Sex, Stigmas + Suspicious adult friendships
Issue 007, check it out in its entirety here
Exploring sexual exploits and bad eggs in friendship groups, I apologise profusely in advance for the lengthy TED Talk-like essays. While I'm sure you've opened this email and said, "I'm not reading all that, but congratulations or sorry that happened to you," I assure you it'll be worth it. [I cannot assure this].
HAPPY(?) FEBRUARY!
LET'S TALK STIgmas
Will we ever get TF over people mating for pleasure? Or will there always be strikes cast against the women who dare to explore their own orgasms? In this essay, I will...
I was once told that the stigmas attached to sex and promiscuity would dissipate as I grew older, and I'm here to debunk this myth. From a very young age, many girls were branded with the Scarlett A. My logic is that it was easier to brand young girls as sluts than to address the real problem at hand, slut-shaming.
Growing up in the UK, there were a number of titles that could either make or break you as a young woman (or man, I guess). There was nothing more damaging or terrifying than being branded a ‘headmout’ or ‘bocat,’ because for some inane reason we believed that if you dared to put genitalia in your mouth you would be cursed with mouth ulcers, dry lips and whatever else. Once titled you were unkissable, un-talk-to-able and lacking of basic human decency. And while these titles have since disappeared from our slang vocabulary altogether, the stigmas have evolved into shaming one another for having sex at all.
I don’t know about you, but I was grossly misinformed about our 20s and 30s being earmarked as the “fun years.” You know, before you settle and have a family or whatever, but even with this notion, I’ve never felt comfortable fully exploring my sexuality without fear of the shaming and backlash. The titles of whore, slut and hedonist even before engaging in amorous activities, have scared me out of wanting to go full Abella Danger*.
(*Please do not Google that name unless on incognito mode in your web browser)
With such large conversations surrounding sexual experiences, is it any wonder we’re shamed out of safely and consentingly enjoying sex? Seldom are we allowed to express a love of intercourse, while men can and often use harmful titles to slander the women they once ‘did the dance with no pants’ with. From observation, it would seem that women have harsher punishments for engaging in sex.
Watching women enjoy themselves on screen also rubs people the wrong way and that is a full enforced fact. When Megan from Love Island shot her shot at Wes and landed, the nation was up in arms. How dare this attractive woman explore her options on a show designed to explore your options! The harmful articles surrounding their relationship only worsened as they proved themselves to be one of the strongest couples on the island. With single people shocked and angered that you could in fact - and I use this term only for emphasis - ‘turn a ho’ into a housewife’. Only further proving that people do not deem women worthy of healthy relationships should they tap into their sexual allure.
Like many teachings as of late, I learned via TikTok the main issue with the term ‘wifey material,’ beyond its extensive use in 2000’s Channel U hits. We were all privy to its propaganda, wearing T-shirts with Tinie Tempah’s hit track whimsically printed across the chest, but I don’t think any of us realised as pre-teens just how detrimental the term would become. Casting women out based on their sexual encounters and degrading them in value dared they step outside of the allotted ‘three men in your lifetime’ rule. The title was used to shame single girls enjoying themselves and only praise those saving themselves. However, I think we can all agree that both ends of the spectrum are to women’s detriment.
Though I sing ‘ONE MAN TO MI PUM PUM’ with all my might in the clubs, I understand that this too is conflicting to my right to get it in if I so please; often changing the number from one to match our sexual exploits. I’ve chosen to disassociate from the ideal that women should save it for their future husbands, and the virginal complex that comes with shaming women for fornicating or feeling sexy enough to partake in various sensual TikTok challenges. Stretching beyond intercourse, we've seen time and time again that even women take pride in shaming one another for showing anything more than an ankle or collarbone on social media. Don't you dare show your thot side lest the Wifey Police come n' get ya.
Guilted for giving in to your baser urges, we don’t talk enough about the virginal complexes surrounding sex and that even those who wait until marriage to engage, feel tremendous guilt for giving in when finally "allowed". Admittedly I'm at a loss as to why we’re made to feel this way for expressing admiration for intimate acts, nor why vocations in the field are also looked down on. With one mission, to delete this ideology in my own world, I set out a task upon myself not to give a fuck anymore. No longer need I blame myself for relationship encounters from [X] years ago nor should we shame women for making money for being sexy.
Taking sexual health seriously, I regularly get tested even in the moments of a sexual abyss where I’ve not engaged in coitus for months. - Here’s looking at you, Pan Dulce! - Traumatised by the horror stories of truly catastrophic sexual experiences, I made it my mission to do my part to protect my genitalia when engaging in amorous activities. In a conversation I had that led to creating this piece, I was almost pretty much shamed for taking the six-month check-up rule seriously. Asked, “WhYyy?!” when a mention of a home-testing kit arose, and unphased by it, I replied, “everyone should get tested mate, even when you’re not boning”. Because truthfully, I don’t think there should be any shame in regular check-ups and would argue that you should be wary of people that shame you for doing it. Like ok, you don’t get tested? Weird flex, but not okay.
Before POSE came Paris is Burning, a documentary following the lives of black and Latino, gay and transgender communities in the NYC ball scene. Naturally, I was enamoured with the fantasy of strutting in ball couture and Voguing to no end, but I was particularly taken with its reporting on AIDs in the 1980s. A health crisis affecting predominantly LGBTQ+ communities, the stigma attached to AIDs and HIV meant that people were terrified to touch, be around and engage with anyone who contracted the virus. My research went beyond both the doc and series as they made such an impact on me, and I found myself exploring the epidemic itself in depth.
The misinformation spread at that time meant that people were afraid and this is even shown through Princess Di’s visit to the AIDs hospital in the late 80s. Changing the way the media viewed the illness and how it was transmitted, this defining moment in history helped to destigmatize the myths surrounding HIV/AIDs. I couldn’t help but relate the information I’d deep-dived for, to stigmas surrounding sexual health today. Though disproportionately different, much of the shame surrounding STI's is similar.
While there are still a number of stigmas attached to STI’s and testing as a whole, there really needn’t be. Educating myself via documentaries and a mild Lady Di obsession, I learned once again that negative connotations really have no place in the world, but to disadvantage the people living with them. STIs, like COVID, exist and while you can’t always control getting them, you can control how you protect yourself. The “automatic” shame in contracting an STI despite going to great lengths to protect yourself, shouldn’t be akin to the shame in getting Corry-V because you went mask-less on your flight to Dubai. Yes, in my post-2020 haze, I have found myself relating wearing a condom for coital activities to that of wearing a mask to Tesco in this global pancreatic. And while this comparison may seem a little far fetched, I liken the two because in the same way that not wearing a condom puts you at risk of contracting Chlamydia, for example, not wearing a mask does the same for Covvy-D, giving us much to think about.
To sum up, I leave you with these final points. Stop shaming women for enjoying themselves, stop shaming people for taking sexual health seriously and rid yourself of the 'good girl gone bad' theory when people feel comfortable enough to explore their own allure. You're only adding to the idea that women should follow a specific set of rules in order to be worthy of respect.
RECOGNISING FRIENDSHIP RED FLAGS
My late twenties have served as a bigger life lesson than teen Lauren could have ever dreamt possible. How naive of me to believe being called out by a group of girls in high school would be the worst of it, but damn it here we are. As children, we’re told what to watch out for in romantic relationships, but the same courtesy is rarely extended to bad seeds in friendship groups. With a delayed reaction to seeing the worst in people, I’m now beginning to develop the typical parent radar of just "not taking" to certain people.
I've been burned many times in my adulthood, and some might say that friendship breakups have been my toughest feat. Trying to navigate your way around new friends and their idiosyncrasies is not unlike exploring that in a new partner. Just as we get to know and find comfort in the person we hope to one day walk down the aisle (lol sike!), we do just that with new mates. Having always been someone who is particularly closed off to men, but almost scarily open with new friends, I take pride in being emotionally slutty. Sharing every thought, relationship woe, win and meme while simply basking in the honeymoon period, I often reveal too much too and immediately regret it. Perhaps this is my own red flag.
As the kind of person who gushes about new friends to old friends, I often preface every mention of their name with, "trust me you're going to love him/her". They rarely do, because my old friends being my biggest protectors can smell the ops a mile off. But in my new friendship haze, all the red flags just look like flags, word to Bojack Horseman. Today, and a little wearier of these waving red flags, I'm more equipped to spot them when they enter my life. Being particularly terrified of overfamiliarity and compliments, due to my inability to accept them, my friendship radar dings amber when in doubt.
As with many things, TV has always acted as my guide for navigating through life, sad as it may seem. A socially awkward kid who shone brightest amongst solid friendships, comedy series aided my inability to speak to new people and only added to my fear of making real lifelong friends. It was through Carrie's inability to be a good friend in SATC that I became more aware of the people in my life whom I loved dearly, but did little for me outside of aesthetics. Often appearing as self-centred, but with sprinklings of, "oh, and how are you?" More and more I weeded out the 'Carrie's' in my life who cared only for their wellbeing, and little for my own. As with Cynthia Bailey of RHOA, I burned my own friendship contracts and no longer subscribed to their Nene-like behaviours. Though of course, I'm not without fault. Now in my beta-adult years, I'm not averse to admitting when in the wrong, because let's be frank, it happens often and tend to overexplain when trying to rectify situations gone awry.
In my debut book, I wrote that we're incapable of letting go of the little identifiers that fuck us up in new relationships, and the same can be said for friendships. I've been burned and scolded by *Mary* but it doesn't stop me from being the best of friends with *Betty*, *Steve* and *Alicia*, despite being their carbon copy by way of personality. My inability to instinctively notice the bad in new people is due to my optimism to see only the good. Which is much to my detriment and ironically only ever applies to friendships.
Though I’ve little advice on how to spot red flags in friendships, I think it’s important to remember to trust your gut feeling as you do with prospective partners. A flytrap for dysfunctional friendships, adult me is learning better than to divest private and intimate details without first vetting the pro-bono therapist. But I guess it doesn’t hurt to have just one more life lesson on the list of 5000.
This month's #ThingsIDontMeme is courtesy of Bad Gal Riri who wholeheartedly understands that not every moment spent in this B2K - Pandemonium must be spent being productive. It's totally okay to rest and not feel guilty about it, this thing is exhausting enough as it is.
I've talked enough, it's enough now. Happy scrolling the internet from different forms of rectangular devices.
Love, L x