Check out the beautiful work by Mark Henson:

He breathtakingly describes the sacred sexual dance. Thank you Mark!


Mark Henson's Temple Erotica

quotes

"But seduction isn’t making someone do what they don’t want to do. Seduction is enticing someone into doing what they secretly want to do already."
-Waiter Rant

"Through the body we are seeing something of the soul and therefore the mystery of life itself. The compulsive aspect of sexual gazing betrays the fact that our looking is not deep enough. When we honor a holy icon we know we're in the presence of the numinous. But in our secular society we have lost an explicit awareness of the sanctity of sex. We think of it in purely human terms, as far from religion as possible and therefore our looking is not right. Our sexual gaze is full of numinosity, but we have no language or artful ritual for this kind of veneration"
-Thomas Moore, 'Soul of Sex'

"If our elaborate and dominating bodies are given us to be denied at every turn, if our nature is always wrong and wicked, how ineffectual we are - like fishes not meant to swim."
-Cyril Connolly

over and underwhelmed

I have been absent from the blogging world for awhile. Lack of desire has not been the reason, just a lack of afflatus. I have been dosing my brain with scientific and historical information in regards to sexuality and I burned out. I forget that this routinely happens. It isn't so much that the subject gets too repetitive, but rather the view taken rarely differs. Frustration at the fact that most books fail to mention that we have a vital essence that is far more complex and elegant than the over prized mind and psychology of humans.
I remember when reading the book 'Sex, Time and Power' I went through a similar state of irritation. I had begun my winter book series that explored why humans were conditioned to mate for life, why we are connected to our kin, why women have so many orgasms and how gender issues came to be. It isn't that those topics aren't of interest or can't help us understand our past and present circumstances; It was that nowhere did they mention the fact that we are also the only species that have looked for God and ponder our own death and have strippers and porn stars and chaste monks.
I feel that I have been writing a bunch of stuff that, while valid, doesn't capture the full spectrum of sexuality. And what's more is that I have been reading books that don't inspire me to look through that particular scope to then feel compelled to scribe from that view. It is my desire to blog solely on the subject of sex and sexuality and have as many fingers in the pot, so to speak. It is with that desire that I have picked up one of my favored books, 'Soul of Sex' by Thomas Moore.
Upon reading the first few pages I felt like I had broken through some sort of readers block. I was back on track. Do you know what I mean when I describe the static felt? Do you feel something similar when it dawns on you that people still eat at McDonald's, or fill evangelical churches or litter? It's like something in us is still sleeping and you just want that spiritual and evolutionary alarm clock to snap them out of a coma.
But I digress.
The purpose is not to discuss WalMart shoppers and Billy Graham, it is to discuss sex and how I can do that with more authenticity. So that is what I have added to the site. Quotes and links to images that I find bring me an internal certainty or comfort that there is more to this sacred act than making a baby, having an orgasm, defining roles or garnering power.

quote of the day

"Heterosexuality is not normal, it's just common."
~Dorothy Parker

the multi ogasmic female- need we probe any furhter?

Let me preface by saying that this subject may indeed serve some higher good that I am not yet aware of.
And now...
There have been numerous studies on female orgasm, but so far as I know the secret decoder ring has yet to crack this mystery. No one can really explain why we are able to orgasm most frequently by clitoral stimulation, which does not result in insemination, or why it's not as easy or quick for us to achieve orgasm through penile penetration. Evolutionists, biological anthropologists and sexologists have put this fact through the ringer. Some say that clitoral orgasms create muscle spasms that help the seed traverse it's way to the egg. If that's so, why is the most productive way to have a clitoral orgasm during sex with a woman positioned on top of the man, which would use gravity to polarize the effect of said muscle spasm? Some say that because childbirth was the number one killer of women for most of history, we needed incentive and developed a multi orgasmic physiology. Well then why is the clitoris not in the vagina? Why were we not lesbian?
What was natures' big idea?
And since we're asking, what the hell of a use is the funny bone for? What great plan is behind being ticklish? Or that reflex thing my knee does at the doctor's, what's that doing for me? Are these beginnings of an evolutionary leap? Say, like telepathy? Probably not. So why are we so caught up with female orgasm? Finding out why we have it won't cure cancer, or end bad sex.
I suppose, for people who spent a few hundred grand in graduate programs on the subject, it's a big deal. As for me, I'm just happy to have a clitoris, G spot and cervix- in that order.
Take a look at my favorite animal- the bonobo chimp. When the females want to reproduce they approach their male mates by "backing it up" and yelping with a swollen pink vulva. Those dirty bonobos need it. It's a primal urge for life's sustenance. But when they want it- they grind their girlfriends and appear to have an orgasm. Yup it looks like we're not so special anymore; chimps have clitoral orgasms too! You can stop your research.
Evolutionists 1 creationists 0.
Of course understanding why? is very helpful...for some things. Things like orgasms I just tend too be glad I'm having.*

*I normally do take an interest in most things about sex, I just happened to have read all these "intellectual" books on the subject and none of them offer answers. So after reading yet another one this week I just kinda felt like I was being led on with no finish...which, I have come to learn, is not what I was designed to do.

'Do it' for world peace

Finally a pro peace demonstration that I can enjoy attending.
www.globalorgasm.org

quote of the day

"Sex, a great and mysterious motive force in human life, has indisputably been a subject of absorbing interest to mankind through the ages."
- William J. Brennan, Jr.

Did you know? Some sex law trivia to be used as conversation starters at holiday parties everywhere.

I wrote my senior thesis on gay marriage and the rights denied to gay and lesbian couples. This was ten years ago and I think I achieved a D on the paper, as it was too biased to be considered anthropological which maintains a non judgemental examination. I remember handing it in about half an hour after including the mornings news that Clinton had upheld and passed the law against gay marriage that had been handed down from congress. Are you kidding me? The man put a cigar into the vagina of his twenty something intern in the oval office, who is he to pass a law that governs who can get married?
But I digress. Here is the issue I want to raise; we saw this monumental shift in racial equality by electing the first African American family into the white house and then passed proposition 8. Getting angry does me no good but providing information does. Here are a list and brief summaries of laws that were upheld against sex acts and sexuality in America. They are absurd, much like Proposition 8 will seem one day.*
Contraceptives
1943 Tileston v. 1961 Ullman Poe v. Ullman- congrees upholds a law preventing the purchase of any item or medicine that would be used as a CONTRACEPTIVES.
1965 Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479- a law that passed 7-2 in congress that stated that the law against purchasing contraceptives was an invasion of a married couples privacy.
1943 Tileston v. Ullman - The law is now in place that all couples, not just married ones, can purchase contraceptives.
1977 Carey v. Population Services International- Minors under 16 years of age can now legally buy contraceptives.
MARRIAGE AND DOMESTIC PARTNERSHIP
1964 McLaughlin v. Florida,- unmarried interracial couples can now live in the same home and share the same room at night.
1967 McLaughlin v. Florida,- It is now unconstitutional to ban interracial marriages.
SEX ACTS
1976 State of Iowa v. Robert Eugene Pilcher- it is now legal to have sexual acts with someone other than one's spouse.
1977 State of New Jersey v. Saunders- it is now legal to have sex before marriage.
1982 Carey v. Population Services International, Federal District Court finds Texas Sodomy Law unconstitutional, however, Court of Appeals overturns it and holds law to be constitutional.
1986 Bowers v. Hardwick- Consensual sex acts between people of same sex can be illegal.
2003 Lawrence v. Texas,A Texas law making sodomy with same-sex partner illegal, but not with opposite sex, is unconstitutional. (This case expressly overturns the above account, Bowers v. Hardwick).
It is important to note that though some of these laws were not enforced they were still laws that could lead to prosecution and in case's like Bowers v Hardwick, they did arrest and prosecute Michael Hardwick for engaging in consensual oral sex with another man.

But I save the best for last.
Oral sex was still illegal between consenting teenagers in Georgia back in the long long ago of 2004. Poor 17 year old Genarlow Wilson got a mandatory 10 year sentence for child molestation after receiving consensual oral sex from a 15 year old girl. Thankfully the Georgia Supreme Court order Wilson's release 3 years later on the grounds that it was cruel and unusual punishment.

So go on with gratitude in your hearts for the people that had to fight for that human luxury of love, sex and the pursuit of equality.

*The whole notion of consensual crimes is ridiculous and nauseating to me. There is a great book that, though huge, is a good read if you ever decide to further educate yourself on this topic. 'Ain't Nobody's Business if You Do: The Absurdity of Consensual Crimes in a Free Society' by Peter McWilliams

The real housewives of the 1800's

If you read the piece on Athenian housewives then you must know how dreadful being a,literally speaking, kept woman was. Fast forward a thousand plus years and...well it wasn't that much better.
The Victorian age saw the rise of the middle class, the dawn of the industrial revolution and the surge of domestic servants and prostitution. During the 1800's the economic shift that replaced aristocracy with a middle class created a desire to excel in social status. Yup, it's keeping up with the Jones', and if you guys are making the same money and have the same power what can you try to out do the other in? I introduce you to gentility.
This is the time where we see a rush of books on etiquette purchased to be given to all ladies of the home and young girls. A time where the wives were to be unburdened by any form of household work, making domestic service one of the largest employments for women. The idea of educating women may have been on the horizon but it certainly was not common place. Women were still second class citizens and, for the most part, property of her husband; property, however, that was also considered somewhat untouchable. Think china doll. This is the time when women had no clue as to their anatomy, no instruction on sex or sexuality and it was a widely held belief that virtuous women were very seldom capable of full sexual desire. The modesty of a Victorian woman was so highly regarded that only during extreme cases was there to be a gynecological exam, and those were done in the dark.
SO let's see you have a wife with too much time on her hands,no responsibility, no sexual satisfaction and no education. What is a girl to do? Why shopping, gossiping and lallygagging of course (think the Bravo channels' 'real housewives of Orange county' program).
The view on sex at this time had taken another turn. Wives were thought to be intolerant of such an act like coitus and the religious theme was to have sex with your spouse only for procreational purposes (there was no sex allowed during her pregnancy and certainly not during her period). Men, on the other hand, were allowed to have sex without love or extreme passion to prostitutes, mainly as a biological release for their well being. So guess what profession jumps up in number along with domestic service?
Prostitution fills the western world and again like in old Athens (but minus the education and political influence), women see a way to make good money and have Independence, especially with no Vice squad in the police department.
Yes, Victorian housewives had a pretty dull existence, but it was the last that women would be seen as second to men and that wives would be seen as property or responsibility. This would be the time when society takes the prototype offered for thousands of years and in it's place creates dual income, marriage counseling, 'better sex for couples' books and stay at home dad's. Though we still had to get through the 1950's.

redefining sex

With an ever expanding interpretation of sex and sex acts it makes one wonder if our vocabulary definitions need an update from their puritanical origins. For instance
according to dictionary.com
To have sex means to engage in sexual intercourse.
Sodomy is defined as oral or anal copulation with the opposite sex or copulation with a member of the same sex.
Virgin is someone who has never had sex or an unmarried girl or woman.
Slut refers to a dirty or slovenly woman or an immoral and dissolute woman and or prostitute.
Interesting eh? maybe it's time to give those words a makeover especially since
Bootylicious is in there and defined as sexually attractive especially in the buttocks.

quote of the day

"Sex is a big question mark. It is something people will talk about forever."
-Catherine Deneuve

erotic art that speaks volumes

This artist has some of the most interesting and pertinent erotic art work I've ever seen.
http://vargagallery.com/Meadow.htm

quote of the day

"Sex without love is merely healthy exercise".
~ Robert Heinlein

quote of the day

"Lord, grant me chastity and continence... but not yet."
-St. Augustine

starting a sex group: the new bookclub

This summer a close friend and I were talking about sex and our sexual experiences, hang ups and what we wanted to manifest or work on. I had just purchased the domain name to my first site and I was eager to get the opinions of my friends on sex and sexuality. We talked and shared and at the end of our conversation we both felt witnessed, validated and empowered. It was soon after that we decided to make an invitation only discussion group and see if the same kind of effects could take place among a diverse group. So, that following week, a group of 10-14 people both male and female ranging in ages 20-55 , married, gay, straight, polyamourous and single were sitting in my friends home and about to emotionally strip.
That first night she and I introduced our desire to be able to discuss sex and be vulnerable and honest in talking about what we were working towards as a sexual individual or what we were trying to cease doing or thinking or feeling in regards to sex. The only rules were that you respect everyone, refrained from judging and that whatever was shared in the group stayed in the group.
I thought it might take a bit to get everyone started or feeling comfortable, but it just took off into what became a four hour talk. It was amazing to hear the stories told or attitudes felt and experiences had, with such candor and confidence. We went around the circle and had a check in. Each person had the ability to say what they were feeling; whether or not they had a rough week at work, home or elsewhere, then they stated if there was anything that they wanted to talk about in regards to sex or just state how they were doing sexually speaking.
We are a society that sells soda with an image of a woman's breasts or deodorant with a heterosexual couple in coitus and yet we do not have a comprehensive sex education that covers, not only the physical, but both the emotional and spiritual aspects of sex.
A lot of what we have learned about sex and sexuality comes from the media, our culture and our peers. With no education you have little information and unless you educate yourself it can leave you confused, uncertain or dis-empowered. Having a sex group where we could find similarity as well as opposition allowed me the opportunity to confront myself on items I had never even been aware of until they came up in group. I was no longer ignorant and therefore able to make decisions with the knowledge I had gained.
We met twice a month and occasionally invited new people to share. Most of us moved from the area and the talks ended after four months. The plan is to start another one after the holidays.
I encourage the forming of sex talks. It is a good way to deepen friendships and create a better understanding of, both yourself and individuals. It also takes the power back from societal viewpoints on sex and allows you to listen, learn and create a new, broader way of looking at sex and your sexuality.

Happy talking!

The return of porn actually

In September, with the help of a friend, I started a website called pornactually.com. My desire in starting it was to have a site about sex and pornography that was honest, confrontational, educational, humorous and titillating. We had, among other things, reviewed a conscious porn site, done a book review on fantasy and the psychological meanings behind them and had our sex and relationship counselor answer questions.
It was up on the Internet for about a month and a half and then it got hacked.
So, that sucked. The good to come out of it was that I got to start this blog; which fulfills the nerdy part of me that enjoys research and many trips to wikipedia, google and my local library. This blog allows me to review my journey by way of posts that were explored as a means to get a richer understanding of the sexual identity I inherited from my family, religion and culture.
PornActually is my way of meshing my research, studies and personal opinions and integrating it into what is happening in society, current affairs and in the sex industry that will ultimately shape the way sex will be taught, viewed and practiced, and I start working on it tomorrow.

Sex, the new health insurance plan

Sex for pleasure, stress reduction, connection, release and dental hygiene?
Follow this link to find out how you can avoid heart attacks, depression and burn off six big macs through sex.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16282622/