Tina Horn

Links & Hijinks: Murder & the Mona Lisa

Kate Sloan

• Sarah says pleasure is a form of political resistance. “Queer intimacy is revolutionary. Joyfully reveling in ourselves, each other, and our pleasure is revolutionary,” she writes. “For marginalized people, our pleasure shouts, ‘I see your violence, but you do not get to take THIS from me. My pleasure is mine, and mine alone.'”

• Carly has some great thoughts on money and abundance.

• Men discuss which women’s beauty products they use and love.

• Here’s how sexual satisfaction changes over the course of long-term relationships – and here’s how to keep passion alive.

• My friend Taylor is a delightfully brash flirt.

• Men, here’s how to listen when someone discloses their sexual assault to you. Quit #NotAllMen-ing all over important sexual assault discourse, and start actually being part of the solution.

• Interesting, scary, and sad: the shower murder scene in Psycho kickstarted a long-standing trend of sexual violence in horror movies.

• Who knew so much thought and work went into crafting Mona Lisa’s perfect smile?

• First times often suck and that’s okay. (This post also contains a li’l checklist of sexual compatibility + chemistry signs to look out for during a first hookup with a new partner, which I found super interesting and useful!)

• “These days, a good handjob is rare but delightful,” reports MEL. I love giving HJs on intact cocks, but still haven’t quite figured out how to do as good a job on circumcised ones…

• Bex wrote about their spanking birthday party, which was a damn good time.

• Have we reached peak pegging culture?

• This one hit close to home for me: how do I stop obsessing about finding love?

• Tina Horn wrote a beautiful essay on queer culture, bravery, and glitter.

• There’s a new Hollywood film about polyamorous people and it might be poly’s watershed moment.

• Lunabelle reviewed the Teddy Love vibrator (which I’ve previously reviewed) and naturally, it’s hilarious. “Normally I’m at least a little excited to try a new sex toy, but NOPE,” she writes. “Slurpy McBuzzyface and I regarded each other in awkward silence…” This piece is worth reading if just for the utter ordeal Luna endured trying to take her Teddy Love through airport security!

• Merritt wrote about fake boobs and it certainly gave me a lot of boob for thought! Er, I mean…

• A male sex worker answered some questions about his line of work (and made me want to hire a male sex worker).

• Not having as much sex with your partner as you used to? Emily Nagoski has some evidence-based suggestions.

• Some interesting writing about how trans folks’ sexual desires change when they transition.

• Bex has some tips for taking better nudes. “Having dinner with my best friend often means reporting on the selfie lighting in the restaurant bathroom when we get back,” they mention at one point. Can confirm: last time Bex was in town, we got ridiculous BBQ at a place near my apartment, and I took some lovely nudes in the bathroom on Bex’s recommendation.

• A lot of men are bad at fingering and could stand to learn some new tricks.

• Some research on where fetishes come from – a question that has haunted me the entire time I’ve been a sex nerd.

• The great Tina Horn wonders: what do we expect from sex workers on social media?

• Taylor has some advice on flying with kink toys.

• Suz is a major role model of mine when it comes to casual sex and confidence in general. Here’s her advice on how to vet a potential hookup for sexual compatibility before you have terrible, lacklustre sex.

Links & Hijinks: Sex Robots, Moneyshots, & Bart Simpson

Kate Sloan

a chair, a table, and a latte

Me: “Why did I start doing link round-up posts again?! I don’t even read that much!”

Also me: *reads a ZILLION articles, wants to share and talk about ALL OF THEM*

• The Establishment posts so much good stuff – although I will say, I am extremely biased, because they’ve published my writing on multiple occasions! I just discovered this old piece on there called Online Dating in 7 Vignettes which gave me so much poignant food for thought. It’s one of the more thoroughly philosophical pieces I’ve ever read about dating.

• Soon, sex robots will have personalities. Hilariously, one of the 12 personality traits you can choose from is “sexual,” which makes me wonder about the kind of person who would buy a sex robot and not want her to be sexual. The always-whipsmart Tracy Moore writes: “I’ll be honest, I wasn’t sure ‘sexual’ counted as a personality type in a woman, so I asked the man standing nearest to me in the MEL offices if men think it is, and he said ‘Sexual?’ and thought about it for a second. ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘Horny.'”

• Social psychology is fascinating. Here are some science-tested tips on making friends faster. The “misattribution of arousal” is one of my favorite social-psych phenomena; one day I’ll write a post about it…

• Don’t say “but” when you apologize to someone. It undermines the sincerity of what you’re trying to say. Cari Romm reports, “According to one 2014 study on the subject, a well-executed apology requires the offender to make it clear that they understand what they did wrong, take full responsibility, offer a plan to fix things, and promise to improve in the future.” So simple and yet sometimes so difficult!

• Some sex-magic practitioners weighed in on how to cast spells with your orgasms. (Years ago, I wrote a piece about this for the Numinous, if you’re interested. It is some truly crunchy/hippie/witchy stuff; you have been warned!)

• An old friend of mine started a sex blog recently and she’s been writing some fabulous, smart pieces. Her and her boyfriend tried a bunch of wacky sex positions; the ensuing post makes me want to work on my sexual acrobatics!

• The evolution of porn tropes is so interesting to me. Here’s an oral history of the moneyshot. Personally, I’m not really a fan; it turns me on most in porn when a dude’s orgasm happens inside his partner’s mouth or other various orifices, not on their face. The palette of human sexual desire is so wide and diverse!

• Ever wondered why “shrinkage” happens?

• Here’s a piece on people whose kink is giving and/or getting tattoos. I thought about this a lot while getting my kinky thigh tattoos last year. I don’t think I could ever get a tattoo that was mentally tied to a specific partner; I’ve never liked anyone enough to want to be with them for-literally-ever! But maybe someday I will…

• S. Bear Bergman has been one of my favorite writers for many years, and after the 2016 U.S. election, he wrote an advice column answering the question, “What do we do now?” He touches on political action, self-care, and countering social isolation in tough times, and he calls Trump “Pumpkin Spice Mussolini.” It’s a much-needed half-laughing pep talk for this weird and worrisome era we’re in.

• The ever-articulate Andrew Gurza wrote about his recent experiences with disability and masturbation. I admire Drew’s candidness and thoughtfulness so much!

• This article is old but I only just discovered it: a Playboy reporter interviewed the founder of the Orgasmic Meditation movement about how she gives blowjobs for her own pleasure. I am always wary of narratives which frame blowjobs as an endeavor of empowered women (including when I myself write that kind of narrative!) because they feel dangerously close to patriarchal tropes repackaged as female empowerment. But if Joanna Van Vleck genuinely gets direct pleasure from giving head (a feeling I know well), I say, more power to her.

• Here’s two of my favorite women writers in conversation: Tina Horn interviewed Alana Massey about the latter’s new book, as well as sex work, internalized misogyny, and gold glitter.

• C. Brian Smith – one of my fave writers over at MEL – hired a masturbation coach for an afternoon and wrote about his experience.

• More excellent pieces from MEL this month: why “performing partnership” on social media complicates relationships, the potential queerness of Bart Simpson, how men feel about hookup culture, saving exes’ nudes after a break-up, and saving exes’ Clone-a-Willy dicks after a break-up.

• Queer tarot wiz Carly wrote a column about how to date/flirt/socialize if you’re shy. So much useful and affirming stuff in here!

What did you love reading on the internet this month?

12 Days of Girly Juice 2016: 5 Sex-Savvy Superheroes

Kate Sloan

One of the reasons I love the sex-positive community so much is that it’s chock full of excellent mentors and role models. At 24, I am but a baby in the grand scheme of things, and there are so many people who know more than me, and have more experience than me, and have learned things the hard way so that people like me can learn them the easy way. I find that reliably comforting.

Here are five people who’ve particularly influenced my sexual evolution this year, all for the better…

14474500_776431015829192_2600787072084082688_nTina Horn. It’s surprising Tina wasn’t on my list last year, actually; she’s been one of my favorite voices in the sex-positive sphere for a long time. But this year she did so much excellent work and introduced me to so many useful new ideas and fascinating new people. In fact, two of the other folks on this list, I discovered primarily because they guested on Tina’s podcast!

Tina’s book Sexting helped me get better at that titular act, while giving me a more nuanced understanding of the theory and ethics behind it. Her writing on sexual morality, porn, and sex work is always captivating and well-crafted. And her podcast often introduces me to kinks I’ve never heard of or haven’t thought about very deeply before – like latex, fire, bootblacking, and puppy play – in discussions that are as nuanced and nerdy as the kinks themselves. Tina is certainly one of the cleverest brains in my community and I always look forward to seeing what she’ll come up with next!

cl0mlyrvyaaciocJillian Keenan. I first heard of Jillian on the spanking episode of Why Are People Into That? and was immediately taken with her: the frank way she discusses her lifelong fetish, how nerdy she gets about kink, and her brave stance that spanking your kids is sexual assault. As someone who has a spanking kink and was also nonconsensually spanked a lot as a kid, her work instantly resonated with me.

Jillian’s debut book, Sex With Shakespeare, is equal parts memoir, kink missive, and Shakespeare analysis. It tells the story of her enduring obsession with spanking through the lens of the Shakespeare geek she’s always been. Not only did this book help me dive more fearlessly and fervently into my own spanking kink; it also made me want to write more fearlessly and fervently about the stuff in my psyche that embarrasses me. If Jillian could confess her spanking fetish to her husband and the whole internet in one New York Times-sized fell swoop, surely I can write about roleplay and mental illness without cringing and blushing, right?!

cyvgqb3weaabiseAlana Massey. I truly believe Alana‘s cultural writing is some of the most important of this decade. Though she went to divinity school, she now writes about a broad range of topics: sex, love, labor, femininity, and technology, to name but a few.

Though you may or may not be familiar with her name, two of her most well-known pieces went so thoroughly viral that you’ve probably read them or at least seen them on your social media timelines. “The Dickonomics of Tinder” spelled out the central problem with men on Tinder – that hardly any of them seem willing to put in the effort to seem charming and bangable – and also popularized what has become a dating mantra among many millennial women I know: “Dick is abundant and low-value.” I reread this piece periodically when I’m bone-tired of Tinder and need a cathartic rage-laugh and some hope that good men do still exist, somewhere.

Alana also penned “Against Chill,” an impassioned defense of enthusiasm and decisiveness in a culture that seems to want us laid-back and laissez-faire. As I’ve told you before, I have no chill, so this piece resonates deeply with me each time I read it again. Some of my other favorite Alana essays are “The Unlikely Appeal of the Dick Video,” “A Woman’s Right to Say ‘Meh,’” “Feeling Lonely When You’re Single Doesn’t Mean You’re Weak,” “The Monetized Man,” and “Stop Wasting Your Time on Bad First Dates.” I wanted to limit myself to only three links in that last sentence, but I could not; Alana’s writing is too good, too thought-provoking, too perspective-shifting. She’s one of the great writers of the 21st century thus far, and I think far more people will realize that when her book comes out in 2017.

imageSarah Brynn Holliday. I met and befriended Sarah at Woodhull this year and I’m so glad our paths crossed. She’s incredibly brave and strong, a badass social justice advocate whose activism takes many forms. This year alone, she’s written about Lelo’s baffling decision to hire abuser Charlie Sheen as a condom spokesperson, sex toy safety as health justice, fatphobia in sex toy marketing, women’s right to privacy, and self-care methods that don’t require money, among other things. She’s always calling out companies when they do terrible shit, highlighting ethical companies, and centering politics in her sex blogging because the personal is political. I admire Sarah enormously.

Though there’s been a lot of debate this year about the term “BlogSquad” and who it comprises, to me, it has always simply signified sex bloggers who are dedicated to intersectional feminism, social justice, sex toy safety for consumers, and so on. Sarah’s a new-ish blogger, having started her site in mid-2015, but to me she completely embodies the goals and values that sex bloggers can exemplify when we’re at our best. I love her and her work and I can’t wait to see what she does next.

crjsy1rwcaag-neLilly. I’ve been reading Lilly’s blog since before I even started mine; she’s a stalwart of the sex blogging world. I was mildly starstruck when I met her last year at the Sexual Health Expo in New York, and I continue to be mildly starstruck every time I remember she’s my friend now.

An incomplete list of the brave, badass things Lilly has done in 2016: When she won the #1 spot in Kinkly’s annual list of top sex bloggers, she wrote about the flaws in the ranking system and why these rankings can be hurtful. She has allocated her Kinkly prize money for scholarships to help other bloggers get to Woodhull, instead of just pocketing it (which she would have been well within her rights to do, given how hard she works on her blog). She has worked to build bridges between communities of sex bloggers and values our community enormously. She’s actively using her platform to help less privileged bloggers get to sex conferences so we can all hang out and learn together.

Also, on a personal note: at Woodhull this year, there was one particular afternoon when I hung out with Lilly and Epiphora in Piph’s hotel room, and told them semi-tearfully about a romantic interest who was treating me badly at the time. They both confirmed for me that his behavior was unacceptable and that I should call him out, set some boundaries, and expect better from him in the future. It was surreal and deeply appreciated to receive romantic advice from the two sharp-tongued bloggers who made me want to start my site in the first place. I can always, always use more people in my life to remind me that I’m awesome and worthy of respect, so I’m super grateful to Lilly and Piph for the support they gave me that day.

 

Who were your sex-positive heroes, idols, and role models in 2016?

Babes, Bards, and Batterers: 3 Brief Book Recommendations

Kate Sloan

Tina Horn has one of my favorite brains in the world, as I’ve told you before. When I heard she was writing a book about sexting, I texted my best friend a mangled string of all-caps words followed by a glut of exclamation points. I can’t help it: a favorite writer of mine writing about a favorite activity of mine? Sign me up.

Simply called Sexting, the book is as straightforward and to-the-point as its title would indicate. It contains practical advice on all things sexting and sexting-adjacent, from online dating to selfie-taking to vocabulary choice to sextual aftercare.

Tina’s book is written such that a beginner to the world of sexting can pick it up and learn, but you’ll come away with some fresh tips even if you’re a seasoned sexter. I love this book and find myself referring to it time and time again!

Incidentally, it was on Tina Horn’s podcast that I first heard about this next book, Sex with Shakespeare by Jillian Keenan. Jillian is a lifelong spanking fetishist – in the true sense of the word “fetishist,” i.e. she has never had an orgasm thinking about anything but spanking. This would be interesting grounds for a memoir in and of itself, but Jillian’s also a Shakespeare nerd, so she’s interwoven her personal story with kinky analysis of the Shakespeare plays that helped her process her emotions as she came to terms with her fetish.

Prior to reading this book, I liked spanking and kinda-sorta liked Shakespeare; now that I’ve read it, I like (and understand) both a whole lot more. Jillian’s writing transports you around the world and throughout history, and you learn a whole lot about her kink and any kinks of your own on the way. Now I’m hungry for more memoirs by clever fetishists like Ms. Keenan!

I read Sex with Shakespeare on my Kindle, but there are good reasons to go analog with this tome. When I gifted Georgia a hardcover copy, she proceeded to (consensually) spank me real fuckin’ hard with it while I was bent over the arm of her sofa. Be still, my li’l kinkster heart!

I recently found out a friend of mine is chronically abusive, and cut him out of my life entirely. I’m very lucky to have been spared the majority of his abuse, but nonetheless, it was a difficult experience to process. I kept wondering: what made him do those things? Was he aware of what he did to those women, or was it inadvertent? How could I have been so blind to his tactics? Or, to put it how author and domestic abuse counselor Lundy Bancroft puts it: Why Does He Do That?

I picked up this book as research for a writing project, but it quickly became clear that I needed to read it for personal reasons, too. Learning about the mindset of abusive men helped me understand what I’ve been through, and gave me tools to analyze potential red flags I see in the behaviors of other men as well. This book is written specifically for women currently mired in relationships with abusive men, but you’ll find it interesting and affirming if abusers have ever confused or frightened you in any capacity.

 

What books have you read and loved recently? Lay ’em on me!

Interview: Tina Horn on Sexting, Style, Self-Discipline & Snuggling

Kate Sloan

tinahornI’m finding, increasingly, that my media consumption habits are based less around “What is this piece of media and what value will it add to my life?” and more around “Who created this piece of media and how much do I trust them?”

The world is full of books, podcasts, articles, and interviews on every conceivable topic. If there’s a piece of information I need to find, or a subject I want to learn about, I can do that in innumerable different places. So what matters to me more, now, is – who is imparting this information? Do I know them? Do I like them? Is their style and approach in line with what I want?

That’s why I got so excited when I heard Tina Horn was writing a book about sexting. When it comes to sexuality, she has one of my favorite minds in the biz. I love her podcast, her writing, her random and irreverent tweets. Ever since the word “sexting” burst onto the scene, every sexpert in existence seems to have shared their best tips and tricks for the medium – but I don’t trust most of their advice nearly as much as I trust Tina’s. She’s a seasoned sex pro, a clever whiz kid, and a dirty-talk aficionado. If anyone can help you up your sexting game, it’s Tina.

And indeed, the book rules. It covers everything, from the basics (how to figure out which vocabulary words turn you on! how to use OkCupid!) to the more nuanced considerations of sexting (how to get someone’s textual consent in a hot and respectful way! how to take a sexy selfie that doesn’t suck!). I consider myself a competent sexter (sextress?!), but Tina’s book made me ponder the whole activity much more thoughtfully, and I think my skillz have improved as a result.

So, I was delighted to be able to interview Tina about her book. Except, in classic sex-nerd fashion, we got a leeeetle bit off-topic because there were just so many exciting sub-tangents to delve into. Including X-rated Animaniacs fanart. Read on for the interview…!

Girly Juice: What kinds of “proto-sexting” activities did you engage in, in the early days of the internet or before that? (I was all about cybersex in ICQ chats and online roleplaying games!)

Tina Horn: I often wonder how my sexuality would have developed differently if I had not been just right age in history to be going through puberty right when we got dial-up internet in my house. Technology continues to inspire an urge for self discipline and self control in me, and maybe that has something to do with furtive, measured trips to the family desktop to talk to my internet buddies when I was 13, 14. I can remember sitting at the wooden desk in the den, madly typing, learning about the world through language divorced from identity.

I’m going to tell you about something I almost never talk about, because I hold a lot of embarrassment about this even though it’s obviously normal and quite adorable. Like I said, I was an adolescent when the Internet became a thing people had in their homes. As a child on the verge of adulthood, I just sort of assumed, oh, ok, you start to grow up and then your access to the world gets bigger. I was too caught up in my own teenage narcissism to give media a historical framework. So what did I look for online? I searched Napster for EVERY SINGLE TORI AMOS B SIDE AND REM LIVE CUT, and I looked for newsgroups about the shows I was obsessed with: The X Files, Quantum Leap, and Animaniacs.

So here’s the thing about Animaniacs. It was a show for children, but it had a very mature sensibility. It was saturated in popular culture and had this sophisticated ironic Borscht Belt humor. So I was a kid who was looking for people to talk obsessively about Animaniacs with. And the internet was filled with adults who were, shall we say, in touch with their inner child. So I spent hours and hours in IRC chat rooms and newsgroups. I think I was honest about my age and I knew there were a lot of adults and they didn’t seem to mind how young I was. I felt accepted and respected in a way I didn’t among my normal peers. Maybe my internet friends were predatory or maybe the Internet was just new to everyone and the novelty of talking to a precious child was no big deal. But eventually they started sending me links to fan porn they were writing and drawing about the cartoons we all liked. I of course have a very vivid memory of clicking on a file in an FTP folder and slowly watching an image load: a hand drawn illustration of Buster Bunny fucking Plucky Duck along with an extended explanation of why it makes sense for cartoons to sexually experiment.

Eventually I got together IRL with some of these folks, and suffice it to say I think some of them may have wanted to seduce me. I guess I was smart enough to be creeped out by that.  I started to actually hang out with some theater kids at school and spent less time online. Eventually this one girl who I used to exchange Sailor Moon drawings with sent me this angry hand written letter saying I was totally shallow and didn’t care about my REAL online friends because some dumb teenagers made me popular. Which was hilarious because of course my new IRL friends were all the freaks and geeks of my small town. I am happy to say I realized how totally backwards and fucked that was even then.

I think this has influenced my subsequent relationship to evolving technology, from texting to Skyping to naked selfies to online dating to Snapchat. I’m very skeptical about the relationship between our virtual selves and our IRL selves. I think technology can facilitate wonderful fantasy exploration, but it’s imperative that we can distinguish between fantasy and reality. That skepticism and self control really informs my proscriptions for etiquette and ethics in my Sexting guide book. I don’t mean to sound like no fun! Think about it: BDSM is also about negotiation, restraint, boundaries. When you have self discipline, you can be absolutely disgustingly filthy and profane and ecstatic within your agreed-upon parameters. When you know the size and shape of your pen, you can go hog fucking wild.

GJ: As a fellow writer, do you share my attraction to people whose grammar, spelling and vocabulary are on-point in textual communication? And how do you respond to people who tell you that this preference is elitist or picky?

TH: You know, there are such cretins out there that my bar is actually quite low! As long as someone is not being a complete troll, I’m pretty tolerant of slang, abbreviations, misspellings, creative grammar. I think the most important thing for me is STYLE. I’m sure we know some people whose use of slang is tacky and tone-deaf, while some people make me bust out laugh when they say something is on fleek or whatever. Same goes for grammar; you can get imaginative with grammar to demonstrate rhythm, emphasis, tone, even surreality. I guess what I’m looking for is writing that I can hear, as if the person is speaking to me, and there are formal and informal ways of achieving that with different digital mediums.

I used to joke that I thought the most important OK Cupid question was, “What does ‘Wherefore’ mean in Juliet’s famous speech about Romeo?” (It means Why, as in, Why must the man I love have a name my family hates?). Then a friend pointed out how classist that is, to weed out people you won’t date because they haven’t had a certain kind of classical education. I think both perspectives are valid. I do value people who appreciate literature and theater, and like to nerd out about language. Then again, I DON’T value exclusively dating people who have a similar education, background, or life experience as me. It’s important to know what you value, but it’s just as important to be critical of your own prejudices and the way our personal lives perpetuate systems of oppression.

GJ: I sometimes get anxious about starting sext conversations because I worry the other person will think I’m overeager, “too sexual,” etc. Any tips for mitigating my anxiety around that?

TH: I don’t believe in playing hard to get, but I do believe in finesse. You can tease without misrepresenting yourself. Use your sexting language to seduce. Sometimes you have to withhold a little in order to get the satisfaction of making your partner beg for it.

Think of your sexting conversation as a story, with a prelude, exposition, rising action, climax, and denouement. Or a pop song that starts off quiet and builds and builds its excitement and dynamics. Or think of sexting as a strip tease, in the classic burlesque sense. You can burst onto the stage fully nude and lewd, or you can appear fully clothed and slowly reveal more and more until you have your audience wrapped around your g string.

GJ: Are there sexual acts you like to sext about that you don’t actually like to do in real life? Or vice versa? Why’s that?

TH: Sexting is totally a place for fantasy. If you have a sexting partner who is capable of distinguishing between fantasy and reality, then go for it! The more absurd the better!

GJ: What celebrities or fictional characters do you think would be amazing sexters? Why?

TH: David Bowie has been on my mind so much lately, so I’m gonna let myself imagine his prolific, surreal, romantic sext life. Suck, baby, suck.

GJ: Do you ever have to do aftercare after intense/kinky sexting sessions? How does that work?

TH: I think if you’re sexting to get yourself and/or your partner off (whether it’s by language message, picture, or video) it’s important to stay with the person after orgasm. Unless you’re on the same page about using each other for stimulation. The magical thing about sexting is that you have such an effect on someone’s body, their nervous system, whether you’re across town or on another continent. Sometimes it can be jarring to feel so close to someone to the point of sexual ecstasy, and then get dropped back into reality. I would say use the same principals as IRL self care: let the person know you’re thinking of them, remind them of how hot your sexting was. The virtual equivalent of snuggling!

Thank you so much to Tina Horn for being as thought-provoking and generous as ever! Go check out Sexting – I’m sure it’ll elevate your sextuality to the next level.