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3 Gorgeous Sex-Related Aesthetics I Admire

Kate Sloan
All images in this post were assembled using UrStyle

When I think of fetish aesthetics, I think of Bettie Page, and of the SuicideGirls. Although these two cultural phenomena hit their peaks decades apart from one another, I think it’s obvious that the SuicideGirl aesthetic was very much influenced by Bettie Page and other midcentury fetish models, and we also see these influences in aesthetics associated with pro dom(me)s and even with the later mania centering around Fifty Shades of Grey.

Sharp nails, sharp heels, sharp eyeliner wings – these are just some of the elements I associate with this type of look. One of the reasons it feels so transgressive is that women’s style is traditionally “supposed to” be subdued, soft, and conventionally feminine. When we incorporate elements that feel tougher, stronger, and scarier – think Sandy at the end of Grease – it can come across as threatening to traditional Western gender roles and even to Western conceptions of heterosexuality as a whole. For many of us, that transgression is exactly what is so appealing and sexy about this type of look.

Obviously the idea of a “sex worker aesthetic” is a problematic oversimplification, since sex workers are not a monolith by any means; even to break down the category of sex workers further and argue that, for instance, escorts in London have a particular sartorial style would be wrong, because they’re all individual human beings with individual aesthetics.

That being said, there are some stylistic elements that are often associated with sex workers in the popular imagination, whether or not these associations are accurate. Some of these come from Hollywood depictions (think Vivian’s thigh-high black leather boots in Pretty Woman) and some come from actual sex workers (such as the pops of red and pink often found in the looks of MF Akynos, founder of the Black Sex Worker Collective). Leather, leopard print, sky-high heels, and fishnets are just some of the stylistic elements commonly associated with sex workers, though of course one’s outfit selections will depend largely on geographic location, weather, the type(s) of sex work being performed, any safety concerns that may limit style choices (including the likelihood of being targeted by police), the type of clientele one is likely to have, and other such factors.

When I did online sex work of various sorts and was briefly a sugar baby, I enjoyed reflecting on the aesthetic legacies of sex workers, and incorporating elements into my look that I associated with them in order to subtly reference those who came before. Obviously these looks can be incredibly powerful and sexy, and they – like sex work itself – have a fascinating history.

Sundresses have come to be discussed as symbols of sexuality in and of themselves over the past few years; “getting railed in a sundress” has become a widespread idea and many women-attracted and/or femme-attracted people rejoice about the start of “sundress season” each year.

If kinky and sex work-influenced aesthetics are conceptually based around transgression, danger, and perversion, I think there’s a certain variety of sundress sexiness that is more about (the illusion of) innocence, inexperience, and immaturity. I don’t mean the fetishization of actual children, which is of course not okay, but rather the fetishization of a certain play-acted naïveté that is seen as feminine, youthful, and fun, but still quite adult in its manifestation.

The vibe, to my mind, is “getting fucked at a picnic,” or maybe “what if the Garden of Eden was a porn scene.” Pretty ideal aesthetic, if you ask me.

 

This post contains a sponsored link. As always, all writing and opinions are my own.

Review: AcmeJoy 3-in-1 Rabbit

Kate Sloan

What is the AcmeJoy 3-in-1 rabbit?

Okay, technically its name is the AcmeJoy 3-in-1 7 Vibrating Modes Rabbit G-Spot Stimulator Anal Dildo Vibrator, but I won’t be calling it that, obviously.

This toy is essentially a standard rabbit vibrator – vibrating shaft with a G-spot curve, fluttery bunny ears for clitoral stimulation – but with an added arm for anal penetration, so it stimulates three erogenous zones at once.

Triple-stimulation toys are always a bit, shall we say, ambitious. Given how many toys only attempt to do one thing and still fail at it, it’s a confident move – almost cocky – for a sex toy company to make a toy that they claim can do three things well. Can AcmeJoy rise to the challenge?

 

Things I like about this toy

  • There are two separate motors in this rabbit. Many dual- or triple-stim vibes only have one motor, trusting that the vibrations will travel throughout the toy to stimulate all the zones it targets, but those toys usually fall short power-wise, and it’s annoying not being able to control the components separately. By contrast, this AcmeJoy rabbit’s two motors can each be controlled individually, using their respective buttons. The motors are located in the clitoral arm and the vaginal arm; the anal arm doesn’t get its own motor, which I think was the right call, because the vibrations are easily conducted through the anal arm as-is and it probably would’ve been overkill to add a third motor.
  • The motor in the vaginal arm is surprisingly strong and even kind of rumbly. I would place it at a 4.5 out of 10 on the rumbly-to-buzzy scale, at least on its first setting; it gets buzzier as you turn it up. I found that the vaginal arm actually felt really good when I tried it out clitorally, for this reason, and it also felt excellent vaginally because the lower-pitched vibrations stimulated my G-spot/internal clit without numbing them out or irritating them with buzziness.
  • I don’t normally care for vibration patterns, but the ones in the vaginal arm of this toy are actually great. There are various types of pulsing which can all feel surprisingly similar to someone thrusting against my G-spot. Despite the disappointments of the clitoral motor (more on that below), these vaginal vibration patterns were so stimulating that this toy could theoretically get me off on a particularly sensitive day, even though I normally need top-tier clitoral stimulation for that.
  • The vaginal arm’s G-spot curve is well-designed. It reminds me of the Lelo Mona (which is excellent), its big head pressing up into my spot insistently but not annoyingly or aggressively. It feels good when kept in one place but can feel fantastic when it’s being thrusted.
  • On that note, this is a rabbit that I found works surprisingly well for thrusting, albeit only with short and relatively deep thrusts (the kind I tend to prefer anyway). The clitoral arm has some flex to it, as do the rabbit ears topping it off, so it moves with my body when I thrust – and the anal beads feel awesome as they move in and out, adding significant stimulation into the mix. I’m not normally the biggest fan of double penetration, as it can be overwhelming or uncomfortable, but it works well here, even with motion involved.
  • Related: One of the reasons I don’t usually like double penetration is that it makes me feel overstuffed down there, which makes it hard to focus on vaginal or anal pleasure. But the internal arms of this toy are well-shaped and well-proportioned (for my body, anyway) so I don’t experience any of that “Thanksgiving turkey” overstuffedness. The anal arm starts out at a diameter of about 0.55″ and is only about an inch at its widest, so it’s beginner-friendly and was comfy for me despite me not using anal toys super often.
  • Usually with double-penetration toys, it’s hard to figure out which order to insert the arms in – do you go vag first, butt second, or vice-versa? This difficulty can be compounded by a floppy anal arm writhing around as you’re trying to insert it. But those problems aren’t present here – the anal arm is firm enough to be inserted easily, but still flexible enough to feel comfortable, and it never took me more than a few seconds to slip it into my ass once the vaginal arm was already inside me. (You just gotta use a lot of lube on both arms, but that’s par for the course, especially with anal toys.)
  • Speaking of lube, the “beads” of the anal arm hold onto lube pretty well, so it doesn’t drip all over the place when I’m getting the toy ready for insertion. (I use a thick-ish water-based lube, though, so your mileage may vary if you’re using a thinner/runnier formula.)
  • I had no issue getting the clitoral arm to actually reach my clit, which is frequently a problem with other rabbits. The flexibility of that arm no doubt helped with this. Actually I found that the rabbit’s head, moreso than its ears, usually landed on my clit, but that’s fine with me and probably even feels better for my pleasure preferences.
  • The buttons are well-placed, intuitively organized, and can’t easily be pressed by accident. They also light up when the toy is on, so you can find them in the dark.
  • When you first turn the toy on, only the vaginal motor is engaged – you have to manually turn on the clitoral motor if you want to use it. I actually prefer this, because it works well for a warm-up; I can still feel the vibrations from the vaginal arm traveling through to the clitoral arm even when the clit motor is off, so it’s a good tease before I’m ready to use full-fledged vibrations on my clit.

 

Things I don’t like about this toy

  • My main complaint is that the clitoral motor kinda sucks. It’s not awful, but it’s definitely not as strong as the vaginal motor and is noticeably buzzier as well. I get that you have to pick your priorities, power-wise, when designing a multi-function sex toy, because motors only have so much power available to them – but IMO clitoral stimulation is more important for most people (and the research bears this out) so I’d prefer if companies allocated more power to the clitoral motor in these sorts of toys, if they have to choose one component to privilege in that way.
  • Relatedly, each motor has only 3 steady speeds of vibration before it switches to patterns – and while this doesn’t bother me on the vaginal arm because I actually prefer the patterns, I always find myself wishing there were more clitoral speeds and that the jumps between the existing speeds were less huge. It’s jarring, especially with the vibrations being buzzy.
  • When I angle the vibe so that its vaginal arm makes the best contact with my G-spot, the anal arm tends to slide out of me. This is a pretty predictable hazard of triple-stimulation toys: it’s really hard (if not impossible) to design a toy that will hit these 3 different erogenous zones regardless of anatomical differences between users, like the distance from the clit to the vaginal opening, or from the vag to the butthole.
  • It’s only splashproof, not waterproof.

Final thoughts

I was surprised by how close the AcmeJoy 3-in-1 rabbit got me to coming. Its blend of rumbly internal vibration patterns, consistent clitoral contact during thrusting, and extra-stimulating anal beads is… a lot, in a good way.

The problem is the clitoral motor, which is (for me, and many others) the most important part of a toy like this, and often the part that turns out to be a letdown. It needs to be stronger, rumblier, and to have a wider range of settings with smaller jumps between them.

But aside from that, this is pretty close to the ideal triple-stimulation rabbit, so it’s worth considering if that’s an intriguing idea for you. Especially at its current sale price of $27.99, I think it’s a good deal for how much sensation it serves up. You’d probably like it more than I did if you’re really into G-spot stimulation and/or anal play and find those activities stimulating enough on their own, or with minimal clit stim. ‘Cause let’s be honest, the clitoral bunny on this vibe is really not pulling its weight.

 

This post was sponsored, meaning I was paid to write a fair and honest review of the product. As always, all writing and opinions are my own.

Sex Work is Work

Kate Sloan
Part of a display at the Leather Archives & Museum in Chicago

What with increasingly puritanical laws like SESTA/FOSTA jeopardizing the livelihoods of sex workers on a daily basis, there’s a lot of discourse these past few years about the validity of sex work as a profession. I think people on both sides are arguing with (what they think are) good intentions, but one side is just flat-out wrong.

See, one of the primary arguments against sex work is that it’s inherently exploitative and bad for society because “selling your body” is somehow more evil, less virtuous, and less valid than other types of work. Critics often make the case that someone can’t freely enter into sex work and agree to “defile” their body in that way because there are inherently a lot of financial (and sometimes social) pressures that push them into that work.

The thing is, a lot of these anti-sex work bigots (or SWERFs – sex worker-exclusionary radical feminists) are either operating from a deeply religious and archaic ideological framework, or don’t even realize how much Christian values have seeped into their thinking. I know this because they hold sex to a different standard than any other activity one might be paid to do, and there’s no reason it needs to be viewed that away aside from the fundamentally Christian belief that sex is somehow simultaneously sacred and special, and taboo and dirty.

If making money using one’s body is what you have an issue with, you’d need to be equally angry with athletes, actors, dancers, personal trainers, lifeguards, models, etc. etc. in order for that position to be ideologically consistent. If you consider “taking something into your body” to be an act so sacred that no one can willingly do it for a living, you should be yelling at food critics and circus fire-eaters too. If you think “inserting part of yourself into someone else’s body” isn’t valid work, why aren’t you harassing surgeons? If touching someone for the purposes of pleasure and relaxation crosses a line for you, why aren’t you mad at masseuses, acupressure specialists, and manicurists?

Some of these examples are a bit ridiculous, sure – but that’s because the arguments they’re refuting are ridiculous too. For me, the wildest thing about anti-sex work criticism is that it points out some of capitalism’s fatal flaws, but rarely goes so far as to actually criticize capitalism – largely because many such critics are well-off, conservative-leaning people who benefit from, and advocate for, capitalism’s deepest inequalities. These people will say that no one can truly consent to a job they take due to financial pressures, that sex work is inherently bad because it’s exploitative and can be dangerous, that it’s gross that someone can pay to access someone else’s body – but all of these are problems with capitalism itself, and not with sex work in particular. If you truly believe financial pressures should be eliminated so everyone can make free choices about what they do with their time, advocate for socialism and a universal basic income. If you think no one should be subject to exploitation and danger at their job, advocate for better worker protections and higher pay. If you think having a lot of money shouldn’t give someone control over other people’s bodies, maybe take that up with Jeff Bezos, for starters.

Humans are prone to trying to come up with “logical” explanations for feelings we hold deep in our gut – and far too often it’s immoral, insulting, dishonest, and ineffective. It’s the reason bigots argue that queer and trans people are the downfall of society, when they actually just think queer and trans people are icky. It’s the reason some racists will argue that they have valid reasons for their prejudices, when actually they’re just propagating the racist values they were raised with and chose not to challenge. And it’s the reason lobbyists and lawmakers would rather make sex workers’ lives harder and more dangerous by, say, banning online sex work platforms, like the Craigslist personals section, Backpage, and escortsliaison.com on the basis of “protecting vulnerable people,” rather than admit that those people either need a different kind of help or don’t need “help” at all.

I’ve only dabbled in some forms of sex work, but even I have encountered these shaming narratives, so I know that people more entrenched in the field are struggling and suffering needlessly under the oppressive weight of discrimination. Sex work is work, and as with all other kinds of work, it can only be done safely if there are proper protections in place for workers, which in this case includes having access to websites that allow them to find and screen clients. And as with all other kinds of work, sometimes it’s freely chosen and sometimes it’s chosen out of financial necessity, and neither is more valid than the other, since we live in a capitalistic system and financial pressures are built into our daily lives by design. If your issue is the danger, take it up with the conservative lawmakers making sex work more dangerous. If your issue is financial hardship, take it up with the conservative lawmakers creating those conditions. And if your issue is just that you think sex work is icky, take it up with your therapist, and leave sex workers the hell out of it.

 

If you want to help sex workers, consider donating to sex workers’ rights organizations like SWOP Behind Bars and Red Light Legal, advocating for sex workers’ rights to your local politicians/lawmakers, and even just donating directly to individual sex workers. This post contains a sponsored link; as always, all writing and opinions are my own.

Review: Acmejoy Lolita

Kate Sloan

I was suspicious of the Acmejoy Lolita from the start, because it’s repeatedly described on its product page as being suitable for beginners.

Granted, it’s not inherently wrong to describe a sex toy as beginner-friendly – I certainly do it pretty often. But when I say that about a toy, what I tend to mean is that it will give beginners an introduction to sex toys (or to a particular category of sex toy) that is both user-friendly and pleasurable. I’ve heard from far too many people who gave up on sex toys after trying one bad one, and so I recommend certain toys to beginners the same way I’d tell a friend to start with my favorite episode of a TV show I wanted them to watch. I want their first impression to be positive and enjoyable, and for them to not feel alienated by it.

But all too often in the sex toy industry, when a toy is described as beginner-friendly, what that means is: It has a friendly and unintimidating aesthetic, but produces weak sensations. There’s an assumption being made that sex toy newbies are far more sensitive than long-time toy users, and that therefore, a toy which might disappoint an experienced user would be just fine for a beginner. I don’t think this is true – and I think it’s insulting.

A truly beginner-friendly vibrator will have a wide range of settings, so that new users can experiment to figure out what sensations they like. It should be a toy they can enjoy right out of the box but that they can also “grow into,” if, for example, they find that they want stronger vibrations a few months down the road, or want to try using a vibe internally after only using it externally. It should be versatile, varied, and forgiving.

The Acmejoy Lolita is none of those things, sadly.

But let’s back up and start with the basics. What is this toy? The Lolita – also known as the “Baby Octopus,” which is a much more apt name, seeing as that is what it looks like – is a small clitoral stimulator with two different functions, sucking and licking. The “sucking” is pressure-wave stimulation, and the “licking” is the rapid movement of a mechanical silicone tongue.

Despite what the Lolita’s inaccurate marketing copy says (“Pleasure two of your hottest hot spots at once!”), you can’t use both of these functions simultaneously, because they are located at different places on the toy. This is a cool idea in theory – you could start with licking and escalate to sucking when you’re turned on enough, or vice-versa. It is a bit odd that both functions are always on if the toy is on (there’s only one button on the toy, which controls both functions at once), but it could be useful if you plan on switching back and forth quickly between the two functions during any given session. Two vulva-owners could also theoretically get into a scissor-ish position and each use one of the toy’s functions at once, but I think it would be challenging to get the angles right.

One other potential benefit to how this toy is designed: If you want to get “sucked” by the pressure-wave part of the toy, while looking at its little silicone tongue flapping, there is a way you can position the toy so that is possible. I sometimes found this vaguely hot, as someone who watches a lot of cunnilingus porn. 🤷🏻‍♀️

My immediate thought, upon discovering that there’s no way to only engage one function at a time, was, “Isn’t that taxing on the motor?” In my experience with low-end to mid-range dual- and triple-stimulation toys, each of the functions tends to weaken when you turn on the other functions, because the motor isn’t typically engineered well enough to keep pace when it’s doing that much at once. It’s like trying to run The Sims on an old laptop.

Indeed, I think the Lolita’s strength suffers substantially for there being no way to use the functions individually. It’s… disappointingly weak, to say the least. Both the sucking and the licking feel very surface-level and insubstantial. Like, yeah, I know they’re happening, but my clit just doesn’t care. In my testing sessions, I was barely able to get turned on, let alone get off. And that’s with weed and porn factored into the equation.

The tongue certainly felt better than the suction. It felt slightly more impactful and even felt a bit like a real tongue at times, albeit the tongue of someone who is teasing you by giving you maddeningly gentle head. The tongue slows down significantly when pressure is applied, though, so for me, this could only ever be a tease – and not a very good one, at that.

The suction is worse – its “mouth” barely encompasses any of my clit, sitting on just the very tip of it, and it doesn’t create much of a seal or generate much sensation at all. Both the sucking and licking functions have 7 intensity settings, and there’s little difference, sensation-wise, between the lowest one and the highest. Have I mentioned that this toy is weak?!

Image via Acmejoy

I have some other issues with this toy, but they’re smaller quibbles that would’ve been forgivable if not for the toy’s bigger flaws. Namely:

After you reach the 7th intensity setting, if you hit the toy’s one button again in hopes of amping up the sensations further, the toy just shuts off. NO TOY SHOULD EVER DO THIS. This is a recipe for ruined orgasms.

Because the toy is spherical, it rolls around a lot and frequently falls off my nightstand. It does come with a small plastic stand, shaped like octopus tentacles, which you can sit it on top of to circumvent this problem, but I’m just not gonna keep something like that on my nightstand all the time, so it’s often not there when I need it. The shape of the toy is also awkward to hold onto – my achy and uncoordinated hands often find it hard to press its one button – and due to its roundness and smoothness, it doesn’t stay securely in place if I try to hold it between my thighs for hands-free use.

When you plug the toy in to charge, there’s no indication that it is indeed charging. Nothing lights up or buzzes or anything. You just have to guess, and hope, and pray.

Image via Acmejoy

I don’t like writing negative reviews, but the Acmejoy Lolita just isn’t a good toy. They’re charging $45.99 for something that doesn’t even feel as good as my fingers alone. Feel free to peruse Acmejoy’s clitoral vibes section – I know for a fact that it contains some options that are way better than the Lolita, including at least one that can actually get me off. But this one ain’t it.

I think we do sex toy consumers a disservice when we say that a weak toy is the same thing as a beginner-friendly toy. I think beginners deserve better than to be condescended to, underserved, and scared off toys altogether by bad ones that didn’t need to be made. I think that if calling your toy “good for beginners” is the only way you can make it make sense, you should probably just go back to the drawing board and make a better toy. Beginners’ tastes aren’t homogeneous, and they won’t be beginners forever. Regardless of your experience level, some toys are just bad. And this, I’m sorry to say, is one of them.

 

This post was sponsored, meaning I was paid to write a fair and honest review of the product. As always, all writing and opinions are my own.

Review: Acmejoy Excellent Clitoral Sucking & Licking Stimulator

Kate Sloan

Is it just me, or is clitoral suction becoming a more and more popular theme in the worlds of both porn and sex toys lately? I feel like I’ve seen more and more discourse about it, on Reddit, in PornHub comment sections, in sex toy reviews, and so on.

I, for one, welcome this new wave of pro-suction sentiment, because it’s long been assumed (at least by toymakers and by many of the cis-het dudes I’ve hooked up with) that the oral technique preferred by most clits is some form of distanced tongue-flicking, the likes of which you might see in mainstream lesbian porn from the mid-oughts, and that’s just never done much for me. Get your whole face in there or don’t bother.

All this to say, I’m always intrigued by toys like the Acmejoy Excellent Clitoral Sucking & Licking Stimulator, toys which make use of clitoral suction in interesting ways. Let’s get into it…

 

What is the Acmejoy Excellent Clitoral Sucking & Licking Stimulator?

This toy has two functions. One of them, as mentioned, is suction – and I mean literal suction, not the pressure-wave stimulation found in toys by Womanizer, Satisfyer, etc. that can sometimes feel a bit like suction. No, this thing actually encases your clit in a little bell-shaped “mouth” and then sucks air out of the chamber created between your skin and the mouth, similarly to what a clit pump does, only not as intensely.

The other function this toy has is “licking.” There’s a little silicone tongue inside its mouth, which moves up and down rapidly to replicate a tongue-flicking feeling. There are 10 licking modes (3 steady speeds + 7 patterns) and 5 sucking modes (I’ll get into those in more detail below). The two functions can be used on their own or separately.

As with any toy that attempts to feel like oral, you’re gonna want to use a lot of (water-based) lube with this one, or it just won’t feel how it’s meant to feel.

 

Things I like about this toy

  • Well, the main thing to know is that it can actually make me come, a rare quality amongst toys that aim to simulate cunnilingus. I mean, heck, actual cunnilingus can’t consistently get me off, because my clit is a spoiled princess with very particular needs, so I don’t usually expect mechanical simulacrums of the act to be able to get me off either. The suction function’s first mode, which is the only one I enjoy (more on that in the “don’t like” section), feels remarkably similar to when my partner sucks on my clit – it’s a mode in which the suction is briefly increased, then released, at a rhythmic tempo of about 84 beats per minute. This is definitely the main thing that got me off, as the licking function is just okay, not great (for my particular body, anyway), while the suction not only boosts my arousal by pulling more blood into my clit, but also physically strokes it, as the toy’s “mouth” narrows and widens slightly around my clit with every suck. I found that I could get off after just a few minutes of using this toy, provided I found the right angle/placement and paired it with cunnilingus-based fantasies or porn. Yay, orgasms!
  • Each of the toy’s two functions can be controlled separately, which is great because sometimes I want to turn up the intensity of the licking while leaving the suction on the same mode, or vice-versa.
  • The “licking” is cool – the tongue actually physically moves up and down, rather than just vibrating, so it can create a somewhat authentic licking sensation when well-lubed, although it’s way faster than most humans would be able to lick.
  • The variety of licking patterns available is surprisingly good – there are steady rhythms at various paces, and some modes that ramp up gradually in speed. A lot of these modes feel akin to what an actual human might do with their tongue, albeit much more standardized/robotic.
  • The toy is well-shaped and sized – it feels relatively ergonomic to hold and to operate, feels neither too heavy nor insubstantially light, and can easily be held between my thighs if I want to use it hands-free.
  • I love that they chose to go with a large, wide mouth, unlike some pressure-wave toys which have tiny little nozzles that can only fit the tip of a small-to-medium-sized clit. This toy will fit a much wider array of clit sizes than those toys will; I even think it would fit many transmasculine folks’ testosterone-expanded anatomy. Inclusivity is a good thing!
  • At only $34.99, I think this toy is reasonably priced for the quality of its construction and design. It’s one of the least expensive cunnilingus simulators I might actually recommend to a reader or friend.

 

Things I don’t like about this toy

  • My biggest issue with this toy is that there is only one suction setting that is steadily rhythmic, the way I tend to want my clit sucked. The second mode is just steady, unbroken suction – good for if you are trying to get yourself turned on, or just want to focus on the licking without being distracted by rhythmic suction. The other suction modes are either sporadic/erratic or just way too slow for me to even dream of getting off with. It was frustrating to wish, at levels of high arousal, that there was a faster or firmer rhythmic suction setting to help get me over the edge more easily and more pleasurably.
  • The “tongue” is not positioned where I want it to be positioned. It’s located low in the mouth of the toy, which I guess makes sense because human tongues are located on the bottom of the mouth. But this means that it ends up flicking upward onto the exposed tip of my clit, which is way too sensitive for that kind of treatment, rather than downward onto my clitoral hood, the way I prefer to be stimulated. The tongue is also pretty short, and not angled toward where my clit tends to sit when the mouth is positioned where the suction feels best for me, so there were a lot of times during testing when the tongue wasn’t making contact with my clit at all.
  • When the tongue does make contact with my clit, I find that it slows down significantly when any pressure is applied, sometimes to the point that it feels like it’s stopped completely.
  • There’s an “exhaust” hole on the back of the toy, where the air that’s been sucked out of the mouth is expelled. I asked my Twitter followers if anyone had the physics expertise to comment on this, and they don’t think covering this hole is dangerous to the user – it just seems to weaken the suction and stress out the motor, if anything. But I do find it annoying that the hole is positioned in a place where you could easily accidentally cover it with your fingers while holding the toy.
  • There’s no quick-release button for the suction, which is a safety issue. If I turn the toy off at a moment when the suction is at its height, it just… stays that way… which some people might enjoy in some situations, but which becomes a problem if, say, your toy dies mid-use and you have to figure out how to get it off of you. (Lube could help, but I still think all suction toys should have a manual quick-release button.)
  • Having to cycle through all of a function’s 5-10 modes using only one button is as annoying as it always is, i.e. very.
  • The toy is only IPX5 waterproof, meaning that you can wash it briefly in the sink but can’t take it in the bath. I like bathtub masturbation so this always disappoints me.

 

Final thoughts

When testing this toy, I made the note, “If this was a nicer version of itself, I would use it a lot.” I know that sounds silly – isn’t that true of most toys?! – but what I mean is, this toy gives me a glimpse of what it could feel like if it was designed and engineered better, and I deeply wish that that version of the toy existed, because as-is, it feels just good enough to get me off.

I found that there were simply too many annoyances and issues for me to really feel relaxed while using it, plus I kept wanting to be able to increase the speed or intensity of the suction and then remembering there is only one steadily rhythmic suction mode. It’s like having a partner who’s incredibly good at cunnilingus… except that they can only do it at one moderate speed/intensity and never escalate their efforts as you get closer to coming. Like, yeah, I can get off that way, eventually, but it’s not gonna happen as easily or feel as good.

I would be more than willing to pay upwards of $80 for a toy that did what this toy does, but had more suction modes, a better-placed tongue, a motor that can stand up to pressure, and an exhaust hole that won’t constantly get in my way. Since this toy only costs $35, I’d say that if my description of it intrigued you, and you’re on the more sensitive side of the spectrum, it’d be worth a shot. But it’s just not quite what I wanted it to be… although maybe that’s because I really just wanted it to feel like my partner’s mouth, and I think the technology has still got a long ways to go before that’ll be possible.

 

This post was sponsored, meaning I was paid to write a fair and honest review of this product. As always, all writing and opinions are my own.