This is sex ed debunked across generational podcast hosted by mother daughter duo, Christine and Shannon curly, where we talk about all the things you learned
or didn't learn
in sex ed,
and where it all went wrong.
From the abstinence curriculum to the monogamy myth.
In the vast spectrum of rainbow representation.
We'll get real about sex positivity, and catch you up on everything from proper anatomy
to the holistic benefits of a great sex life. Tune in to sex ed debunked wherever you get your podcasts and follow us at sex ed debunked on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. Hi, and welcome to another episode of Sex Ed debunked a podcast about sex ed for life, sex positivity, and the seven and a half minute long seksyen from Blue is the Warmest Color seven, seven and a half, seven and a half, seven and a half minutes. It's insane.
How have I not watched this movie?
It's a movie about lesbians. And it came out in 2003. And it's I think three hours long. And I think NC 17 rating but what we was most known for in the beginning was that it has seven and a half minute long sex scene. I mean, that is like a third of the length of our entire podcast.
And in contrast, how long have the sex scenes in romantic comedies involving men and women? 30 seconds, 30 seconds, maybe a minute and a half.
I mean, it. It's an important scene. Okay. It's an important scene because the myth of today's episode is that orgasms are the only goal of sex. And obviously, it's not seven and a half minutes straight of orgasms. It's about connection and intimacy. But it is seven and a half minutes long, which is a lot remarkable, a lot of minutes
remarkable for the movies, but not remarkable for Real Life. We really hope that in real life that the journey of sexual pleasure lasts much longer than seven and a half minutes. Unfortunately, the research shows us for heterosexual sex, often it does only last seven and a half minutes. Womp womp womp.
Well, and that's why today we'll be talking about the myth that orgasms are the only goal of sex because if that were true, then seven and a half minutes might be totally sufficient. But it's about a sexual experience, not about a sexual outcome.
So, you know, as you figured out where your hosts Christina Channing Curley and the myth today is, orgasms are the only goal of sex.
So for today's episode, I actually did a little bit of homework. And I read the article that you shared with me, mom, from your human sexuality class that you teach at UConn. The article is by Pamela Madsen, and we'll share the link in the references for episode this week. But what the article tackles is this exact myth and it says that sex is and should be about more than an orgasm. Because otherwise, you're just focusing on the destination and
not the journey. And that is a waste of a really good road trip.
It is it is though. I am kind of a destination girl I have to say, but
not in this first photo, because otherwise you shouldn't be doing this episode.
Not at all. And what I'm going to do a little bit today is read some excerpts from Pamela Madison's blog. She runs a company called back to the body. Her words are better than mine, because she's been working to help, particularly women, but also men and other genders to reach their erotic potential and access their erotic energy for over a decade. So what she talks about is the society's preoccupation around orgasm. And these are her words here. I'm going to make a bold statement
here. orgasm is not the goal of every sexual experience and connection for either partner. We get so stuck on this idea that quality sexual intimacy must end in an orgasm. What if we change our point of view about having an orgasm? Think of it this way? Do you think that having an orgasm will always bring with it a feeling of satisfaction, Completion, or nirvana? Let's go back to the
book or movie metaphor. How many of you have read a book or watched a movie and loved the story, but felt disappointed in the ending? When the intention is just on the orgasm, you get the same result? Pleasure is the journey, not always the endpoint? How many times I go to the movies and what do I what's the first question I asked when I say hey, what was that movie? Did it have a good ending?
I think the metaphor probably that most of us are most familiar with here is the that well known old school baseball metaphor. So you know, the basis but sure what you're always looking for, right or what a you know, middle school in high school was always like the home run. But if you don't appreciate just getting on base, then you're missing out a lot of the game. And if you actually know anything about baseball, then you know that anytime you
get on base, it's good. You know, your your batting average has to do with any time you get a hit not just when you score a homerun
That's right you don't get you don't get extra points on your batting average for a home run a home run is a hit like any other hit, right. And for some of us, not athletic types, at least in the area of baseball, I'm pretty happy to be on the team and playing the game. And that's kind of what this is about. So so the other thing that Pamela Madson talked about in the blog, and I'm going to quote a bit more, because I said her words are spot on and better than anything, I can
invent myself. So she says, and forget our partners. If women don't have an orgasm, it's often our sexual partners who feel that something's wrong, not only with us, but with our own sexual ability, we have to drop achievement of the big O as the standard barrier of our erotic happiness. How about connect gasm or pleasure gasm or joy gasm which parenthetical alone those terms and I love those words. But sometimes orgasm can really be beside the point.
There's so much pleasure and intimate connection that can be found in taking the time to explore sexual arousal as a meal in and of itself.
I I like that idea of kind of changing up the words and the verbiage around it too. And it makes me laugh because how many times have I like gone out with my friends and we get like a dessert and someone's like, it's orgasmic. Yes. But we've sort of really like reserved the word orgasm for a sexual experience. But I think it's fun to play with language a little bit like, you know what a chocolate lava cake can be orgasmic in the sense that it's a pleasure. Kasam. Right,
right. And let's maybe maybe we're using orgasm to mean pleasure. So let's meet, let's say pleasure to be broader and not just meaning orgasm. Because yeah, I've had a lot of desserts that I could definitely put in that category.
I had a I had an old partner. And we always used to joke, because we really liked going on home goods, dates, we'd be like, do you want to go to home goods and maybe like, say to get the point is that there's, I think orgasm has been reserved in this very loose like Temple of sex as not only the end goal, but something that is an experience you can only have sexually, but I like the idea of playing with the language in a different way that there's more
to orgasm than sex. But there's also more to sex than just pure orgasm.
Yeah. Let's see if we can get that new word. Maybe we'll just talk about pleasure gases more often.
I like Joy gasm? Because it's the same syllabic It does. Yeah. So as a words person, I'm like, I like it, because it still follows the same general rules. But all about grammar. So this is all kind of about the reeducation. Right? When I say let's play with words and use our language differently, it goes back to the idea of re educating ourselves about sexual pleasure. Right?
Exactly. And, and that's, that's what she kind of closes with in her in this blog post is, perhaps it's time to re educate ourselves about sexual pleasure. We be some such a goal oriented society, which is true, right. And this is my words that we are goal oriented in everything. And, and it's not unrealistic, that it's that it's bleeds over into our sexual life to have a goal. Like, I want to know, I don't know where I'm going here. But that's the
reeducation. Because, as she says, we become such a goal oriented society, that we often don't look out the windows on the train, it's all about getting where we think we need to be going. And it's often really the journey itself, that holds the treasures for our mind, body and spirit.
It's funny, because I am the kind of person who's, you know, if I'm driving somewhere or walking somewhere quickly, I'm always like, it's about the destination, not
the journey. Now,
I don't know. But in this so this metaphor, for me is kind of tough, because I'm like, well, most of the time, I actually think it is about the decision on the journey. But this is more like you know, if you order a five star meal, but you eat it, like fast food, you know, just like shovel it all down, and you didn't get to enjoy it like, you know, it's is your meal about the calories or is it about the experience?
Exactly. And sexual encounters sexual activity, a sexual experience, it doesn't always have to be a gourmet meal. But it still should be something that savored so it's not to say that orgasms aren't good. They can be. But all the rest of it is to the touch the words the connection. And if we're only focused on as you said, getting calories in, we're kind of missing that this meal is delicious.
So I want to talk about the idea of love languages, because you know, I think a lot of people have understand this idea of like The Five Love Languages. This is something that's become really popular, I think in the last few years. I think it's Gary Chapman who does
the five love languages. And when we're talking about why orgasms shouldn't be the only goal of sex or we're debunking that myth, I think it's useful to remember that there are ways that people feel connected to their partner and feel more connected in relationships and that also goes into sexual love languages. So the love languages for those of you who may not know or just need a refresher are receiving gifts, words of affirmation quality time acts of
service and physical touch. And I think, you know, we can see how that manifests in a relationship. And we're not talking about sex, right words of affirmation is, hey, I love you, you know, I love you, I appreciate you quality time is putting aside that time to spend with your partner. Acts of service can be something like doing the dishes. Physical Touch is physical touch. But there's also a way to think about this in terms of sexual love
languages. Because for some people, you know, words of affirmation of whether it's talking dirty words of affirmation, or it's, you're so beautiful, I love your body affirmation, quality time, it's that difference between is it hot and heavy rush at sex? Or is it let's take the time, let's take the dirt floor. And, of course, physical touch makes a
lot of sense. But there's different ways of showing that physical touch and acts of service is, you know, some for some people an act of service might be being a top for some people being active service might be being a bottom, depending on what your partner
likes. And so I just I think it's important to talk about that full body experience because again, that moves away from the goal oriented orgasm sex and talks about the fact that there's so much more that goes into it and your partner may have these different sexual love languages that also create a fuller experience for them.
And and understanding that you and your partner might have different languages. So for you, for one person, physical touch might be you know, touching breast touching the genitalia. Someone else physical touch might just be a light stroking on on the arms or, or holding back or kissing, or maybe someone's physical touch might be might be firmer, might
be grabbing. Sometimes, someone's words of affirmation might not be about physical affirmation, and might be, it's amazing when I when I see you, at your computer, and how intense you are, and how much you love your work. I think your intensity is amazing. I think your loyalty is amazing. You know, getting away from focus, even on the body, like the whole body, the whole person experience. You are amazing, because I see how loyal you are to your friends. I see how much
you love. I want to take a minute to though and talk about the the downside of the fact that there are such a thing as bad orgasms. Does that surprise you? That there's no such thing as a bad orgasm?
I guess I would be curious of how that's like operationalized. What is? What does it mean to have a bad orgasm? Because I guess that's it like I don't? I don't know.
Well, and and I was kind of curious myself. And there's actually a recent study that came out in 2019. And what they did is they surveyed 720 odd people across genders across sexual orientation, using Facebook and Reddit to recruit people. And what they asked them was how many of you have experienced bad orgasms, essentially, in consensual sexual encounters? Because I think we do tend to think that the bad stuff happens when you're coerced. And it's in
relationships. Sometimes you do have unwanted sex, or sometimes you do feel pressure. And what's shocking to me is that across genders, across sexual orientations, 55% of the individuals who took this survey set at least one occasion, they had bad orgasms as a result of giving into sex, not in a completely non consensual way, but in a way that they felt pressured to have an orgasm. Well, that
makes a lot of sense to me. Because how often again, we talk about media and TV, but sure you've also experienced this in your personal relationships is the question at the end of a sexual experience. Did you come Did you finish? Right? And of course, that's going to put a ton of pressure on either partner to say, yeah, yeah. You know, and it's not just faking orgasms, which, you know, we, there's so much research and so much we could
talk about there. But it's also I think, faking enforcing, because if you didn't finish, then did you even have sex?
Well, and and sometimes because of that pressure. And what was really interesting about this study, is it was a combinations, what they call a mixed method study. So part of it was a survey, but the other part was a free response. And they asked individuals to explain why the orgasms were not good. And they actually said, because they were just physical. And because they felt pressure to like, Are you there yet? Are you there yet? So they got
themselves there. Right. But the journey sucked, basically,
it's like, they had to take the toll route, like there was speed bumps, there was construction there. And it was not an enjoyable journey.
And it was like okay, I got to get there because I There's this feeling that there has to be equality. And you know, both people have to orgasm, both people have to feel the same thing we know that doesn't happen. And certainly this whole idea of simultaneous is a whole other issue. That's definitely a myth. But there's also a myth that if both partners don't orgasm, it wasn't a good sexual encounter, that that's the barometer of sexual
satisfaction. And the frustration expressed in the individuals who answered the qualitative responses in the study was kind of like, it would have been so much better if I didn't have to orgasm. If, if my partner just believed me when I said, this was an awesome experience together, I don't need to get there. Because the fact that they felt pressured to self stimulate or do whatever was necessary to get that also the experience for
some people, the experience of giving pleasure is pleasurable enough. Exactly. And it shouldn't be, you know, oh, I guess it didn't count. Because you didn't, you know, you didn't calm or you didn't orgasms like that, for some people being you know, a quote unquote, top is the most enjoyable part of a sexual experience. And that doesn't mean or, you know, some people are top, some people are
bottoms, whatever. But for some people giving the experience of pleasure to what partner is what gives them the most of erotic satisfaction in the most sexual satisfaction. And
I would take that a step further, Shannon and say, most people, most people, at least in a specific encounter, so So one of the things that's talked about in research and in articles and blogs, is it okay to say, this times all about me, next time is all about you. Maybe the next time, it's just about playing. And it's just
about the journey. And if we understand that, we don't have to have equality, meaning both parties orgasm, we can let go of so much pressure and start experiencing pleasure instead of pressure. So back to the orgasm gap, or the pleasure gap, if you will, we're going to talk about that coming from three primary places, and some of these aspects we've talked about already, so we won't go into them. But
Pause, pause, redefine the the orgasm gap, because we kind of brushed over it because we know what it is. But
you're correct. So So research shows that there is an orgasm gap. Primarily, the research does look at men versus women. And sadly, there's not a lot of research right there out there right now on genders outside of that binary. But in terms of looking at men and women, heterosexual women have
the lowest orgasm rates. If you look at same sex, if you look at heterosexual men game and lesbian women, bisexual men, bisexual women, let's just say that the gap often comes from three primary things, individually, you not understanding your wants, needs and desires. Second, you not understanding your partner's wants, needs and desires. And third, your partner not understanding yours. And as an
aside, yes, there. There's certainly cases where there's legitimate physical issues, emotional issues that, you know, we would recommend you going to a counselor or a therapist, that's really specially trained clinically, which which we are not, but these three basic pieces are an awful good start.
So this I think, we talked about a couple episodes, we talked about the erotic blueprints, and we brought up that question of well, what do I how do I know what I want? And even without going into detail, I think, you know, there are over there five different results of erotic blueprints. And each of those different identities or characteristics kind of show the different needs that someone might have in a relationship or in a sexual
experience. And they are similar to what I was talking about with love languages that you know, different people desire different things from their sexual experiences.
And you can find the erotic blueprints quiz online and the sex therapist is Jaya J. A iya, who I had the I was fortunate to meet several years ago at a conference in Denver. She has been working with couples for years. And she came up with this blueprint and what the blueprint is, is understanding your energy around
sexuality. So the love languages kind of go to a different type of experience kind of inexperience within a relationship, whereas the blueprint is more about your own erotic energy and there's five blueprints and we won't go into them in detail because you can find that online, but it's called one is energetic, meaning you get the pleasure from the energy of the connection. Sensual, which is focused kind of more on that physical touch, and not just touch but also hot,
cold, soft, hard. You know, rough, gentle things like that. Then there's a shapeshifter, which kind of is across the spectrum, then there's kinky and some of the kinky is is not, it could be roleplay could be power exchange type dynamics, and then sexual. And so some people are really sexual they are all in with the physical aspects of sexuality and taking a quiz like that to understand what is what
it is that you like. And then what it is your partner likes is a huge part of the sexual journey, not about reaching orgasm, but finding pleasure in the journey together.
And it could be fun with your partner. If you take this quiz, that could be a fun thing to start a conversation. I mean, I have certainly had relationships where I've been like, what's your love language, you know, and it's good to know it really is good to know. Because similar to this corollary to this, you know, if my love language is words of affirmation, which it is, and my partner's love language is quality time, we need to figure out how to make that work for
each other. Because I'm going to need my partner to affirm me and my partner is going to need me to make time for them. And it's not always going to be the same and your love language, its language. So someone might speak their love language differently than you do. And in the same way, if you understand your erotic blueprint, you know, you might have a partner who sees themselves or who experiences, you know, their erotic satisfaction in an energetic way. But you might experience it
in a kinky way. And that doesn't mean that you're not compatible, it means that now get the opportunity to make those things work
and to explore. Right and that is, and if you are focused on orgasm, you miss the exploration, the exploration, the sale as well, to realizing that, hey, you know what, maybe I'm not, maybe I'm not into power exchange dynamics or roleplay. Dynamic, but but my partner is. So let me give it a try. Because because it's kind of just fun and novel and new. And part of that whole pleasurable experience. And when you put the whole orgasm thing,
put it in the corner. And you know what, if it happens, it happens as part of this experience that you've had together, trying to understand what you like and what your partner likes, and trying to find someplace in the middle on that journey, which really is kind of the whole point of this sexual pleasure. And the reason we want to debunk this myth.
I'm going to bring it back to a sports metaphor because of who I am. But I always I used to when I was younger, you know, think that winning was the only important thing. Yes, you did. But now I can lose a soccer game and I can still be like, but I had fun. And I think that's part of being sex positive and part of being like sexually genic and just confident in your sexual experiences. As long as you had a good time. The goal of good positive sex is having a fulfilling sexual experience.
That's your goal. orgasm is not your goal. Your goal is having a fulfilling sexual experience. So sex education, lifelong, it requires an understanding that there is more to sex than orgasms so no matter what your age or level of experience, there is a lot more to positive sexual experience than crossing the pun intended. Finish Line. Haha, that's funny. I'm sorry. I don't know why we're just riddling you with sports metaphors today. But here we are. So that isn't that is our
myth today is that goal? That orgasms are the only goal of sex they're not.
So another myth, put to bed to bed, sexual pleasure,
his body, mind emotions, and all all the above.
Or maybe just one of the above, but it's what you want it to be? Whatever you want it to be. Go Team. Go Team. Go team.
We ask for victory. All right, great. Thank you, as always for tuning in to sex ed debunked. If you have any questions, comments, suggestions for new episodes, feel free to shoot us an email at sex at debunked at Gmail. And of course, follow us on all the socials where we post updates and fun resources for our podcast every week.
Take care and have a good holiday season.
Oh yeah, happy holidays.
Thanks for tuning in for this week's episode of Sex Ed debunked. During the course of our podcast, we have limited time together, which means that unfortunately, many identities groups and movements may not be represented each week. The field of sexuality and gender orientations, identities and behaviors are changing growing rapidly, and we remain committed to being as inclusive as possible.
Please remember that all of us, including us are learning in this area and may occasionally slip up. We ask that we all continue to be kind to one another so that we can create a truly inclusive and accepting environment. As always, if you have any questions or comments, please feel free to reach out to us at sex ed debunked on Instagram,
Facebook and Twitter. Sex Ed debunked is produced by trailblaze media along with myself Shannon Curley and Christine Curley from trailblaze media or engineering is handled by Ezra winters