Episode #15: The Sex Education That We Wish We Had, with Doug Braun-Harvey, part 1
This week we start our new series The Sex Education We Wish We Had and our first guest Doug Braun-Harvey, the co-founder of the Harvey Institute, an international education training, consulting, and supervision service for improving healthcare through the integration of sexual health.
Since 1993, he has been developing and implementing a sexual health-based treatment approach for men out of control, sexual behavior. His book, treating Out of Control, Sexual Behavior, Rethinking Sex Addiction, written with co-author Michael Vito was published in 2015. If you Google his name, you'll get access to his other books. Doug is a licensed marriage and family therapist, certified sex therapist, supervisor and certified sex therapist in San Diego.
He has taught and consulted on sexuality and sexual health with Biden University, the University of Michigan, and the University of Minnesota.
The term “Sex Addiction” (14:50). “The idea was sex addiction was supposed to become a diagnosis […] there was an effort to create some sort of mental health diagnosis for this human behavior of dis-regulated sexual behavior […] there's always been a kind of contentious notions about whether that's an accurate description because there can be a lot of shame and judgment that goes with sex addiction. It's not just, gee, you have this condition, you have a condition that is the source of shame,” Doug explains the history of the term sex addiction, which has a nuanced history that ropes in shame, safe spaces, and a way to classify sexual behavior that did not fit within societal expectations.
New Safe Spaces (16:40). “The idea of being a sex addict was relieving to people in its time? Sure. Yeah. It gave them an honorable space to go and openly discuss what they were doing in rooms outside of churches, outside of therapy offices, outside of places where stigma and shame might be commonplace.” Doug highlights how the diagnosis of “sex addict” gave people in that era a safe space, where they are not alone and do not have to turn to places that shame them (churches) but instead were offered resources and a community. “It was kind of a breath of fresh air to walk into these spaces. You were out of isolation. There was no internet back in those days. It was compelling to sit in a room and meet other people who weren't monsters.”
The Billy Graham Rule (28). “I think for me, that idea of, well, I don't want to hurt anybody. I don't want to cause pain to anybody. And learning early on that we talk about the Billy Graham rule. This idea is that if men are in rooms with women by themselves, like leave the door open. Inherently speaking, what's going to happen is that the man is going to do something violating toward the woman. It's just gonna happen. So leave the door open. That way, you know, that other people could at any moment kind of walk in. Well, that's depressing. That is depressing. That's pessimistic.” Jeremiah opens up about the effect the Billy Graham rule and purity culture have had on him, and how in many spaces men are conditioned to believe their sexuality is inherently violent.
The Power of Language (32). “Men don't walk into a therapist's office with useful language for talking about sex. All they have is what they've been taught, the popular culture language, which is very stigmatizing. Look at the Billy Graham rule. I mean, somebody's gonna walk into my office thinking that they're a dangerous monster” Doug talks about how most men do not walk into therapeutic spaces with the language for talking about sex and sexual health. Media has a huge impact on sex, and the language we use, he gives the example later of how when some men say “jacking off” he uses the language of “solo sex.” Doug however never forces his clients to use this language but notices them start to use it over time, which shows the power of simple changes.
A Woman’s Humanity and Male Desire (43:24) Julia asks a thought-provoking question: “As a woman who has experienced quite a bit of sexual harassment and objectification, how do you then talk about the beauty of desire and for men who are attracted to women? How do you do that in a way that's more respectful to a woman's humanity?” Which Doug answers by saying, “So what we have to do is teach people the difference between pleasure and politics. How do you enjoy your pleasure and be respectful and be aware of patriarchy? Be aware of sexism. Be aware of misogyny. That is another narrative. But the world of pleasure is also another narrative. And so we have to honor both.”