Putting the "Mutual" Back in "Mutual Pleasure"
We follow a lot of sexual and relational health folks on Instagram; there’s a lot of fantastic people doing fantastic work helping people discover new relationships with their bodies. And I typically see folks marketing programs that invite people to get to know their bodies in a different way, to have a different relationship with their body.
To experience pleasure, which we talk about this week with Nicole Marinescu, editor of the Sexvangelicals podcast.
After all, one of the fundamental tenets of Purity Culture is that our bodies are bad, to not be trusted. The gendered implications are different; men are taught that they cannot control their sinful bodies (except through Jesus—still trying to figure out what that means), while women are expected to both control their sexuality and stifle the sexuality of anarchical men.
Programming that teaches Sensate Focus, an incremental series of touch exercises that can be individually or relationally practiced that reintroduces the concept of safety and homeostasis for bodies who have been taught that touch equals threat, new ways to engage with your genitals, from masturbation techniques to two that I’ve seen recently that teach women how to squirt ejaculate, and spaces for engaging in non-sexual touch and vulnerability are all (I think) designed to create a greater accessibility to pleasure.
I hope that I don’t need to make this disclaimer, but I’ll make it anyway. Sexvangelicals is a pro-pleasure relationship podcast. Any sort of physical sensation of pain that is unwanted is off the table.
When Doug Braun Harvey and Michael Vigorito originally wrote about the six sexual health principles in Treating Out of Control Sexual Behavior: Rethinking Sex Addiction, which we’re currently reviewing on our podcast series The Sex Ed We Wish We Had, the final principle that they noted is mutual pleasure.
Interestingly, on The Harvey Institute website, the word mutual is removed; Jeana Jorgensen, sex educator, explains:
“The word ‘mutual’ was removed during the Institute panel presentation to take into account pleasure derived through masturbation.”
Fair point. Masturbation is an extremely important part of sexual health.
But I would argue that the exclusion of the word “mutual” before the word “pleasure” is quite the misstep. In fact, when thinking of the phrase “mutual pleasure”, the more important word is mutual.
Even with masturbation, in order to have a pleasurable sex, I have to make an agreement with myself about where, when, and how I’m going to do this. As I’m writing this newsletter in a public space, I’m also thinking, “When is the next time that I’m going to masturbate?” There’s a part of me that’s interested in public sexuality. However, privacy is a big value connected with masturbation for me, so I need to think about the next time that I’m going to be alone. (Also, I don’t want to get arrested for indecent exposure.) Therefore, the answer is, “Not now.”
For me, a goal of masturbation is to be able to fully engage with myself, which requires intentionality regarding space and time. Masturbation involves a mutual agreement between the different parts of myself in order for me to fully enjoy the experience and not have masturbation be another item that I check off my to-do list.
Julia and I don’t talk a lot about masturbation on Sexvangelicals largely because we’re interested in how people come together to talk about and practice sexuality. In relational spaces, the word mutual becomes especially important.
One of the main trends that we’re tracking in the sexual health world is the sexual behaviors of Gen-Z; despite the expansion in sexual/orientation vernacular and the greater exposure to sexuality through the Internet, Gen-Zers are having fewer sexual experiences. Jen McNeely, founder of She Does the City, suggests that the COVID pandemic is a significant player in this, writing:
In Lovehoney’s post-Roe survey, they found that 40% of Gen Z adults say they are less likely to hook-up, 15% are less likely to engage in sexual intercourse, and 68% of women reported being worried that this will negatively affect their ability to have pleasurable sex.
She refers to an interview with Jessica O’Reilly, founder of Happier Couples, Inc., who explains:
“Thoughtfulness around safety precautions has been the norm — from masks and testing to socially distancing and vaccines and this has extended to dating and sex. I hope that the normalization of these conversations and considerations outlives the pandemic — not to encourage people to abstain, but to give them options to assess their own risk tolerance and take precautions that align with their own needs and values. If you don’t feel pressure to “lose your virginity”, perhaps you’ll have more time to reflect on and explore your own sexuality before doing so with a partner. With broader discussions about sexual options and sexual identities also comes greater awareness of asexuality.”
The problem with this perspective is that we were getting data about Gen-Zers having fewer sexual experiences before the pandemic; the pandemic only exacerbates this trend.
Nicole Marinescu, a Gen-Zer herself, gives a different perspective:
“Most of us can compare one night stand that happened in person—like you met in a bar, you met wherever—and a one night stand from Tinder (or any other virtual platform). Those are completely different experiences.
“And both of these people are strangers. But I can say when I met someone in a bar, you at least talk to them. That has to happen at some point. When you meet in a bar, you can't just stare at each other and then just start making out. I mean, you can, but most of the time there's a conversation there. And you don't have to know the person's whole life story, but you find out where they're from, maybe where they go to school, where they work, things like that.
“There's some human connection there. It's not love, but you realize this is another human being. You are physically in their presence, and then you have to make the decision, but I’ve met them.
“When it starts from Tinder, what I've realized is the conversations usually start off as, again, my experience, but it'll be a man sending like, ‘Oh, you have great tits.’
“Literally, that is how they introduce themselves.
“Or like, ‘What are you doing later?’
“I’m like, ‘We just met two seconds ago via internet, and you're saying, what are you doing later?’ And you can be very honest and be like, “Oh, I'm gonna work later.’
“They're like, ‘Well, you're gonna be free.’ And I’m like, ‘No, you're a stranger on the internet.’”
Nicole is speaking to a larger trend that we’re seeing across professional disciplines; people communicate in completely different ways on virtual spaces than they do in non-virtual spaces.
And more importantly, people who use virtual platforms for a high volume of their interpersonal non-professional communication with others often experience uniquely high levels of anxiety in non-virtual interpersonal conversations.
That anxiety transforms the interaction, either by creating an anxious attachment, and I would argue that the “You have great tits” comment that Nicole made is rooted in an anxiety that attraction to men is rooted in the establishment of dominance and performance of expected gender roles), or an avoidant attachment; there’s a really thin line between “taking precautions”, as Jess O’Reilly refers to in her quote, and avoidance.
Mutuality requires you to have not just the verbal communication skills to negotiate what you want, which involves this difficult blend of advocating for your position while also being flexible but simultaneously not immediately giving in, but also the emotional regulation skills to manage your breathing and amygdala while doing so.
That’s hard enough to do when you’re trying to figure out masturbatory practices that only involve yourself.
It’s exceptionally challenging when you’re trying to figure out how to do this with another person, regardless of whether it’s a first date or you’ve been married for 15 years.
This is the reason that Julia and I have jobs: Relationships are hard work. Pleasurable sex is hard work.
Sometimes you get lucky and have one-off, out-of-the-blue positive experiences. But the people who are experiencing positive sexuality over long periods of time are those who are able to put in the hard work of mutuality, negotiation, and emotional regulation.
Virtual spaces, especially those that are explicitly text-driven, such as dating apps and texting, cannot replicate this.