Beginning from the Rear or Ass Demon

After a fraught week, my beautiful friend Maria and I decided to spend a Friday afternoon licking our wounds in the marble womb of the Metropolitan Museum of Art off Central Park. The steps were thronged with tourists. I scooped Maria out of the crowd and arm-n-arm we ascended into the venerable halls of esteemed artists. The cherry on our culture sundae: Michelangelo’s first painting.

The priceless piece, a diminutive copy of a German print titled “St. Anthony Tormented by Demons,” has undergone painstaking, expensive renovations. We slid through the cluster of serious faced admirers, huddling around the painting in a small gallery. The haloed Saint is encircled by demons, brilliantly fish scaled and monsterous; the first kinda looks like it is humping his leg, and the last…

I slid out of the crowd towards the back of the room. Reunited with Maria and whispered aside, “Did you look at that last demon?”

“Oh yah- I looked at that demon three times and thought, ‘oh! he so went there!’”

At which point, we had to leave the room, collapsing in hysterical laughter against each other. Because that last demon can only be described as the Ass Demon, with a winking, gaping pink butthole worthy of all the gay porn in LA.

Perhaps he was just faithfully copying the original print, but I prefer to think he understood the taboo confronting his audience. It’s profoundly satisfying, imagining an adolescent Michelangelo meticulously painting each wrinkle around the anus, cracking himself up with the audacity of it. This is the spirit of the same genius artist who would later defy Church law by secretly dissecting cadavers to learn muscle structure to paint the truth of the human body.

And part of the truth of the human body is a zillion pleasurable nerve endings in all our pink parts, including our assholes. The great equalizer, I believe Tristan Taormino once called it.

Yet the taboo remains, tangled up with fear of gayness for many man and out of bounds, seemingly irrelevant, for many women. Of course, the whole shebang is associated with poop, so it can be literally dirty, which is high on the ookie scale for many folks. The good news, my friends, is that this is nothing a shower cannot remedy, and for the fastidious, enemas.

When the behind has been ignored as a potential erogenous zone, the pleasure from touching, rimming and penetration can take us by surprise. Ladies- spread the good word - it’s not just about the prostrate! Anal play also tends to require a slow hand (or tongue or toy) and a level of relaxing and presence that can be intense in bed.

While there is a lot to be said for normalizing (liberating!) anal sex for the masses, the transgressiveness of the act can be a turn on. Exploring new or disputed territory with a partner makes us vulnerable together, and the trust, gentleness and desire we can show each other through this process…also a big turn on!

So – look to the old masters for inspiration. Begin by looking the ass demon in the eye with Michelangelo then check out some of these excellent resources:

• Luscious, stories of anal eroticism Edited by Alison Tyler Forward by Tristan Taormino
• Anal Pleasure & Health: A Guide for Men and Women by Jack Morin
• Bend Over Boyfriend video by Carol Queen

And add your own to the list, por favor!

PS...the secret is lube lube and more lube.

Pop!

So, this article about a Swedish couple who is keeping their baby's gender secret, has been making the rounds. And to those of us interested in non-gender conforming identities, and what it means to raise kids in a world where no one is forced into a box, this article raises some interesting ideas.

However, even MORE interesting are the heated posts from folks with all sorts of opinions about what these parents should or should not be doing with their child. Responses range all over the spectrum. But what fascinates me most is how people assume that by not sharing the child's sex with the general population, this then means that this child doesn't have a gender identity. How commentors made this leap is easy to see-- we should all be privy to one another's gender identity all the time, right? Wrong. Good for this couple, to take a stand, and affording their child far more privacy than most of us, in this age of internet blogging.

This level of progressiveness forces us all to look a little more closely at our own baggage, eh?

An Alternative Top 100...

OK - so Fruity Cake has already commented on AfterEllen.com's Annual Hot 100. She challenges the list to show more of what we think is hot - in terms of gender, ethnic, age and size diversity. I agree. Not just because I really think Beth Ditto should be on there, but also because there were only two or three women that looked hot to me. Most just looked like women I'd go shopping with on a good day and be jealous of on a bad day.

And, then Sinclair Sexsmith of the Sugarbutch Chronicles answers the call:

Top Hot Butches: The 100 hottest butch, masculine, androgynous, genderqueer, transmasculine, studs, AGs, dykes, queers, and transguys.

I won't diminish it by saying its merely a reaction to aforementioned list, but well it was. And boi is it hot.

I'm a fan of Sinclair Sexsmith's work.
He SERIOUSLY did a great job of picking the photographs. Its absolutely clear just how good he is at making fellow gender fuckers look good.

Women Inmates Segregated Into "Butch Wing"

According to the Associated Press, inmates in Virginia's largest women's prison, Fluvanna Correctional Center, were segregated and verbally harassed for being or looking gay or masculine. Where do I even start with this one? It is so wrong in so many ways that I could probably reel off a few pages right now. Instead I'll try to step aside for a moment and let the women there speak for themselves:

• "I have been gay all my life and never have I once felt as degraded, humiliated or questioned my own sexuality, the way I look, etc., until all of this happened," said Trina O'Neal, 33.

• "Point blank, this institution is ran by homophobes, and the rules instated here are based on your sexual preference not what is right or wrong," wrote inmate Casey Lynn Toney.

I got the opportunity to visit Fluvanna and to read the stories that women incarcerated there had written about their lives years ago after I helped conduct a book drive for their library. No statistics about the extremely high rates of poverty, addiction, and physical and sexual abuse that women inmates have experienced could ever have taught me nearly as much as their own words did. The women of Fluvanna deserve a lot more than most of them have ever gotten in terms of resources, education, and opportunities - but at the very least, they are dignified human beings and should be treated with basic respect! Discriminating against inmates on the basis of their gender expression and perceived sexual orientation is both wrong and arguably illegal and the wardens know it - that's probably why they are denying it, contradicting to the testimony of guards and inmates. In my ever-humble opinion, there is a lot that is fundamentally wrong with our criminal "justice" system, and this situation in Fluvanna is just some icing on a very messed-up cake.

Nonetheless, I will try to end this on a somewhat upbeat note. According to the AP's article, "The practice was stopped recently after the Associated Press began questioning it, according to several inmates and one current employee." Incarcerated people are ignored or forgotten all too often, but paying attention really can make a difference. I encourage you to learn more not just about why so many women are incarcerated in the US today, how their labor is often exploited, and the effects of privatizing prisons, but also what you can do - boycott a company that uses prison labor; donate to a book drive or an education fund or a prisoner's rights project; read a book that was written by someone who has been incarcerated. I know I have some catching up to do.