How to add conflict to your erotic story to make it more realistic and exciting

Drawing for the cover of my novel "Desencadenada". 

Let’s face it: most erotic stories are boring. The sexual images titillate us and that keeps us reading but, other than sex, not much is happening. You may add appealing characters, a nice setting and beautiful wording, but more often than not the reader will skip over the wordy parts to get to the good stuff. She is not interested in the story (because there is none!), just the sexy bits.

Most erotic stories are not interesting because they do not abide by the basic rules of fiction: there must be conflict, the conflict must drive the plot, and the plot must change the main characters in a significant way.

However, for many writers of erotica conflict is incompatible with sex because they think that conflict is the same as violence, and mixing violence with sex equals sexual abuse. And they don’t want to go there. Sex is supposed to be loving and peaceful, a way for people to connect. It should not be violent.

This is wrong on two counts. First, sex can be violent but no abusive. For example, in BDSM physical violence is combined with sex to make it more exciting. But, most important, conflict is not the same as violence. Hollywood has created this wrong idea by inundating us with movies full of fistfights, gunshots, car crashes and explosions. But, fortunately, life is not like that. And yet life is full of conflict.

This is particularly true when it comes to sex. In fact, most sexual acts have an element of conflict. We still live in a repressive society in which a lot of sex is done by breaking taboos, conventions, ethical rules, agreements with third parties, and even the law. Also, more often than not there is a mismatch between the desires, goals or emotional states of the participants during sex. Therefore, not only are our run-of-the-mill erotic stories boring, they are unrealistic because they offer an idealized vision of sex that rarely corresponds to reality.

In this, erotic stories are not very different from porn videos: the absence of conflict makes the sex unrealistic. Besides, if the appeal of our erotic story is based solely on sexual images, video will always be able to do it better. But if our story dwells into the experiences that happen inside the minds of the characters, we will be doing something that video cannot do.

There is also an opportunity to be educational. You can present as conflict a problem that you know how to solve. It could be questionable consent, homophobia, problems achieving orgasm, lack of communication, sexual shame, etc. The characters face the problem, experience distress, find a way to solve it, have great fun, and end up feeling great about the whole thing. Or you could write it in a dramatic key, showing how the inability of the characters to solve the problem leads to an unhappy ending.

Just like any other kind of fiction, erotica can be happy, dramatic or even tragic. It could also be written as humor. When you stop to think about it, sex is inherently funny, filled with undignified positions, embarrassing outcomes, and endless possibilities for slapstick accidents. The whole repertoire of humans emotions are brought into sex: joy, sadness, fear, surprise, anger, disgust, shame, guilt, indignation, disappointment, envy, jealousy, pride, empathy, compassion and, of course, love.

A critical decision is who is going to be the point of view character in your story. Avoid an omniscient narrator, that is, one who can move from the mind of one character to another. This distances the reader from the action, which is the last thing we want in erotica. What you want is the reader to slip inside the skin of one of the characters so that he or she can feel what the character is feeling. This is achieved using either the first person or a tight third-person narrative. Make sure to go frequently inside the mind of the character to describe her thoughts and emotions. Never create confusion about who is the point of view, especially at the beginning of the story. Usually, your point of view character is the one who experiences the conflicts the most and gets transformed at the end of the story.

And, please, don’t make your characters perfect! Only imperfect people can be transformed by what happens to them. Give them some flaws, this will also add some depth to them.

At this point, you probably have realized that there are endless possibilities to bring conflict into an erotic story. I list a few examples below. I classify them according to whether the source of conflict is external, in the relationship, or internal to one of the characters.

External sources of conflict 

The sexual attraction is so strong that these people are having sex against all odds and putting themselves in danger. Or maybe danger is the secret ingredient that makes sex so hot.

• Romeo and Juliet - the characters belong to antagonistic groups: families with ancient quarrels, nations at war, or opposing cultural tribes.
• The characters belong to different groups that make communication between them problematic, such as different races, social classes, political parties, nations, cultures, etc.
• Having sex in an unusual place where there is danger to be discovered: an elevator, a train, a plane, a beach, a park…
• Having sex in a dangerous place: underwater, in a rock-climbing route, in the snow, on a kayak in the middle of the sea, on a mountain top, in a dangerous neighborhood.
• The sex act breaks a societal taboo. For example, stories featuring incest, cheating, student-professor or boss-secretary relationships. Of course, you should consider the ethics of writing such a story and whether it may be targeted for censorship. 
• The sex is against the law. For example, a homosexual act in an Islamic country.
• Sex during a natural disaster: hurricane, earthquake, etc.

Sources of conflict in the relationship

Most couples have problems and those tend to surface when they have sex. And if the story is about casual sex, well, then the potential for conflict rises considerably, doesn’t it?

• Performance sex. Sometimes one of the persons wants a relationship much more than the other. Then sex may become an act of seduction to convince the reluctant partner that they would get a lot of pleasure out of the relationship. This creates a dynamic that can range from the comic to the tragic. 
• Problematic consent. I do not agree with the absolutist position that anything other than enthusiastic consent is rape. Ignoring the fact that there are borderline cases actually hinders the fight against rape. There are a lot of these gray areas and fiction is a great way of creating hypotheticals to explore the limits of what is ethical. Let’s face it, a lot of sex is not accepted enthusiastically and it is still OK. There is charity sex, service sex, sex to keep your spouse from looking for another lover, sex to get a job or a promotion, etc. Some of it is ethical, some is not. A story is a good way to get your readers thinking about it. 
• Jealousy and envy. A sex story may involve a threesome, in which case these pesky emotions are more likely than not to come up. How will your characters deal with them? Or will it all end up in disaster?
• Angry sex. A couple has a fight. Before the can make up, they are hard at doing it. In fact, the anger makes the sex even hotter. But how will they feel when they are done?
• Problems in achieving orgasms. There is much talk about the orgasm gap. All the cultural and political baggage that comes with this problem can be an excellent source of conflict and illustrate the values and beliefs of the writer. 
• Premature ejaculation and loss of erection are common problems in men. Just like with female orgasm, we should stop pretending that all goes well in sex all the time. Writing these problems into your story and still come out with hot sex can be challenging, but worth the effort. And, who knows, some of your readers may learn something from it.
• Ironically, sexual boredom in couples that that been together for a long time is also conflict. How will they rise to the challenge and make sex interesting? Will they be able to light their fire?

Internal sources of conflict

As I was writing my novels, I realized that internal conflict is the most beautiful kind of conflict. It is subtle and challenging to write, but if the protagonist is to change at the end of the story it would be through some kind of inner struggle. A writer who can show inner conflict will demonstrate his ability to understand the finest aspects of human nature. Fortunately, sex is one of the most common sources of inner conflict.

• Pent-up sexual desire. He had wanted her so bad, and now he is about to have her. Will this be a dream come true? Will he be disappointed? Or is his desire so crazy that he will spoil his chance?
• Internalized sexual repression or homophobia. Even these days, a lot of people have to struggle with these problems, particularly at the age of sexual awakening. Sexual shame and guilt surface unwanted and can become a major problem. Confronting them can lead to a spectacular transformation of our protagonist.
• Guilt. The protagonist may be doing something wrong, like cheating, so the guilt may be warranted but in conflict with a strong sexual attraction. The fact that he is willing to transgress illustrates to the reader how strong is his desire. Or, instead, the guilt may be irrational and anchored in her past, as I did in this passage from my first novel. 
• Shame very often accompanies sex. In the process of confronting it, the protagonist may learn something valuable about herself, about her partner and about sex.
• Disgust. I once dated a woman who had had her left leg amputated. She was very attractive, but the first time we had sex I looked at her stump and it was not a pretty sight. She noticed my feelings. You bet that our lovemaking was full of conflict, of which I learned some valuable lessons. 
• Prior sexual trauma. Unfortunately, this is more common than it is usually recognized. Anxiety and even panic attacks can show up during sex. Here is a great opportunity to show how empathy and compassion can be used to deal with these difficult situations. 

If your story is long fiction, perhaps a novel, it will be a good idea to interweave problems that are external, in the relationship and internal to create a beautiful tapestry of interrelated conflicts to drive the plot. After all, this is what happens in real life: the environment affects the relationship, and trouble in the couple awaken old problems and drive inner struggles.

Do not worry, adding conflict to your story will make it hotter. Taken by itself, sex is just pure mechanics. Even the kinkiest act is just a simple combination of body parts and motions. When sex becomes really exciting is when it means something, when it carries with it a lot of emotional baggage. This is what makes an erotic story exciting, and not boring.

The orgasm gap is a terrible idea, scientifically, personally and politically

I have wanted to write about the orgasm gap for a long time. However, the subject seemed rife with political landmines. As a neuroscientist specializing in pain and sensations, I gathered many scientific papers on sexual pleasure and orgasm. Female orgasms are so complex, so controversial and so ideologically loaded that they seemed impossible to tackle in a short article. Nevertheless, I am giving it a try, leaving a lot of information for future posts.

The ‘orgasm gap’ can be understood as two interconnected ideas:

1. Women have fewer orgasms than men during sex.
2. Men are to blame for this.

You may object, saying that the orgasm gap is only the first idea and that the second is a strawman. However, since its inception, the orgasm gap always referred to men as the culprits of women not being able to reach orgasm [1].

Although the orgasm gap is presented as a call for women being more aware of the inequality they suffer during sex and as the remedy to this inequality, I think that it achieves exactly the opposite by perpetuating some wrong ideas about the female orgasm and how to achieve it. Not only that, this idea damages feminism by increasing the divide between women and men.

The ‘orgasm gap’ idea is wrong scientifically

I am not contesting the idea that women achieve orgasm less frequently than men during sexual intercourse. That is a statistical fact [2-4]. However, an idea can be wrong scientifically even when based on fact: when it provides the wrong conceptual frame to understand a problem. The ‘orgasm gap’ idea does that by looking at orgasms through only one variable, their frequency, when in fact orgasms are complex phenomena in which intensity, quality, and emotional impact are as important as frequency. When we consider these crucial properties we come to realize that there is, in fact, another orgasm gap in the opposite direction: female orgasms are often more intense, more enjoyable and have a greater emotional impact than male orgasms. Of course, this second orgasm gap is not to be blamed on women but on some basic physiological differences between the sexes. This is not a new finding, people have been aware of it since antiquity, as I humorously pointed out in my article The Orgasm Gap According to the Ancient Greek.

Of course, if you do not reach orgasm at all it does not help that it would have been better than a male orgasm. Here we are faced with a third orgasm gap, one that exists between women: some women are multiorgasmic and cum easily, others are anorgasmic, and most are between these extremes with different levels of difficulty in achieving orgasms. To complicate things even more, the ease, frequency and intensity of female orgasms change through life, notably after menopause, but also depending on factors like childbirth, motherhood, emotional health and quality of romantic relationships. Emotions like anger, indignation and shame have a great impact on the ability to orgasm and orgasm quality.

The other way the ‘orgasm gap’ is wrong scientifically is in its second part. It discusses orgasms as something that happens only during sex with another person, ignoring orgasms achieved through masturbation. However, the inability of a woman to achieve orgasm through masturbation is a different problem that her inability to get it with a sexual partner. The first could point to a serious physiological or psychological disorder, whereas the second may or may not be caused by her sexual partner. By framing female orgasms as something exclusively related to sexual interaction, the idea of the orgasm gap may direct women in the wrong direction to solve their problem.

Approaching sex with an ‘orgasm gap’ mentality is bad personally 

Many people come to sex with a lot of emotional baggage. They may have grown up in a sexuality repressive culture that has left them filled with sexual guilt and shame. They may have been abused sexually. They may come from previous relationships with people that disregarded their sexual needs or that were sexually incompatible with them. And yet, for sex to be fulfilling, healthy and fun we have to leave that baggage behind and try for a fresh start. That may not always be possible, but at least we should be aware of our problems and not blame them on our sex partner. Here, an ‘orgasm gap’ mentality is likely to increase instead of remedy our previous problems. It makes women look at men with suspicion, which is a bad place to start. Even worse, it presents sex as a transactional act: “I give you pleasure if you give me pleasure”, when sex should be an act of generosity. A fundamental thing to understand about sex is that giving pleasure IS pleasure. Pleasure is not just the sensations arising from our genitals, is the whole emotional feedback, the upward spiral of ‘I enjoy that you enjoy that I enjoy that you enjoy…’.

In my experience, the biggest obstacle to orgasm is anger. That’s why I think the revindicative approach to orgasm brought by the concept of the orgasm gap gets it completely backward. If you start having sex with the frame of mind that you are going to blame your partner if he doesn’t give you an orgasm, most likely you are not going to get one. You may add other negative emotions to anger, shame and craving, for example, but nothing drives sexual pleasure away as effectively as anger. There is no amount of sexual expertise that can overcome those walls in your head.

If you are trapped in anorgasmia, the way out is in not to find a man that can ‘give you an orgasm’. Barred a medical or psychological problem, the path to better orgasms is creative masturbation. You should be able to give yourself orgasms, and in the process map out the places in your body, the touching, the rhythms, the fantasies, the words and the sounds that get you off [3]. Only then you will be able to tell them to your partner, so you can travel together on a landscape of pleasure. And remember, orgasms are only one more feature in that landscape.

Regarding men's behavior, there is an issue regarding female orgasms that has been ignored by the orgasm gap warriors. As analyzed in the book A Billion Wicked Thoughts [5], many men do seek to give women orgasms with single-minded determination. However, they do not do it in the spirit of good, giving and game (GGG) sex, but because they consider it an act of conquest, a personal achievement demonstrating their sexual skills. Here the giving of pleasure comes from the ego, not from a place of generosity. The ‘orgasm gap’ ideology encourages this, adding to the ‘making her cum’ ego boost the additional reward of being politically correct.

Genesis did a great satire of this attitude in their song Counting Out Time:

I'm counting out time, hoping it goes like I planned it,
'cause I understand it.
Look! I've found the hotspots, Figures one and nine.
Still counting out time. Got my finger on the button.
"Don't say nuttin' just lie there still
And I'll get you turned on just fine".
Erogenous zones I love you!
Without you, what would a poor boy do?

The ‘orgasm gap’ hurts the political goals of feminism

I have always defined myself as a feminist, but I look at modern trends in feminism with increasing unease. Some feminists seem to be hell-bent in starting a gender war. This is not new, of course. There is an undercurrent of misandry (hate of men) in some forms of feminism that goes back to the 70s. In particular, anti-porn feminism tried to condemn male sexual desire as inherently violent, exploitative and objectifying of women (culminating in the “penetration is rape” nonsense). I suspect that the ‘orgasm gap’ comes from this ideological current in a last desperate attempt to fend off sex-positive feminism. After all, this idea is consistent with a view of male sexuality as being inherently selfish.

However, if feminism is to succeed, it needs to recruit men to its cause instead of alienating them. And this is what the ‘orgasm gap’ idea does when it blames men from the sexual problems of women. Of course, there are some selfish men who only seek their own sexual pleasure. More often, however, men fail at giving pleasure out of ignorance and lack of skill. As the practice of casual sex becomes more common, pleasuring women is not an easy task because their sexual responses vary enormously [2, 4, 6]. And no, it is not as easy as stimulating her clit; many women do not like their clits to be directly stimulated. And yet some others do. Others vastly prefer vaginal stimulation and do not care if this is politically incorrect. There are submissive women who fall on their knees and beg to be used for your pleasure. I’ve met sadistic women who were much more interested in my pain than in their own pleasure. Every woman is different, so go figure! As sex adviser Dan Savage once said, sex should be like a five-page dinner menu where each person gets to pick their favorite dish, and then share it.

Just like in a relationship, sex should be the glue that binds women and men together to fight for progressive political causes. Including, of course, women equality. Tossing blame and shame back and forth across an artificially-created gender gap is foolish and counterproductive. Equality is not a zero-sum game, and nowhere is this truer than when it comes to sex.

References:

[1] E.A. Armstrong, P. England, A.C.K. Fogarty, Accounting for Women’s Orgasm and Sexual Enjoyment in College Hookups and Relationships, American Sociological Review, 77 (2012) 435-462.
[2] K.L. Blair, J. Cappell, C.F. Pukall, Not All Orgasms Were Created Equal: Differences in Frequency and Satisfaction of Orgasm Experiences by Sexual Activity in Same-Sex Versus Mixed-Sex Relationships, The Journal of Sex Research, 55 (2018) 719-733.
[3] D.A. Frederick, H.K.S. John, J.R. Garcia, E.A. Lloyd, Differences in Orgasm Frequency Among Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Heterosexual Men and Women in a U.S. National Sample, Arch. Sex. Behav., 47 (2018) 273-288.
[4] J.R. Garcia, E.A. Lloyd, K. Wallen, H.E. Fisher, Variation in orgasm occurrence by sexual orientation in a sample of U.S. singles, J Sex Med, 11 (2014) 2645-2652.
[5] S.G. Ogi Ogas, A Billion Wicked Thoughts: What the Internet Tells Us About Sexual Relationships.
[6] R. King, J. Belsky, K. Mah, Y. Binik, Are there different types of female orgasm?, Arch Sex Behav, 40 (2011) 865-875.

Sub Spaces

There is a lot of interest in the BDSM community on the “sub space”, a blissful state that it is said to be achieved through the use of skillful techniques of impact play, or rope play, or perhaps through masterful Dominance and unwavering submission. It is also assumed that sub space is mediated through the release of endorphins. In the past, I have pointed out that some of these beliefs are supported more by myths than by actual scientific evidence. Still, it is undeniable that bottoms and submissives achieve some remarkable altered states of consciousness, often followed by negative emotional states called “sub drop”. I would like to propose here that there is not just one sub space but several ones with distinctive, sometimes even opposing, characteristics. It is important to emphasize, however, that there is almost no scientific research done on masochists, and very little on the endorphin high and other altered states of consciousness produced by extreme exercise or pain. Therefore, what I am going to say here is highly speculative. It is based on my knowledge of pain neurophysiology and by drawing parallels between the effects of drugs and observations of the behavior of bottoms and submissives during scenes. I propose that there are at least three different states that can be considered “sub states”. I will point out their similarities with emotional states and with the effects of some drugs.

Adrenergic sub space. The most natural response to pain is the fight/flight response. In it, there is an activation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis that leads to a large release of adrenaline from the adrenal glands into the blood. This increases the heart rate, switches blood circulation from the viscera to the periphery, and promotes muscular activity. At the same time, inside the central nervous system there is a parallel activation of pathways that use noradrenaline as a neurotransmitter. Among them is a pathway that projects from the adrenergic nuclei of the brain stem (locus coeruleus, A5 and A7) to the spinal cord, where it intersects inhibit incoming pain signals in the peripheral nerves producing analgesia. Other noradrenergic projections go to the cerebral cortex, activating it and increasing alertness. In practice, when the bottom goes into this state she screams, struggles, stomps and laughs, while her pain thresholds go up. This sub state is characterized by analgesia, mild euphoria and high interaction with the Top. It is important to note that while the fight/flight response is considered a stress reaction, this is not necessarily bad. Some forms of stress (called ‘eustress’) are healthy and sought by many people in the form of roller-coasters, scary movies and exciting sports. I consider BDSM a form of eustress. A certain amount of eustress may be necessary for good health and can counter the nefarious effects of distress (bad stress). The adrenergic sub space is similar to the effect of stimulant drugs like cocaine and amphetamines, which act by increasing the availability of noradrenaline and dopamine at some key brain areas.

Endorphin sub space. This sub space also produces analgesia, but in almost all other aspects is the opposite of the adrenergic sub space. In it, the heart rate goes down, and activity and alertness decrease. The relevant release of endorphins takes place not into the blood but in some brain areas. The pain inhibition is driven by a pathway connecting the periaqueductal gray area in the middle of the brain with the nucleus raphe in the brain stem and then down to the spinal cord to block incoming pain signals. There are reciprocal inhibitory connections in the brain stem between the nucleus raphe and the noradrenergic nuclei (coeruleus, A5 and A7), so that when the endorphin system gets activated the adrenergic system gets inhibited, and the converse. This is because, while the adrenergic system mediates fight/flight, the endorphin system is related to freezing behavior, in which the animal becomes immobile in order to avoid been detected by a predator. Repeated freezing behavior and certain patterns of endorphin release have been shown to lead to learned helplessness, a dysfunctional state that decreases learning, reduces immune activity and produces several other negative responses. Therefore, endorphin release is far from being the panacea that it is cracked up to be. This is not to say that that endorphin release is bad. However, a when a bottom continuously goes into this state, the long-term effects may not be good. In practice, a bottom in the endorphin sub space becomes dreamy, in an emotional mist, stops screaming and struggling, and is less alert of his surroundings. He will respond to questioning by pleading for the beating to go on - what some people call the “forever place”. The endorphin sub space is similar to the effect of opiate drugs like morphine or heroin because endorphins activate the same receptors as these drugs, the mu and delta opioid receptors. Endorphins also produce the release of dopamine in the nucleus accumbens, which is at the end of what is called “the pleasure pathway” that mediates motivation and is activated by addictive drugs.

Serotonin sub space. This the sub space that is properly-named as such because, while the adrenergic and endorphin sub spaces are produced by pain and other sadomasochistic types of stimulation, this sub space is induced by the Dominance/submission (D/s) interaction even in the absence of pain. Surrender, obedience, service, mind-fucking and other strong intimate interactions with the Dominant  likely lead to the release in the brain of oxytocin and vasopressin, neuropeptides that mediate bonding. The similarity of this state with that produced by the drug MDMA (ecstasy), which also increases bonding, intimacy and affection, makes me suspect that this sub space is predominantly driven by serotonin release in the brain. Serotonin produces positive mood and counters depression. However, it produces mixed effects on pain because some serotonin receptors in the spinal cord increase while other decrease pain. The same goes for dopamine, which can increase or decrease pain depending on the emotional state of the individual.

Whereas the adrenergic and endorphin sub spaces are incompatible, it is quite possible that the serotonin sub space can combine with them to produce mixed effects. It is also clear that the noradrenergic, dopaminergic and serotonergic neurotransmitter systems vary a lot between individuals. That is why it is so difficult to fine-tune antidepressant drugs to each person. Therefore, sub space is going to vary a lot from individual to individual. A flogging technique that is blissful to one bottom may be hellish to another. An accomplished Top is not one who has perfected techniques so that they are going to work with anybody, but one who has learned to accurately read the body language of the bottom and knows how to adjust the scene accordingly.

Let me finish by addressing the issue of sub drop. There are at least two types of sub drop: one that happens right after a scene and another that occurs about two days afterward. The first one is likely the coming down from the fight/flight adrenergic reaction. After a strong activation of the sympathetic system (the one that releases adrenaline into the blood), the parasympathetic system kicks in, decreasing the heart rate and cutting blood circulation to the periphery. The result is that the bottom feels cold, tired and emotionally exhausted. A blanket, lots of cuddles and emotional support are the best solution. The second sub drop is similar to the one produced by MDMA and may be the result of the serotonergic or even the endorphin sub space. It is much harder to address, because the scene is long over and the Top may not be available for emotional support. It may even last several days. The only way to address it is to be ready for it and have some kind of emotional support system (friends, chocolate, a good movie, etc.) in place.

The take-home message is that things in the scene are not as simple as going into sub space and come out of it a happier person. The human brain is something incredibly complicated that we are just beginning to understand. By inflicting lots of pain, or messing with strong emotions like shame, guilt and submission, we are giving our minds some extreme challenges. It is hard to predict what is going to happen. The best course of action is to go slowly, pay a lot of attention to your body, and find the path that is best for you.

The octopus fisherman

[Trigger Warning: Childhood sexual abuse]

I woke up earlier than usual. Little sunbeams filtered through tiny cracks in the blinds, announcing a beautiful summer day. I slid down from my top bunk and, not wanting to wake up my brothers, dressed up quietly. Just my swimsuit, a T-shirt and beach slippers.

I was thirteen.

The sun was still low over the pine trees. The bay was calm, an incipient breeze changing its color from silver to deep blue. It was going to be a hot day. Nobody was up yet, so I decided to go for a stroll.

I wandered through fields of cabbage and corn till I came to the rocks on the shore. Not far on the water, in his wooden boat brightly painted white, brown and blue, was the octopus fisherman.
Octopus is a delicacy in Galicia, sort of a national dish. It is served boiled on thick wooden plates, seasoned with olive oil, coarse salt and spicy paprika. I loved to eat it but was also fascinated by the animal itself. I had learned to catch it. With my mask, snorkel and fins, I would swim over the sandy bottom looking for odd objects: an old rubber boot, a pot, a tire. Then I would dive down and check inside for octopus. More often than not I would find one, which then I would wrestle to the shore, kill and proudly present it to my mother to cook for lunch.

The old fisherman used completely different methods to catch octopus. He would never get in the water; like most Galician fishermen, he probably didn’t even know how to swim. He carried long poles with a hook at the end. When he spotted an octopus in the bottom he would quickly get one on his poles, hook the octopus and haul it into his boat. Sometimes the octopus would get into a crack in the rocks and stubbornly held to it with all the considerable strength of its tentacles and suction cups. Then a fight would ensue, the fisherman pulling with his pole this way and that and the octopus holding on for dear life.

* * *

One day I witnessed one of these struggles while lying lazily on a towel on the beach. The fisherman fought for over half an hour and still couldn’t get the octopus. I grabbed my mask, snorkel and fin and got in the water, wanting to take a closer look at the struggle. There was a large rock on the bottom and the hook of the fisherman’s pole keep going under it. There must be an octopus under there. I asked him if he needed help, but he just muttered something incomprehensible in Galician. Finally, I couldn’t stand it anymore. I took a deep breath and dove toward the rock. Bracing with my knees on the bottom it was a simple matter for me to turn over the rock. The octopus came out and took off swimming at full speed, opening and closing its tentacles, looking like a little ghost. I went back to the surface for air. “Now I’ve done it!” I thought, “I have lost this poor fisherman his catch.” Desperately, I swam on the surface following the octopus, which was heading for deep water. I dove again. If the octopus were as smart as some people think it is, it would have just keep on swimming and I would have not been able to catch it. Instead, it opened its tentacles on the bottom and waited for me. I grabbed it and head back to the surface. It was a big one. It wrapped its tentacles around my arm all the way to my neck, pulling hard to slide between my fingers. I knew it just wanted to get away, but I started to get scared. Then I looked up and saw the fisherman in his boat. He grabbed the octopus and peeled it off me.

“I’m glad I could get that octopus for you,” I told him after I climbed into his boat.

“That’s your octopus, not mine,” he said. “Take it home and ask your mom to cook it.”

* * *

I used to ride with the octopus fisherman in his boat, watching him peer into the water to see an octopus where I could see just rocks. Another way he had to catch his prey was to drag a line to which he had attached a small rock with a crab and hooks tied on top. The octopus would try to get the crab and get hooked. He taught me the names of all the beaches in the bay and a lot of things about the sea. At the end of the morning, he would pull his boat to the beach and the beachgoers would gather around and bid for his catch.

So when that morning he called me and rowed his boat backward to the rocks to let me in, I didn’t think twice. I went and sat of the prow as he rowed back out on the bay.

I was starting to ask something about octopus when something really weird happened. The fisherman pulled the oars in and came to where I was. Then he started touching me over my skimpy swimsuit. I couldn’t believe what was happening.

“What are you doing?” I said.

“Whoa, you have a big one!” he said.

That was completely ridiculous. I haven’t reached puberty yet, I had the penis of a child. It didn’t even care if it was big or small.

“Do you want to touch mine?”

I couldn’t imagine anything more repulsive than to touch that old man’s cock.

“No! Stop! Leave me alone!”

“Do you want to go to shore?” He said in Galician. But he wouldn’t stop touching me.
Go to shore and do what? Go to a hiding place so he could continue touching me? Anybody looking out from the beach could have seen us. But there was nobody.

“Stop! Stop, or I’ll jump in the water!”

He took a step back, considering what I had said. Then he started again.

I quickly took off my T-shirt and my slippers and dove head first in the sea. The water was cold. I come to the surface and looked at him. He could row his boat much faster than I could swim. Would he fish me out of the water like I was an octopus? But he just stood there, looking at me with apparent indifference. I swam in a perfect crawl straight to the beach.

I wanted to slip quietly back into my room and change, but my mother saw me walking in, barefoot and wet.

“You have been swimming already?”

“Yeah, the water is nice,” I muttered and went upstairs.

* * *

What was that old man thinking? How could he dare? He was just a poor man, my father was a local authority. If I told, I could get him into a lot of trouble. He would probably wind up in jail. But I couldn’t stand the thought of that free spirit in jail. For me, he symbolized the freedom and wildness of the sea. Even what he had done to me represented that wild freedom. Those were still the dark years of the Franco dictatorship. I didn’t know anything about sex, nobody had told me. Obscure desires had started to awaken inside me, like the strange excitement I felt when I watched my classmates getting a spanking. I didn’t understand any of that. It scared me. The priests told us something about it, but it was always unclear. It was shrouded in secrecy and sin. Perhaps the old fisherman could explain it to me, the same way that he explained the way of the octopus. But not if he was going to touch me like that again.

It slowly dawned on me that I could never ride in the old fisherman’s boat again.

* * *

Later on that day I saw the fisherman pulling his boat on the beach. He had a system to pull his boat out over the tide line. He lay the oars over the sand, then put a round log across them. Then he rolled the boat over the oars using the round log as a wheel. He repeated the process until the boat was on the white dry sand. Some beachgoers always helped him, although he was perfectly capable to do it on his own.

While the bid over the catch started, I quietly grabbed my slippers and T-shirt from the boat and walked away.

* * *

He must have done other boys. One day, I was walking on a beach that could only be reached by hiking through thorny gorse and blackberry bushes, or from the sea. Then I saw him, walking out of a shack with a teenage boy. I pretended that I didn’t see them.

The locals never talked much about him. He had no wife, no children, no family that I knew of. He seemed content and self-sufficient. He looked as old as the world, with his short white hair and his wrinkly face, but there was no way to know how old he really was. Perhaps he didn’t know himself. I saw him once dancing at a local fiesta, alone. He jumped and pranced with a vitality and abandon that I almost envied.

* * *

I may have been already in college when I heard that the octopus fisherman was dying. Stomach cancer, they said. I made discreet inquiries and found the way to his place. It was an old stone house surrounded by an unkempt garden, but there were peach trees and fig trees and plum trees, the fruit still green in the early summer days. I knocked on the door, called, then walked in.

The inside of the house was just a large single room, with a high ceiling, a wooden floor and walls of naked granite. There was a large bed in the middle. The old fisherman was laying on it, his belly swollen.

I sat by him and asked him how he was. He knew he was dying. I asked him if he was afraid of death. He said he was afraid of the pain. We must have said other things, but that’s all I remember. I’m pretty sure I didn’t mention the incident in the boat.

A few days later my father told that the octopus fisherman had died. He asked me if I wanted to go to his funeral. I said no. I had already said my goodbyes to the old man.

In defense of cheating

Although statistics about the prevalence of infidelity vary wildly (between 25% and 60% over the duration of a marriage), everybody seems to agree that it is on the increase on Western societies. Is this necessarily a bad thing? Or is it just one more symptom of the disintegration of the monogamous norm? Judging from what I read, it seems that many polyamorous people, while critiquing sexual exclusivity, are quite judgmental when it comes to cheating. In agreement with people of a more puritanical persuasion, they tend to view infidelity as the betrayal of a sacred oath. According to them, if a person is sexually unsatisfied in her or his current relationship, there are only three morally acceptable options: 1) continue to live sexually deprived, 2) negotiate an open relationship, 3) leave the relationship. The 4th option, of course, is cheating. I believe that sometimes it is ethically justified for the following reasons…

I believe that the basic issue underlying the ethics of sex is personal autonomy. It means that my body (and my mind) is mine and I should be able to use it as I see fit, as long as it doesn’t impinge in the personal autonomy of somebody else. This has two implications, one negative and one positive. The negative implication is that nobody should use my body (or my mind) against my desires, which makes rape, sexual abuse, psychological abuse and other forms of non-consensual sex, immoral. The positive implication is that I have a right to my own sexual satisfaction (again, as long as it doesn’t violate the personal autonomy of somebody else). This implies that sexual repression also violates personal autonomy and should be considered a form of abuse. Therefore, cheating is not a violation of consent because it does not violate the partner’s personal autonomy. What it does violate is a personal contract in which two people have agreed to mutual sexual exclusivity. However, breaking an agreement is a much less serious offense than violating personal autonomy (as in rape and sexual abuse). It is important to note that the sexual exclusivity agreement does involve relinquishing a large segment of personal autonomy: before I was able to have sex with whoever wanted to have sex with me, now I’m restricted to just one person. Because of that, any form of coercion in establishing this agreement should be considered quite seriously.

We cannot forget that we live in a society that strongly enforces monogamy. In fact, there many places in the world today where non-monogamy is punished with death. Even the more enlighten Western societies exert considerable pressure in favor of monogamy, using different forms of legal, economic, cultural and social sanctions. Very often these are unfairly directed more toward women than toward men.

Because of that, we cannot consider the agreement of sexual exclusivity involved in marriage as one freely made, but one made under the pressure of a coercive environment. In practice, this means that we are given the option between a monogamous relationship or no relationship at all. Almost nobody is given the option between an open relationship or a sexually exclusive one: it is monogamy by default. Let’s remember that an agreement made under duress is not morally binding.

Let’s now consider the three options (other than cheating) offered to a person who is sexually dissatisfied in a relationship. The first one is to just put up with the sexual deprivation. In the old, sexually-repressive culture, this went unquestioned. Sex was considered something superfluous, unnecessary for the happiness of a decent person (especially if it was a woman). The new sex-positive culture has changed that perspective, posing that it is unacceptable for a person to live sexually deprived. This not only applies to having sex in general, but also to enjoy alternative sexualities like BDSM. If I’m kinky and my partner is not, I’m entitled to do something about it. So this is no longer an acceptable option for a lot of people.

The second option is to negotiate an open relationship. This is considerably difficult, often impossible. Let’s not forget that open and polyamorous relationships are vanishingly few. Realistically, proposing an open agreement to a partner entrenched in the monogamous mentality is not only futile, it is foolish. The only thing that it would accomplish is to make us instant suspects of cheating, or wanting to cheat.

The third option is breaking the relationship. I am quite surprise at the alacrity with which so many people propose this option… like breaking-up was easy and entailed no suffering at all! Quite the opposite, most of the time it is the least desirable option, often an impossible one. This is because we live in a society that wraps a lot of power in the institution of marriage, in the form of economic power (share savings, mortgage, etc.) and restrictions of individual freedom (the house where I live, the job that I have, childcare, etc.). Then, breaking-up is not a simple matter of stopping a sexual and emotional relationship, but something that throws our life in a complete turmoil, most likely ending up by lowering significantly our standard of living. Divorce is easy when you are rich, ruinous when you are poor. And then there are the children, who probably wouldn’t suffer much if a parent occasionally cheats, but would be devastated by a divorce.

In conclusion, cheating is not a black-and-white issue, but one of great complexity. If one thing is clear, is that we would all gain a lot by de-dramatizing it. Contrary to what we read in novels and see on television, it’s not worth killing anybody over it. Is not even worth leaving our loved one over it. Sex is just sex, let’s not blow it out of proportion by attaching all sorts of mystical meanings to it. Yes, in some cases cheating is a dastardly thing to do, involving breaking of trust, dishonesty and betrayal. But in other cases it is just the least bad of a set of bad options. Like the case of the woman who has become economically dependent of her husband by leaving her career to have children, and now finds that he no longer wants to have sex with her.

From the point of view of a non-monogamous, sex-positive culture, we should be able to appreciate the element of rebellion against the established order that is implicit in cheating. Yes, the person being cheated suffers, but the monogamous norm is partly to blame for that suffering. It is that culture that has convinced him that being cheated is, oh, such an awful thing to go through! And let’s not forget that that cultural norm of sexual exclusivity creates an unbalance of power, empowering the sexually repressive member of a couple to the disadvantage of the one that yearns for sexual freedom. Ideally, we should all be able to be polyamorous if we wanted, but in reality the ability to do that is reserved to a precious few. We should not be judgmental of people who have to resort to other, more unpalatable options.

The Feminist Umbrella

(A letter to my daughter on the occasion of her 14th birthday)

 

by Valentina Solenzol

Feminism is a term that most men and women believe they understand…until you ask them to articulate its meaning.  Like Obscenity or “The Situation In Israel/Palestine”, it’s a moving target with unexpected layers of subtlety and nuance that tends to spark overpowering emotions and impassioned controversy.  General explanations that try to be objective are, by definition, desperately oversimplified.  There are entire libraries and Ph.D. programs on the subject.  This letter is intended to give you a starting point, a framework with some vocabulary and the most basic history, for you to build on.

It starts with patriarchy, which is any society (including ours) that gives men most of the power and privilege in law, politics, property rights, sex, religion and so on.  Feminism is a set of ideas, developed and supported by women and men who believe in equality of all people, designed to transform the patriarchal system into an egalitarian society. 

I see feminism as a big umbrella with two ideas printed across it:
1.    Our society systematically oppresses and disempowers women.
2.    Something Ought To Be Done About It.

Under the umbrella, there is a kaleidoscope of competing, cross-pollinating, sometimes mutually exclusive ideas, opinions, philosophies, and agendas. 

In a feeble attempt to tame an overwhelming topic, I’ll limit myself to the US in the last 150 years or so.

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, suffragettes marched, protested and lobbied to get women the right to vote.  Additionally, they fought for other basic women’s rights, such as owning property getting an education; entering “male” professions such as medicine and law; having equal legal claims over their children, and much more.  In retrospect, we call this period First Wave Feminism.

Some people/topics you may like to look up: Susan B Anthony, Margaret Sanger, Emma Goldman

The suffragettes and their political descendants are Liberal Feminists who are focused on women gaining equal rights under the law and within the current system.

The World Wars slowed advances in women’s rights activism.  But with the civil rights movement, the Pill and post-WWII affluence, Second Wave Feminism had its day.  This generation of feminists took on inequalities in the workplace and home, reproductive rights such as birth control and abortion, women’s sexuality, and a wide variety of other issues.

Second Wave Feminism: Simone de Beauvoir, Betty Friedan, Gloria Steinem, National Organization for Women (NOW), Ms Magazine

The ERA, or Equal Rights Amendment to the US Constitution was supposed to be the jewel in the crown of these activists.  It reads: “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.” It would have taken approval, or ratification, by 38 states to be added to the US Constitution, but it missed the mark by 3 states.

During these decades, feminism flourished and grew in multiple directions. Some activists became increasingly militant in their thoughts and actions.  These Radical Feminists, in contrast to their Liberal Feminist compatriots, believe that it is virtually impossible to overthrow patriarchy from within a patriarchal system.  They see the need for a dramatic transformation of society’s basic assumptions.

While Radical feminism vs Liberal feminism is often presented as the main feminist dichotomy, feminism actually comes in many other flavors. For example, Radical feminists, comprise (among others) Separatist and Lesbian feminists; Marxist, Anarchist, Socialist and Libertarian feminists; Black or Womanist feminists; Chicana, Asian American and Native American feminists. Third World Feminism deals with ethnic issues and racism, since the oppression the American woman experiences is a world away from what women may face in other parts of the world, from routine genital mutilation to denial of education to death by stoning. And that’s just scratching the surface of feminist consortia.

Some Radical Feminists saw violent oppression in the way men relate to women sexually.  In their view, pornography, sadomasochism and prostitution were central to explaining women’s second-class position in society.  Accordingly, they were labeled Anti-Pornography Feminists. A few had a exceedingly antagonistic attitude towards heterosexual men.  Their extreme ideas caught the imagination of the general public, creating the impression that this iconoclastic school of thought was widespread among feminists.  Because of this, many people rejected feminism altogether.

Anti-Porn Feminists: Andrea Dworkin, Catherine MacKinnon

In the 1980s, others under the metaphorical Umbrella of Feminism took exception to the anti-porn approach to sexuality. Positing that sexual freedom among consenting adults is key to women’s liberation, they became known as Sex-Positive Feminists.  They clashed intensely with the anti-porn feminists in an ideological conflict colorfully nicknamed The Sex Wars.  There is still an Anti-Porn/Sex-Positive rift pervading feminism today.

Sex-Positive Feminists: Susie Bright, Carol Queen

Third Wave Feminism is difficult to discuss, because we are still in the middle of it. The children and grandchildren of second-wave feminists have been bringing women’s rights into the 21st century.  They point out that queer people and non-white women have not been well represented in previous iterations of feminism.  They challenge male-female duality, suggesting that gender is much more fluid than previously envisioned.  Many in this generation even reject the label “feminism” entirely, though they agree with the writing on the umbrella.

Most third-wave feminists fall in the sex-positive category.  High on their list of concerns are biases based on race, social class and sexuality, workplace issues (equal pay, glass ceiling, etc), rape and gender violence, reclaiming derogatory terms (i.e. “slut”), and reproductive rights. 

The Vagina Monologues, SlutWalks, Pussy Riot, Riot Grrls

How Third Wave Feminism will develop, and what comes next, is up to you. I know you will make me proud.

With love,

Mama