The Good Vibrations Guide to Sex (2 page)

Introduction

People need good sex books. Access to accurate sex information helps us to understand ourselves better and to build more intimate relationships. Not to mention that sex is just good, clean fun—and the more you learn about it, the more fun it becomes.

We were inspired to write the first edition of this book when we worked in a women-run vibrator store. Many customers requested a comprehensive, up-to-date sex manual, but we simply couldn’t find one that spoke to a diverse audience, addressed a wide variety of sexual activities, and celebrated sex toy use. So we wrote it ourselves. Since its publication in 1994,
The Good Vibrations Guide to Sex
has made its way onto bedside tables around the world. It is used in health clinics and college sexuality courses, is recommended by sex therapists and medical professionals, and has helped tens of thousands of women and men to enjoy more satisfying sex lives.

What’s New?

This is the third edition of
The Good Vibrations Guide to Sex
. We revise this book every few years, which might lead you to wonder, “Is there really anything new to say about sex?” Our answer is, “You’d be surprised.” Sure, basic sexual anatomy doesn’t change, but cultural attitudes, entertainment technologies, and health information change with every passing year.

Our sex manual offers the most complete guide to sex toys in print, and we consider it a duty (and a pleasure) to bring you up to date on the latest developments in sex toys and technologies. Read on to learn how the microchip is transforming vibrators just as it did computers, making them faster, smaller, and more powerful. Digital video not only makes the latest blockbuster jump off the screen, it’s also adding more realism to your porn; and cell phones aren’t just for roadside emergencies anymore (at least of the nonsexual kind).

Thanks in part to reader feedback, we’ve further broadened our scope beyond toys and technique. In a new chapter called Sex Over a Lifetime, we discuss how major life milestones affect your experience of sex, and we offer suggestions for navigating the sexual changes effected by adolescence, pregnancy, parenting, menopause, and aging. Throughout, we have included the most current information regarding sexual health.

Over the past quarter-century, certain sex-positive pioneers have made unique contributions to improving sex in America. We pay tribute to these sex educators, activists, and entrepreneurs with interviews and profiles throughout the book. You’ll learn how Candida Royalle, Betty Dodson, Nina Hartley, and many others can enhance your understanding of sexuality, deepen your appreciation for sexual diversity, and show you a good time in the process.

Since this book first appeared in the early nineties, the Web has burst onto the scene, bringing millions of people together to share information, entertainment, and community. Our sexual landscape has been forever altered in the process. We used to lament the fact that people had such limited access to sexual resources, but now, thanks to the Web, you can easily discuss sexual techniques, order a new toy, read some hot erotica, or chat with a sexy cyberpal. We’re enthusiastic cheerleaders for the ways in which the Web has advanced our collective sexual literacy, and we’ve added a new chapter devoted to how the Web can enhance your sex life.

Finally, we’ve added all new illustrations to give the book a more contemporary feel. When it comes to describing a certain technique or toy, a picture really is worth a thousand words.

In more than fifteen years as sex writers, we’ve had the privilege of fielding sexual questions, confessions, concerns, and tips from thousands of women and men. Their healthy, candid curiosity dictates what you’ll find here—advice, instruction, definitions, illustrations, anecdotes, encouragement, and validation for a variety of sexual interests and activities, courtesy of two women who have been asked a lot of questions about sex. We’re convinced that access to good sex information leads to greater health and happiness, and we hope to provide you with all the encouragement you need to explore a whole new world of sexual pleasure. So dive right in and enjoy!

Cathy Winks and Anne Semans
San Francisco
July 2002
www.anneandcathy.com

CHAPTER 1

About Good Vibrations

The Good Vibrations Philosophy

We are two very lucky women. During our decade-long careers at Good Vibrations, San Francisco’s women-run sex business, we not only had the opportunity to discuss sex with thousands of customers, but we actually got paid to play with vibrators, read erotica, and review adult videos. Since then, we’ve written several sex guides, edited an erotic anthology (about sex toys, of course!), and braved numerous media interviews in hopes of sharing the Good Vibrations’ philosophy with as many people as possible. We feel fortunate to have found a vocation that fills us with missionary zeal, is consistent with our feminist politics, and is fun to boot.

Good Vibrations was founded on the premise that there’s more sexual pleasure available than most people experience, and that achieving this pleasure should not be difficult, dangerous, or expensive. The company mission is to provide access to sexual materials and accurate sex information to combat the fear, ignorance, bias, and insecurity that prevent too many of us from enjoying the sexual pleasure that is our birthright.

Not everyone would agree that selling vibrators and adult videos is consistent with a feminist agenda, but we believe that honest communication about sex is a prerequisite to equal rights both in and out of the bedroom. The adult entertainment industry has traditionally been grounded in male experience and geared toward male consumers—so it’s up to feminists to challenge this bias.

Our customers frequently tell us how refreshing it is to shop at a women-owned business, as they feel that our “clean, well-lighted” environment is equally appealing to men and women. Good Vibrations, founded in 1977, is part of a grassroots movement that has been picking up steam ever since: More and more women have stepped forward to name their own sexual desires and to produce their own sexual writings, images, and products, and in the process they’ve changed the face of the adult industry for men and women alike.

We take a great deal of pride in the revolutionary nature of our work. For one thing, we believe that sex toys are inherently revolutionary. Not only are they self-assertion tools—no dildo is ever going to pressure you into an encounter against your will—but when you plug in a vibrator or cue up an adult video, you’re affirming that you deserve to experience pleasure for pleasure’s sake. This affirmation is a great leap of faith for many of us. We can experience sexual pleasure in countless ways, yet we tend to rate sexual activities in a hierarchy of best, second best, or better-than-nothing. Whether consciously or not, many of us operate from the belief that sex is okay only if we’re motivated by the desire to (a) make babies, (b) express intimacy, or (c) please a partner. The idea that pleasure for pleasure’s sake is sufficient motivation for sexual activity, and that no means of experiencing sexual pleasure is morally, aesthetically, or romantically superior to another, is the subversive philosophy behind the enjoyment of sex toys.

When Good Vibrations first opened its doors, the vast majority of manufacturers and retailers in the adult industry dealt in overpriced, shoddy merchandise—many still do. They can count on the fact that their customers are simply too ignorant or embarrassed about sexuality to demand the same quality control from sex toys that they would from household appliances or other products. Good Vibrations revolutionized the marketing of sex toys by taking a consumer-friendly approach. We display samples of all products on the shelves for customers to handle and compare before making their selection. We want our customers to make informed choices, so we acknowledge the drawbacks as well as the advantages of everything we carry.

By holding sex toys to the same standards as any other consumer goods, we’ve been blessed with an enthusiastic, trusting, and loyal customer base. Good Vibrations’ success has had a ripple effect—other retailers and catalogers have adopted the same straightforward approach to selling sexually explicit materials, while manufacturers and distributors have begun improving the quality of their products.

We call the products we sell and love “sex toys,” rather than “sexual aids” or “marital aids.” A lot of the stigma attached to sexual merchandise seems to result from the misconception that vibrators, dildos, lubricants, and erotica are “aids” for those troubled by sexual “problems.” Certainly sex toys are useful tools for individuals and couples who wish to explore and enhance their sexual imaginations and responses, and they can be immensely helpful to preorgasmic women, men with erectile dysfunctions, and couples with desire discrepancies. But identifying sex toys as relevant only to those with special needs, let alone relevant only to married couples, is inaccurate at best.

Our products were created first and foremost for fun, and that’s why we call them “toys.” You don’t need to be experiencing a sexual dysfunction to justify purchasing a sex toy, and you shouldn’t feel that purchasing a sex toy exposes you as someone with a “problem.” No one would describe a bakery as an establishment that sells “dietary aids”—to us it seems equally illogical to describe Good Vibrations as an establishment that sells “sexual aids.” Whether or not you yourself enjoy playing with sex toys, we hope you’ll agree that they are among the many “normal” options available in erotic accessories, no more and no less.

Yet the Good Vibrations mission to normalize the purchase of sex toys is just the thin end of the wedge—our ultimate goal is to normalize sex as a vital, life-affirming, primal force in human experience. All of us suffer when the Powers That Be—whether religious, political, or social—ignore, repress, or distort the free expression of sexual energy. This suffering is most disturbingly evident in sexual abuse and most commonly evident in the shame, discomfort, and insecurity many of us feel around sex. Sexual shame is completely unnecessary, and in our work and in this book we strive to bring the subject of sex into the light while encouraging a spirit of fun and adventure.

What’s Between These Covers

Good Vibrations customers come from a wide range of cultural, religious, and political backgrounds; they are all ages and all sexual preferences. We supply sexual resources to urban professionals, bikers, suburban newlyweds, mobile-home-dwelling retirees, college-age lesbians, transsexuals, stroller-pushing moms, therapists, and nuns. We hope to reach a similarly wide range of people with this book—gay, straight, bisexual, transgendered, young, old, novices, old-timers, singles, partnered, multipartnered, the physically challenged, and the sexually jaded, to name a few. And we dream that this book will wind up in the hands of folks too shy to enter stores like Good Vibrations. We try, through our language, illustrations, and attitude, to reflect and be respectful of a variety of interests.

It’s our experience that people from a wide range of backgrounds share certain traits: They crave accurate, practical, nonjudgmental information about sex, and they relish the opportunity to speak frankly about sexual activities. Furthermore, people of all sexual preferences take pleasure in many of the same toys and activities and have similar questions about what toys to play with and how to play with them. The teen looking for ways to enjoy safer sex and the transsexual looking for alternatives to intercourse may discover identical solutions in one of our chapters.

We’ve arranged the chapters according to types of sexual activities. For example, whereas many mainstream sex manuals will discuss penetration in a chapter on penis/vagina intercourse—usually billed as the ultimate sexual experience—we describe the variety of ways to penetrate a partner of either sex (vaginally, anally, with toys, fingers, etc.) and as only one of many enjoyable sexual activities.

You won’t find chapters entitled “How Monogamous Heterosexuals Can Spice Up Their Love Lives” or “What Lesbians Do in Bed.” We like to think that the contents of every chapter are relevant to women and men of all sexualities. To this end, we speak to our readers directly in the second person, as this seems to us the most graceful way to avoid any presumptions about sex or sexuality. You’ll notice that we tend to describe sexual activities from the point of view of the active partner. We’ve done so to keep the descriptions simple and the language clear. We certainly don’t mean to imply that the experience of the passive partner is of less worth.

Even the most well-intentioned sex books have a tendency to abuse statistics, and readers can’t help but use these statistics to assess whether they’re “normal”—are they having the right kind of sex, the right amount of sex? Yet surveys are just as vulnerable to cultural biases and trends as any other popular literature. Whether you’re reading survey results claiming that less than 3 percent of the general population is gay, or that 40 percent of women and 30 percent of men suffer from “sexual dysfunction,” keep in mind that it’s notoriously difficult to compile accurate statistics on a subject as highly charged and as subjective as sexual behaviors and attitudes.

We won’t be able to say it enough throughout this book: Everyone’s different. This book is not about keeping up with the Joneses or judging the Joneses. It’s about finding out what activities strike your own fancy. While we cop to citing a statistic now and then, it’s usually to counter a stereotype. No matter how often you ask, we won’t tell you how many vibrators it would take to satisfy the staff at the White House.

One of the most exciting aspects of working at a business like Good Vibrations is bearing witness to the breadth and variety of human sexuality and encouraging people to trust their own experiences and respect their own unique responses. The single most frustrating question Good Vibrations clerks field every day is, “What’s the best vibrator (or lubricant or massage oil or erotic video)?” The myth that there’s one sure-fire sexual silver bullet that will guarantee orgasm for one and all dies hard. Yet, you wouldn’t dream of asking the clerk at a record store, “What’s the best CD you’ve got in here?”