Or I’d Rather Be ‘Dick Drunk’ Than Be Masturbated Like Clockwork
Content Warning: Explicit description of sex.
I picked up Emily Witt’s Future Sex after a friend reviewed it. I haven’t finished yet, but I couldn’t help but notice the discomforting comparison of the chapter on Kink.com (obviously very, very NSFW) and the one on Orgasmic Meditation. Perhaps contrary to our cultural expectations the porn shoot is much more connected, alive, and joyous than the “well-lit room” of a female-led San Franciscan blend of orgasms and transcendentalism.
In the chapter on Orgasmic Mediatation, Witt visits OneTouch, a program1 founded by Nicole Daedone that teaches a very particular form of partnered masturbation:
“So if her clitoris were a clock” (the room found this hilarious) “it would be in the one o’clock position. And you’re just going to stroke there, up, down, up, down, up, down, up, down.” (Kindle Location 733)2
This clitorial time keeping lasts for exactly 15 minutes—the stroker sets a alarm on their iPhone. To me, this sounds like the most deadly and boring sex imaginable.3 Daedone claims to want to free women from the male-centric concept of sex, but drains all the life out of the act in the process. Moreover, it ignores the wide range of female sexuality and physiology. Not every woman is going to find repetitive strokes pleasurable. Some woman like rough sex; some women like gentle touch all over their body; some women like to spin fantasies with their partners. And on and on. Yet Witt concludes:
The people at OneTaste were looking for a method to arrive at a more authentic and stable experience of sexual openness, one that came from immanent desire instead of an anxiety to please. (Loc. 914)
I can hardly find any human desire in such a rote practice. OneTaste has removed joy from sex. I shouldn’t kink shame, but Orgasmic Meditative sounds pretty distasteful to me.
In the chapter on Kink.com, Witt visits a Public Disgrace shoot. As one might expect, the lead performer, Penny Pax, is disgraced in a bar full of strangers.4 After a long day of intense shooting:
[Witt] asked if there were any moments if genuine pleasure. She [Pax] looked at me like I was crazy. “Yeah. Like the whole thing! The whole thing.” She apologized for not being more articulate and explained she was in a state of delirium. “We call it ‘dick drunk,'” she said. “I’m a little dick drunk right now because it was just very nice.” (Loc. 1123)
Pax seems to have had a far more “authentic and stable experience of sexual openness” than anyone at OneTaste. She was in her body and connecting with both her fellow performers and an audience she had never met while being filmed. There was spontaneity and joy, not treating her clit like a mechanical clock on a timer.
I’m sure Daedone would be horrified by a woman tossed around, touched by strangers, treated like a piece of meat.5 But I bet Pax enjoyed her orgasms way more than anyone at OneTaste.
- Or grift? They offer a coaching program that costs $13,000. (Loc. 754) ↩
- I’m not a big fan of ebooks, but I’m trying not to accumulate a library in the Berkshires that I’ll eventually have to haul home to the city. ↩
- Daedone claims it’s not sex, which is a very heteronormative viewpoint. As Dan Savage says: sex does not equal penetration. Someone is touching another person’s genitals to provide sexual pleasure—that’s clearly sex. ↩
- They sign up through the studio and the director, Princess Donna, maintains a strict standard of behavior, albeit a standard that our mainstream culture would probably not approve of. ↩
- To be more accurate, they pretended to treat her like a piece of meat on camera. Princess Donna made sure she was cared for, comfortable, and consenting at all times. ↩