut is the opportunity to make intimate connections with people whose background is unlike your own. When you do that, you will find yourself tripping, with some embarrassment, over a lot of differences. This process can feel awkward, but every time it happens, youve learned something new about how people go about being human—perhaps just the thing that was lacking in your own culture.

Its also worth remembering that many people, particularly those whose differences are visible, feel safest in the communities they grew up in and may be taking considerable risk by coming into a less diverse sexual environment. If becoming an out-of-the-closet slut would shock your community of origin, you might wind up sacrificing the safety and acceptance of home to join a community where most people dont look like you.

Boundaries in communication, connection, and relationship vary from culture to culture. Personal distance differs enormously—they say you can recognize the European Americans at a Latin American cocktail party; theyre the ones who are backing away from everyone who wants to talk to them because the Latin Americans keep stepping too close. Volume varies too: some cultures value being subdued and quiet, while others are dramatically expressive and, well, loud.

We recommend that you look for these differences and question your judgments. Is that person who seems too loud actually able to be more expressive than you? Does that quiet person notice more? Whats the intelligence of a person who hasnt read a lot of books but understands how your car or your computer works? Who are these friendly people who make sexual propositions openly and enthusiastically and get really confused when you accuse them of coming on too strong? Maybe theyre counting on you to say no if you dont want to. Maybe they have some ways of making connection that you could learn from.

"We recommend that when you are in the company of the unfamiliar, you look for unfamiliar wisdom."

It is tragic that so many of our sexual communities fail to welcome people from the whole world of cultures, races, genders, orientations, and sexualities. Those of us who grew up in a European-descended culture too often expect our friends to deal with cultural differences by conforming to us. When you look at the people around you and dismiss them—or, worse yet, assume you know all there is to know about them—because of their skin color, gender, orientation, way of speaking, mode of dress, religion, or country of origin, youll never get to hear any of the new and fascinating things those people might have to say.

We recommend that when you are in the company of the unfamiliar, you look for unfamiliar wisdom. Youll find lots of it, and it will make you richer.

What Can You Learn?

If thinking about all this makes you kind of nervous, what you are experiencing is how threatening it feels when the customary boundaries you take for granted, and believe apply to all social and sexual situations, may no longer apply in some environs. There are no universally accepted boundaries of gender or attraction among consenting adults, and the limits of sexual exploration are not handed down on stone tablets by some higher authority.

When you look at people who meet your standards of happiness and success without buying into the worlds standards of lifetime heterosexual monogamous pair-bonding, you begin to see how such things can be possible for you, too—even if these people arent doing it the same way you want to. Recognizing other sexual cultures offers an opportunity to become aware of your own preconceptions and uncertainties.

Listen to your fears: they have a lot to teach you about yourself. Not knowing whats what can feel scary—but think of it as a chance to scrap all your preconceptions and start from scratch. Its only by recognizing all the possibilities out there that you can choose the ones that work for you. Then you can be free to figure out where you want the boundaries in your life, what your personal limits are, and whether you ever want to expand those limits. Accomplishing this amazing task will set you free to explore beyond your wildest dreams.

"Listen to your fears: they have a lot to teach you about yourself."

Black and Poly

Here are some thoughts about poly and the way it plays out in Black communities—from our friends Ron and Lisa Young, cofounders of the international support group Black & Poly (blackandpoly.org), who have graciously allowed us to use this excerpt from their upcoming book, _Love: A Black Love Revolution_.

"Many of us are not just looking for that extra someone for casual sex and occasional affection; we may see the freedom and openness of poly as key to our survival. For many people of color, though, surface-level connection is easy, yet complex bonding and romantic love is a motherfucker. Heres why.

"Imagine trying to love someone when everything around you is set up to systematically pull you apart. For Blacks, first there was slavery, then Jim Crow, then the welfare system, and now mass incarceration—we havent had time to concentrate on love. We havent had time to comfortably settle into each other. Sure, we have love, family, and community within our homes, but moving those feelings out into the world can be a very big problem.

"Weve been taught that in order to get by in this world, we need to be strong…but that doesnt work in terms of dealing with each other. Our culture has asked us to maintain strong boundaries that protect us from harm: from being broken down, taken advantage of, robbed of basic human necessities, and stripped of our dignity. This fear often leads us to reject anything that places us in vulnerable positions, redirecting our attention away from the fact that only through vulnerability can we find true strength, growth, beauty, and most of all love.

"As Blacks, we were sent here as objects. Through polyamory, we receive the unique and joyous opportunity to define ourselves. We dont want to be your Mandingo Warriors or Nubian Princesses, or just to attend your play parties. We want to be respected as equals when it comes to building something real, polyamorous, and tangible. We see the love that is abundant within the community, and sometimes we feel that love reaching out to include us.

"But theres a still a huge divide between us and the white poly communities. How will we bridge the gap?"


Input:
 Title: Battling Sex Negativity

Prompt: Write a chapter about the challenges faced by sluts in a sex-negative world. Discuss the ways in which people try to stop sluts from being sexual, including outlawing birth control and abortion, restricting access to sex information, and resisting vaccines that prevent cervical cancer. Explore the ways in which sluts are often blamed for violence against them, and the consequences of being openly sexual, such as losing property, children, and income in a divorce settlement or being fired from a job.

In this chapter, also delve into the ways in which sluts judge themselves and others. Ask the reader to reflect on their own experiences of oppression and the assumptions they have made about their own sexuality. Discuss the concept of internalized oppression and horizontal hostility, and suggest that the reader re-examine the beliefs they learned in a sex-negative culture.

Next, discuss the legal challenges faced by sluts, including the inability to legally marry more than one person at a time. Encourage the reader to create legal agreements with their partners, especially if they are living in a marriage-like structure or have children together. Recommend that the reader consult a lawyer to ensure that their agreements are enforceable and that they express their desires in a formal and legal manner.

Finally, explore the concept of sex work and the benefits of legalizing it. Discuss the ways in which sex work could be treated as a profession like therapy, with clients making contracts with providers and brothels being treated like clinics. Explore the ways in which legal sex work could help end legitimate sexual crimes, such as rape and abuse, and enable sexual healers to help partners rekindle sexual heat and free people from sex-negative inhibitions.

Response:
# 5

# BATTLING SEX NEGATIVITY

From the sluts point of view, the world is sometimes a dangerous place. Lots of people seem to think it is okay to go to any lengths to stop us from being sexual.

Some antisex crusaders try to make loving dangerous for women by outlawing birth control and abortion, leading to unwanted pregnancies and back-alley abortions. Others would outlaw access to sex information, in schools or on the Internet, so that our children cannot learn to care for their health and well-being and have no access to safer-sex training that would teach them how to avoid spreading diseases. In an appalling development since the previous edition of this book, a vaccine that helps prevent cervical cancer in women is being met with resistance from puritans who believe that inoculating a young woman against cancer somehow encourages her to have sex. People who take medications that can protect them from contracting the HIV virus are called "sluts" and "whores" (presumably not the good kind).

Some people believe that being a slut makes you fair game for violence, that it must somehow be the victims fault. They might demand, "Why were you walking down that street at night in a short dress or tight pants?" or proclaim, "No wonder you got raped or assaulted" or "You look so queer—no wonder that gang decided to beat you up."

We are considered fair game for other forms of oppression, too. Multiple sexual partners can be seen as a good reason to take all your property, your children, and your future income in a punitive divorce settlement. You could lose your job or your promise for advancement or your professional reputation if the wrong people find out about your personal life.

"Some people believe that being a slut makes you fair game for violence."

Judging Ourselves

We hope this examination of the dangers of sluttery will lead you to ask yourself some questions. What is my experience of oppression and how does it affect me? Who do I have to lie to in my life? What are my closets? As you look deeper, you might ask yourself, "What assumptions have I made about how my sexuality should be? Do I hold judgments about what good and nice people do that I wind up turning against myself?"

When we judge ourselves by cultural values imposed from the outside, when women believe they ought to be small and quiet, when gay people believe that their sexual choice is a neurosis, or when we all believe we would be better people if we were able to be monogamous, this is internalized oppression. When we apply these unfair judgments to other people who are like us, when we see our friends as _too_ slutty or _too_ free, this is called horizontal hostility. We suggest you look through chapter 2, "Myths and Realities," as a checklist to see where the beliefs that you learned in our sex-negative culture might be getting in your way.

Its a Harsh World Out There

Those of us who choose to run our lives and loves in an unconventional manner should probably be prepared for the fact that many parts of the world will not welcome us with open arms. For many people, sluthood is their first experience with being in the closet, and they learn firsthand what their queer friends have known for quite a while.

While there are certainly ways to protect yourself against some social, logistical, and financial consequences, we cant guarantee that there will never _be_ consequences. Its not easy being easy.

Ex-spouses, parents, in-laws, and others who dont share your values about the potential for inclusive relationships may be hostile. Your friendly neighborhood pastor may not be sympathetic, either. Bringing both your partners to the company picnic is not necessarily a good way to ensure your continued ascent through the corporate hierarchy. We recommend caution in choosing who to come out to: yes, we know youre blissfully happy and want to share your joy with the world, but remember, you cant un-tell. We know people who have lost jobs, child custody, and more because the wrong people have become aware of their sexual choices. In some places outside the United States, the consequences of unconventional sexual choices are far more dire, up to and including the death penalty.

But even here, some states and cities have laws that forbid multiple adults to live together if theyre not related by blood or marriage. In others, landlords are reluctant to rent to groups that dont conform to the traditional family structure. Some leases contain clauses that allow landlords to terminate rental agreements on the basis of "immoral behavior" or "association with undesirable people"—which in some states includes nonmarital sex.

Similarly, your personal love and sex arrangements are best kept out of the workplace: both of us have lost jobs and clients for being who we are. While some cities and states offer some protection to people who are gay, lesbian, or transgender, we are not aware of any that guarantee equal rights for sluts.

We urge those who can be out and proud to do so because its harder for the world to hate sluts when it can see lots of us living happy lives that do no harm to anyone. However, unless you are absolutely certain that your workplace and important relationships are slut-positive, we recommend caution.

Legal Agreements

> With thanks to Dylan Miles, Esq., for consulting on legal aspects, and for being available to our communities as a knowledgeable and open-minded family lawyer.

Much progress has been made in recent years in establishing and affirming the legal rights of sexual minorities, including the Supreme Courts historic decision to legalize same-sex marriage throughout all the states. Several states have made provisions for children who are growing up with more than two parents, which protects many youngsters from foster care when a person who has functioned as a parent to a child can assume custody if needed; it also allows nonbiological parents to sign up for all the rights and responsibilities of parenting. When any of our allies in thinking outside the box wins any battle in human rights, we all benefit.

You still cant legally marry more than one person at the same time. If you and your partner(s) are living in a somewhat marriage-like structure, with the expectation of sharing property, providing for one another in the event of illness or death, raising children, or running a business together, we strongly recommend official legal documentation of your status and intentions. Terrifying stories of lover kept from lover when one of them is hospitalized, a longtime partner left penniless and homeless after someones unexpected death, individuals who have been parents in all ways but blood losing an orphaned child to a partners parents or ex-spouse, and so on, should be enough to convince you that its time to get official about all this.

You do not legally own your children, and the legal agreements you can make about them are limited by that fact. You can use your will to express your desires about who will care for your children after your death, but the court may not be obliged to follow your wishes. In some cases, a nonbiological parent can adopt a lovers children as a stepparent. Some states and municipalities are not supportive of second-parent or stepparent adoption, meaning if you are a childs third parent at that childs birth, you have fewer rights than any parent from a second, third, or fifteenth marriage.

We encourage you to write out your plans and your agreements, especially your lifestyle choices, and have your signatures notarized. Such affidavits may not be enforceable in most states, but in the event of later disagreements, they may serve as evidence of everyones intentions on forming a family or a relationship, and they make it clear what you have signed up to do. Writing out your vision of the family you are building together is a valuable and affirming act in its own right.

Dont forget to make and keep current your durable powers of attorney for finances and health care and your wills. These are legal documents, and while the law will not support everything an eager slut might want to do with their money and property, your chances of having your desires upheld by the law will be greatly improved if you express them in a formal and legal manner.

We recommend checking out a publishing company called Nolo Press, which puts out carefully researched do-it-yourself legal books on aspects of family and business law, including sample forms and step-by-step instructions. However, if your agreements are particularly complicated, or if things of substantial value (such as a lot of money or a successful business) are involved, you may want to go beyond the do-it-yourself level and contact an attorney. If you have that kind of money, you probably know more about this than we do. Do try to find an attorney who is open to nontraditional relationships; you can ask that in a question or two over the telephone, so you dont have to pay good money to find out that your lawyer thinks youre the Whore of Babylon.

We have neither the space nor the expertise to tell you all the ways that people with nontraditional sexualities can go about setting up their lives—options range all the way from adopting your partner to setting up a business trust and beyond. But please, dont assume that your good intentions, heartfelt love, and general wonderfulness will protect you. Sluts dont have that luxury. Do your homework and get the law on your side.

"Dont assume that your good intentions, heartfelt love, and general wonderfulness will protect you."

The Oldest Profession

What would the world be like if sex work were legal? If sex work were out in the open, and sex workers could be judged like any other workers—by their skill, their respect for their clients, and how well they manage their responsibilities?

Imagine if sex work were treated as a profession like therapy: a client making a contract with a provider. If the customer liked the work they received, theyd keep coming back; if not, theyd move on and try someone else. Brothels could be like clinics, new sex workers could learn from more experienced practitioners, lower-fee services could be provided by interns being supervised and taught by more experienced practitioners.

If sex work were legal, a worker being exploited by a pimp or trafficker could leave, report abuses and file charges, even unionize—just like any other worker. If we stopped clogging our legal system with consenting adults engaging in professional sex, perhaps our police would have more time and resources to end legitimate sexual crimes like rape, abuse, sex slavery, and child prostitution.

If sex work were legal, sex workers would be free to require whatever levels of safer sex seem appropriate to them—sex workers are often world-class experts at ways to spend hours in sublime pleasure and still refrain from passing around harmful viruses—and to seek out testing and treatment to avoid passing on any bugs.

Legal sex work would enable partnerships, too often driven apart by the pressure of a long-term relationship where passion has ebbed, to rekindle sexual heat by seeking the services of a skilled heat-kindler. Therapists could refer clients to such practitioners for embodied explorations of their deepest dreams and oldest fears, just as they might to any other professional. Dossie has worked with clients whose spouses bought them a session with a professional dominatrix for their birthday.

Many sex professionals have worked hard to acquire skills that most of us dont even know are possible: freedom of choice about our physical responses, timing of orgasms, ease of erection, G-spot fountains, the amazing possibilities of all the muscles in the pelvic area to bring pleasure in so many ways. Sexual healers could help free us from the terrors and inhibitions learned in a sex-negative society and show us what amazing sexual geniuses we all might be. Healing shame, healing trauma, the amazingness of sex beyond violation, the power of our fantasies…so much is there for us to learn and grow. Sex can be a powerful journey into healing and general goodness, and there are professionals who can teach us how.

Some people believe that sex for money is dirty. Our sex-worker friends prove otherwise, over and over again. We pay our ministers, priests, rabbis, imams, and gurus, so why should we not pay our sex priests? Our spiritual and sexual healers and guides deserve to make a living for the valuable work they do.

Right now, some kinds of sex-for-hire are legal in the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Germany, Australia, and New Zealand. We note that all these countries seem to be managing just fine with letting talented and devoted professionals make their living doing what they do best, for the betterment of their clients and the greater society.


Input:
 Prompt: Write a chapter about building a culture of consent in the face of sexual assault and aggressions. Discuss the prevalence of sexual assault and the ways in which it can prevent the building of a sex-positive culture. Emphasize the importance of freedom from sexism and rape, both at the individual and community levels.

In this chapter, also explore the different types of violations, including major ones such as drugging, violent rape, and child molestation, and smaller ones such as verbal offenses and edging over people's limits. Discuss the challenges of prosecuting rape and the need for communities to work for their own safety, including the removal of offenders from parties and other environments they control.

Next, discuss the impact of cultural beliefs about gender roles on consent, and the need for people of all genders to examine these beliefs and make changes. Provide advice for those who have experienced trauma and are struggling to enjoy their sex lives, including the importance of collaboration, clear agreements, safe space, and patience.

Finally, provide advice for those who have been accused of violating someone's boundaries, including the need to reflect on their own strengths and ethics and make changes in their behavior. Discuss strategies for conflict resolution, including the importance of emotional intelligence and restorative justice, and the need for communities to adapt these strategies to their own needs. Encourage communities to offer new members information on ethics and boundaries, and to create a sex-positive culture that deals proactively and constructively with problems, rather than sweeping them under the rug out of shame.

End the chapter with a discussion of clean love, and the importance of loving without attachment or expectations, and the freedom and innocence of childhood.

Response:
# 6

# BUILDING A CULTURE OF CONSENT

People around the world are gaining awareness of the enormous prevalence of sexual assault and smaller sexual aggressions. But bringing into consciousness something that we have avoided thinking about usually requires some thrashing around. When we claim our sexual freedom and start building communities wherein we can express ourselves in a sex-positive way, we immediately bump up against the truth that we are living in a society that holds some insane values about sex and consent. When it is not safe, accepted, or welcomed to say, "No thank you" to sex, building a sex-positive culture can become impossible.

Dossie, giving a lecture on consent to about two hundred people, asked those who had never been sexually assaulted to stand up. Only about a quarter stood up, mostly men, some women. There were many men as well as women among those still sitting. That large number of people who remained sitting—lets admire their courage and determination to free themselves and their sexuality, even though someone hurt them.

All our wonderful sexual freedom is dependent on two very important conditions: freedom from sexism and freedom from rape. These changes must take place at both the individual and community levels. Prosecuting rape and child molestation is quite difficult, so our communities need to work for our own safety. We can seldom send offenders to jail, but we can uninvite them from our parties, and remove them from the other environments that we control, both online and in the physical world.

Major violations include drugging someone and then raping them, violent rape, child molestation, and any intentional violation of another persons stated limits. These are all very serious crimes, even if they are often hard to prosecute. Other violations require some discussion, sometimes because the accused doesnt feel that theyve done anything wrong. Verbal offenses—pushy come-ons, arguing with someone who has said "No, thank you," or objectifying or belittling people—may cause less harm than physical offenses but can still create an atmosphere of danger in our communities. Edging over peoples limits, or trying things that have not been explicitly agreed upon, can tear apart relationships and have a ripple effect that occasionally destroys the communities in which those relationships are grounded.

Much of this conflict is the consequence of our absurd cultural insistence that in sex, men should be the initiators and women the withholders. Thus, some people learn that they are supposed to be pushy and others that saying anything but no is, well, slutty. This pattern leads to "no" being heard as an invitation to push harder, with predictably disastrous results. Freeing your sexuality requires that you look at these cultural beliefs about what it means to be a person of your gender, and perhaps make some changes—unless you want to spend the rest of your life living down to your gender stereotype. How would we propose that people of all genders learn better behavior? We wish we could say that theres a handy twelve-step group around the corner for this sort of thing, or a class we could take, but at this writing, these resources are pretty rare. Some community members are stepping up to the plate to do this sort of work. Wed love to see more.

"Freeing your sexuality requires that you look at cultural beliefs about what it means to be a person of your gender."

For Trauma Survivors

Way too many people of all genders, ages, and cultures have experienced sexual trauma. Sexual assault, outright rape, child sexual abuse, sometimes even medical trauma, can leave us with major challenges to enjoying our sex lives—including flashbacks, disassociation, post-traumatic stress disorder, and just plain fearfulness.

People who have survived trauma, especially as children, have particular vulnerabilities and may feel unsafe or violated more easily than most. A trigger response may have been learned, and an individual may be responding to a relatively modest offense as if it were the terrible thing that may have happened in the past, or as if they were still the child that they were when they were abused. The fear may appear unrealistic or disproportionate to outsiders, but thats not the point—the fear itself is real, usually doesnt feel sexy at all, and may leave the person so panicky that discussion, or even hearing an apology, may be impossible at that time.

Dont give up! Your therapist author Dossie specializes in healing old wounds for trauma survivors and is happy to announce that many people find ways to deal with their history of violation, take care of themselves when painful memories show up, succeed in reclaiming ownership of their bodies, and enjoy a free and happy sexuality.

Sometimes all it takes is a little collaboration about safety, establishing clear agreements about boundaries, creating safe space, and being supportive and understanding. Survivors and partners alike need to be willing to deal with the interruption if a person needs to stop and recover from a bad memory, even if that happens in the middle of sex. We hope you will be patient with yourself if this is your situation, because being kind to yourself and your partners can become the practice that heals you.

The information about taking care of yourself around triggers that youll read in chapter 15, "Roadmaps through Jealousy," is also applicable when you decide to deal with other emotional landmines. If you have a partner who is struggling with reclaiming their sexuality from an ugly history of violence, we hope that you will choose to become an ally in that struggle and find the patience to support the work that needs to be done to claim a joyous sexuality. Check Further Reading for some good resources about healing sexual trauma.

For Those Who Have Been Accused

If youve done something that has left a partner feeling traumatized, you have a different problem. Our natural tendency when we are accused of doing something wrong is to get very defensive and really want to tell our side of the story. But if the people who used to like you well enough to have sex with you are now angry with you and clamoring for your hide, you might want to look around and see if theres anything youd like to change in your behavior.

You may have been taught that "getting laid" is about getting away with something. From that point of view, having an active sexual life may look like consumerism: how much can you acquire, with how little effort? Does that mean that your lover, or potential lover, is a commodity? Having learned this doesnt necessarily make you a problem, but acting on it certainly will.

How would you go about making changes in yourself? And later, how will you let people know that you have done some work on yourself and its now safe to welcome you back?

If you are in this situation, please remember to retain your sense of yourself as a whole person. Behavior that may have frightened or hurt another is a part of you, and you have many parts. Take a little time to reflect on your own strengths and sense of ethics. How do you want to use your strength? What can you do that is in line with your ethics?

For Everyone

Here are some strategies that we know _dont_ work:

_Pathologizing_. This refers to turning a response or reaction into a disease, as if labeling it were a sort of antibiotic. Is this person a predator, a sociopath, a victim of Stockholm syndrome, a victim of the patriarchy? (Pretty much all of us act like all of these on occasion.) Are we rape apologists if we dont immediately ostracize the offender? When we define a problem as a disease, we often act as if a diagnosis were a solution: paste on a label and then end the discussion as if weve accomplished something. But then nothing ever changes.

_Splitting_. This is a psychological defense in which a person tries to feel safe by presuming that the good guys are all good—so if any part of some person is not good, then that person must be all bad and needs to be permanently exiled, with no accommodation for change or growth. Splitting can divide whole communities, with everyone choosing up sides rather than asking what they might do to make things better.

_Truth seeking_. In many of these problems, there is one person saying "So-and-so did me wrong, hurt me, caused me pain or damage," and the other is insisting that the person who is upset with them is making it up, getting revenge, or really wanted it. So who do we believe? It is going to take courage to try and find solutions when we cant determine the absolute truth of the problem. We must understand that we are a community, not a criminal justice system, and our actions need to be about whatever we can do at this time, with the resources we have today, to make this situation a little better.

_Blaming_. Whose fault is this? Who did what to who first? Very few of us actually blame ourselves: we all have ways of rationalizing and reasons why our behavior is justifiable. But when we try to feel safe by minimizing our own involvement and blaming someone else, then we disempower ourselves. We give the "other" all the power by saying that only they can make things better. Many people, acutely uncomfortable at hearing about how a person has been violated, distance themselves by finding some reason to blame the victim: looking too sexy, drinking too much, what did you expect if you want a kind of sex thats more extreme than most? And just to make things more confusing, what feels like violation to one person might be easy for another, and a third may see it as play and delight in it.

But there are a number of conflict resolution strategies that we find helpful to draw on. A marvelous body of wisdom is emerging from efforts to teach emotional intelligence and restorative justice in some American high schools and middle schools. Students in these programs are being trained to be peer counselors and peacekeepers, to intervene in conflicts that might become violent or otherwise destructive. Many studies have measured very positive results, even in "difficult" schools, as a result of these trainings, both in reduction of fights and suspensions and in increases in the percentage of students who graduate.

Some schools now have a quiet room where kids who were causing trouble can sit at a desk to write down their answers to questions like these: "What happened?" "What was my part in it?" "What can I do to make it better?" "What can I do to make it less likely to happen again?" Perhaps when there is an issue about sexual boundaries, we can ask ourselves these same questions—"victim" and "villain" alike—and see whether that leads to a more productive dialogue.

Back in the protest era of the 1960s, we used to say, "When you dont want to be part of the problem, you need to become part of the solution." Resources to support change happen all over the world, and we need to adapt them to our sex-positive communities: nonviolent communication workshops, anger management classes, conflict resolution classes, self-defense classes where you can practice clarifying your "no," support groups for offenders and survivors, and more.

We approve of communities that offer new members information on ethics and boundaries in their community, and we also know that rules alone will never be enough. We need to be willing to enter into an ongoing process that addresses these issues and supports change and healing and growth, each of us contributing what we can and expecting to continue indefinitely in the process of navigating consent and boundaries. We do have a right to insist that people prone to bullying, limit pushing, and other problematic behaviors go learn what they need to learn—take a workshop or a class, join a group working on changing compulsive or antisocial behaviors, get a therapist, get sober—before they can earn their way back into our communities.

We cant prevent every problem, but we can create a sex-positive culture that deals proactively and constructively with the problems we face rather than sweeping them under the rug out of shame.

Clean Love

Can you imagine love without jealousy, without possessiveness—love washed clean of all its clinginess and desperation? Lets try.

We can take some thoughts from Buddhism: What would it be like to love without attachment, to open our hearts to someone with no expectations, loving just for the joy of it, regardless of what we might get back?

Imagine seeing the beauty and virtues of a beloved and letting go of how their strengths might meet our needs or how their beauty might make us look better.

Imagine seeing someone in a clean light of love—without enumerating the ways in which that person does and does not match up to the fantasy we carry around of our perfect mate or dream lover.

Imagine meeting another person in the freedom and innocence of childhood and playing together without plotting how to make this person give us the kind of love we wish we could have gotten in our actual childhood.

But…but…but. What if you open your heart to someone, and you dont like what happens next? Suppose that person gets drunk or treats your open affection with scorn? What if this person doesnt fulfill your dreams? What if this one turns out just like the last one? Suppose all those things do happen. What have you lost? A little time, a brief fantasy. Let it go, learn from it, and walk away a little wiser.

Love doesnt much take to being stuffed into forms, which is what everybodys fantasies and imaginings are: custom-built plans for a constructed individual theyve created to solve all their problems. Your authors have dream lovers, too—but people are not made of clay or stone, and it wont work well to approach them with a chisel.

How many times have you rejected the possibility of love because it didnt look the way you expected it to? Perhaps some characteristic was missing you were sure you must have, some other trait was present that you never dreamed of accepting. What happens when you throw away your expectations and open your eyes to the fabulous love that is shining right in front of you, holding out its hand?

Clean love is love without expectations.

Washing your love clean doesnt require advanced spirituality or weekly psychoanalysis. Youll probably never let go of every single attachment—at least weve never managed it. But maybe you can let go just for an instant: your history, worries, frets, and yearnings will still be there to come back to when you need them. Just for now, take a look at the wonderful person who is standing right in front of you.