“In a better reality, sexuality would be understood as a fundamental part of human existence, its good inherent and not dependent on how it can be leveraged. Why? Because pleasure is a good thing. We should all feel more of it when we can. And sex, for many people, is a source of a uniquely wonderful range of pleasurable feelings – physical, emotional and spiritual.
It’s a simple concept, but in a society so disordered and divided when it comes to sex, it’s a radical one. Sex should feel good. Maybe that means candles and a rose-petal-filled bathtub. Maybe it means restraints and role-play. Maybe it means feeling gorgeous when you live in a body that advertisers tell you is ugly or wrong. Maybe it means having sex with someone of the same gender. Maybe it means feeling great about not having sex at all.
Pleasure-centered sexuality means that sex doesn’t have to come with self-loathing or anxiety; sex doesn’t have to be performative or even “normal”.”
+ Solo Poly talks about “friends with benefits” versus “dating” and how even though some people use friends with benefits to mean “person I am embarrassed to be seen with / might drop at a moment’s notice / do not actually value as a human being” writing off the term entirely is limiting:
“I’d allowed other people’s bad behavior and prevailing social norms to color my thinking about an entire category of intimate relationship — one that, in fact, I’ve been engaging in and enjoy quite well. By resisting that term, I was effectively cockblocking myself, reducing my options for mutually beneficial intimate connections.
The fact is, people can behave badly in ANY style of relationship. So if I choose to say “FWB” it’s up to me to make sure I walk my talk about the “friends” part. Also I make it clear to those partners: if they decide that, because we’re giving each other orgasms, they’re entitled to treat me disrespectfully — we’re done.”
“We shot from 11 am to 6pm. I literally orgasmed for 7 hours. We set up two cameras for each orgasm position – a tight pussy shot and a wide body shot. I looked right at the camera and described how I was stimulating my body…what I was feeling…why orgasm was important to me. I was panting – out of breath – sweating from head-to-toe. At one point, I just collapsed on the floor. Lawrence grabbed the camera and ran it down my body. I shared how my fingers and toes were tingling. The camera panned to my pussy to document my erection…the reddening of my labia and plumping of my clitoris.
It was so intimate. It was so pure. It’s the most honest work I’ve ever done.”
“Just like when I came out first as gay, then as trans, and then finally as queer parts of me and my behavior that were viewed either by me or by others as strange all of a sudden had an explanation. I’M A SERVICE-ORIENTED SUBMISSIVE AND A MASOCHIST! What that clarity felt like was AMAZING. Now, fast forward to three years ago. I was at a play party and a couple of friends of mine were about to start playing with someone else. Among their arsenal of toys was a hockey stick. As I chatted with my friends I became curious of said hockey stick so one of my friends asked the person bottoming if I could hit her with it. She said okay so my friend asked me to hit her with the stick. I ended up hitting this girl with the wrong end. I found the moment amusing for sure but after being told of the error I’d made, I sheepishly walked away from them. To this day my friends cite that moment as a clear sign of my being a switch and it makes sense now because I like to consensually hurt people. It’s fun for me to hear the scream that comes as a result of something I’ve done but for years since that hockey stick incident, I denied at every opportunity that I was a sadist not because I had any shame of my desire to inflict pain, but because in my mind, I didn’t fit what a sadist should be like. I’m not big, mean, or particularly strong; I don’t wield giant floggers or long single tails; I’m not particularly mean when I play (at least I don’t think I am); and I don’t carry giant bags of equipment to play parties. Those signs were what for a long time indicated to me that someone was a sadist and since I’m not any of those things I just described, there’s NO WAY I can be a sadist, right?”
+ England, China, Iran and Saudi Arabia now restrict access to online porn, and Denmark, Iceland, Norway and Sweden seem to be facing a similar public effort. It is unclear what this means for other countries, but its pretty clear that porn bans are band-aid non-solutions to underlying problems:
“Porn seems like an easy target when compared to the deeper, more institutional problems women and children face. How are we to deal with the widespread domestic violence that wracks families everywhere and is compounded by the never-ending recession, the new economic normal? How are we to end sex trafficking? And what about all those girls and women who experience sexual violence, including date rape, at the hands of a partner?
Porn invokes people’s worst sexual fears/fantasies. Yet, it’s a fight almost impossible to win. Anti-porn activists are unsettled by the enormous increase and easily availability of porn (especially “hard-core or “gonzo” porn). They claim such porn harms women and children, contributing directly to gender inequality, violence against women and children and sex trafficking. This assertion is much debated. It’s not been made clear how restricting porn will put a stop to the actions that harm all too many women and girls in America.”
All of the photographs on NSFW Sundays are taken from various tumblrs and do not belong to us. All are linked and credited to the best of our abilities in hopes of attracting more traffic to the tumblrs and photographers who have blessed us with this imagery. The inclusion of a photograph here should not be interpreted as an assertion of the model’s gender identity or sexual orientation. If there is a photo included here that belongs to you and you want it removed, please email bren [at] autostraddle dot com and it will be removed promptly, no questions asked.
Ryan Yates was the NSFW Editor (2013–2018) and Literary Editor for Autostraddle.com, with bylines in Nylon, Refinery29, The Toast, Bitch, The Daily Beast, Jezebel, and elsewhere. They live in Los Angeles and also on twitter and instagram.
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For Them & Autostraddle exist to fill the gap in a world that overlooks queer and trans needs, offering products and media that honor expansive identities and celebrate authentic self-expression.
Autostraddle & ForThem valiantly aim to produce top-tier media and products for queer and trans people overlooked by the mainstream. Join today to support an inclusive, expansive future.
For Them & Autostraddle exist to fill the gap in a world that overlooks queer and trans needs, offering products and media that honor expansive identities and celebrate authentic self-expression.
