Margaret Brooks, the noted anti-sex work activist who thinks that arresting sex workers somehow protects them (because hundreds of years of evidence isn’t enough to show that it always makes things much worse for them), is at it again. Citizens Against Trafficking just released a statement from her that’s full of scare quotes, misinformation, and […]

This post also appeared on the Good Vibrations Magazine. It isn’t news that people who step outside the gender binary face violence, prejudice, and discrimination. But for the first time, there’s a large-scale study that researchers, policy makers, and equality advocates can point to for proof. Injustice at Every Turn is an impressive accomplishment by […]

This post also appeared on the Good Vibrations Magazine. Last week, hyperconservative Maggie Gallagher wrote a piece in which she rather unsuccessfully tries to link women’s right to make reproductive choices and anal sex. The first thing that set off alarm bells for me was her citing a research article mentioned in the book “Premarital […]

As a lot of people have heard, Oregon State University dropped Tristan Taormino from the lineup for the Modern Sex conference last week. It’s an unfortunate situation that highlights many of the effects of sexual shame. The irony of my still being on the schedule while Tristan was removed isn’t lost on me. As Toby […]

As you may have heard if you follow her on twitter, Tristan Taormino was invited to speak at Oregon State University’s Modern Sex Conference, at least until the folks in charge at the school found out that she makes and sells porn. Since I’m one of the speakers at the conference as well as being […]

Two articles came through my in-box the other day. I found one of them rather thought-provoking and the other quite irritating. But they both had one thing in common. Well, actually, more than one thing, but they had one thing in common that I found especially difficult. They were both using gender-essentialist language to talk […]

This post also appeared on the Good Vibrations Magazine. Lots of websites, including, the Washington Times and CNN are reporting that there’s a new survey showing that 10% of teens who say that they’re sexually abstinent are testing positive for chlamydia, gonorrhea and trichomoniasis. And while I agree that some of the reasons for this […]