Condom Monologues

Category: Monologues

  • The True Story of Mr. Too Big

    The True Story of Mr. Too Big

    Being armed with a drawer of condoms doesn’t always guarantee full preparation for hot safe sex. The Sexpert tells her story about the power of lust with Mr. Too Big.

    Last year I wrote this.

    It is not the most impressive post I have ever crafted – but I would like to offer even further explanation for its inspiration. Yours truly is not always as perfectly behaved as you may think. Based on my values of being a sex-positive feminist who calls herself ‘The Sexpert’ you may imagine my life a polyamorous bisexual multi-orgasmic wonderland. One where consent is always verbally given, I get rapid HIV screenings on a monthly basis, and I have safer sex items in candy dishes in my living room. This is (sadly) not the case.

    The Sexpert demonstrates how elastic a "regular" size Durex can be.
    The Sexpert demonstrates how elastic a “regular” size Durex can be.

    In the post I wrote about “some naive person somewhere” falling for the line, “I’m too big.” I wrote it with a smile on my face knowing that I was referring to myself having been in that situation only a few months prior. My sarcasm was likely only funny to me, however, and lost on my reader. So much of my motivation for writing The Sexpert comes from the frustration of never having been armed with good information early on. The Sexpert is my contribution to the universe to fix that problem for myself and whoever may stumble across my writing.

    So, the story of Mr. Too Big goes like this:

    I was out with a group of my girlfriends on a Friday night at a downtown dance club. A couple vodka tonics into the evening I see the most gorgeous man I have ever been in the same room with. What’s more is that he is already engaged in conversation with a friend of mine. I walk over and she is more than happy to introduce me and mentions that they know each other from a previous party they both attended. She excuses herself and I promptly ask him to dance.

    To my extreme delight it seems he reciprocates my intense feelings of attraction! We exchange numbers and a few days later we are on a date that ends with him coming home with me. Normally, I am the type of girl who holds to certain ideals of romance. I genuinely try to get to know someone and I am logical about if we make a “good fit.” I will check these two things off my list before the decision to begin a sexual relationship…but this is not a story of when I used my best judgment. He had already tipped me off to some things going on in his life that I felt would get in the way of us having a successful relationship. However, did I mention he was the most attractive man I had ever seen?

    I made the decision that I would be having sex with him even if the only outcome of this decision was getting to have sex with someone as attractive as he was. In other words, I was not consulting my brain in this particular decision. I didn’t lose sight of the fact that this was someone I barely knew who I had met in the seedy underbelly of Minneapolis. I insisted he wore a condom and he happily pulled one out. My only thought when I saw his penis for the first time was, “I didn’t know God made them that big.”

    I do have the privilege of having sexual partners with whom I have a trusting, honest, and an emotionally stable bond with. I can share the dates and times and results of my last STI testing with them and they with me without any awkward feelings. With Mr. Too Big I was not privileged with that same sense of comfort. So when the first condom was used up and we still wanted to engage in more sexual activity I approached the situation gently. I figured I was most safe as long as I had the assurance that a barrier was in place. I had a stash of condoms in my room – the very same Durex in the purple wrapper that I mention in my blog. I quickly pulled one out but he only laughed. He told me size had always prevented him from wearing certain condoms and my request was simply impossible. I was dumbstruck but I went ahead with the deed despite my discomfort.

    WrongSizeCondomThings continued on in this way for a few more days. Finally, I grew tired of his pushiness and the uncomfortable feeling I have when I am not proud of myself. We stopped talking and have not crossed paths since. I was tested for STI’s soon after and was thrilled to find out that I did not catch anything in spite of myself. I am blessed to live in a state with some of the lowest relative rates of STI’s in the nation.

    I think oftentimes we have a chance to turn negative events into positive life lessons and in this way earn ourselves some good Karma. My goal in sharing this story with you is to give you a chance to learn the lesson the easy way because I did not. I have since learned that, yes, condoms come in different sizes and being “too big” is not a good enough excuse for me to engage in unprotected sex. We could have stuck with less riskier acts if he really couldn’t fit into any condoms I had, such as manual sex.

    I have also learned the importance of staying honest with myself; to be confident with the boundaries I set even at the risk of upsetting him or damping the ardor. Because honestly, what’s more important? I am turned off when someone dismisses efforts I make to keep myself safe. I didn’t like how that felt nor did I ignore the power disparity I attributed to our gender difference. I am someone of very small stature and he was an easy counterpart to Hercules. This taught me a huge lesson in trust and the boundaries I must set and communicate when there is a lack of it. From the moment he refused to wear a condom I had trouble ever feeling safe around him. I can see now that that was due to how reckless I truly found his decision to not go through the trouble of supplying the right size condom for himself! Or use it!

    Stay safe,

    The Sexpert

  • Why the Birds & Bees Just Won’t Cut It

    Why the Birds & Bees Just Won’t Cut It

    Hymen myth, sexist magazines, pleasure-shame: obstacles which have helped build my dream of opening a Sex+ Sex Shop. May it one day be normal to celebrate sex!

    That awkward first sex talk.

    Plenty of kids seem to share the same dreadful story about their parents or teachers stumbling through “the birds and the bees” speech.

    Sometimes you come across a few folks who have learned the ins and outs of sexuality from peers instead. Mostly this information is collected from whispered conversations amidst giggles in bathroom stalls. Or late at night during sleepovers in which the details of how to perform perfect oral are spewed out for all the untrained friends gathered around.

    I remember one of my partners and I spent hour’s Googling how to make women orgasm. He even drew me a diagram of where he figured my clitoris must be located (he made sure to describe it as ‘a little man in a boat’). I guess that means to some people that clitoral hoods look like boats?

    He tried so hard to learn about sex the only way he felt comfortable. This meant turning exclusively to the internet. Needless to say, that was one lesson that would have been nice to learn from someone we trusted instead of turning to random wikihow articles. Wikihow your partner to multiple orgasms! Conversations regarding sex and sexuality ultimately mean more when they are done so face to face. This holds true despite the awkwardness which will undoubtedly ensue once you begin to imagine your parents or children wrapped up in deliciously compromising positions.

    There was one time he did have a conversation with his parents about sex. This occurred when they washed his jeans and found a condom wrapper in the hamper. He summarized the gist of the conversation, with his dad issuing a stern warning about the dangers of pregnancy during premarital sex while his mom cried on the couch. Off-putting to say the least. Nor was it the least bit helpful or practical. A conversation about sexual health shouldn’t be focused on dread and fear. They need to begin to describe the creative, diverse ways that sex can be had, with whom you can have sex, and the ways in which each individual will enjoy(or not enjoy) different things.

    A later partner I discovered enjoyed anal stimulation. He was so ashamed by it because when he looked it up, all accounts made out that heterosexual men did not, should not, and could not enjoy anal stimulation.

    He believed blogs written by anonymous sex gurus from Maxim and of course the piles of Seventeen Magazines and Cosmopolitans his female roommate kept in their adjoined washroom. The messages he received from these sources, from his parents, from his male friends and from what little porn he did confess to watching, made any encouragement of anal play useless.

    The messages these individuals took so much to heart had an adverse effect on me as well. The person that I had sex with for the first time actually dared to question my virginity after we had penetrative sex for the first time. This, because of myths he had internalized about hymens.

    Immediately after the act I was basking in the glow of it all. We had oral and manual sex so often that I was eager and ready for vaginal sex. Further, I had the delight of not feeling any pain throughout my first experience. I told him that I was happy, that it hadn’t hurt. I was smiling on the couch next to him, when I glanced up and noticed the shocked look on his face. Bothered, I asked,“did it hurt you? I am so sorry if it did!” Luckily, it hadn’t. Rather, his disturbance was due to the fact that I hadn’t bled. I told him I too, was surprised and relieved. He wasn’t satisfied with this kind of a response. He thought that virginity was very important and also had some misguided beliefs about having to ‘pop the cherry’ in order for the act to be legitimate.

    Fortunately my relationship with sexuality was slightly more positive than many, but mostly because I was so curious that my parents didn’t even need to sit me down. I’d just come to ask whatever was on my mind; often to their embarrassment. Speaking of which, years after my “birds & bees” chat with my own mother, I gave her a phone call to share the exciting news that I had achieved my first orgasm with a sex partner. She had never known before that I was having difficulty, and I think she was shocked that I had called her to celebrate the occasion in the same kind of manner my sister often does about a job offer or an excellent mark on a term paper.

    Now I’m not saying at all that my parents were shy about sex. My mother has become quite comfortable sharing details of her life with me that I think, unfortunately are quite taboo in many other parent/child relationships. However, what my point boils down to is that unlike celebrations over achievements or a lesson well learned, there was no celebration when we discussed sex.

    I want that to change for everybody!

    I can completely comprehend if some people feel uncomfortable teaching their own children how to put on a condom or how to properly use a dental dam. I’m sure the majority of parents are a little unprepared for a consultation with their offspring about what size packer looks most comfortable under their slacks.

    This sort of unease is one of the main reasons I want to co-own a Sex+ Store & Education Centre. Our community members need a safe space to gather in which they can learn about sex, celebrate sex and enjoy themselves while exploring healthy sexuality. If there had been a place where I could have gone as a preteen to delve into birth control options with some sort of enthusiastic advisor I would have been all over that!

    Unfortunately, the sex stores near my home weren’t all that inviting. Most of them had reputations as sleazy joints with back rooms full of pornography. Needless to say anyone under 18 wasn’t welcome inside the door.

    Then there is the concerning number of young women I know who claim to have ‘suffered through’ their first few attempts at intercourse. If we all felt comfortable exploring our own bodies, asking questions, communicating openly with our partners about our desires, these kinds of things wouldn’t happen quite as often. We need to stop demonizing sex, especially sex amongst our youth, our elderly and the specially abled. Sex is natural, it is beautiful and if I ever have children I want a phone call, or HELL, maybe even a party to celebrate their first orgasms! Better yet, if children were encouraged instead of shamed when caught masturbating, couples would have far less trouble achieving orgasms with one another in the first place.

    Owning a Sex Positive/Queer Positive Shop is my way of giving back to the community that embraced me and helped me bloom into a colourful sexual being. It is my way of giving all of the future (and past) generations a place to come and learn without the additional weight of secrecy or taboo. Our education systems will be slow to change their policies on Health and Sex education. I attend a Catholic University as a don and one of my forbearers was fired when he decided to distribute free condoms to his residents. This kind of injustice needs a grassroots solution. What better way to overthrow a stagnant heteronormative, anti-pleasure system than by creating our own affiliation-free safe spaces to explore sex.

    Hopefully the entire world can eventually be a sex positive space one day, but we’ll take it one row paddle at a time in the right direction.

  • The Person on the Other Side of Your Herpes Diagnosis

    The Person on the Other Side of Your Herpes Diagnosis

    Upon her sex partners herpes diagnosis, Pilar Reyes reflects on her personal path from initial anger to condoms enthusiast. The opinions shared are the authors own.

    FuckItWe had been sleeping together on and off for a few months when he got herpes. At first, it was the usual immature reaction: panic, followed by anger, followed by bitter text messages that said, “We’re never fucking ever again!” But that wasn’t true, because despite the echoes of my high school sex education that had planted the seed of “anybody who has an STD is a dirty, bad person,” the sex was still good, and I still wanted to fuck him.

    So I did my research. The Internet threw a lot of information at me, but at the end of the day I knew one thing for sure: condoms, condoms, condoms. We had always used condoms before the diagnosis, and it seemed that now using protection was imperative. The herpes virus is spread via direct physical contact. The herpes virus can shed from the skin and be passed from person to person even in the absence of a physical outbreak. Even with the use of condoms, herpes can still be passed on, although the use of condoms greatly diminishes that risk.

    I looked at the odds, I looked at my needs, and I came to the conclusion that the risk was worth the reward. Armed with the knowledge that I could potentially spread an STD to my other sexual partners, I did the responsible thing and let them know. Of course, when they found out, they decided to stop sleeping with me. That was fine, because it wasn’t that serious anyways. I guess that’s the thing about casual sex – at the risk of STDs, it becomes a less worthwhile pursuit.

    Which was why my partner and I became less casual and more serious. After a brief hiatus, and after the initial outbreak cleared up, I realized that the sex wasn’t the only reason I was coming back. Maybe it was the shared experience of dealing with a new STD diagnosis together, or maybe it was the fact that I hadn’t completely ditched him because of his herpes, we decided, fuck it, we clearly care about each other. Let’s stop fucking around and start dating.

    It would have been really easy to instead close my legs and walk away at that point. Certainly all my friends had advised me to do so, but when I had done my initial medical research, I also came across an online community devoted to debunking the STD shaming that is pervasive in modern culture. At first I was surprised that I had never come across this point of view before. As a feminist and an avid anti-slut shamer, it just made sense. Given my initial reaction and my friends’ reactions to the situation, I realized that , much to my chagrin, our attitudes to STDs were not exactly PC. Sure, I have friends with HIV and herpes, but they were certainly not people that I would have even considered having sex with. Of course, that’s a completely unfair perspective, because all it takes is a condom to diminish your risk. So long as a person is honest when disclosing their STDs, there shouldn’t be a problem.

    To give this story a happy ending, my partner and I are still together. We have safe sex every time, and, while I still do not have herpes, I’ve come to realize that if I get herpes, then I’ll have herpes. It won’t be a life shattering event, nor should it be, for myself or anyone else. Sure, I certainly don’t want an STD, nor does anyone else, but much like a cold or like acne, often times STDs are merely inconvenient medical conditions. With proper education, you can diminish your risk. Fuck it – just use a condom every time.

    Monologues are independent stories. The opinions shared are the author’s own.

  • What Fire & Ice Condoms Feel Like According to Pilar Reyes

    What Fire & Ice Condoms Feel Like According to Pilar Reyes

    This story by Pilar Reyes is originally published on Fuck Feast (@fuckfeast) and cross-posted with permission. The opinions shared are the writer’s own. NSFW. 

    Image from UnderCover Condoms
    Image from UnderCover Condoms

    Whenever I’m in the “Family Planning” aisle at Walmart, usually I just spring for the condoms that are on sale today. Sure, I can always score condoms at various free clinics and free love inclined coffee shops in Oakland, but it’s always good to have some back up, just in case. About a week and a half ago I bought a 36 pack of Trojans, you know, the one that has 4 different varieties of condoms on them. Generally, it would never occur to me to buy those weird “Fire & Ice” condoms or anything other than standard, cheap condoms because, I’ll be honest, I’m not the one with the penis and different types of condoms don’t really create any marginal increase in pleasure, so who cares. (Maybe the dude cares, but if he really cares that much, shouldn’t he be the one buying condoms? And while we’re on that subject, how come it’s always my responsibility to have the condoms? Dudes in this city are so underprepared. I guess every boy in Oakland failed in the Boy Scouts department.)

    Anyways, back on topic. I wasn’t really paying attention to the type of condom that the boy was putting on (mostly I just cared that it got on there), but after a few minutes there was this weird tingly-numb sensation in my pussy that immediately made me think, “I’m dying inside my vagina.” But, no, a few seconds later, I thought, “Maybe I’m contracting an STD right now and this is what it feels like….”

    Read the full story at Fuck Feast

    f-feast (1)

    Pilar Reyes is an Oakland native who still lives in her hometown. She publishes pieces daily for Fuck Feast [www.fuckfeast.net], her personal blog. When she’s not writing, she’s doing bad things. Follow her on Twitter: @pilar [www.twitter.com/pilar].

  • Dear Dental Dam,

    Dear Dental Dam,

    There is no way I am having you cover my vagina while my partner performs oral sex on me. It is simply not going to happen. I would rather have no oral sex at all, because you sound like torture, kind of like licking ice cream through the screen door.

    I am having this rant because my sex partner showed up armed to the hilt with condoms, lube and you for an evening of sex. You were a new addition to the safe sex practice because a counselor at the health center suggested you to him. Obviously, you have never covered that counselor’s vagina during oral sex.

    I have no sexually transmitted infections, other than HIV. My partner has no sexually transmitted infections and we are monogamous. The odds of him getting HIV from licking my vagina are about as great as being struck by a meteor. I am going to chance getting hit by a meteor. My partner is also happy to escape having to lick you- dental dam. Oral sex is the greatest pleasure and an alternative safe sex practice that does not involve you right now. Besides, I would never knowingly put someone at risk.

    My partner already had the discussion with the condoms about staying off his privates during oral sex, so why the hell would I want you covering my sensitive parts during oral sex and stifling my orgasms? The condoms are bad enough and that is as far as I am willing to go with safe sex practices with my partner. You are not going to take all the pleasure out of sex and intimacy for me. It is simply too much latex and makes no sense.

    I have always believed that a little common sense in each situation can go a long way. So you, dental dam, are going to be put in the bathroom drawer until further notice. I promise to seek you out if needed for some future date.

    Yours Sincerely,
    Virgina

    Monologues are independent personal stories. The opinions shared are the writer’s own.

    For information on HIV and safer sex practices we recommend these resource: The Sero Project. Rise Up to HIV. CareXO.com. The Body Q&A Forum. The Needle Prick Project. Baseline Mag. Positive Lite Mag. Poz Mag. Just Get Tested. Connected Health Solutions. The Stigma Project. AIDS ACTION NOW. Act Up!. Testing Makes Us Stronger. and your local HIV/AIDS community center. Know your status.

    For more monologues follow us on Tumblr and FB.

  • #WithoutShame: Storytelling about HIV

    #WithoutShame: Storytelling about HIV

    To combat the spread of HIV and stigma, we need honest discussions that go beyond politically correct ways of representing today’s realities about the virus without oversimplifying and shaming. That is what these two digital stories offer. Watch and listen.

    btp_logo_printReal life storytelling is a powerful way to raise awareness about HIV and stigma. Stories not only convey information but they also communicate values that relate the storyteller and the listener in more nuanced ways. The Banyan Tree Project, run by the folks at The Asian & Pacific Islander Wellness Center, has utilized this human resource and extended it to Twitter chat.

    Viewing Stories on Twitter #BTPChat

    They launched a digital storytelling initiative to combat HIV-related stigma in Asian and Pacific Islander communities. For those of you that don’t know, digital storytelling is a workshop-based practice in which participants write their own first-person scripts, record narration, select and scan images, add music, and make 3-4 minute digital videos- in this case, about one’s experience with HIV. The digital stories are uploaded on the project website and have been shared in panels, conferences, and other community discussions to provoke dialogue and community change.

    This is how I learned about the Banyan Tree Project (BTP) and watched the two digital stories posted below. BTP organized 5 weekly Twitter chats with guest including TheBody.com and the USA Positive Women’s Network, among others, and framed questions based on digital stories they shared.
    You can follow and participate in the chats by following @BTPMay19 and using the hashtag #BTPChat.

    June 6, 2012, there will be a #BTPChat about HIV and Youth with the Youth, the Arts, HIV & AIDS Network (@YAHAnet). It starts at 5pm Eastern /2pm Pacific Time and runs for an hour.

    BMCww-aCMAE5bnA
    Image from @yahanet

    HIV and Gay/Bi Men #BTPChat

    Last week’s topic was about men who have sex with men and HIV with the National Minority AIDS Council (@NMAC AIDS). Tony’s digital story initiated the chat. Sharing his experience of grief and denial, Tony emphasizes the need for community support which includes the important role of family and friends.

    (All videos from the BTP can be watched on their website)

    Following the video, @BTPMay19 tweeted these questions for us all to respond.

    1) Tony says “Know your status, get tested, seek treatment, find support.” What do gay/bi men need in order to do this?

    2) Tony most likely contracted HIV decades ago. How has the gay community’s perception of HIV changed over the last 30 years? #BTPChat

    To-the-point answers (you have to be, it’s twitter!) from various HIV outreach professionals and activists rolled out. I’m REALLY generalizing here but comments ranged from issues of disclosure and stigma, the need for everyone (not just poz folks) to have updated info on the manageability of HIV; and the urgency of different ways to frame HIV facts that resonate with different communities.

    In the second video “Side Effects”, a sexual health educator candidly explains what led to his choice to have sex without a condom. He reveals that he’s secretly on post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) and works through his guilt.

    The #BTPChat question posed were:

    1) PEP/PReP can protect against HIV exposure. What do you think this means for gay/bi men relationships?

    2) What challenges do gay/bi men still face when getting tested/treated for HIV?  #BTPChat

    Also, one of the guest moderators, @NMAC AIDS, asked if this storyteller is a hypocrite and if outreach professionals would use this video when teaching prevention? Again, I’m writing a very simplified overview but I think it’s fair to say that most twitter participants felt this story was the kind of frank discourse needed to tackle taboo subjects like drugs and unsafe sex. Every participant seemed to express support for PEP/PReP stating that it offers more options for different relationships and circumstances. Comments did touch upon the inaccessibility of PEP/PReP due to high costs. It was also emphasized that such treatment must be coupled with promoting regular testing and condoms use in appropriate circumstances. Other participants mentioned that condom stigma needs to be taken more seriously by activists.

    Post-Thoughts?

    The creation and (careful) distribution of these digital stories have potential to make people rethink assumptions about HIV issues and stereotypes of people living with the virus. These are not HIV experiences typically represented in national public discourse. You will not find them in H&M or state-funded sex ed classes. In some ways, they uphold harmful stereotypes that reduce people with STDs and infections as deviant and careless. The storytellers admit to dissent, recklessness, negligence and guilt. But that is the power of these stories- honest talk that keeps it real.

    They expose the trickiness of discussing HIV-related topics without subconsciously casting moral judgment. People are slutty, people are negligent and irrational, people use drugs and take part in abusive relationships (be it with themselves or another).

    However, these digital stories are not innately effective at combating HIV stigma and posing discussion. They require careful framing.  Dialogue needs to be monitored and kept tailored for particular audiences in order to respect the storyteller and effectively combat myths and stigma that might be decoded by the audience. I think the people at APIWellness who run #BTPChat do a great job at this and I hope they continue to twitter #withoutshame.

    What are your responses to these digital stories and the #BTPChat questions?

  • How I Contracted HPV and What I Did About It

    How I Contracted HPV and What I Did About It

    This post is written by Tashia Amenerio, founder of the non-profit HPV Awakening.  She writes from her personal experience why she is pushing for HPV be reportable- meaning sexual partners must legally inform each other of their status- and why she urges you to sign the petition to get the FDA to approve HPV testing for men.

    (Un)Knowing HPV

    Graph from the CDC. Fourteen million will become newly infected with HPV this year. This means that almost every sexually active person in the US will acquire HPV at some point in their lives.
    Graph from the CDC. Fourteen million will become newly infected with HPV this year. This means that almost every sexually active person in the US will acquire HPV at some point in their lives.

    When diagnosed with HPV, life as you know it is over. You face disturbing contradictions within the medical community . On the one hand, there are those who describe it as “this generation’s AIDS”. On the other side, you are faced with medical “experts” who don’t know their head from a hole in the ground and tell you that HPV is nothing to worry about.

    Here is the kicker: Most HPV strands, like most cold or flu strands, really don’t do much of anything but chill out in your body having a viral party of genome development. The issue(s) arise when you get people who are knowingly infecting others with cancer causing strands- a crime of which I’m personally all too well aware. And then you have others who are unknowingly transmitting the STI. A major reason for this is because it is not standard practice to get tested for HPV- and there are no official tests made publicly available for males- despite the fact that HPV is the most prevalent STI in North America right now.

    So What Can We Do?

    www.hpvawakening.org.
    www.hpvawakening.org.

    Well, I started a nonprofit HPV Awakening Inc. I lecture all over the Florida and have done a few media interviews. I sit here now writing you about my experiences and I’ve launched a petition that needs 100,000 signatures by May 28th, 2013, so that it can go to the White House to get HPV male testing approved by the FDA. Sign the petition.

    I have contacted several local media stations and sites. And I have tried moving my civil court case Tashia Ameneiro vs. Zamil Xavier Lopez to a criminal one in order to have the state acknowledge the fact that HPV cancer strands should be taken as serious as AIDS/HIV strands.

    The Miami Dade DA has kindly informed me that, well, HPV isn’t mentioned in the Florida statute at all. Thus they can’t help me. This is in spite of the fact that my case is backed with the full support from the local police department that filed my report (Miami Gardens), and they are willing to facilitate the investigative work!

    So here is where you the reader come in. What can you do? Well, if you have ever been diagnosed or know someone that has been- I can relate. It sucks and it isn’t easy. And fun (insert EXTREME sarcasm) questions and situations follow diagnosis.

    From Why Me? To What I Will Do About It!

    In my case, I had been a virgin with no sexual experience prior to my ex, so I didn’t have to go through the questioning phase of Who? But I did have to go through the constant questioning phase of Why? After I received my diagnosis and contacted my ex he kindly informed me that he had known but since it hadn’t directly impacted me he hadn’t cared.

    But that wasn’t the only “Why”. The “Why me?” phase kicked in and it kicked in for several of my friends too. Because once you get sick, it isn’t just you. It’s you and those that care about you, or who know you in a caring light- family, acquaintances, associates, co-workers and strangers you disclose to- that are impacted.

    I remember one conversation in particular with a friend of mine that went through a bad life phase (attempted suicide and was a bug chaser at one point in time) sitting on the stairs while we shared a smoke (a short lived habit I picked-up during that “Why be and Why bother” phase). He was crying because he couldn’t understand how “Good people like [me], who never do anything risky end up getting sick and people like [him], who have tried every way possible to be ill and die didn’t.” Easy answer: “I don’t know what a ‘good’ person is, but sometimes Shit Just Happens.” It is a matter of what you do with the situation that counts.

    I finished the cigarette and realized that some habits aren’t worth starting or maintaining just to stay wallowing in self-pity.

    For those of you that are still reading, I say Yay! Thank you in sharing in my past misery. It really does love company.

    Please sign the petition to get HPV male testing approved by the FDA. Go to We The People to sign.

  • The “Condom Girl”: Condom Policing is Gender Policing

    The “Condom Girl”: Condom Policing is Gender Policing

    “What do you do when you’re detained by powerful officials, everything you say is presumed deceptive, arbitrary “evidence” is held against you, and you’re treated like a moral deviant? And what if its 2013, you’re a woman, and the “evidence” is that you possess condoms?”- Clay Nikiforuk 

    NYC_condom-in-handcuffs_zps66258bf1
    Say no to condoms as legal evidence. Image from Photobucket.

    In March 2013, Clay Nikiforuk was detained at the Quebec/Vermont boarder under suspicion of being a sex worker.  The evidence: about 8 condoms and some sexy underwear.  Hours of questioning passed over the possible relationship between her lingerie and condoms. Clay was eventually allowed into the US, but found out two weeks later that she had been flagged as a suspected sex worker.  A series of consequences followed including limited visa permits, about $1000 in extra travel fees, and more police interrogations.

    It’s easy to point at the sexist double standard here.  If a young, stereotypically “masculine” man traveled with a pack of condoms and nice underwear his moral integrity would not be questioned.  But there is something else at play than slut-shaming alone. Condom policing reinforces standards of what is appropriate female and male sexuality (a.k.a. heteronormativity).  And wrapped up in those messy assumptions are racial and class stereotypes.

    We have posted other monologues about condom policing before.  The NYPD’s tactic of condoms-as-evidence systematically results in gender-based violence.  The victims are overwhelmingly non-white transsexual women. This discrimination occurs daily.  The news media picks it up from time to time- maybe once a year by questioning whether condoms-as-evidence of sex work is constitutional.  In fact, a bill to stop this legal practice has been struggling to pass congress for nearly a decade.

    But when condom policing happens to a white, educated young woman (read privilege) the media takes up the issue in a new way- through innocence.  Clay writes a response to the media’s representation of her story on Rabble.ca.

    “I wasn’t featured nationally in Metro as “Uneducated girl is accused of sex work” but rather as “UBC student.” I didn’t join CBC’s Daybreak show as “Sex worker/adulteress treated as second class citizen” but rather, “Woman files complaint after border crossing nightmare.” So long as I was positioned as privileged, and, sometimes by proxy, innocent, my story had shock value. Because when bad things start happening to innocent, educated white people, they could happen to anyone — or rather, other privileged people. And that is very, very scary.”

    “….I’ve stopped answering the point-blank question of whether or not I am, was, or ever will be a sex worker. I like to entertain the half-mad fantasy that no matter whom one has consensual sex with or why, one is irrevocably a human deserving respect and rights. The point is: when sex and sexuality are criminalized, people are made illegal and their rights made moot.”

    “….If I were a sex worker, I might have “deserved” the treatment I received, or my detainment might have “made sense.” If I were from a minority group or were not as educated in the English language, my story might not have provoked the shock and outrage that it did. And rather than receiving the reaction “That should never happen to anyone,” often the reaction I still get is “That should never have happened to you.”

    Read the entire article at Rabble.ca  For more information on the campaign to stop condoms as evidence by police and in court, check out The Red Umbrella Project and End the Use of Condoms as Evidence.

  • A Mark in History of Marriage Equality: Family Story by John & Stuart

    A Mark in History of Marriage Equality: Family Story by John & Stuart

    LGBTQ-Logue 005.

    You know, the sense of the historic moment hanging over these cases is incredible, and the atmosphere is really electric…As my husband said, it really feels like our very lives are before the court. But there’s no mistaking this historic moment. The momentum leading up to these hearings is incredible. Every day, when we turn to the headlines, there’s some new polls showing increasing majority support nationwide for equal marriage rights.- Stuart Gaffney, interview on Democracy Now!

    Stuart Gaffney and John Lewis speaking on Democracy Now 26 March 2013
    Stuart Gaffney and John Lewis speaking on Democracy Now 26 March 2013

    That is a quote from Stuart Gaffney, media director at Marriage Equality USA, describing what it felt like, both as a married gay man and an activist, to be in the Supreme Court watching the arguments about the constitutionality of DOMA.  For those who don’t know, DOMA (Defense of Marriage Act) is a federal law enacted in 1996, that denies federal benefits to legally married same-sex couples.

    Our LGBTQ-logue pays homage to this historic moment (the Supreme Court discussing the systemic discrimination of sexual orientation is landmark!) by hearing the family story of Stuart Gaffney and his husband John Lewis, together for 25 years.  You can watch a full interview with them at DemocracyNow.org

    What follows in an excerpt of Stuart and John’s family story that was originally written for the Marriage Equality Quilt for National Freedom to Marry Day (PDF) in Feb. 2007.

    Stuart and John’s Story…

    is significant because it directly connects with the history of laws banning interracial marriage until the Supreme court deemed them unconstitutional in 1967.  This issue came up in the Supreme court when Justice Scalia asked attorney, Theodore Olson, when it became unconstitutional to exclude homosexual couples from marriage.

    Listen to Clip [sc_embed_player fileurl=”https://condommonologues.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/12-144-Hollingsworth-v.-Perry-trimmed.mp3″]

    For the entire Supreme Court argument on March 26, 2013, listen here.

    John and Stuart’s very own family story draws parallels of racial discrimination and discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation in marriage law.  As an interracial couple, Stuart’s parents- mother Chinese-American and father English/Irish American- faced the same barriers that Stuart and John face today. Read below:

    For nearly as long as we can remember, we each wanted to meet someone to fall in love with and start building a life together. For us, it happened in 1987, when we met at a neighborhood election party. When we met, John felt as if he had already known Stuart forever. To this day, when we visit old places from Stuart’s childhood, John feels like he was there with Stuart. And even before our second date, Stuart had already told his best friend from college, “I’ve met my future husband.”

    When we married at San Francisco City Hall on February 12, 2004 after 17 years together as a loving and committed couple, we felt for the first time in our lives that our government was treating us as equal human beings. Subsequently, the court ruled that our marriage was null and void. Since then, we have been working to educate our fellow Californians about the importance of equal marriage rights.

    This is not the first time our family had found itself in the center of a historic civil rights struggle for equal access to marriage. Stuart’s mother, who is Chinese American, and father, who is white, were only able to marry over 50 years ago, because the state’s ban on interracial marriage was overturned. Stuart’s mother remembers how one of her classmates at the University of California had to leave the state to marry her white fiancé before the law was changed.

    After their wedding, Stuart’s parents traveled across America and lived in many different parts of the country. When they moved to Missouri, they were disturbed to learn their marriage was illegal and void in Missouri because that state still prohibited marriages between Chinese-Americans and whites.

    But everywhere Stuart’s parents went, they educated people about interracial relationships by their very presence as a loving couple. We too have traveled across America as part of the coast-to-coast Marriage Equality Caravan to do the same — to show that our common humanity is the basis for marriage equality across the land.

    Like our parents before us, we simply want the freedom to marry the person of our choice and to have the same rights, recognition, and responsibilities for our family that all other loving and committed couples enjoy. Today, all of our parents want nothing more than for their son and son-in-law’s marriage to be legally recognized, just as their other children’s marriages are.

    To read their story in full, visit the website Marriage Equality USA.

  • A Town Called Condom…

    A Town Called Condom…

    condom.jpgI can’t imagine it’s easy being a French town at the best of times, without having the daily struggle and ridicule of being known as ‘Condom’. All the other towns must point and laugh, and let’s be fair, they have every reason to. I mean, naming a town ‘Condom’, it’s just not fair. Would you name your baby ‘Coil’? Or your new dog ‘The Pill’? Even as middle names, contraceptives rarely work. That said, ‘Sheath’ seems to be a fairly well accepted surname.

    Anyway, despite the word ‘condom’ not strictly being part of the French language, the people of this town have accepted it does have an English meaning. They have built their own museum detailing the history of the Rubber Johnny. They ensure each and every shop has a regular supply of everyone’s favourite rubber things and even some of the road dividers have been gifted a rather humorous shape!

    Good to see a town’s sense of humour breaking a very well established language barrier…

    Monologues are independent stories. The opinions shared are the author’s own. You can read more by Duncan @ DuncWilson.co.uk