Mary Roach: 10 things you didn’t know about orgasm
April 11th, 2009Pilobolus: A performance merging dance and biology
April 9th, 2009Zumanity, the very sexy Cirque du Soleil
April 8th, 2009Cirque du Soleil’s Zumanity, act: “Waterbowl”
Gyulnara Karaeva Waterbowl
La sirène -- FINA 2005 -- Gala -- Waterbowl
Faust
April 4th, 2009
Faust or Faustus (Latin for “auspicious” or “lucky”) is the protagonist of a classic German legend who makes a pact with the Devil in exchange for knowledge.
The story concerns the fate of Faust in his quest for the true essence of life. Frustrated with learning and the limits to his knowledge and power, he attracts the attention of the Devil (represented by Mephistopheles), who agrees to serve Faust until the moment he attains the zenith of human happiness, at which point Mephistopheles may take his soul. Faust is pleased with the deal, as he believes the moment will never come.
In the first part, Mephistopheles leads Faust through experiences that culminate in a lustful and destructive relationship with an innocent and nubile woman named Gretchen. Gretchen and her family are destroyed by Mephistopheles’ deceptions and Faust’s desires and actions. The story ends in tragedy as Gretchen is saved and Faust is left in shame.
The second part begins with the spirits of the earth forgiving Faust (and the rest of mankind) and progresses into rich allegorical poetry. Faust and his devil pass through the world of politics and the world of the classical gods, and meet with Helen of Troy (the personification of beauty). Finally, having succeeded in taming the very forces of war and nature Faust experiences a single moment of happiness.
The devil Mephistopheles, trying to grab Faust’s soul when he dies, is frustrated as the Lord intervenes recognizing the value of Faust’s unending striving.
Faust wanted something valuable now and believed he could pay up at the end. Or even better, he believed he could get away with not paying at all. Throughout the story he realizes that for everything he got there was something he lost. The suffering and disappointment were the price to pay very step of the way.
I believe the lesson here is that we always pay the price upfront. Always. There are no shortcuts. There are no gifts. Even when we think we are getting something for cheap we are still paying dearly for it, we just don’t see yet how much.
http://www.cummingsstudyguides.net/Faust.html
Not really a kinkster
April 2nd, 2009
Everything I’ve experienced has led me to believe that when it comes to BDSM, there are two main categories of people: there are kinksters, people who enjoy the lifestyle and find pleasure in certain aspects of it; and then there are a smaller category of people who seek it out because they recognize in themselves an innate need to dominate or submit. It doesn’t need a name or a definition. It is just there, lurking in the subconscious, waiting to be unleashed on the conscious mind. The latter category of people are the ones I am most interested in, as it is the category I belong to.
Menstruation is obsolete
March 31st, 2009
In our technocratic and scientific world view the human body is rarely viewed holistically, but understood as an object made up of transferable bits and pieces. Body components can be exchanged or replaced like spare parts: blood transfusions, organ transplants, prosthetic devices, artificial bones and joints, false teeth, plastic surgery, breast and penile implants. We can all be disassembled and reassembled like the cyborgs from our favorite sci-fi flicks.
The pragmatic goals of some scientific advancements are clear: the alleviation of pain and suffering, the ability to make all bodies fully “functional”, and the prolongation of life. But there are times when this pragmatism gives way to another goal; in our drive for a pain-free and healthful existence we are also seeking a means to perfect the human body.
Some of the most radical physiological transformations that are now possible involve sexuality and reproductive processes: genetic engineering, sex selection, artificial insemination, in vitro fertilization, test tube babies and sex changes demonstrate that nothing, absolutely nothing, is immutable.
A recent study by Brazilian Elsimar M. Coutinho adds to this mind-boggling list of what we can now do to alter the human reproductive system. In a controversial book published by Oxford University Press, Coutinho suggests that menstruation is an unhealthy and unnecessary process that causes women countless health and emotional problems. Is Menstruation Obsolete?, the title of Coutinho’s new work, suggests that the most medically advanced “treatment” for menstruation would be its total cessation in all women of reproductive age.
Coutinho’s study has been hailed a scientific success by a variety of intellectual broadsheets and magazines (see The Guardian, Canada’s Globe and Mail and The New Yorker, for a good sample) who have reported his research as a breakthrough for the improvement of women’s lives. But even those that agree – and this is a controversial assessment in itself – that menstruation constitutes women’s “curse” and not her “blessing”, should not cheer too soon. What Coutinho suggests is not the eradication of what, for some, is a monthly nuisance, but a much more radical transformation of female physicality.
Coutinho has the qualifications to make his study heard widely in scientific circles. He is the pioneer of Depo-Provera, the popular injectible contraceptive method that is typically taken 4 times annually. He is a Professor of Gynecology, Obstetrics and Human Reproduction in Brazil and has published scholarly articles in the field for more than 30 years.
While Coutinho denounces blood-letting as a modern medical treatment. Coutinho claims the contrary (as Segal’s preface states): “from a medical point of view, menstruation has no beneficial effects for anyone, and for many women it is harmful to their health”.
According to Coutinho’s definition, menstruation is simply the sign of a failed process: “When menstruation occurs, it means that the [reproductive] system failed and, for the sake of reproductive efficiency, would have to be repeated the next month, the month after that, and so on, until a successfully nested fertilized egg starts to develop”. This is not far from the standard definition of menstruation provided in health education classes: menstruation takes place when pregnancy does not.
Coutinho’s definition of menstruation is important since it underpins his major claim in this new work – that regular menstruation is not “natural”. According to Coutinho, a monthly menses would have been unusual for early women who were regularly pregnant or breast-feeding (and therefore without periods), “young women were either pregnant or lactating almost continuously”. It is only the modern woman, he argues, who experiences menstruation as a regular, monthly occurrence. While repeated menstruation made biological sense for Stone Age humans whose survival was by no means assured, Coutinho hypothesizes, regular menstruation is no longer necessary in the modern world where human survival is not contingent upon prolific childbirth.
Coutinho concludes with a syllogistic logic: since menstruation exists for the purpose of prolific childbearing, and repeated childbirth is no longer necessary, then menstruation is now “obsolete”. Without the promise of 10 or 12 children to bear, menstruation, according to Coutinho, is a waste of a woman’s resources. It takes away her energy, lowers her iron levels and induces an array of minor health troubles – headaches, nausea, cramps, moodiness – and major health symptoms for those with chronic menstrual ailments, such as endometriosis. Regular menstruation, Coutinho concludes, is an outmoded function of our evolutionary ancestors and should now be suppressed in all reproductive aged women.
In the end it may not be so surprising to find that the means through which Coutinho suggests that menstrual suppression can be achieved is via regular Depo-Provera injections, the birth control method that he, himself, pioneered.
Adapted from article originally written by Kathleen O’Grady, the co-author of Sweet Secrets: Stories of Menstruation (Second Story Press, 1997).
Sensuality secrets, by Patty Contenta
March 30th, 2009
The modern world needs brothels of love
March 29th, 2009
The Brothel, by Vincent Van Gogh
(translated and adapted by text originally written by Arnaldo Jabor)
Once upon a time our sweet ladies of easy virtue were called by violent names: whore, hooker, prostitute, trollop, slattern, baggage, bawd, hussy, slut, tramp, wanton, floozy, moll, camp follower, tart, strumpet, in a collection of brutal names that demonstrated the hatred from the good families to the sins outside the family life. The old prostitute was the symmetrical opposite of the decent wives. Today, our ladies of the night are called “escorts”.
A long time ago our streetwalkers would hide away, ashamed and marginalized. Now, with high-tech permissiveness, being a call girl is a profession, more so than the occupation of trophy wife. Now we are no longer talking about miserable girls, but proud sporting ladies living on the edges of the upper class, on the excitement of TV shows and magazines.
The modern courtesan is no longer on the fringe; she is at the center of the system like the lawyers, bankers, or dentists. The media and the Internet display their success. Formerly the working girl resented the sacred matrimony which excluded her. The old harlot was a physiological necessity, an extension of the families to compensate for the sadness of marriage. Today they don’t need to get married. There is no “pretty woman”; they don’t want to be rescued by romantic chumps.
The modern ladies of pleasure brush aside a “normal life”, preferring the cold adventure of money. Many of them are well married and help their husbands with the finances. I have met a school teacher in the suburbs that used to travel to big cities during school vacations to work in famous houses of ill fame.
The contemporary lady of the night is not ashamed of her work and does not suffer from guilt; perhaps just nausea… of you. They look at you as equals, or better yet, with a fine sense of superiority. They are active, on the move, taking action, and taking away from men their biggest pleasure which was the sense of moral superiority in temporary recess – an inhabitant of the clean world visiting the dirty world. Today you are the dirty one.
The old John used to believe in rescuing the fallen unhappy girls. The old brothels used to have a certain sadness in the air like an impossible love. There was also a repugnant kindness in those bygone wore-mongers: “Why are you doing this?” would ask the hypocritical client, before the act. “Oh, my father threw me out of the house, my boyfriend ruined me…” would moan the working girl. “But why don’t you leave this?” Whispered the vicious man, superior and malign, taking his pants off. Perhaps that is why they used to fall in love for their pimps, who used to spank them with sincere and joyful slaps.
Today you don’t comfort harlots, sluts, and fancy women. The romantic woman, now we know, is a man’s invention. Just like the sad, lost girl is as well. A friend told me that “there are no unhappy hookers”. Today they advertise as companions, escorts, promoters, and other euphemisms. They are athletic, aerodynamic, healthy. We used to live in a constant succession of gonorrhea’s. Today, they are the ones who fear your diseases. The condom excludes you, ridiculed with you penis wrapped in plastic like a little dog in a sweater. With the condom you are the venereal threat; she is the health. You used to visit a brothel looking for illusion. The man would go there to feel like he is in an harem. He wanted to be the center of the action. Today, he is the subject. There is a cold air in the modern brothels: clean, fast, and efficient like a fast food restaurant. There is something of a nurse or psychiatrist in the modern courtesan. The is something of a MacDonald’s in the modern brothel.
There are no mysteries left about our bodies: Every position, muscle, fluid, everything was explored. There is nothing else new to find. After the intercourse there is great sadness. As our life became so similar to the brothels, what we need are thematic brothels!
There are some thematic brothels on the Internet. On those you can be subjected in dungeons, hump in paradise among saints, have an orgasm in Mars. But that is not enough. We need brothels of dreams and love. That’s it! Men (and women, why not?) really need pure sentiments. Even if they have to pay for them. You get into a thematic brothel like in an interactive video game. There you will find sad women that you must comfort, motherly women that will comfort you, bad women that will disdain you with delicious cruelty and will forgive you later.
There you will find cries and tears, jealousy fits. In those brothels we can have the feeling of moral suffering (no BDSM, leather and latex), death pacts, endless sorrow, romantic breakups, total happiness, Tristans, Isoldas, flirts, serenades, stolen kisses. We can have real virgins blushing and defending their honor, we can have intrigues, innocence. Brothels of abstinence where everything is permitted, except sex. Orgasms (if ever) would be ethereal, like clouds, like holograms. Those would be platonic brothels. So we don’t have any ingenuity, temperance, love, ethics and moral? It all goes to the brothels. We could even have ethical brothels, where embarrassed intellectuals would purge themselves of malice and opportunism’s. There would be prohibitions, rules, ideologies, enforced by austere ladies, punishing us, wearing white gowns or dressed like “reason”, with black garters underneath, of course…
There can be depressive brothels, solitude brothels, cathouses of goodness, compassion whorehouses, houses of fine sentiments. There is an intolerable level of comfort in our market society. We need anguish, repentance, and restraint. The brothels of the future will be more like spas, like spiritual retreats. Great idea! I think I will open one of those ethical brothels and, naturally, will make a lot of money!
Wolves vs Spiders
March 28th, 2009
Wolves:
Wolves will eat almost anything they can catch. They usually hunt in packs but sometimes might be on their own. Wolves hunt at any time day or night. Wolves hunt when they are hungry but if they are not successful they can go without food for many days and even weeks. Some wolves are not in packs, these wolves are called lone wolves. They hunt by themselves while wandering around. At some point the lone wolf might join another lone wolf and form its own pack to hunt with. After finding and choosing a particular prey, they move in on it from the opposite direction the wind is blowing. This prevents the prey from smelling the wolves coming, becoming alert, then running away. The wolves will quietly close in on the prey, sometimes in single file. Soon they will break into a run and the chase begins. Wolf hunts can last only a few minutes or as long as a few hours or more. If the hunt is not successful the wolves will continue on searching for new prey, maybe one that is weaker, providing an easier kill.
That so reminds me of guys storming the bars and clubs in packs, cold approaching, peacocking, chasing their prey for miles, sometimes getting some, sometimes starving for long periods of time. For me the most visible part of it is that they walk and move a lot to do it.
Spiders:
During the process of making a web, the spider will use its own body for measurements, a very practical and ergonomic design feature of any web. This will allow the spider to move quickly around its own web with very few faults. After the spider has completed its web, it will sit and wait. If the web is broken without any major structural damage, the spider does not make any initial attempts to rectify the problem. Webs allow a spider to catch prey without having to expend energy by running it down. Thus it is an efficient method of gathering food. However, constructing the web is in itself an energetically costly process due to the large amount of protein required, in the form of silk. The spider, after spinning its web, will then wait on or near the web for a prey animal to become trapped. The spider senses the impact and struggle of a prey animal by vibrations transmitted along the web lines. Spiders do not usually adhere to their own webs. However, they are not immune to their own glue. Some of the strands of the web are sticky, and others are not. For example, if a spider has chosen to wait along the outer edges of its web, it may spin a non-sticky prey or signal line to the web hub to monitor web movement. Spiders have to be careful to climb only on the non-sticky strands of their webs. A spider positioned in the middle of the web makes for a highly visible prey for birds and other predators. Many spiders reduce this risk by hiding at the edge of the web with one foot on a signal line from the hub or by appearing to be inedible or unappetizing.
Many people act like spiders. They lay out their web (parties, clubs, pads, businesses) carefully and tend to the upkeep of their webs (maintenance) while sensing the presence of any prey on it. When the prey is ensnarled on it the spider moves to catch it, and then moves back to it’s apparently static post on the edge, waiting for the next opportunity.
Which one is you?
One would rarely choose one style in total exclusion of the other, but we tend choose the method that is more congenial to our personalities.
Why some people turn submissive?
March 27th, 2009
There are several aspects to that like the different social roles (alphas, betas, etc), the biological drive, etc. But I think one new aspect is very influential in modern society. I heard from several friends that are Doms and Dominatrix pretty much the same story with little variation: that when someone is in charge and important and full of responsibilities in the “real world” that person would have a strong drive to then prefer the opposite in their sexual life, hence their strong drive to become sexually submissive.
It’s a fine explanation but I saw too many exceptions. I am a Dominant when it comes to intimate relations but I am not submissive, or indecisive, or a beta male, or a follower in any way in the “real world”. Same happens to all my friends who are Doms. That was a big hole in the theory people were telling me about. Yes I know of a lot of surgeons, politicians and businessman that turn passive and submissive when it comes to sex, but I couldn’t apply the formula to most Doms I know and to a good number of subs as well.
Then I came up with an explanation I think will cover a much higher percentage of all people I know. Still not perfect, but I think this theory is much more universal. Here it is:
We all play roles in our lives, like “father”, “husband”, “doctor”, “mother”, “boss”, “mistress”, etc. We all play several roles. We know that many men let themselves be defined by their roles, specially their professional role. They don’t see themselves separated from the role they play as a doctor, a police officer, a professor, a stock broker, or whatever they do for a living. Many men get depressed when they lose their job, some have trouble having sex and suffer from very low self-esteem while unemployed. They let their work define who they are.
I believe that when a man (most men, and some women too) lets himself be defined by his professional role, and that role is very stressful, full of decisions, pressure, and anxiety, he will have a very strong drive to seek relief from it and will not want to take any decisions and will prefer a passive and sometimes a submissive role in sex.
When a man dissociates from his professional role and other external symbols of success, responsibility, and importance, he won’t have the anxiety and stress and will not need to seek similar relief. So he can then be dominant and independent and a leader in one aspect of his life, and do the same in other aspects, like in their intimacy.