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By Andrea
Nemerson DEAR ANDREA: I have a question that's a burning concern to all my power-kinked, perverted friends. Can a woman be conditioned to orgasm on command? Is this something that only works if she's close to orgasm and the command just sends her over? Might it work if she's cold, and just the single word sends her from 0 to 60 in a heartbeat? And to round things out, what about men? I'd really love to hear a conclusion from someone with an informed understanding of both the physiology of orgasm and the psychology of conditioning. Love, Dear Friend: You and your pals need better burning concerns. This is an interesting question, but it's not that interesting, if you know what I mean. A couple of problems render your question semi-unanswerable. The first is that orgasm on command is huge – huge – in the BDSM fantasy biz. There's an entire subgenre ("mind control") devoted to variations on the "You will feel X when I say Y" theme, and less-specialized BDSM porn very often concludes with the stern master/mistress granting the exhausted sub permission to orgasm, which he or she does, spectacularly. I assume there are people who think it's a common occurrence or have even convinced themselves that it's happened to them, simply because it's such standard S-M erotica fare. The second problem is really a question: "What is an orgasm?" While researchers from Masters and Johnson have measured and quantified the moment of sexual release (so many contractions, of such and such parts, for such and such a duration ...), it's still largely a subjective phenomenon. Women (and, more rarely, men) can go through the entire expected, measurable series of engorgements and contractions and still not be sure if they really "had one." If an orgasmic platform contracts in the forest and nobody feels it, was there really an orgasm? And what about the people (paraplegics and others) who claim to experience fully satisfying orgasms from the stimulation of earlobes, nipples, or whatever works, without any involvement of pelvic or pudendal nerves at all? Who are we to tell them they're mistaken? In short, there's no reason to believe that orgasm on command isn't possible or that (all of the) people who claim to experience it are lying. If the followers of Masters and Johnson were to burst into the room and menace these people with penile plethysmographs and pressure-sensitive dildo-cams, sure, they might discover in some cases that no such physiological events were actually taking place. But ultimately, sexual pleasure really is all in the head. If she were your girlfriend, would you want me to tell her that what she felt wasn't a real orgasm? Love, Dear Andrea: I have a few fetishes. Too many, I think. I have always enjoyed seeing women wear strap-on dildos; it really turns me on. I bought my (now) ex one, the type and size she wanted. She seemed to like wearing it, but not the thought of entering me with it. One day she came home from work, and I was dressed in her clothes. She asked me if I was gay, because I liked wearing her clothes and I fancied her more in the strap-on. She said she wanted to show me what a gay man gets. I was very sore after she finished, and I bled for some time. We stayed together for eight months after that, but we only made love six times in that time. We had sex, but it was always a case of me giving her oral and her using the strap-on. She bought new clothes and a vibrator on my cards and ran up huge bills, then left me, ironically for a girl she'd met at work. Does what she said ring true? Am I gay? Love, Dear Peg: No – sigh – you are not gay. You're just a sissy submissive boy who likes mean women. Gay men rarely get off on wearing women's clothing, and – I know this seems shocking, but you'll have to take my word for it – they have sex with men. Your girlfriend may be gay, but you can't draw any such inference from her liking to strap it on. The running away with another woman, however – I'm taking that part as a hint. I'm having trouble believing the whole "she came home early and caught me wearing her clothes, and then she went for the strap-on" scenario because, honey, that has been done. If orgasm on command is a cliché, "sissy boy caught wearing mama's underwear" is a moldy old chestnut. Which doesn't mean it can't still be fun. There are actually nice women out there who would wear a strap-on for you. There are even nice women who would play-act the whole "bend-over, you bad, bad boy" scene with you. You can tell they're nice women because they use lube and don't steal your credit cards. Love, Andrea Nemerson sez: take the San Francisco Sex Information fall
training. Read up and sign up at www.sfsi.org.
E-mail Andrea Nemerson at andrea@altsexcolumn.com.
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