Do teens consider oral sex to be sex?

A recent study finds that only 20% of a convenience sample of teens consider oral sex to be sex. This finding has been documented anecdotally, such as in the classic scene from the 1994 movie _Clerks_, where the main character is described to hear the discrepancy in his girlfriend's number of sexual partners and number of oral sex partners. (3 vs. 37.) He had only been told about the former.

Of course there's the caveat that this convenience sample has no implications about US teens' norms in general since the sample wasn't random.

Webster's dictionary is too sexually explicit

This article reads like it's from the Onion, but in fact parents really do seem to have asked their school district to ban the dictionary from the school library because of its definition of "oral sex," and the district complied.

Not only that, but the school district is looking for more objectionable words in the dictionary. ' "It's hard to sit and read the dictionary, but we'll be looking to find other things of a graphic nature," district spokeswoman Betti Cadmus told the paper [the Guardian].' Just ask any 8 year old. Those "graphic" words are the first words a curious 8 year old turns to when they open any dictionary.

What do school officials think the dictionary is for? Kids don't need to look up terms that they have ample information about such as "flower" and "toe". They need to look up ideas that they do not have ready access to, such as sexual behavior, substance use, and intelligence, as a quote from a board member illustrates well:

Board member Randy Freeman, an elementary school teacher and parent to four daughters in Menifee schools... said it's "a prestigious dictionary that's used in the Riverside County spelling bee, but I also imagine there are words in there of concern."

In other words, it sounds like he's never opened a dictionary.

Bar mitzvahs as the Jewish Rainbow Party?

Brandeis sociologist Shulamit Reinharz writes in 614 magazine, the magazine of the Brandeis women's research institute, that Jewish girls are giving oral sex as a bar mitzvah present, a topic people have been speculating about since at least 2005 (for instance, this 2005 David Brooks column is skeptical of what sound like old rumors even then.) Without better substantiation than the vague assertion from an unnamed Brandeis student that oral sex at bar mitzvahs is "common", it sounds like another rainbow party urban myth.

As head of a research institute, I'm surprised Professor Reinharz couldn't spare even a work study undergrad to investigate whether this claim has any basis whatsoever before raising alarms about it, much less publishing it under the name of an institution that might be considered an authority on "Authentic Judaism."

Germaine Greer on abstinence-ish

At the very beginning of
this show with 1970s feminist Germaine Greer (author of the Female Eunuch which I remember really liking when I was 14 or 15), she mentions a couple interesting anecdotes about young adult/late adolescent women and sexual decision-making.

1. One of her students didn't feel ready for penetrative sex, and eventually her boyfriend left her for it. She would meet men at parties to hook up with, and say "By the way, I don't do penetrative sex." and the men would just walk away. Which is a strange anecdote. The qualitative book _Hooking Up_ describes most hook-ups as not going that far, often just kissing (at least that's what they would tell the sociologist.) Meanwhile this woman's housemates all had boyfriends and were all sexually active and having penetrative sex "because it was required of them" in Greer's words, but they were less accustomed to sexual pleasure.

2. She says Sex in the City depresses her because the characters focus so much on men and sex.


Just anecdotes, but I find it fascinating from the perspective of the earlier wave of feminism and earlier feminist sexual values.

Condoms during oral sex: the hidden danger

Women inhales condom during fellatio

Indian J Chest Dis Allied Sci. 2004 Jan-Mar;46(1):55-8.
Accidental condom inhalation.
Arya CL, Gupta R, Arora VK.

Jaswant Rai Speciality Hospital, Meerut, India.

A 27-year-old lady presented with persistent cough, sputum and fever for the preceding six months. Inspite of trials with antibiotics and anti-tuberculosis treatment for the preceeding four months, her symptoms did not improve. A subsequent chest radiograph showed non-homogeneous collapse-consolidation of right upper lobe. Videobronchoscopy revealed an inverted bag like structure in right upper lobe bronchus and rigid bronchoscopic removal with biopsy forceps confirmed the presence of a condom. Detailed retrospective history also confirmed accidental inhalation of the condom during fellatio.

It's an old paper, but perhaps not well-publicized enough.

I can't really picture how this would happen.