Apparently, “pleasure” is a dirty word. At least it seems to be according to the Powers That Be of Facebook. I had no idea. Being a small business owner definitely has its educational moments.
I’ve used a variety of tools to promote my business so far: Twitter, blogging, guest posting, networking on- and offline. I had done a fairly good job of ignoring Facebook, mostly because I hadn’t quite figured out how I wanted to use it. But recently, I had a conversation with a friend who suggested a strategy that made sense. It sounded possible. It even sounded fun. I was able to redefine the Facebook tasks in a way that made sense…so I decided to get set up. I’ve had a page but I decided to rebrand from Leela Life Coaching to Body of Pleasure and actually engage at a higher level.
Name the page. Check. Tell people about it. Check. Twenty-five followers, check. Custom URL…not available. I tried BodyofPleasure, and then I tried other combinations and permutations. No dice.
In frustration, I posted to a forum of sexuality educators of which I’m a part. Someone posted back, “I believe pleasure is a blocked word.”
Indeed the Facebook help menus say that “certain words are blocked” from custom URLs, but nowhere is there a list of these words, nor have my colleagues been able to get an answer from The Powers Of Facebook. My colleague listed a number of words with clearly sexually explicit meanings that she knew were also blocked, but I was stuck on pleasure.
Pleasure, really? Pleasure is blocked? Pleasure?
Apparently so. Just to check I tried other phrases with “pleasure” and none were available. (Pleasing is ok though. Huh?) And Body of Pleasures, an adult toy seller (with whom I am not affiliated), doesn’t have a custom URL either.
So what’s up with this, Facebook? Surely you can’t tell me that the pleasures of ice cream, warm sun, cozy blankets, sweet pets, good movies, fabulous writing, grass under my toes, brilliant music, travel, art, and warm peaches fresh from the tree are all obscene. Pleasure is, in fact, not obscene. It’s not offensive, is it? It’s not even NSFW. People drink good quality coffee at desks and computers all around the world. By blocking the word pleasure you’re implying that enjoyment itself is somehow unfit for the public eye.
And it is this attitude that’s got our entire culture tangled in a hopeless knot.
Pleasure is not something that can or should be forgotten, hidden, or shamed. Pleasure is not something we can afford to set aside. Pleasure is the thing that tells us when we’re doing it right.
When we feel good, we’re doing it right. When we don’t feel good, something needs to change.
Sometimes it is a small thing. Sometimes it is a big thing. Sometimes it feels like EVERYTHING.
And when we can’t tell what we’re feeling, we have no idea if it’s right or not. We don’t know if we need new curtains. We don’t know if we need alone time. We don’t know if we should paint our toenails red. We just don’t know.
Which is sucky. And hard. And hard on everyone around us, too.
Pleasure saves the day. It is absolutely key. And Facebook? Blocking it from your URLs does not help matters one little bit. Instead you become part of a general cultural malaise that makes us less and less likely to know what we want and more and more likely to buy stuff or get drunk or get in fights or have insomnia and depression in an effort to figure out what we don’t even remember that we don’t know anymore. All we end up with is this general feeling of blah and no way to fix it.
No way that we remember.
We are caught in this shroud of forgetfulness around pleasure, and so we don’t know that all the tools we need are inside our own heads already.
Dear Facebook: help us remember. Help us remember to remember. Help us engage with the systems of knowing that we already have. Help us figure this one out. Sometimes pleasure is about sex. Sometimes it isn’t. Sometimes toes are about sex, too, but I don’t think those are blocked. Do one tiny thing to help us be a better place.
Friday, June 22, 2012
Thursday, June 7, 2012
The Accidental Orgasm
Now that everyone knows what a clitoris is, there is equal opportunity for all. Prior to the groundbreaking discovery that clitoral stimulation was THE big factor in orgasm, men could imagine that the erect male member was the whole of the ecstasy package.
PREHISTORY AND THE SEX THING — WHO KNEW?
Our ancestors huddled in caves, fled from sabre-toothed tigers, ate roasted lizard, and died at 35. Female sexual satisfaction was not much on their minds.
The first man to elicit an orgasm from a female partner may have had a eureka! moment much like that of the guy who ate the first oyster or lit the first campfire. But I’m betting he didn’t know what a momentous discovery he’d made.
HE: “What the — #*%!^?*!? What’s the matter with you?”
SHE: “I just felt incredibly, fantastically good there for a few moments…”
HE: ”Well, put a sock in it next time. Your shrieking and clawing interrupts my concentration.”
THE EVOLUTION OF THE ORGASM
Civilization has passed through many millennia, all of them sympathetic to male supremacy. We live in the Age of Information Glut, wherein every sentient man knows women are not only capable of orgasms, but insist on them. Staring out from magazines, newspapers, and screens of every size and resolution are the faces of super-confident hotties whose message is plainly, “If you don’t get me off, pal, you’re gone.”
Now that everyone knows what a clitoris is, there is equal opportunity for all. Prior to the groundbreaking discovery that clitoral stimulation was THE big factor in orgasm, men could imagine that the erect male member was the whole of the ecstasy package. These days accidental orgasm is passé, an embarrassment, a sign that a man is not doing his job.
BUT ON THE DOWNSIDE….
Female self-affirmation has unleashed upon males a tidal wave of performance anxiety. Men once feared mere death, but now they live in terror of erectile dysfunction. It’s not just grandpas who are using Viagra. Studies suggest that younger men too experience E.D. For those with no physical ailment, the cause is most often fear of comparison, fear of not — er– measuring up.
Older guys’ E.D. is more physical than emotional. UniversityofChicagoresearchers say about one-third of American men 50-65 suffer from E.D. and from ages 65 to 85 the figure jumps to 44 percent. Few older men report the kind of performance anxiety that comes from fear of comparison, partly because they’ve had time to hone their skills in long-term marriages or in multiple relationships over time. And unless they’re wooing women young enough to be their daughters or granddaughters, they can count on the understanding of women partners mature enough to have been through the same wars.
WHAT OLD GUYS FEAR THE MOST
For old guys it’s not performance anxiety. It’s fear of the Last Erection. When a man of 60 experiences a temporary limp-out he’s positive that this is the moment he’s dreaded for the last decade. OMG my last erection was THE last.
This sort of flawed thinking can introduce anxiousness into otherwise vigorous and spontaneous lovemaking. If only the order were reversed – first the ejaculation, then the foreplay! Getting rid of the Big If right away, senior men could relax and focus more happily on the ecstasy-inducing moves the modern woman requires.
We don’t want it that way, of course. Women have had enough of being the afterthought. But ironically, we senior gals can benefit from Big If stress, because guys who are bummed about not having the rock-hard erections they had in their 20s will simply try harder to please, which means they won’t be settling for the accidental orgasm — and neither will you.
PREHISTORY AND THE SEX THING — WHO KNEW?
Our ancestors huddled in caves, fled from sabre-toothed tigers, ate roasted lizard, and died at 35. Female sexual satisfaction was not much on their minds.
The first man to elicit an orgasm from a female partner may have had a eureka! moment much like that of the guy who ate the first oyster or lit the first campfire. But I’m betting he didn’t know what a momentous discovery he’d made.
HE: “What the — #*%!^?*!? What’s the matter with you?”
SHE: “I just felt incredibly, fantastically good there for a few moments…”
HE: ”Well, put a sock in it next time. Your shrieking and clawing interrupts my concentration.”
THE EVOLUTION OF THE ORGASM
Civilization has passed through many millennia, all of them sympathetic to male supremacy. We live in the Age of Information Glut, wherein every sentient man knows women are not only capable of orgasms, but insist on them. Staring out from magazines, newspapers, and screens of every size and resolution are the faces of super-confident hotties whose message is plainly, “If you don’t get me off, pal, you’re gone.”
Now that everyone knows what a clitoris is, there is equal opportunity for all. Prior to the groundbreaking discovery that clitoral stimulation was THE big factor in orgasm, men could imagine that the erect male member was the whole of the ecstasy package. These days accidental orgasm is passé, an embarrassment, a sign that a man is not doing his job.
BUT ON THE DOWNSIDE….
Female self-affirmation has unleashed upon males a tidal wave of performance anxiety. Men once feared mere death, but now they live in terror of erectile dysfunction. It’s not just grandpas who are using Viagra. Studies suggest that younger men too experience E.D. For those with no physical ailment, the cause is most often fear of comparison, fear of not — er– measuring up.
Older guys’ E.D. is more physical than emotional. UniversityofChicagoresearchers say about one-third of American men 50-65 suffer from E.D. and from ages 65 to 85 the figure jumps to 44 percent. Few older men report the kind of performance anxiety that comes from fear of comparison, partly because they’ve had time to hone their skills in long-term marriages or in multiple relationships over time. And unless they’re wooing women young enough to be their daughters or granddaughters, they can count on the understanding of women partners mature enough to have been through the same wars.
WHAT OLD GUYS FEAR THE MOST
For old guys it’s not performance anxiety. It’s fear of the Last Erection. When a man of 60 experiences a temporary limp-out he’s positive that this is the moment he’s dreaded for the last decade. OMG my last erection was THE last.
This sort of flawed thinking can introduce anxiousness into otherwise vigorous and spontaneous lovemaking. If only the order were reversed – first the ejaculation, then the foreplay! Getting rid of the Big If right away, senior men could relax and focus more happily on the ecstasy-inducing moves the modern woman requires.
We don’t want it that way, of course. Women have had enough of being the afterthought. But ironically, we senior gals can benefit from Big If stress, because guys who are bummed about not having the rock-hard erections they had in their 20s will simply try harder to please, which means they won’t be settling for the accidental orgasm — and neither will you.
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