Pervert!
You might’ve noticed I have no problem whatsoever calling myself a depraved pervert.
A lot of fellow sex bloggers and sex blog readers (even some of my clients) don’t like the terminology I use sometimes, and I can understand why. It can sound harsh or negative, when you can’t see that I’m saying it with a wink and a grin. Sex and openly sexual people are disparaged in American culture; they are made disgusting and held as special in that way that also means held apart from everything and everyone else.
I like to mix dirty and sacred because, to me, dirt is pretty damn sacred. Dirty is earthy and a part of daily life and at the same time its own form of glamour. Weave the sacred and the feeling of openness to something beyond you that comes with both religion and sex in with that and you have a pretty good approximation of how I feel about sex.
Rest assured that there is absolutely no sting for me in the term depraved pervert. It was a label I chose to apply to myself long before anyone else had the chance: I chose it when I was 12 and have worn that sticky badge with pride ever since.
I had a dirty mind and a love of dirty jokes (and, behind closed doors, a slowly growing acceptance of my love of books with the “good parts” and my own left hand). That was what my friends called me with affection; we had a virginal one, a partier, a silly one, and a perverted one. I took it in the sense of something bent and twisted in a way usually considered a little wrong, to a degree that could be disturbing and/or obsessive - but to a 12 year old geek, that’s a compliment.
I realized that the sheer amount of time my brain spent thinking about sex or twisting around perfectly normal situations to imply sexual innuendo was kind of twisted, but in a good way that entertained me and made people laugh. If loving erotica and thinking about kinky sex constantly made me a pervert, then, well, yeah, I was. So what?
There was no shame attached to that label. Not for me.
And that’s the kicker. Usually words like depraved and perverted are used to imply a sick, unhealthy, or wrong like of sex seen as an obsession with sex. They’re used to smear the labeled with shame and guilt. They imply deviant sexuality and a strong need to return to the fold of sex that’s enjoyed for the love only or for procreation, if it’s enjoyed at all and not done out of duty or used as a bargaining chip.
(That’s a rant I’ll save for another time.)
At that point calling me a deviant was just a statement of fact. I was weird inside in every sense and less weird sexually than I was in the others so really calling me a pervert was letting me off easy…
Being interested in sex, even unusual sex, isn’t sick, unhealthy, or wrong and fortunately at the time I didn’t believe it was. Instead I was told during my preteen years that porn, visual or verbal, was wrong (not age-inappropriate, but wrong and unhealthy at any age).
I was told as a teenager that sex was mine to choose but not really. I could say no, but I couldn’t say yes unless certain conditions were fulfilled, and I wasn’t supposed to want to say yes, let alone try to initiate things. (I was very, very reluctantly virginal for a long time.) Which conditions I had to wait for varied by the month - or rather, they were added on to whenever one was met.
I’d decided my own conditions when I first realized at some point I’d want to have sex. They were:
- Feeling ready
- Being motivated by internal drive and feelings, not outside pressure
- Being with someone I loved (not necessarily forever, not necessarily my soulmate, and I wasn’t opposed to one night stands down the line)
The list I was given was of course much less longer and much more self-contradictory. It was also handed over with a certain amount of sexual shame. I was told that the things I really wanted to do (not that I mentioned them - I wasn’t that stupid) would make me pathetic, disgusting, shameful. A slut.
That was the sexual label that was used against me, and it was completely (unsatisfyingly) unjustified. I took things slowly, I was in a long-term monogamous relationship, and I didn’t do more than kiss and grope through clothing until I was 16. No good-girl chastity, but nothing really age-inappropriate, nothing kinky, nothing anywhere near as bad as a good half my classmates were doing.
Yep. For that I was a slut, and told I deserved to be called that. Yeah.
(Nowadays, if someone wants to call me a slut, they can. It doesn’t bother me. Sure, I’m a slut. I’m your bitch. They’re paying me for the privilege and it’s all in good fun. They’re also usually sending me friendly, kinky emails after the scene.)
Even knowing at the time the shame was unjustified, I felt it. Good girls don’t like sexual pleasure. They don’t ever give it because they want to, only for other reasons. They don’t ever want to receive any pleasure themselves. That would somehow be extra slutty.
It took some time but the guilt and shame wore off and were replaced by lies, my very own 24/7 submissive, and some of the most delicious bondage sex I’ve ever had. The lies were uncovered as lies almost always are: my mom saw me unpacking a brand new custom made flogger (happy birthday!) and this didn’t surprise her. After all I was never shy about being a perv. The sex work did surprise her, and she tried pushing the few shame buttons I hadn’t uninstalled.*
It didn’t really work - actually I think it backfired. Frankly I’m good at what I do.** I’ve had an almost lifelong interest in sex, kink, and sexual technique. Isn’t it every entrepreneur’s dream to make money doing something they love?
How did you unwind the feelings of shame from your sexuality?
*For the record, she’s pretty cool with things now. My family rocks.
**Shitty photography aside. I do that for entertainment, mine and yours, not for a living. This is obvious since I can still pay my rent…
February 3rd, 2006 at 9:49 am
Unwinding the feelings of shame from my sexuality has also been a long and winding road. I grew up Catholic, so sex was always taught as taboo, and crossdressing wasn’t even mentioned. Just as I was begining to shed all of that and explore my sexuality, I met my current SO. She is also Catholic and quite worldly - she lived with a lesbian couple out of college, we have many gay and lesbian friends, and she’s a progressive thinker. However, when it comes to our sex, she is still very much the good Catholic girl. So more shame for now. Argh!
February 3rd, 2006 at 10:10 am
Having only just now figured out how to leave you a comment would be something of an embarrassment, if i hadn’t already confessed to you offline how much of a clueless technoprat i truly am.
Ahem.
So much of what you wrote rang true with me. Especially growing up, hiding and suppressing how i felt about sex, this line in particular struck a chord: “I had a dirty mind and a love of dirty jokes (and, behind closed doors, a slowly growing acceptance of my love of books with the “good parts” and my own left hand).”
I was raised in a religiously observant household. Any and all feelings i had were denied and pushed to the back of my consciousness because of the environment surrounding me. Pushed there by me — as a result of parental and peer pressure. I was dirty, a freak, what i thought and felt was wrong.
Flash forward to 20-odd years later, and I write erotica — and practice what I preach also. (Ask the Muse!) i’m still hiding it to a certain extent. But only because my kids are too young for any detailed sex education. But you can bet your nylon’d booty that when the time comes i will be far more open about their sexuality with them and more liberal and accepting than anyone ever was with me.
I like to think that i learned something growing up, and that i can in turn pay it forward
February 5th, 2006 at 5:49 pm
I was not raised in a religious household, but there was alcoholism, physical abuse of my mom, and she had sex with her abuser. At five years old, I wanted to be like the sexy women on my stepdad’s automotive calendars. They were treated well and had power in my eyes.
For the longest time, I could only act on desire when I was drunk. I was often punished by my peers with scorn (the hypocrites) and I would feel ashamed. Vicious cycle. I was turned on by the SF Gor series books as a young teenager, and felt there was something seriously wrong with me at the time (besides reading badly written SF).
I almost repeated my mom’s pattern, but escaped in the nick of time. I met someone who broke the pattern completely and we are still together 18 yrs later.
The point I am getting at, and I do have one, is that I didn’t really start to lose the shame until I discovered Pitch Black fanfic many years ago. Seriously. I slowly started to realize that I wasn’t getting turned on because my needs weren’t being met. As a woman I had no access to the information I needed to know what turned me on. I also found out that a lot of women felt like I do. The internet has caused a new sexual revolution that has benefitted women because of the relative safety of acquiring information. Sexual knowledge=Sexual power.
It really sucks that in good ol USA this kind of vital communication must be anonymous (mostly), but I bless you all from the bottom of my kinky heart. Thank you, thank you for sharing and helping me, us, to enjoy life more.
February 6th, 2006 at 5:17 am
“Good girls…don’t ever want to receive any pleasure themselves. That would somehow be extra slutty.”
You hit that one on the head. You would think that would no longer be true but sadly it still is.
My mom was particularly anti-sex. Thankfully, hormones, good sex and time got her thinking out of my head. When I decided to have sex my conditions were the same as yours.
My father discovered my flogger. And the cuffs, paddles and other naughty goods. He was helping my husband and I move and the box that had the sex toys in it fell apart. I’m in the kitchen when I hear “well, I found your sex toys”-possibly my most embaressing moment ever. Thankfully he was a good sport about it.