Benny Hill, Lisztomania, and the barmaid’s outfit

Posted by lilech on February 27, 2012

Benny Hill got his start at The Windmill Theatre, which “was infamous for its risqué dancing girls and nude tableaux but it was a tough crowd for comedians who would make up part of the show. Not too many patrons were there for the jokes. … Hill had a strange relationship with women. He was very confused about the accusations of sexism in the latter part of his career. … But society around him had moved on and an elderly man surrounded or chased by very scantily-clad women made for uncomfortable viewing.”

From the FAQ section at Science Cheerleader: “The Science Cheerleaders are professional cheerleaders pursuing science careers who playfully challenge stereotypes, turn everyone onto science by encouraging participation in citizen science activities, and inspire the 3-4 million U.S. cheerleaders to consider careers in science, technology, engineering and math.”

“Now, thanks to The Icelandic Phallological Museum, it is finally possible for individuals to undertake serious study into the field of phallology in an organized, scientific fashion. The Icelandic Phallological Museum contains a collection of more than two hundred and fifteen penises and penile parts belonging to almost all the land and sea mammals that can be found in Iceland.”

On Ken Russell’s Lisztomania (1975): “The girls tear and claw at Liszt, who whips a harp from out of nowhere [and] … inspires them to summon out his trouser snake with a sweet siren’s song. Their lilting calls yield totally unexpected results as Liszt’s member expands and expands, finally ending up at a length of about ten feet.” Liszt is played by Roger Daltrey, the Pope is played by Ringo Starr. Somehow, Wagner and Hitler also get into this movie. Here’s a frame that I copied from the previously linked Cine-Miscreant:

The Rhine maidens in "Lisztomania"

“After outlining Marcuse’s theory of the role of Eros in social life, I discuss two pornographic Web sites that combine eroticism and social critique. I argue that Marcuse’s work is valuable for its emphasis on the intersection of sex, technology, and capitalist economy, but that it needs to be supplemented by a focus on masculinity and the male body in Internet pornography.”

“Jacobs describes an experiment in which she and a group of her students went to a Starbucks coffeehouse in Shenzhen to search for sexually explicit media on the Internet. The aim was to see what they could access through mainland China’s Great Firewall. “We were there for 30 minutes and we found all this porn using an Internet connection in a public space.” Pornography has been officially banned in China since the foundation of the People’s Republic in 1949. …
Subcultures of user-generated or DIY pornography have evolved on the Internet as a result.”

From Dyan Elliott’s The Bride of Christ Goes to Hell: Metaphor and Embodiment in the Lives of Pious Women, 200-1500: “The impact of Bernardine spirituality among the early Beguine mystics provides the impetus for a sensual, embodied, and ultimately eroticized bride of Christ. The tendency to express this spirituality somatically perhaps culminates in the matrimonial embellishments of later pious widows such as Bridget of Sweden and Dorothea of Montau.”

Karmen MacKendrick: “It is hard to see how one might have an obligation to others to feel the bite and burn of a well-wielded whip …. It is just as hard to see how it makes sense to say that one could have the right, just for oneself, to be broken out of that self, slammed against the sturdy boundaries of the ego until they break. … This shattering, exteriorizing intensity is an otherness that arises from within the focus on the body and its pleasures. … We, at least since Leopold von Sacher-Masoch first eyed the Lives of the Martyrs … have been inspired by images of the saints: Teresa, unspeakably joyous as the cherub’s arrow pierces her entrails; … Sebastian, serene with his multiple arrow-piercings; Catherine stretched and broken on the wheel.”

"Monna Vanna" by Franz von Stuck

According to Anne Dufourmantelle, “Philosophical ideas, like sexual enjoyment, exceed our control and can only come to us unbidden. Both offer the illusion that we can escape time and mortality into the timelessness of thought or the ecstatic moment of the sexual encounter. In sex we try to overcome our separateness and to connect with someone else. Likewise, philosophy tries to grasp a hidden world order in which everything is connected. Most importantly, in sex, one encounters another body, another world outside one’s own, and this unseats and transforms.”

“Although neither Severin nor his creator [Sacher-Masoch] appears in David Ives’s wildly intelligent and sometimes frightening new play, “Venus in Fur” (at the Classic Stage Company), it helps to have some knowledge of the novel and its author …. This sexual roundelay about power and powerlessness, about the imagination butting up against so-called “reality,” is played out by two contemporary characters.” That review’s a couple of years old.

Have you seen the article in the Atlantic about Jaroslav Flegr’s work, which links schizophrenia and car crashes to a brain parasite that we can get from cats? According to that article, male rats that have the parasite behave in more risky and even self-destructive ways and are more attractive to female rats than the more prudent males are. Well, now the folks at Improbable Research have linked to another of Flegr’s papers, which is called “Dominance, submissivity (and homosexuality) in general population. Testing of evolutionary hypothesis of sadomasochism by internet-trap-method,” (here’s the pdf of that paper).

“Subcutaneous Penile Insertion of Domino Fragments by Incarcerated Males in Southwest United States Prisons: A Report of Three Cases: … In each case, an incarcerated Hispanic male or fellow inmate filed a domino into a unique shape for placement under the penile skin. Utilizing the tip of a ballpoint pen or a sharpened shard of plastic to create a puncture wound, each man inserted the domino fragment into the subcutaneous tissue of the penis. … Conclusions: Incarcerated males put themselves at risk for injury and infection when attempting penile enhancement with improvised equipment.” (via Improbable Research)

“The editors, who are also contributors to this book, begin by identifying themselves as “part of a generation of women currently entering the workforce as professors, researchers, lawyers, and other professionals who also worked during some part of our lives in the sex industry” (xi). “Flesh for Fantasy is devoted to destigmatizing the sex industry, illuminating the labor conditions of strippers, and revising the cultural connotations of exotic dance” (xxxii). It challenges the patronizing attitudes about sex work that have characterized most, but not all, feminist discussions until very recently.”

“The distinction drew a line between sex and gender. Sex referred to the reproductive categories of male and female, and it was a useful biological concept, applicable to humans, nonhuman animals, and plants. Gender, on the other hand, indicates the socially constructed roles, behaviors, and traits of male and female. … The French philosopher Michel Foucault set the agenda when he lamented … that “the notion of sex made it possible to group together, in an artificial unity, anatomical elements, biological functions, conducts, sensations, and pleasures, and it enabled one to make use of this fictitious unity as a causal principle.”"

“On the evening of May 29 [1912] at Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris the audience was scandalously titillated (or titillated scandalously) as they watched Nijinsky’s erotic pleasure dancing the lead to Claude Debussy’s Prélude à L’Après-Midi d’un Faune. The audience was captive to and captivated by the great exhibitionist in a dark brown and white costume designed by Léon Bakst and based on a Greek satyr … enthralled with his erection the size of a tree trunk.” Here’s Nijinsky about to scandalize Parisians by simulating masturbation with a nymph’s scarf:

Nijinsky as the Faun about to pounce on a nymph's scarf

“Barmaid’s risqué outfits cause gender divide in Italian town: … The female mayor of the town has called the 34-year-old barmaid a threat to public order, because her miniskirts, high heels and skimpy tops are drawing male customers from up to 70 miles away, who clog up the nearby streets with their cars and park illegally.”

“A how-to guide for better masturbation that hangs in Skidmore College bathrooms is steaming up the campus in more ways than one. The [guide], published by the college’s Center for Sex and Gender Relations, encourages masturbation as “a great way to relieve some of the stress that comes with classes, finals and the never ending homework.” The poster shows a map of the body’s erotic zones and offers suggestions for heightening self-pleasure.”

David Barash on “The Evolutionary Mystery of Female Orgasm” Parts 1, 2, and 3.

Uncanny photo erotica by a Russian artist.

Here’s a kinky scene from the 1963 film of Jean Genet’s The Balcony. The cast included Peter Falk, Leonard Nimoy, and Shelley Winters. The actors in this scene are Ruby Dee and Peter Brocco.

Frisky elk, the iceman cometh, and sharia law on sex robots

Posted by lilech on February 25, 2012

“Since 1995, [75-year-old Professor Judith] Hanna, a University of Maryland [anthropology] researcher, has helped clubs repel efforts to tax, regulate or close them, arguing more than 100 times that striptease is just as much an art as ballet. Next year, her lap-dances-are-art argument will be part of an appeal before New York’s highest court. A stripper in heels is like a ballerina en pointe, she says.”

“Reframing sexual differentiation of the brain: … The dominant model of sexual differentiation stated that genetic sex (XX versus XY) causes differentiation of the gonads, which then secrete gonadal hormones that act directly on tissues to induce sex differences in function. This serial model of sexual differentiation was simple, unifying and seductive. Recent evidence, however, indicates that the linear model is incorrect and that sex differences arise in response to diverse sex-specific signals originating from inherent differences in the genome and involve cellular mechanisms that are specific to individual tissues or brain regions.”

“Disrobing Associated with Epileptic Seizures and Forensic Implications: … Two cases involving disrobing associated with seizures …. An additional case reveals the legal consequences endured by one patient who experienced a nocturnal seizure and began wandering in an unclothed state. Collectively, these cases illustrate the medical reality of seizure-related disrobing and the related adverse effects on patients’ quality of life.”

Pharyngula on an unfortunate woman with two vaginas: “In didelphys, the vagina is divided in two by an internal septum, nothing more.”

The 1st lesbian scifi novel: “Which makes Gregory Casparian’s The Anglo-American Alliance. A Serio-Comic Romance and Forecast of the Future (1906), the first lesbian science fiction novel, all the more notable.”

“Sex Differences in Sports Across 50 Societies: … In all 50 societies with documented sports, there were more male sports than female sports; hunting and combat sports were almost exclusively male activities; and the sex difference in sports was greater in patriarchal than in non-patriarchal societies. These results show that a robust sex difference in direct physical competition co-occurs with meaningful variation in its expression.”

“The origins of [circumcision] are lost in antiquity. It was performed since 3000 BC by the Egyptians for hygienic and religious reasons. … Nowadays, circumcision is performed as a routine procedure by the Jews and the Muslims for religious reasons. The world prevalence of men with circumcision is 12.5-33%, especially in USA, Canada, Islamic people and Africa; in Europe the prevalence rate is low (in Great Britain it is 1.5%).”

Dr. Petra on average penis size: “The other problem with this area is studies differ in how they operationalize their measuring of penises. Some relied on lab based studies where men were measured by researchers, others based their work on self-reports from men …. Some studies were based on erect penis measurements; others relied on stretching a flaccid penis as far as it could be pulled and measuring that as an approximation of a hard-on.”

“[Historian Ivan Crozier] explores how koro – the fear that the genitals are fatally shrinking into the body – has been central to the definition of the ‘culture-bound syndrome’.”

“Damage to parts of the penis vital for proper erections has been repaired for the first time with the help of stem cells. In rats, the treatment restored full erections, improved blood flow and accelerated healing.”

“Ethical and Legal Implications of Sex Robot: An Islamic Perspective: … This study first review the state of the art in sex robot and its associated ethical and legal issues. Secondly the issue is evaluated from Islamic perspective together with position of Islamic law (Shariah) towards the deployment of robot in sexual activities. The social effect of robot sex to the institution of marriage in particular is examined.”

“‘Imagining Cihuacoatl’ examines the conundrum of the multiple identities of the ‘serpent woman’, a Mexican goddess, analysing her relationship with other goddesses in the Nahua pantheon. She and the others were marked in a particular sexualised and gendered manner in the Nahua world. This article argues that Cihuacoatl and the fertility goddesses cannot be conceptualised in a symbolic universe that has binary divisions between male and female, nor can they be analysed by the methods currently employed in the social and cultural history of sexuality.”

“Jonas and Wyatt Maines were born identical twins, but from the start each had a distinct personality.” “The twin boys were identical in every way but one. Wyatt was a girl to the core, and now lives as one, with the help of a brave, loving family and a path-breaking doctor’s care.”

“Airborne molecules that elicit a reaction in a member of the same species are called pheromones, and the most famous ones are potent aphrodisiacs, like androstenone and androstenol in the saliva of male boars. If a fertile female gets a whiff of these molecules, she’ll present her rear to the male, a universal gesture in wild pig patois that means, “Let’s start a family.””

“Swede shocked by backyard elk ‘threesome’: … While he’s used to seeing elk get tipsy from eating fermented apples, Lundgren said he was wholly unprepared to have a front row seat at an elk sex show taking place in his backyard. “I’d never seen anything like it. Not with elk, at least,” he said. … “An older bull would never try to mount a cow in a wide-open residential backyard at this time of year,” [said Pär Grängstedt, researcher at the Grimsö research station].”

British banker leaves Goldman Sachs to start a custom-fit condom company.

Bollywood actors and filmmakers interviewed about shooting sex scenes.

Typewrite erotica c. 1920′s, inc. some nudes.

Wine, Rorschachs, and naked rugby

Posted by lilech on September 4, 2011

Angie Dickinson

“Tumblr, as a user-directed medium, releases porn from those traditional visual cues. It allows the viewer to look at porn without feeling like she is, you know, looking at porn.”

“San Francisco … is the perfect home for an institution like the Center for Sex & Culture [CSC]. I spoke with another institution, its co-founder, Dr. Carol Queen.”

“Spermatorrhea (an excessive discharge of semen) was such a source of panic in the mid-19th century that there were even cases of suicide among those who had convinced themselves – or been led to believe – that they were suffering.“

Declining sperm counts? “According to their results, global sperm counts had dropped by 50% in the five decades before the report.“

Male infertility and the missing coat: “Sperm wears a protein coat that helps it sneak past the female immune system – or it should. Going coatless could be a major cause of male infertility.”

“In this video from the University of Surrey … the first research project Hegarty discusses is … on the categorization of homosexuality as a mental illness, including the inclusion of homosexuality in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association from 1952 to 1973. Hegarty’s interest is in how the rise and fall of the Rorschach test as a psychological instrument related to efforts to detect and diagnose homosexuality as a mental illness during this period. “

“Waxing . . . is the most common method for extensive depilation, and complications include burns, mechanical folliculitis, infectious folliculitis, other infections of skin and soft tissues, and contact dermatitis and/or vulvitis. Removal of hair causes skin microtrauma, with inoculation of pathogens and subsequent mechanical spread of infection.“

“The finding that regular moderate intake of red wine is associated with higher FSFI scores for both sexual desire, lubrication, and overall sexual function as compared to the teetotaller status is intriguing. While this finding needs to be interpreted with some caution … it nevertheless suggests a potential relationship between red wine consumption and better sexuality.”

Photo by Chema Madoz

pdf: “Right Orbitofrontal Tumor With Pedophilia Symptom and Constructional Apraxia Sign”

“It’s what women have been telling men for decades: stimulating the vagina is not the same as stimulating the clitoris. Now brain scan data has added weight to their argument.“

“For the peahen, choosing a mate who has a beautiful long tail increases the chance of her male offspring growing one, and so also be attractive. Of course, for her there is very good reason to be choosy. Males can and want to spray their sperm around willy‑nilly, but producing an egg and offspring levies a prohibitive tax upon her metabolism.”

“The monkeys live in groups of three to nine, in which multiple adult males mate with a single breeding female and then cooperate to raise her young. This mating system, called polyandry, occurs in less than 1 per cent of bird species, and is even rarer in mammals.”

“Spider sex is unusual in that males transfer their sperm to the female on small limbs called pedipalps. … Dr Aisenberg and Dr Barrantes observed the process 17 times in pairs of Leucauge argyra. On the 14 occasions a sexual plug was made, the female produced it without assistance from the male. On ten of these occasions the male’s pedipalps then seemed to get stuck while he was transferring the sperm … and he had great difficulty freeing himself. In two of those ten instances, he was eaten as a result.“

“Some male insects also give females what’s called a spermatophylax to increase their chances of mating. A spermatophylax, which can weigh up to 30 percent of a male’s body weight, is essentially like a really good snack attached to their sperm.”

“Pornography, Society, and the Law in Imperial Germany“: “The view of human sexuality that surfaces in a society’s pornographic subculture is often a reflection, however distorted or reversed, of officially sanctioned attitudes toward sex. Likewise, the extent to which a society seeks to control a popular phenomenon like pornography is an indication of the fears, both conscious and unconscious, harbored toward that object.”

Uschi Digard

New Zealand vs. Fiji in a game of naked rugby

Bert and Ernie are not gay (according to a press release).

Transhumanists discuss sexbots for women.

Sex in the stands at a Red Sox game, captured on film by an ESPN cameraman.

“Mistressdom, like celibacy, is a crucial lens through which to explore how women relate to men other than in marriage; mistressdom is, in fact, an institution parallel and complementary to marriage. Mistresses, it seems, are everywhere.”

A gallery pinup collection of Bettie Page

Concerned clerics, Swedish sex changes and more MRI sex

Posted by lilech on July 4, 2011

Observational study of ‘Bicyclist’s Vulva’

Norwegian sex priest suspended for his book on sex in the Bible, in which he wrote that it “reeks of horniness, lust and pleasure, and is an endlessly rich tale of sex that can stimulate people’s own sex lives.”

The strange, sad tale of the overstimulated Rector of Stiffkey, a “prostitutes’ padre” who tried to “save” wayward young women and who was killed by a lion

“Thoughts of death led both men and women to say that they’d be more likely than controls to go ahead with the one-night stand, thus showing how a subtle change in sexual symbolism can alter the relationship between morbid thoughts and sexual desire.“

“Two studies, including an ecologically valid study of online dating advertisements, provided evidence for men’s production and women’s evaluation of humor in romantic contexts. A third study revealed that women’s evaluations of potential mates’ humor are predictive of their romantic interest. Moreover, this article shows that preferences for and perceptions of humor are associated with preferences for and perceptions of intelligence and warmth.“

Inclusive fitness and kin selection in an account of homosexuality’s survival value

“The intelligent homosexual’s guide to natural selection“

“Just How Naughty was Berlin? The Geography of Prostitution and Female Sexuality in Curt Moreck’s Erotic Travel Guide“

Anita Berber

Anne Tamar-Mattis argues that ‘intersex’ should be kept out of the DSM, which leads her to oppose expanding the concept of gender identity disorder.

In Sweden, opting for a sex change entails consenting to be sterilized, since “if a woman becomes a man, she should not be able to become pregnant as a woman.” Some are trying to change this law.

A stats professor has a “learning experience” occasioned by a transvestite cardinal (a bird, not a cleric).

While writing about The Story of O, Susan Sontag “compared the ratio of first-rate pornography to trashy books within the genre to “another somewhat shady subgenre with a few first-rate books to its credit, science fiction.” She also maintained that like science fiction, pornography was aimed at “disorientation, at psychic dislocation.””

From Just Jaeckin's film version of The Story of O

Naomi Wolf: “We now know that porn delivers rewards to the male brain in the form of a short-term dopamine boost, which, for an hour or two afterwards, lifts men’s mood and makes them feel good in general. The neural circuitry is identical to that for other addictive triggers, such as gambling or cocaine.” NOTE ADDED (July4): See the refutation at Mind Hacks.

Another orgasm in an MRI: “”This kind of research is incredibly useful,” says Heiman. “Orgasm is tied into the brain’s reward system and likely other important systems as well. There is much we can learn about the brain, about sensation, about how pleasure works and probably much more from this one physical response.”"

“One interesting ability that Kamisaruk found … is that some women … were able to “think themselves” to orgasm. Without using any external stimulation, women closed their eyes and, using only sometimes erotic imagery but just as commonly very random and abstract thought processes, achieved an orgasm that was indistinguishable from orgasms achieved through self-stimulation.“

Scicurious on rat studies that clarify how antidepressants interfere with ejaculation

Annie Sprinkle likes Chester Brown’s comic-strip memoir of being a john

A catch-all catch-up post

Posted by lilech on April 7, 2011

Gina Lolabrigida

“In the earliest records of human religion, castration was regarded as an act of devotion. Moreover, the ritual of circumcision is still followed by many modern religions. … CONCLUSION: The ritual of castration evolved into circumcision as a less-invasive and bloody procedure than castration.“

“Tally is short for Tallywacker, a British nickname for penis. It is also the nom de Internet of a 55-year-old, heterosexual, happily married attorney in Tennessee who is at the vanguard of the foreskin restoration movement. With evangelical zest, he shares his story, and a sequential series of photographs of his penis.“

“According to the original commitment–skepticism hypothesis, women err on the side of underestimating prospective mates’ commitment to avoid the high costs of pregnancy without support. … Confirming our predictions, … postmenopausal women did not show a bias toward underinferring men’s commitment intentions.“

“The current study demonstrates that exposure to a sexily dressed woman increases single men’s likelihood of noticing status products in a visual display.” (pdf)

“[We used] one of the most compelling visual cues of female sexual attractiveness (low waist-to-hip ratio) to test the influence of news anchor sexualization on audience evaluations of her as a professional and their memory for the news that she presents. Male participants saw the sexualized version of the anchor as less suited for war and political reporting. They also encoded less news information presented by the sexualized than her unsexualized version.“

Marisa Berenson

“Previous research had shown that a woman at the fertile stage of her menstrual cycle seems more attractive, and that same effect was observed here — but only when this woman was rated by a man who wasn’t already involved with someone else.“

“Resource control was associated with preferences for physical attractiveness over good financial prospects and greater maximum partner age tolerated. … The results implicate the role of constraints on female access to and control of resources in sex-differentiated mate preferences and highlight differences between resource control and wealth.“

“Although neuroticism was negatively associated with marital satisfaction on average, it was unrelated to marital satisfaction when couples had engaged in relatively frequent sex over the past 6 months.“

“So when news broke this week that the FDA had approved Viibryd, a so-called sexy-friendly antidepressant, it caused quite a stir. Far too often, people are forced to choose between their mental and sexual health — as though these were entirely separate categories.“

Damage to amygdala disinhibits two women: “For one to two hours after each seizure, she would engage in a wide variety of unusual sexual behaviors, such as masturbating in public and trying to seduce family members and neighbors.“

“There are at least 11 different sex-related sleep disorders, collectively referred to as “sexsomnia” or “sleepsex,” that affect people who are otherwise psychologically healthy—causing them to unknowingly engage in various sexual activities during the night.“

Photo by Rudolf Koppitz

“Now, we know that females of many nonhuman primates and maybe even some nonprimates experience orgasm. But we still don’t know why.” (pdf)

Spermatologist Tim Birkhead recommends five books, inc. some on sperm competition

“7 fascinating new findings” in sex science

“We summarize in this review recent results showing that both the main and accessory olfactory systems are able to process partially overlapping sets of sexual chemosignals and that both systems support complimentary aspects in mate recognition and in the control of sexual behavior.“

“Olfactory systems in mate recognition and sexual behavior“

“Semen allergy suspected in rare post-orgasm illness“

“The mice showed the same scent preferences for male and female mice and vocalized for male and female mice equally. When the serotonin in these animals was replaced, they preferred female mice over male mice.“

“During contests between males, full eunuchs that had lost both pedipalps were better fighters than half eunuchs and intact males …. The scientists think that, once a male has lost his means of procreating, he protects his investment further by becoming a superwarrior.“

“It was From who told her it was her “scientific duty” to study homosexuals and promised her access to all the subjects she needed. Initially she demurred but eventually, with the encouragement of From and her colleague Bruno Klopfer, [Evelyn] Hooker began an investigation that would ultimately result in the removal of homosexuality as a form of psychopathology from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual III of the American Psychiatric Association.“

A review of New York Hustlers: Masculinity and Sex in Modern America

Dr. Petra on a lap-dancer study: “The problem with writings about lap dancing in the past have been either they’ve focused on entirely positive accounts, or been overtly negative and often hostile to/about dancers. … This research is different as it takes the experiences of dancers and discusses their lives in a way that doesn’t flinch from the problems they face when dancing, or the positive (and mundane) parts of their work.“

“Music for Wanking: Brian Eno discusses his porno collection with Chrissie Hynde, 1974“

“Drugs, drag queens, nude psychotherapy, tutorials on stripping, trepanation, women wreastling (sic), disco churches and a soundtrack by Piero Piccioni, a suspected murderer who himself would be a suitable subject for Naked England, is an irresistible mix that makes this flick a perfect candidate for restoration and a digital release.“

Flaccid in Flanders — Belgian senator calls for a sex strike until political deadlock is broken

American Nudie Classics — “Your Grandpa’s Porn”

Propulsion, electro-ejaculation and the misplaced pen

Posted by lilech on December 16, 2010

Alla Nazimova

“Sensory information from the genitals is a potent activator of pro-erectile spinal neurons and elicits reflexive erections. Some pre-motor neurons of the medulla, pons and diencephalon project directly onto spinal sympathetic, parasympathetic and pudendal motoneurons. They receive in turn sensory information from the genitals. These spinal projecting pathways release a variety of neurotransmitters, including biogenic amines (serotonin, dopamine, noradrenaline, and adrenaline) and peptides that, through interactions with many receptor subtypes, exert complex effects on the spinal network that controls penile erection.“

“Penile erection is caused by a change of the activity of efferent autonomic pathways to the erectile tissues and of somatic pathways to the perineal striated muscles. The spinal cord contains the cell bodies of autonomic and somatic motoneurons that innervate the peripheral targets. The sympathetic outflow is mainly antierectile, the sacral parasympathetic outflow is proerectile, and the pudendal outflow, through contraction of the perineal striated muscles, enhances an erection already present. The shift from flaccidity to erection suggests relations among these neuronal populations in response to a variety of informations. Spinal neurons controlling erection are activated by information from peripheral and supraspinal origin.“

“Erection, emission and ejaculation are separate phenomena and have different innervations. … When interpreting a specific lesion it is important to understand if postsynaptic fibres are intact or not. Afferents of erection, emission and ejaculation are the pudendal nerve and descending pathways from the brain. Erection is cholinergic and NO-mediated. Emission starts cholinergically (as a secretion) and ends sympathetically (as a contraction). Ejaculation is mainly adrenergic and somatic. For vibratory-evoked ejaculation, the reflex arch must be complete; for electroejaculation, the postsynaptic neurons (paravertebral ganglia) must be intact.“

“The involvement of the neuropeptide oxytocin in the control of male sexual responses is documented although its exact mechanisms of action, and especially the site(s) of action, are not fully delineated. In order to clarify this issue, we tested the effects of a peptide oxytocin antagonist delivered through different routes on sexual responses elicited, in anaesthetized male rats …. Brain oxytocin receptors mediate male sexual responses elicited by i.c.v. 7-OH-DPAT in anaesthetized rats whereas L6 spinal oxytocin receptors only impair the occurrence of ejaculation.“

Photo by Raoul Hausmann

“The propulsion of seminal fluid is in 3 phases: I. Contraction of seminal vesicles; II. Closure of bladder neck …; III. Expulsion of semen from the bulb of the urethra …. The coordination of these phases is probably at hypothalamic level. Failure of ejaculation may be classified into I. Deficiency of production of seminal fluid from (1) Absence of seminal vesicles or (2) Androgen deficiency from (a) Pituitary dysfunction or (b) Testicular interstitial-cell failure from a number of causes. Correction of androgen deficiency usually restores ejaculation.“

“Electrical microstimulation of the spinal generator for ejaculation revealed an accelerated expulsion phase in rapid ejaculating rats.“

“Electrical microstimulation of LSt neurons activates the entire sequence of ejaculation in rats in a coordinated fashion, ie the emission (SV/VD contraction) followed by expulsion (rhythmic BSM contractions) of living spermatozoa.“

“We recently characterized a population of spinothalamic neurons in the lumbar spinal cord of male rats (LSt cells) that constitutes an integral part of the spinal ejaculation generator. LSt cells send projections to the autonomic nuclei and motoneurons involved in the emission and expulsion phase, and they receive sensory projections from the pelvis. LSt cells are activated with ejaculation, but not following other components of sexual behavior, and lesions of LSt cells completely ablate ejaculatory function. These data support a pivotal role for the LSt cells in the control of ejaculation.“

“In contrast to rats, the expulsion reflex could not be reliably elicited in mice with or without spinal transection. This latter finding suggests the existence of fundamental differences in the organization of the spinal network controlling sexual reflexes between rats and mice.“

From Johann Kresnik's staging of Verdi's "A Masked Ball" (2008)

“An 18-year-old male having a 3 cm coronal macro urethro-cutaneous fistula, developing as a result of a strangulating rope tied at the coronal sulcus in an attempt to cause penile detumescence, is presented for its rare mode of self-inflicted penile trauma and unexpected postsurgical successful cosmetic and functional outcome.“

“We report the case of a 57-year-old male who attended the emergency department after inserting a ballpoint pen into his urethra 24 hours earlier during a sexual encounter. … It was subsequently removed using a combination of graspers and stone retrieval baskets. Self insertion of foreign bodies into the urethra is often as a result of psychiatric disturbance, alcohol intoxication or as a means of sexual gratification. … Temporary insertion of a urethral catheter may be necessary. We reviewed the literature in relation to this unusual problem.“

“Two cases of urethral foreign body are described: a 74-year-old male with mental disorder who presented with acute urinary retention arising from a fragment of a metal tube in the bulbous urethra and a 34-year-old female with intense micturition syndrome arising from a calcified electrical cable located in the urethra.“

From the Russian miniseries adaptation of Mikhael Bulgakov’s Master and Margarita

Sacred prostitutes, sexy books and why sex is worth it

Posted by lilech on December 11, 2010

Charlotte Rampling

Another excellent treasure trove of Veruschka pics. An older Veruschka: “My eyes carry more than happiness.“

Western Sexual Mysticism: “The vast range of possibilities for hidden, erotic mysticism demand a closer look.”

Sex in the Dionysian mysteries, and sex in the Orphic mysteries

From a journal on endocrinology and metabolism, “Baubo: a Case of Ambiguous Genitalia in the Eleusinian Mysteries“

Sacred prostitution in Sir James Frazer’s Golden Bough

“Sacred prostitution and Aphrodite“

More about sacred prostitution, and still more

Michael Coogan on “God and Sex”

“Sex and the Renaissance Nun: Why Venetian Nunneries Were Once Hotbeds of Passion“

Dr. Debby Herbenick’s research interests range “from examining attitudes toward vibrator use to investigating the relationship between sexual lubricant and pleasure.”

The Veruschka segment from Blowup:

Rhesus Macaques “pay” for monkey porn (pdf)

“Sex differences in relative foot length and perceived attractiveness of female feet“

“While outbreaks of koro (a culture-specific syndrome involving belief that the genitals are shrinking and retreating into the body) are most common in China and other parts of south-east Asia, sporadic cases have also been reported in other countries such as Thailand, India, and even western nations such as Canada.“

Hooters opens in Japan

Two kinds of Persistent Genital Arousal Disorder

“This mind trick – called the Belladonna effect – is helping the team’s research into attractiveness. Large pupils is [sic] a known signal of physiological arousal, say the authors, so they predicted that making the pupils seem dilated would make a face appear more attractive.“

From almost five years ago, Susie Bright on Playboy‘s list of the 25 sexiest books. Adam Ross recommends James Salter’s A Sport and a Pastime.

Laura Miller against the Bad Sex in Fiction Award

Charlotte Rampling (1974)

“In this review, we summarize neural regulation of sexual function and neurological causes of sexual dysfunction in women.“

“Dr Abecassis performs a “hymenoplasty” as it’s called, at least two to three times a week. Re-connecting the tissue of the hymen takes about 30 minutes under local anaesthetic. … With Chinese manufacturers leading the way, there are now non-surgical options on the market as well. One website sells artificial hymens for just £20 (23 euros). The Chinese hymen is made of elastic and filled with fake blood.“

“When it comes to the age at which boys and girls first have sex, boys are far more influenced by what their peers are doing and by the number of available sex partners than are girls.“

“Several standard sex differences replicated across cultures, including women’s greater valuation of social status and men’s greater valuation of physical attractiveness.“

Hypothesis: “Sexual frequency would moderate the association between neuroticism and relationship satisfaction.“

Sex costs much time and energy. Is it worth it?

Alla Nazimova

“Additionally, the mating dance is another cost of sex. Individuals expend time and energy seeking out mates, and may have to compete and display for the attention of all. Why bother?“

“Men, they’ve found, are less likely to continue a relationship with an unfaithful partner who’s had a heterosexual affair, as opposed to a homosexual affair. For women, it’s the other way around – they’re more troubled by their male partner going off with another man.“

“Some historians have proclaimed that America’s first gay president was really … the now-obscure James Buchanan. (He was the 15th president, serving from 1857 to 1861). Buchanan is the only bachelor to ever have held America’s top office, and his private life raised many eyebrows while he was alive.“

“In Search of Looks, Status, or Something Else? Partner Preferences Among Butch and Femme Lesbians and Heterosexual Men and Women“: “Previous research posited that butch lesbians are physiologically similar to heterosexual men, and by implication, femme lesbians physiologically resemble heterosexual women. The current study sought to compare partner preferences among butch and femme lesbians, as well as heterosexual women and men.”

Blind passion

Posted by lilech on December 8, 2010

Theda Bara

“This is the Tenga onanism cup, or Onacup for short, launched in sexually-adventurous Japan in 2005 and now sold in over 40 countries – with global sales of 13 million units including 1.5 million in Western markets. … Its creator Koichi Matsumoto – a car mechanic by training – says he wanted to help male toys shed their “nasty” image.“

“Natalie Portman has branded her masturbation scene in the much-anticipated movie, Black Swan, as “disgusting”. The film – about two ballerinas battling it out for the lead role in Swan Lake – contains a particularly graphic scene in which Natalie’s character Nina is caught by her mother pleasuring herself.“

Scrotal hyperthermia: “Your balls can’t take the heat from your laptop“

“Historical Highlights of Erectile and Sexual Dysfunction: an Illustrated Chronology,” including 18th-Century masturbation hysteria and Baker Brown’s female genital mutliation as a “cure” for masturbation. Here’s more about clitorectomies and other 19th-Century sexual surgeries, and a dramatic depiction of some of the characters behind this practice

“Massive Magnets Reveal More Sex in the Brain“: “They showed heterosexual male subjects a range of pictures, some of them pornographic, others “emotional” but non-sexuaual. … [A]nticipating seeing a picture, as opposed to actually viewing one, activated different areas of the cortex and also of the thalamus …. Sexual arousal was also correlated with activity in a third thalamic area.”

Man goes blind at ejaculation. From the study: “A 66-year-old man complained of recurrent transient monocular visual loss in his left eye during the climax of sexual intercourse. … Each attack of blindness lasted 1–2 min, consisting of monosymptomatic complete visual loss of rapid onset in the left eye only (no light perception). Vision remained normal in the fellow eye. The patient stated that each attack was followed by spontaneous complete visual recovery over a few minutes.”

Cats as the BDSM enthusiasts of the animal world. “In both large wild cats and smaller domestic cats, males tend to get rather rough with females.“

“Is the female orgasm an evolutionary by-product?” Scicurious attacks a recent study.

Homer Bostwick, Ernst Gräfenberg, and the Excessive Machine

Posted by lilech on November 16, 2010

Barbarella in the Excessive Machine

I’ve been skimming through an 1847 book by Dr. Homer Bostwick called A treatise on the nature and treatment of seminal diseases, impotency and other kindred affections, with practical directions for the management and removal of the cause producing them; together with hints to young men (that link is to the whole book on Google — on pp. iv and v of which you’ll see the hand of the woman who scanned in the book — she has … um … prophylactic rubbers on her fingers).

It’s a hard-hitting tract on the evils of masturbation that would do Christine O’Donnell proud. On p.46, while describing the horrific effects of masturbation, Dr. Bostwick says, “The testes have dwindled away, and the penis has become small, and to the touch conveys a cord-like feeling.” He then adds that, “Indeed, nervous twitchings of the eye-lids, head, and limbs, are occasional consequences of long continued masturbation.” The condition of the un-regenerate wanker degenerates until (by p. 47),

He is finally either hurried to a premature grave … or, insanity, taking the hopeless form of dementia, has removed him … to the mad-house. It is safe to say, that of all the cases of incurable insanity, a large majority are caused by involuntary seminal emissions, or by masturbation.

Later, Dr. Bostwick recounts some cases from his own practice. Though much of the book focuses on men, Dr. Bostwick includes some cases involving female patients. Thus, on pp. 208-210, he quotes a young widow, Mrs. R., who — though she lived in the northeast — I like to imagine as speaking in a southern accent:

Before my marriage my imagination was wrought up to the highest points by connubial enjoyments. The venereal appetite was first excited by novels, love stories, theatrical representations, gay parties, etc. … So strong were my passions, that it was with the greatest difficulty that I could conduct myself in a decorous and lady-like manner in the presence of the other sex …. I acknowledge, with shame, that I practised self-abuse both before and after marriage …. If I cannot be relieved of this agonizing condition, I am certain that the struggle between my moral sense and lascivious longings must soon send me to the grave.

'Death of Onan' by Franc Lanjšček

Drastic measures are called for, since, as we have learnt from Dr. Bostwick, the young lady’s fears are all too likely to be borne out if she cannot still the dreaded hand of Onanistic passion (sorry). As a remedy for the poor dear, Dr. Bostwick, among other things, instructed Mrs. R to apply “six leeches to the os uteri, and … to throw up the vagina a decoction of poppy-heads and hops, four or five times a day.” He later “cauterized the urethra, and used the nitrate of silver, in the solid state and in solution, to the excoriated surface of the vagina and vulva” (p. 210). Happily, Dr. Bostwick reports, Mrs. R made a full recovery and re-married [because, you see, a passionate woman who masturbates is so unwell as to be unfit for marriage].

Another case (pp. 211-212) invovles Miss D, a woman “of a tall, spare, and uncomely appearance, and of filthy habits.” On examination, Dr. Bostwick discovers that,

On the inside of the right labium, there was a large growth of warty vegetations …. The urethra pouted out, and was indurated and inflamed; the clitoris was very much elongated, but it was in a dry and hardened condition.

Fear not — she, too, makes a full recovery under the doctor’s guidance.

Homer Bostwick’s other cases include a man with immense testicles who wants to be castrated and a convicted rapist who castrates himself.

Lest it be thought that Bostwick’s attitudes were an inevitable product of his age, note that little more than thirty years later, Mark Twain would pen (but not deliver) his glorious defence of masturbation, ‘Some Thoughts on the Science of Onanism‘ (which was posthumously published).

Skipping ahead several decades brings us to the inspring work of Ernst Gräfenberg (after whom the G-spot is named). Someone has devoted a whole site (with a blog) to him and his spot. The 1950 paper in which Gräfenberg posited the G-spot is on-line. It’s called ‘The Role of Urethra in Female Orgasm‘ and was originally published in the International Journal of Sexology (which was discontinued in 1955).

The G-spot is intimately bound up with female ejaculation, the controversy around which could be the basis for an opera. A tragic one, though, since the G-spot’s low profile makes it so difficult to locate.

“Female ejaculation has been a topic of debate for more than 50 years. … [R]ecent careful investigations have confirmed both the existence of semen-like liquid emission and the existence of the female prostate (Skene’s glands) as its primary source.“

“This fluid can sometimes eject under pressure and thus resemble male ejaculation. It may presumably originate in the vagina, in the bladder (orgastic urination) or in the paraurethral (Skene’s) glands, labeled by some authors as the female prostate.“

“The G-spot is an ill-defined region, located on the anterior vaginal wall, in its upper outer third, suggested by Ernst Grafenberg …. The G-spot is thought to be the vaginal part that lies beneath the posterior part of the “female prostatic gland”, which, when stimulated, results in female ejaculation during orgasm.“

“One of the seven women reported ejaculation at orgasm …. On MRI, paraurethral glands could be visualized in six of the seven patients. There was no relation between glandular volume and ejaculation status.“

“Ancient Indian texts in sexology (kamaśastra) from the 11th century onwards prove that their authors knew about the area later termed the “Gräfenberg zone” in Europe, as well as about the female ejaculation connected with the stimulation of this area.“

Kamasutra illustration

“In ancient Asia female ejaculation was very well known and mentioned in several Chinese Taoist texts starting in the 4th century. … First mentioned in a 7th century poem, female ejaculation and the Gräfenberg spot (G-spot) are described in detail in most works of the Kāmaśāstra. In ancient Western writings the emission of female fluid is mentioned even earlier, depicted about 300 B.C. by Aristotle and in the 2nd century by Galen. Reinjier De Graaf in the 16th century provided the first scientific description of female ejaculation and was the first to refer to the periurethral glands as the female prostate.“

“The female ejaculate had lower levels of creatinine, but had elevated levels of prostate specific antigen, prostatic acidic phosphatase, prostate specific acid phosphatase, and glucose. … We hypothesize that female ejaculation has a unique function in producing a secretion into the urethra that provides protection from urinary tract infections (UTIs). We further predict that female ejaculate contains antimicrobial compounds including elements such as zinc.“

“Every woman has the right to feel sexual pleasure. … The vulva is formed by the labia majora and vestibule, with its erectile apparatus: clitoris (glans, body, crura), labia minora, vestibular bulbs and corpus spongiosum. … Knowledge of the embryology, anatomy and physiology of the female erectile organs are important in the field of women’s sexual health.“

Jane Fonda in Barbarella

I have a thing for research that involves orgasms in a lab. Here are two previously cited cases. Here’s another, and now there’s this new one reported by Pharyngula:

“‘In one experiment we asked women to self-stimulate and then raise their hands each time they orgasmed. Some women raised their hands several times each session, often just a few seconds apart,’ Professor Komisaruk said.” SciCurious has more about this case.

And I found this older one:

“Sexual arousal by clitoral self-stimulation was used by healthy, young adult women volunteers (n =28) to induce orgasm in the laboratory. [italics added] … The mean measured orgasm duration was 19.9 seconds (SD, ± 12, n =26). For 14 subjects, their estimate of the duration of their orgasms (12.2 ± 9.8 seconds, mean ± SD) was greatly underestimated compared with the measured duration (26 ± 14.6 seconds). This result indicates that data obtained on the duration of orgasm from questionnaires or interviews have suspect validity.“

“More detailed examination of responses during intercourse revealed that, while female orgasms were most commonly experienced during foreplay, copulatory vocalizations were reported to be made most often before and simultaneously with male ejaculation. These data together clearly demonstrate a dissociation of the timing of women experiencing orgasm and making copulatory vocalizations and indicate that there is at least an element of these responses that are under conscious control, providing women with an opportunity to manipulate male behavior to their advantage.“

More Polly-Jean:

Schéhérazade, Sir Henry Head and the Ladybirds

Posted by lilech on November 8, 2010

Cover for an LP by Scheherazade

I wish I knew what artist made this cool cover for a recording by a Japanese band called Scheherazade. I hit upon it while looking for images of the ballet Scheherazade, based on Rimsky-Korsakov’s music. The choreographer was Michel Fokine. The ballet’s first performance starred Ida Rubinstein and Vaslav Nijinsky.

Findings from the National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior (a 140-page pdf)

“There has been a transition for women in direction towards a stereotypically ‘male’ personality profile, but not at the expense of traditionally socially important female traits. Comparisons in psychological profile subscales showed an increase in dominance, exhibition, aggression and achievement.“

“Using … data from a high-fertility polygynous human population of Senegal, we first show that extraversion, a personality dimension predicting men’s mating behavior in this population, is associated with inter-individual differences in testosterone profiles, with men in the top quartile of extraversion distribution having 29% higher testosterone levels.“

“This study conducts an exploratory investigation of various post-coital behaviors that the authors propose may reflect the divergent adaptive reproductive strategies of each sex as understood from an evolutionary perspective.“

‘What the presence of attractive young women can do to men‘

The scientific case for masturbation — 4 theories about its adaptive function

The best cover for a Scheherazade LP or cd, c. 1963.

“A recent study suggests that daily masturbation and ejaculation can reduce the amount of accumulated DNA damage in sperm by 12%. Therefore wasting sperm into a sock can actually improve the mobility of sperm and increase fertility.” Here’s the study

Some history of masturbation: “Freud famously concluded a 1912 symposium on masturbation for the Psychoanalytical Society in Vienna by saying, ‘I think the time has come to break off. For we are all agreed on one thing–that the subject of masturbation is quite inexhaustible.’“

Mind Hacks posted on erotic asphyxia. Here’s a review of the literature on autoerotic deaths between 1954 and 2004. Here’s a pdf of the first paper that I could find on this topic (in the British Medical Journal, 1960). After a gruesome description of the circumstances in which four men had died, the authors venture a Freudian hypothesis — somehow, the men wrapped themselves in plastic in order to simulate a return to the womb. (!) Then the authors make a more sensible claim: “A much less elegant and more superficial explanation is that these people were trying to achieve some undifferentiated thrill or excitement from partial suffocation or anoxia. This factor may have existed but it does not explain the transvestism, sexual arousal, or complete enclosure of the body. It is an interesting reflection that the sexual impulse in man is so protean in its manifestations that a technical advance resulting in a new packaging material can result in a new perverse manifestation.”

Here are some more recent (but equally sad) cases involving less typical autoerotic causes of death: “These modalities include ligature around the thorax or abdomen, plastic bags covering the face, electrical current, inhalation of a toxic gas or chemicals, or partial or total submersion, known as aquaerotic asphyxiation. This study highlights 11 cases of atypical autoerotic death, including asphyxia with a plastic bag, electrocution, and inhalation of butane and nitrous oxide (N2O).” Two more atypical cases: “We here report the case of a 34-year-old man who died due to asphyxia, secondary to body wrapping in the largest and most complex plastic bag ever involved in a published case of autoerotic death“; and “Unusual death of a 24-year-old man, involving propane inhalation and plastic bag suffocation, is described.“

Back to a less depressing topic: You get a sense of the erotic nature of Scheherazade from this review of a perfomance by Anna Kisselgoff in the NY Times (Jan. 18, 1981). Kisselgoff summarizes part of the narrative as follows: “The wives bribe the chief eunuch to release the slaves who spring out to make love to the women. The leader of the orgy is Zobeide’s ‘golden slave’ …. It is common to think of ‘Scheherazade,’ with its frank acknowledgement of sexual passions, as an early expression of Freud’s century. To most Anglo-Saxon audiences at the time, it was inconceivable that a powerful queen would bother with a black slave. Russians brought up on tales of Tartar harems and white princesses had no trouble with the idea.” Here’s Yvonne de Carlo as she appeared in a 1947 movie called Song of Scheherazade.