Summary: An article in WebMD says only 20% of young adults believe oral sex “counts” as sex. Jayme Waxman sets the record straight.

While I’m not completely enthusiastic about the close association between sex and disease Jayme Waxman of Sex Matters does use it in a good cause:

I just want to go on record and say oral sex is sex. That means BJ’s and CJ’s (blow jobs and clit jobs – a term I hope I just made up, but I’m sure I didn’t, still it’s what I’m calling cunnilingus from now on, as in from right now on) are sex. You can get sexually transmitted infections like gonorrhea and chlamydia form oral sex, and you can give and receive herpes and HPV that way too.

Read the quote in context here.

And yes, yes, she could also have mentioned another forgone association: that both giving and receiving oral sex is a source of sexual enjoyment. For whatever reason that never really seems to come up in conversations involving definitions of sex. So kudos to Waxman for punctuating the bottom line: oral sex is sex.

Teresa Strasser of MomLogic says

If you’re thinking about conceiving, or certainly if you are already pregnant, there is some pretty convincing evidence that instead of just swallowing, say, folic acid, you might want to swallow something else.

Let me be delicate about this, if I can.

As far as I can tell, not only should you be having lots of oral sex with the father of your baby — even up to a year before conceiving — you should also make sure to ingest his seminal fluid. Listen to what I’m telling you: the international medical community is giving you an Rx for oral. Sure, they say frequent intercourse is good, too, but oral is better. So, if you care about having a healthy baby and not potentially unleashing what scientists call a “destructive attack on the foreign tissues” of your fetus, if you want to avoid immunological disorders during pregnancy, and I’m sure you do, get to work. Or to pleasure, depending on how you feel about it.

Basically, the research says you need to be able to tolerate your baby’s foreign, paternal DNA; in other words, you need to get your body accustomed to the stuff, need to cozy up to some daddy double helix for a while so your body doesn’t reject it.

She said it here.

Further down in the same post, though, Dr. Suzanne Gilberg-Lenz, also of MomLogic says that’s true if and only if a single, very small study by a non-specialist counts as “the international medical community.”

Maybe I have not been attending grand rounds enough and am out of date — but I NEVER learned about this benefit of oral sex in medical school or residency, or at any of those fancy continuing medical education conferences!

So while my search was far from exhaustive, I checked out a few of the wiki sources named in Teresa’s blog. The one academic paper that seems to support this supposed “immune maladaption theory of preeclampsia” is in fact published in one of our most esteemed peer-reviewed journals, but it is a small study and, no offense, was authored by a resident … and the bigger, better controlled study with more than 2,000 subjects published in another peer-reviewed journal concludes otherwise. So, if you like, swallow, and if you do not … please do whatever it is that you do with undesired contents of the oral cavity

Care to guess which way most of the comments on the post go? Suddenly being skeptical about a very dubious study makes Gilbert-Lenz a prude? Or “a feminist,” as if that was a bad thing?

I think fellatio feels very nice, and I agree that it’s lovely when a partner swallows. I also think there’s no, zero, none chance the study demonstrates that “gastrointestinal absorption of semen” is the best way to establish immunological tolerance. Or anything of the sort.

That’s a good thing, too. Because from the look of it the cluster of related papers all say the immunological effect seems to be related to substances in semen, not sperm. Which would suggest another, even more reliable way to avoid preeclampsia would be to altogether avoid contact with semen, period. So.

Quick question for anyone hoping Dr. Gilberg-Lenz is a spoilsport: would you be as credulous about a similarly small, obscure study claiming preeclampsia could be avoided through total lifetime abstinence except specifically for procreation? No? Good call.

I mean, it sounds like a good call. She says clearly, if a bit medically, “so, if you like, swallow, and if you do not … please do whatever it is that you do with undesired contents of the oral cavity.” Do it if you already like to, otherwise don’t force yourself is feminist advice, sure, but it’s pretty good advice period.

For instance what if an “international medical community” of one claimed that “gastrointestinal absorption of semen” was the best way for men to avoid prostate cancer instead? How many straight-oriented men do you think would start swallowing semen? Even if their wives emailed them the links? Even if their wives reminded them that prostate cancer leads all other forms in men? Are those crickets chirping? I thought so.

If you look at this (or, obviously any other sex-related recommendation) from an it-could-happen-to-me perspective “swallow if you want to but don’t let anyone force you if you don’t” starts sounding pretty good for everybody. Feminism’s good for everybody.

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Finally, despite admonitions about not looking gift horses in the mouth and all I think it would be weird to find out one’s partner’s suddenly interest in oral sex turned out to be about her enjoyment, or her interest in my enjoyment, but because she was thinking about its medicinal properties.

I mean, yeah, inside the fantasyland where “men just need a place to have sex, women need a reason“ womanly/maternal/feminine concern for health is great “leverage” for sex. But… first of all eww, and second of all I’m really, really tired of the Two Rules of Desire where men are incapable of being desired, and women of desiring them… and where it’s inconceivable that a man might receive a blowjob because a woman wanted to give him one.

Update:

Me? As much fun as it is for you when someone lovingly kisses his way down your body… from your lips to your neck to your shoulders and breasts… gingerly across your belly and then down further, lingering longer and longer while your eyelids flutter and your breath quickens and… Ahem, where was I? Oh yeah, as much fun as it might be for you, one of the pleasures of eating you for your partner is that he gets to be the reason for your… well… flutters and sighs. And that he enjoys the way you look, the way you taste, the way you feel against and in his mouth… the way her legs flex… and quiver… rise… and squeeze or thump his shoulders.

And so much as I enjoy the same trail of kisses down to my naughty bits, and don’t notice my curled-toenail marks further kisses bring, it’s hard to believe the common belief that being the source of my murmers and sighs and shortened breath might not be just as enjoyable for a partner… or that she wouldn’t enjoy the way I look, the way I taste, the way I feel against and in her mouth, and the way my legs stretch out… the way my muscles tense… the way my hips roll and surge up against palms of her hands.

I mean… in the broadest terms could one gender really get less enjoyment from that than another? Could it be that the only motivation for one might be it’s possible medicinal value?

In an always interesting regular feature, Lo of Em & Lo: Sex. Love. And Everything in Between. runs a statement from a reader to a panel of three men to see how they respond.

“I really hate going down on guys. I’ve tried it, I don’t like it. In fact, I loathe it. I feel bad about it, but if I don’t expect oral in return (I don’t), then why should I feel compelled to do something I don’t enjoy?”

Read the quote in context here.

Yeah, feeling obliged to do something we hate during sex is just the best… um… way to… stay enthusiasti…

Um, no. That doesn’t really work, eh?

And, yeah, getting a blowjob from someone who’s half-hearted, hurried, and so not into it her mouth is cold is just such a… great feeli…

Um, no, that’s not so hot either.

I think the difference is that men have this idea that your no doesn’t mean “no, I don’t enjoy it,” it means “no, I’m holding something back.” Stupid I know. But since it’s just not true that “there’s no such thing as a bad blowjob” and since one of the best ways to get a bad blowjob is to pressure someone who isn’t into it in the first place then… it’s not about the physical sensation it’s about feeling like they’re somehow getting “all” of you.

Question is then do you really want to keep hanging out with a guy who thinks he’s getting more intimate with you by… pressuring and/or pining you till you do something you hate doing?

One of the panelists, identified as Gay Engaged Guy (Joel Derfner, author of Swish), had an excellent point…

If you don’t like going down on guys, there’s absolutely no reason you should feel compelled to do so. However, there’s also absolutely no reason a guy should feel compelled to keep dating you if you won’t go down on him. You just have to find somebody who gets his kicks in other ways. The pool will be much smaller, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t, um, fish to be had.

...that goes even better in the other direction. Sure, if a guy thinks it’s his privilege that you go down on him then yeah, he doesn’t have to stay with you… but… you really want to stay with him?

There are actually plenty of men who won’t pass one up if offered but who don’t think a blowjob is the Holy Grail. So why waste your time (not to mention compromising the quality of your sexual enjoyment) on someone who does?

Another panelist, Straight Married Guy (Matt) took a more conventional line “But wouldn’t giving the occasional (special occasion) blowjob be a little easier than banking on these super longshot odds?”

Eh. While I think it’s a fairly common strategy, saving up something you really hate for special occasions probably isn’t going to make it that much more special for you.

Here’s the thing, and no, it’s not a secret back door ploy to get disinclined women go give blowjobs after all: for a lot of people, not just women, not just men, feeling obliged to do something is enough of a buzzkill threshhold that you never get to where you might not mind it or might even enjoy it.

I don’t know about women doing it for men so much but I’ve certainly heard men say they they eat their girlfriends only for something in return. And they hate that too. Meanwhile like a lot of other men** I think eating a partner is fun all by itself because even if it wasn’t pretty, and tasty, and intimate, and sexy it’s really cool when someone is writhing and shuddering and panting your name. And for people, men and women, if you’re just feeling resentful it’s hard to register any of that. All of which means that if Em and Lo’s correspondent finds a partner who’s just not that into being eaten it might give her enough space to enjoy it. And if not? No big deal.

[** Sabina of Y Tu Hermano Tambien has a good post on men who are into being eaten vs. men who’d rather eat their partners. —fl]

Via Rachel Kramer Bussel, John DeVore of The Frisky says in an article titled “Mouth Love Is Meh”

Blow jobs are overrated. There. I said it.

I think “meh” can be the right word. It’s not that there’s no such thing as a great blowjob, it’s that there’s not no such thing as one you don’t enjoy. (Key point: it doesn’t have to be their fault if you don’t enjoy it.)

What’s weird, or, maybe more accurately, significant, is that we feel compelled to duck rhetorically when we say it (as in “There. I said it.”) as if it was doctrinal heresy rather than a personal or even general insight.

I think DeVore, like me and like one of his commenters who said “Even if you don’t get off on mouth-love—and I rarely do—it still feels great,” are actually pretty average. Fellatio feels good; it’s hard to come that way… and therefore the doctrinal mania for receiving it comes from somewhere else.

Aside: about that “somewhere else.” Until not that long ago fellatio, in particular, was considered exceptionally coarse, the provenance of (then scorned) homosexuals and, oddly, of heterosexual lower/working-class customers of prostitutes. (For that matter it was often considered too coarse for prostitutes!**) Consequently no matter how nice it felt, nor how much fun it was to do, the barriers to either asking or giving were extraordinarily high. That, however, hasn’t been particularly true in mainstream culture for going on decades now. Yet the sense that it’s an accomplishment to receive one or, for that matter, a compromise to give one, persists. But I digress…

On the other hand the enjoyment in giving blowjobs, if it’s anything like my enjoyment of giving cunnilingus, makes a lot more sense: it’s fun, it’s a developable skill, and most important (and sort of reinforcing my point) it’s really great when you get it right. That last bit about “when you get it right,” when you think about it, belies the received wisdom that receiving oral is automatically the best sensation in the world.

Of course the same can be said, I believe, about cunnilingus… for many of the same reasons.

Anyway, any more than it’s true that the subset of those who enjoy receiving it overlaps perfectly those who’s partners enjoy performing it, neither is it true that the subset of those who feel “meh” about it overlaps perfectly those who’s partners don’t thoroughly enjoy doing it.

Point being

See also: Rachel Kramer Bussel for whom feeling “meh” about receiving fellatio is a deal breaker. And Britni Danielle who would far rather give than receive.

[** “...up to two decades ago Sydney prostitutes refused to offer French at all. The women expressed disgust at its suggestion and took affirmative action if the subject was raised. Lisa, who worked in the lanes in the 1960s, told me that at that time the guys just asked for straight sex and nothing else, no oral or anything, and if they did they would have got their heads kicked in. One girl got caught doing oral when I was on College Street (1950s) and she was smashed and left lying in the gutter.” Source: Working girls: prostitutes, their life, and social control/ Roberta Perkins
ISBN 0 642 15877 0 Canberra : Australian Institute of Criminology, 1991 (Australian studies in law, crime and justice series) —fl]