One thousand years ago, a charismatic fellow named Odo remarked that "to embrace a woman is to embrace a bag of manure." A few hundred years later, two young men published a book, a real best-seller, that argued that sexuality (especially that of women) would be the downfall of all that is right and good unless it was violently persecuted.
This tradition for antisexual, so-called moralist God-fearing behaviour would perpetuate itself again and again and again in the years to follow. Sexual repression has a long and colourful history, often couched in so-called "higher" ideals.
Now, this doesn't mean that material of a sexual (or "prurient" if you prefer) nature was unavailable to the people, mind you. Certainly not. In fact, English literature alone boasts multiple examples of stimulating material, both clandestine and the wildly popular.
Sometimes, sex-positive reading could be found within both the spirit and heart of the same sort of people who otherwise would seek its purgation. That sort of suggests something, does it not? And sometimes, sex-positive expressions could be found in times and places far more ancient and diverse than that.
But still the proponents of sexual repression, of single-minded judgment, of homogenous culture, of whitebread patriarchal gender roles continued to beat their drums and their chests before the lost and wayward sons and daughters of Sodom. Finger-pointing was good business when the sawdust got into your shoes as they bellowed quotes under the Big Top, or later on the radio, and later still on the small grey screen after Mitch Miller stood behind the bouncing ball.
But between chomps on his cigar, an Austrian guy had already started a dialogue about sex that had nothing to do with the book those pulpit pounders kept quoting from. A few years later, between chomps on his pencil, an American guy wrote a book of his own that a lot of other people started quoting from. Not long after that, something incredible happened in the world of print media when, heavens-to-Betsy, women started talking and learning and sharing and realizing and connecting in a way that would have given good ol' Odo a righteous heart attack.
Then came Gloria. And Betty. And Nancy and Xaviera and Reay. Then Camille and Susie and Nina and Violet and so many more contemporary voices proudly sharing, teaching, discussing, and even climaxing in joyful abandon for and about empowered, articulate sexuality.
Welcome now to the postmodern cybersexual world. The erotic classic literature remains with us, and many modern writers continue the tradition. But now we can also add to that genre a wider world of media and expression. Phonesex chat lines yield to webcam sites, VHS (itself the successor of Super-8 film loops) yields to DVD and YouPorn, and earmarked paperback sexbooks yield to the growing world of internet sexblogs.
But still, even with all we've learned and celebrated since Kinsey and Playboy and My Secret Garden, since vibrators moved from the Sears & Roebuck catalogue for "curing women's hysteria" to the glass counters of upscale boutiques, since the development of both oral contraception and erection enhancement in convenient little tablets, there are still those heirs to Odo who insist on trying to spoil the party. They are Saturn to our Dionysus, saltpeter to our ambrosia, Wrath to our Lust.They are the small-minded folk who harass sexbloggers.
It's because of these spoiledsports that so many people, throughout history, have been terrified to express themselves as they truly wish to live, do, be. This is part of the reason why elements of the fetish community can be as insular as it is accepting, because once we realize that we all (well, ok, most of us) have our "kinks," it becomes much easier to appreciate the diversity available in the world, providing no actual physical/emotional/mental harm is being committed. "Safe, Sane, Consensual."
Nevertheless, some sexbloggers have strong apprehensions about their sexblogging because of the possibility of a blog's discovery by another in the writer's life. Many of us write with a level of anonymity for that reason.
I, for example, use my pseudonym because it's simply more convenient. It allows me to share my truths without too much worry that I would hurt a lover's feelings should I write something critical (although that rarely happens). It's also because I'm part of a spiritual community that, in my region at least, is really quite judgmental and sexist and hypocritical despite its reputation for more openmindedness than that, and I enjoy not having unnecessary headaches. To date, two lovers have deliberately been told about this blog (and continue reading it) (hi guys!) and another found it by accident (hi!), all to no ill affects or breach of trusts thus far. But I may be lucky.
One sexblogging colleague of mine tells me of people who not only send her hate mail, but have doctored blog-shared photographs in particularly nasty ways and resent them to her. In one case, an individual was observed staking out hotels where the writer's consensual escapades took place. These people then would use other internet resources to lambast the subject's sexual play in troll-riddled forums where they freely espouse their judgement.
Another sexblogging colleague recently posted about how her blog had been "discovered" by a co-worker. This co-worker found it titilattingly necessary to share the fact among others in their office, and this resulted in a complete change of decorum toward the blogger. She became the brunt of colourful "humour" and, in one case, had actually been physically approached and touched inappropriately. She writes about sex, so she had become "easy" in the eyes of these social Neanderthals. She had become a victim of sexual harassment at work, but her first instinct was to panic about her blog rather than redress the infantile and liable behaviour she was being subjected to at her place of employment. This eventually changed.
And there is the man who stopped sexblogging because his ex-wife thought it would strengthen her case during a custody dispute to argue that his bisexuality made him a bad father.
Or the courageous, selfless woman who stepped down from her position as a successful parochial schoolteacher because of her sex-positive community building (and blog) as part of an agreement to keep her A-student child out of controversy. Not that there would be any controversy without the immature judgement of these allegedly educated people, or that child would have been part of it to begin with without their machinations. But even this (tragic) compromise didn't prevent the God-fearing powers-that-be from twisting the knife later, sending this happy and sane family into unnecessary duress anyway. So much for loving thy neighbour. Or being human.
It is easy for lesser persons to point fingers toward those who are living joyfully. In our post-Puritanical Western culture where the likes of radical conservative and religious zealots still manage to bluster their way into large microphones, it is easy to sometimes forget that those people who choose to behave thusly not only weaken their arguments with such illegal and reprehensible tactics, but they actually empower the braver souls to carry on doing what they choose to do, what makes them happy.
Sexblogging, at least here in Canada, is not a crime. The harassment these people may be responsible for very probably is. The inter-office sexual assaults definitely are.
At the root of voyeurism is the desire to want to secretly witness the escapades of others. Those of us who enjoy sharing ourselves pose for photographs or films, write about our sexuality, or create blogs. Exhibitionists. We give consent, and thereby have an amount of control over what will or will not be shared.
But sometimes even consentual exhibitionism is not enough for some and an invasion of privacy (or worse) is necessary to achieve the desired thrill. These are the people who delight in seeing sudden "surprises" on Jerry Springer programs, or ferret out personal information about others for amusement, or who create and use surrepticious networks to share their vitriol with others of like heart. These are the passive-aggressive people who delight in gossip and drama and hurtfulness. They want their judgment to be shared, to be agreed upon, so that their lives may seem so much less uninteresting and puerile. They form social bonds with others to cluck tongues and roll eyes with. Misery may love company, but judgement requires a forum.
The irony is that people who take the time to send virulent remarks, or harass, or cajole, or stalk often do so out of a sense of righteousness and moral vigilance. But what in fact they only manage to demonstrate is their own pathetic ignorance, provincialism, and compassionlessness. They advertise how empty their lives truly are. There is no sophistication in bigotry. Further, I'll submit that many, if not most, people who target literate libertines do so out of a latent and conflicted jealousy.
Nyeh nyeh. So there.
But such jealousy can be easily surmounted: you're not going to beat 'em, so simply join 'em. History is not on their side. In every age and in every repressive regime, the human imagination and desire for passion has surmounted every attempt to contain and control it. Jeannie is out of the bottle, sons and daughters of Odo, and she's sucking Master's cock. Probably Major Healey's too.
And she likes it.
Love your sexuality however you choose to express it, be it, do it, have it. Sexually "conservative"? Fine. Love the arousing beauty of your partner in whatever happily monogamous, missionary, bimonthly way you choose. Stay dressed. Keep the lights on. Make it quick. Be sure to get to confession right afterward.
And if you can't handle that, really, then please consider continuing your own guilt-ridden masturbation sessions while keeping your Wrath and Envy and Anger away from our Lust.
A closing thought... How can any "sin" that has helped elicit minstrels and artists and poets to heights of inspiration, join people in happiness, be the one of the most important topics for every culture in every era on every continent on the face of the earth, and repopulate the planet after plagues and pogroms and crusades and wars be called "deadly" anyway?
Now go get laid, wouldyapleez?
