Talk Sex with Annette (Locker Room Talk & Shots)
Talk Sex with Annette
Where desire meets disruption—and pleasure becomes power.
Hosted by sex and intimacy coach Annette Benedetti, Talk Sex with Annette is the go-to podcast for bold, unfiltered conversations at the intersection of sexuality, identity, and empowerment.
From kink to connection, self-love to sexual healing, Annette dives into the topics most people are too afraid to touch—with expert guests, raw storytelling, and a feminist lens that challenges shame and reclaims pleasure.
Think smart, sexy, and radically real: this is the cultural conversation around sex that’s long overdue.
Talk Sex with Annette (Locker Room Talk & Shots)
Virginity is a Scam! What They Didn't Teach You In Sex Ed
What if I told you virginity is a scam—and you’ve been sold a lie that’s screwing with your pleasure, your confidence, and maybe even your relationships? In this no-BS conversation with certified sexologist Dr. Susan Milstein, we unpack the toxic history of virginity, the science that debunks it, and the shame it’s still spreading in bedrooms everywhere. From the myth of the hymen to the double standards that teach women to expect pain instead of pleasure—we're ripping the covers off the kind of sex ed you should have gotten. Whether you're rethinking your own sexual story, parenting a teen, or just want to stop playing by patriarchal rules, this episode is your permission slip to rewrite the script—and claim your sexual debut on your own damn terms.
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Do the sex pleasure and desire Around here. Nothing's off limits. These are the kinds of conversations we save for our boldest group chats, our most trusted friends and, of course, the women's locker room. Think raw, honest and sometimes unapologetically raunchy. If you've been here from the beginning, thank you, and if you're new, welcome to my podcast. Where desire meets disruption and pleasure becomes power. Now let's talk about sex Cheers. Today's Talk, sex with Annette.
Speaker 1:Topic is Virginity is a Scam and you Deserve Better Sex Ed Than that. Let's talk about virginity folks, that weird word that somehow still holds weight in sex ed classes Religious guilt trips, hookup culture and wedding night expectations. For some it's a badge of shame, for others it's a badge of honor and for a whole lot of us it's just confusing as hell. What is virginity really? Is it a broken hymen, a penis entering a vagina? Is it lost, stolen, given, taken, and why the hell are we still using this word like it's a moral checkpoint?
Speaker 1:Today I'm joined by Dr Susan Milstein, a master's certified health education specialist, certified sexologist and longtime badass in the sex ed world. She's the founder of Milstein Health Consulting, a co-host of Unzipped Tapoos podcast and someone who's spent over 20 years helping people unlearn sexual shame and replace it with knowledge, agency and pleasure. This episode, it's not just about the first time. It's about what we weren't told, how those stories shaped us, and what happens when we finally reclaim the mic on our own sexual stories. So whether you're redefining your own past parenting a teen or just realizing wait, that wasn't even the kind of sex I was hoping to have You're in the right place.
Speaker 1:I am about to introduce my guest to you, but before we dive in, I want to remind you you can find me over on OnlyFans, where I am posting my sex and intimacy how-tos and demonstrations, along with audio guided self-pleasure meditations and more, all designed to help you have a more pleasure-filled intimate life. You can find me there with my handle at TalkSexWithAnette, and or you can find me on Substack doing a lot of the same, and my handle there is at TalkSexWithAnette as well. You can always scroll down to the notes below this episode and find all of the links to all the places you might want to find me, but for right now I want to introduce the doctor to you. Can you tell my listeners?
Speaker 2:more about you, absolutely, and thank you for having me here. This is an incredible experience just to be on this podcast and this episode, I think, is just from your description it's going to be fantastic. So my name is Dr Sue Milstein. I have a PhD in human sexuality education. I have been working in academia for a while. I always hate to age myself, but, as you mentioned in the intro, I am the founder and lead consultant for Milstein Health Consulting. I've written textbooks on human sexuality, I've spoken about it for people across the lifespan, so teens up to their 80s and I am also the co-host of Unzipping Taboos, candid Conversations About Sex, and I also do anonymous. I answer questions that are submitted anonymously on sex, so from anyone who's got access to the internet.
Speaker 1:So you're going to want to listen. Also, I get to be a guest on her podcast, so a little pitch for you to go over and check her out in advance and stay tuned for me as one of her guests, which is really exciting. So, folks, look, I like to tell you to stay to the end of episodes for takeaways, but this whole episode is going to be a takeaway. This is an important podcast, I'm going to say for everybody, every gender, but I specifically want to point out that for girls women, people who identify as women have vulvas. This is going to be important because a lot of our worth and a lot of shame and stigmatism is placed upon us.
Speaker 1:Our value has been assessed by virginity and purity for a long, long time, where the history kind of around men and people with penises is a little bit different. But also for my male listeners, this is going to help you look at women yourself, sex and intimacy, in a new way. This is a transformative conversation, so I hope that you'll stay to the end, just so that you can learn all about virginity, what it is, what it should mean to you and how it should guide you in your own pleasure-filled intimate journey with someone else. So I'm ready to talk about sex and virginity. How about you? Let's talk about sex Drinks in hand.
Speaker 1:Oh, where do we start with this? So I'm going to start with just the obvious question what is virginity?
Speaker 2:I have no idea. No, I do. That's a really horrible way to start as an expert. In our culture it tends to mean that you have not had penile-vaginal intercourse, but it's also sometimes that the hymen hasn't broken. It's also sometimes for some people it's specific to only vaginal-penile intercourse, so they'll say they're a virgin. But maybe they're also a virgin for anal sex and oral sex. And the problem is we kind of use that term and we never quite define it for everybody. Because if you're a woman who's only engaging in sex with a woman, you'll theoretically be a virgin forever. If we use that, vaginal penal intercourse as the definition, Same thing with two men. So the way most people see it in our country is that they haven't engaged in penal vaginal intercourse. But I don't think that's inclusive enough and I don't think it's something that really explains what someone is or is not doing.
Speaker 1:Well, so I would ask this what does it even matter? What is it a measure of?
Speaker 2:That's a better question, and I think for, for and I'm glad you brought up the gender piece really early what we tend to see is that for women who, for people who have vulvas, people who identify as female, it's this thing that they're supposed to hold on to and they're supposed to kind of gatekeep power to their body, and then, but once they lose their virginity, they've given away that power somehow, which I still don't completely understand. And so I think that for some people, it's a way of saying I'm pure or I haven't done these things which are bad, even though we don't really define what bad is, think people want to know, because they want to know people's experience, which, in my mind, you should be asking people about their experiences instead of using this label that comes with so much baggage.
Speaker 1:Right, because if your virginity was based on the hymen which is correct me if I'm wrong it is a very thin membrane of skin that exists, and also correct me if I'm wrong here, but I don't some people are born without it even Isn't that correct?
Speaker 2:It could be partially broken, it could be missing. It can break for so many reasons other than penetrative intercourse. So you are correct, and for some people it's always been not fully intact, right?
Speaker 1:So if we're basing virginity upon that being broken, some of us are born not virgins anyway. Right? Because it is true that? Or or our bicycles took away our virginity, because sometimes doing things like riding bicycles or our tampon was our first sex partner. All of those things could break a hymen, correct?
Speaker 2:Less likely to see with the tampon, because I don't want to freak out anyone who might be listening. I think the tampons are going to steal their virginity, though there's a whole lot of problems with that phrase. It's less likely with tampons, but it's possible, sure Possible with a sex toy. It's possible with all sorts of things. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the point being, if we are going to call your virginity that little piece of skin and what happens with it, then obviously that's problematic in its own right Right, and I think that clearly there is some worth tied to the idea of virginity and we've used historically that, that little piece of skin, as sort of the check for your worth, and that hasn't been stolen someone to have it.
Speaker 2:There's an interesting thing. I've had conversations with students where they talk about losing their virginity by choice, because when they lost their virginity it was not something they had control over, and so for them, they may have met that definition of losing their virginity, but it wasn't their decision, and so even that kind of term is nuanced. But yeah, it's this idea of have you given it away? Do you still have that worth? For men, there's nothing to break. There's not a membrane around the penis that we can say this is broken, now you're no longer a virgin. So the fact that the definition is so different for the genders is kind of interesting and frustrating.
Speaker 1:It is interesting because it sounds to me like virginity, as it's used to describe a woman or a girl is that it's this thing that she has in her body that, once given away, devalues her, except for, perhaps, to the person who now has taken her virginity. But her value to everybody else goes down. Now, with men, virginity is totally different. A it's not measurable other than inexperienced, and men feel quite shamed when they take longer, to quote, lose their virginity or gain the experience of having been with a woman. And once they lose their virginity, their value goes up to all women because now they are experienced. Seed flingers, spurters, sprayers, sprayers, probably.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't know. I like frayers. I like frayers, yeah, but it's this idea that, and we take men at their word, right? We don't, we don't. There's no proof. Like most women, when they, when their hymen breaks, there'll be some blood and some pain For men. The only way we're really going to know if they're no longer virgins is we take them at their word, but we never trust.
Speaker 1:We rarely trust women when they just tell us their experiences, which is another layer of that gender discrepancy. Right, I mean it's so frustrating to talk about. We're going to talk about it because it's good for us. Yeah, I mean it is interesting. It's a measure of experience for men and has this sort of elevating effect. We take them at their word. And I remember losing my virginity many a year ago and I did not bleed, so I have to assume that mine was broken and it did hurt. I was like oh, this is awful.
Speaker 1:It did hurt but I didn't bleed. And I know in some cultures that if you were to have sex for the first time and the woman didn't bleed, they would assume I mean like that could be a life or death situation for her yes, quite literally, they will ask to see the sheet that has the blood to prove that she's a virgin.
Speaker 2:And in some of those cultures and we I mean there are definitely parts of the US where we see that in the culture but in some of those cultures where it's much more common, we have heard about young girls having essentially surgery done to insert a membrane of skin. So there will be something. So she will not be threatened with violence, she will not be disowned, she will not be punished for this thing that she had no control over if her hymen had already broken. So in some cultures it truly is a matter of life and death.
Speaker 1:Right, that's terrible. So it does sound like the concept of virginity is mostly a social construct. Is what it's all coming down to, guys. That's why I say it's nothing, it's nothing.
Speaker 1:If you've been on this podcast listening to me long enough, I don't care what gender you are. What you've learned is sex is not what we've been taught. It's not P and V. I mean, you can do it that way. You can stick it in, thrust away and be done. But if that's what's happening in your sex life, it's probably why no one wants to fuck you and no one's satisfied.
Speaker 1:But sex really is. It can start when you're not even together. You can have phone sex. You can have emotional sex. We do it all the time we start affairs and we aren't even together and that the way in which we interact and we talk about sex to each other to get each other riled up that can be considered sex. So technically you can do that have some phone sex and lose your virginity, if we want to talk about virginity as being a sex-based thing. But that's not really how it's used in our society, right? It's more. We're using the body and looking for physical signs so we can judge someone's worth. Whether that is for men, making them more manly, or women, devaluing them.
Speaker 2:We also use it. Yes to all of that. We also use it as a way of scaring women. We tell them, like if the first time you have sex when you lose your virginity, it's going to hurt, you're not going to enjoy it, which sets a really low bar for her partner, because he doesn't have to be good at it, because he's already expected not to be, and it makes sex this terrifying thing. And unfortunately, we live in a culture that we try to scare people not everyone, not you and I but we try to scare people into staying away from sex, and so if we can't convince them not to, then we're going to scare them. Ladies, when you have sex, don't expect to enjoy it, which also ties into this idea of good girls don't enjoy it. So don't expect to enjoy it, oh yeah, and it's going to hurt and it's going to be something you never want to do again. I mean, we're setting this bar to take away women's pleasure before they've even engaged in anything which is also part of the problem.
Speaker 1:I mean, I've already told you guys my theory on that. Sexually empowered women are powerful women. They're safer women. We can control a lot. It makes sense for our society to want to take that power away from us, oppress us and make us feel small and powerless. Right? Imagine what it would be like if we ran the world right now, just saying We'd do that as another law of the south.
Speaker 1:Yes, I'm just saying the power of the pussy really pays off for everybody in the end, just saying We'd do that as another episode. Yes, we'd be. I'm just saying the power of the pussy really pays off for everybody in the end. If you guys would just stop trying to oppress it, right. But no, I mean I say sexually embodied is that we are more powerful, we stand in our power, more and more confident and safer and stronger when we aren't separated from that part of us. And it is interesting to me and here's why I think you know guys listening to this might be like well, how does this benefit me? I like that it makes me like cooler the more I get to have sex and that it keeps women kind of off their high horses if it devalues them. But look, there is a payoff for everyone in my opinion, and I'd love to hear your opinion, so you and I could agree that the vast majority of people are not happy about the sex they're having in their life.
Speaker 1:The vast majority of people aren't happy about the relationships they're having. We talk about the loneliness epidemic, with men not having sex anymore. I'll just go have sex with my besties. I mean, we already like, cuddle and love each other. What's the difference? You know what I mean? Women find a different way to kind of fill that missing place. And if you can look at women in a different way and see her sexual experience as also a bonus, as like, oh, she has more experience now. Now she's going to be able to have more pleasure with me. Now, those little dirty thoughts you have in your mind that you won't tell anyone about.
Speaker 2:but I know they're there.
Speaker 1:You confess them to me. I see them all in my DMs. Now you have a partner who knows how to talk about sex, who has done some of those things, and she's excited to be with you and experiment. It does not benefit you to have women who are afraid of sex, who shy away from it, whose bodies are shut down because they're being told it's wrong. That's why you're not having the sex you want. So if you shift the way you kind of look at this, it's going to benefit you, right? Am I right? Please tell me.
Speaker 2:You think so, oh, I, yeah, I agree with everything you said and I think it's like not being male. I can't really get into that male perspective. But to me, I would think that I would want a partner who could be like hey, here's what I like, here's what I don't like and here's what I've always wanted to try and what turns you on. But when we don't shame women and we allow women to have these experiences, it's like you said they communicate better, and communication for me, like that's the first level of turn on. You can have that conversation, whether it's face to face or by text or however you're doing it.
Speaker 2:But to have a partner who could be like yes, this is what I like, like, let's skip this, this and this, let's try that, that and that, and let's see what happens, I would want a partner who knows what they want and knows how to express it, and can also express when they don't like something, because I wouldn't want to be doing something with a partner that are not comfortable with. And when we tell women from the beginning that this isn't something you're supposed to enjoy, you're not supposed to like it, don't just lay there and get it over with, they don't learn how to say, wait, I don't like this, or wait I don't, this doesn't feel right or this doesn't feel comfortable. To me, a partner is someone who's truly that a partner, someone who's in it with me, and if there's that power imbalance, you can't ever have that partner you want Right.
Speaker 1:I would like to say this I think that body count is sort of the modern day equivalent to virginity. I hate that word with a passion.
Speaker 2:Yeah, body count. Oh, I know, I saw your reaction man.
Speaker 1:You said you're from New York, right, I am Okay. If you guys are only listening, maybe head over to body count. Oh, I know, I saw your reaction man. You said you're from new york right is I am okay, because you could. If you guys are only listening, maybe head over to the the youtube. There's some.
Speaker 2:There's some new york attitude yeah, it's funny because when I first heard the word body count because I'm on the older side I remember the band I used to with the band body count, so I always on the older side. I remember the band I used to with the band body count, so I always hear that playing in my head. But my students are like they just look at me funny.
Speaker 2:I hate the term body count because there's, there's it's the same thing, it's a gender term, it's it's shame and stigmar for women. Shame and stigma for women if their numbers are too high and if you're just listening, there's a lot of air quotes on my end but for men it's like we don't really like oh, you've got a cool body count. But what drives me nuts is that when I talk to teenagers and people in their 20s and 30s, they hate the term too, but they use it all the time. And it goes back to your question from the beginning, which was why do we care? If I care about sexual risk, then I don't care how many people maybe you've been with in your lifetime, but I'd like to know how many people you've been with in the recent past, especially from an SDI, sexual health perspective. But I don't think I need to know every single human you've been with.
Speaker 1:And also I want to let's just address the SDI thing. If you look at the studies, people who are polyamorous, so have multiple partners. People in the sex industry tend to have a lower SDI case and risk because A they're sex positive, they're having the conversations they need to be having, they are going and getting tested, they know about how to keep themselves safe, they're having the conversations they need to be having, they are going and getting tested, they know about how to keep themselves safe. They know all the different ways, not just condoms. There are a lot of different ways. Where the rates of STIs really get high are infidelity in monogamous looking relationships in marriages, right? In relationships with people who seem to have low body count, right. It's not about the number of people, it's about the communication and the practices, the safer sex practices and that kind of thing. And I think body count is just using STIs as an excuse to call body count a thing. It's just again, it's just a way to try and control the narrative people I've been with recently.
Speaker 2:Do you want to know if I've been tested recently? Do you want to know if I've been sexually active recently or ever, if we're taking it back to virginity? But that also assumes that people are capable of having those conversations and we have horrible sex ed in this country and people never learn how to communicate this. Not that that's an excuse, but they never learned how to have these conversations, so they're really awkward no-transcript.
Speaker 2:And there's a lot of things that I do that are not related to sex, that are ridiculously pleasurable, and I don't count those experiences, because why should I so? Just behind that whole concept of body count is again this idea that there's value. There's somehow a hidden value. It's important enough that you should have taken note.
Speaker 1:Right, oh, I mean. So this brings us to the idea of your sexual value, and I'm talking about it to everyone. It can be given or taken away or affected in some way. That your value as a person as well as a sexual being can be given, taken, diminished or built by a sexual activity with somebody, like by giving Steve a blowjob in the bathroom after a party. Somehow you're going to wake up and be less of a person the next day, you know.
Speaker 2:Which is 100% not true.
Speaker 1:It's crazy, I mean. That effect can only happen if you decide that's how you're going to feel about yourself.
Speaker 2:And I mean, unfortunately, we also get it from the people around us. I mean, this is you know? So if you go into the bathroom or the closet or the wherever with Steve afterwards and you give him a blow, or don't you just disappear for a while, then by the time you get up the next day and check your phone, you've already been branded and that's, and so that could be really hard and I I know this especially for talking to people who are getting back into the dating world after losing partners to divorce and or death. It's this idea of, well, people are going to assume things about me and and we do live in a culture that that does push that, and it can be hard to be like, no, I don't care when everyone around you is branding you. So it can be hard to kind of fight those ideas that exist. But we're only going to do it if we start doing it.
Speaker 2:We're only going to do it if we start having these conversations.
Speaker 1:Right, I'm going to share a story time because it's interesting. This is a story that has come back to me in my mind again and again and again, mostly because it wasn't something that happened when I was really young. I mean, compared to how't something that happened when I was really young, I mean compared to how old I am now. I was really young, but I must have been in my 20s. It was right before I got pregnant with my first child and I was single. I had just graduated college and moved to Seattle.
Speaker 1:I was living with one of my sisters and it was 4th of July and I went to a 4th of July party with my oldest sister to one of her friends' house. It was a man who was putting this party on and my sister had dated him at one point in time many years prior, and now my sister is engaged. Anyways, we go to this party. This guy is clearly interested in me, like he is hitting on me. He's, you know, and I'm new on scene, I don't know everybody, any of that stuff, but he's, you know, aggressively coming after me and she kind of corners me at one point and she says don't do anything with him, like clearly it was a boundary for her. She was uncomfortable with the idea of someone she had dated being interested in her younger sister. And I wasn't. And I was like that's cool, that's cool, we had all been drinking, we went and saw the fireworks. We come back, we're all a little bit drunk.
Speaker 1:I go to go to the bathroom and I shut the door and right as I shut the door, this guy who owns the house comes bursting into the bathroom. I was drunk but I had the smarts enough to be like, what are you doing? And he was, you know, kind of swaying and trying to be charming and I like jumped into the shower. It was a bathtub with a shower curtain because he starts to whip himself out and I pull it closed to create a block between the two of us. Well, that was enough to kind of snap him to and afterwards he gets done and walks out. I go to the bathroom and I'm kind of like, oh, that was so uncomfortable, walk out of the bathroom.
Speaker 1:The whole room is full of people are looking at me and my sister would not talk to me until days later and she like went off on me. Several people I know several people were like shaking their head at me and when I finally talked to her, she was very angry about the fact that I had flirted with him, that he had gone in the bathroom and done something with me, and I said I didn't do anything. I told her exactly what happened and then I asked her I'm like, did you, did you say anything to him about it? No one ever talked to him about it. No one ever got mad at him about it. They were all peachy keen. He did not feel any heat from that, you know, and and that just this whole conversation reminds me of that he was still like top dog and look at him like a young girl.
Speaker 1:Right, sisters and then me, I was definitely did not feel welcome around. None of them treated me kind of the same again afterwards, right, that stigma had stuck. And one thing that I've learned from that because you were talking about how people will brand you and look at you differently and I'm no Mel Robbins, but fucking let them. And what I've learned from it is the minute someone does something like that to me, they aren't welcome to be close to me anymore. I only surround myself by people who see my worth, back it up and stand by me, and if that means I have a tiny circle, so be it.
Speaker 1:Unfortunately, at that time, kind of like you were talking, I didn't have the resources or the knowledge to do, I was I'm proud of myself because I do remember saying well, did you talk to him about it? And but I didn't. You know, I still felt shamed, I felt smaller, I felt gross, I felt like you know the bad sister, I felt like the black, you know all of those things. But I hope, if you're listening to this and this story resonates with you, fuck them. Let them think that. Hold your head high and keep doing your shit Right and keep doing your shit right.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So, first of all, I'm sorry that happened to you, but I want to go back to something you said which was very telling, where you said that your sister got mad at you for him going into the bathroom. So now, not only are you responsible for whatever happened in the bathroom, you were responsible for a grown man making the decision to walk into a bathroom that a girl was in, or anyone, I mean, it doesn't really matter. And so it really just shines a light on how much women are supposed to be like, how much we're supposed to control the situation, when all you can do is control you. You can't control what another human being is doing, and yet we're expected to do that.
Speaker 1:And even in a situation like that we're talking about, like our worth being either added to or taken away by sexual acts or presumed sexual acts, for me my worth came down, my self-respect came down in everybody else's eyes and, frankly, in mine I remember the shame like clear as day, but his, at the very least, stayed the same. You know, and, and that kind of blows my mind, it's the same thing. It's the same thing as this idea of purity and virginity, and experience versus lack of experience.
Speaker 2:And how we view it just so differently for the genders, and how, again, we make women responsible for not just themselves but for what's happening to them. When we tell them hey, when you lose your virginity, like it's something to lose, like it's here's something I'm giving you, when you lose your virginity, it's going to suck, it's going to hurt and you're going to hate every second of it and you're totally responsible for what people think about you afterwards. That's a lot. I can understand why some people would want to avoid that, because that sounds like something I would want to avoid if I was younger, right?
Speaker 1:So have we even been able to answer? What the fuck? Virginity? It's just an idea and a social control, and if y'all care about the hymen and the bleeding and I guess, go for it.
Speaker 2:But the only reason I think someone would care if they're I'm thinking about. I'm trying to find a positive. I do actually have some good news about this, but one of the things like when I talk to young men there's an opportunity for us to educate them. Yes, you may want to ask if it's your partner's first time, so you can think about how to make it more pleasurable by using lube and by taking your time and by communicating instead of just thrust, thrust, we're done. There's an opportunity to make men responsible for making that. You know, making that first time as pleasurable as possible. That's a lot to put on men, though. They're just like why do? Why do I have to figure out how to make my partner feel good? Why can't I just do the thing I do? Well, there's a great place for education there.
Speaker 1:That's an interesting idea, though. Let's get creative with it. I mean, I'm a woman of experience when it comes to different sexual things. I'm just saying, and I'm proud of it I like sex and I like doing sex and experimenting. I like doing sex and experimenting.
Speaker 1:It is interesting, though, because when I have a new partner, oftentimes there are areas in which I am more experienced and it can be really sexy, exciting and fun to be someone that gets to introduce someone to something else that's going to feel good or has the potential for that, and to have that experience together like having someone's first time doing something together is bonding. It's vulnerable, it has its own beautiful sexiness to it. It's an opportunity to create something incredible with someone you know, and so, if we looked at it more like this, there's responsibility to it to do it safely, to make it pleasurable, make sure you know so, for instance, if it's butt stuff, you've got lube and you're being gentle and asking consent all the way. If it's, you know, I don't know, some people haven't had Bdsm experience or spanking experiences or whatever different kind of toys or threesomes like doing it in a way that.
Speaker 1:So here's this adventure we're gonna do together. Let's go get the outfits and the tools and and have it be this beautiful thing. And it can be this because you were, you had talked about before. You know. Anal sex virginity, that is a thing. Oral sex virginity, it is a thing. If you can go into the idea of virginity just being the first time and have it be this really exciting, beautiful thing, then that's fun. It never takes away, it always adds to someone's life experience, right?
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 2:And how much better would that be if your partner was like enjoying it, enjoying it and relaxed and not tight like not just tight like vagina tight, but like tight like their body was tight and tense because they're fearful of so much pain. I don't know, there may be some people who get off on that, but I would think you'd want a partner who is like into it and actively. Yes, let's keep going, and there's an opportunity to make that. Yes, it may hurt a little, but there's an opportunity to reduce that and make this really beautiful experience. That's not something to be ashamed of. And then we're giving women the right to enjoy sex, and I'm not really sure our culture is 100% behind that.
Speaker 1:yet Well right, I think the idea of virginity goes hand in hand with trying to make sure women also don't think sex is too enjoyable and don't want to do it with too many people and just want to do it to make babies, which there seems to be a big agenda for baby making in our country right now.
Speaker 2:Absolutely a big agenda for baby making in our country right now.
Speaker 1:That's weird, Just saying. And if you think it hurts to have a cock go in your vagina, let me tell you a giant baby head coming out hurts way worse, oh yeah. But I do have good news.
Speaker 2:Yes, I want your good news. Okay, so the good news is this next generation, like the young one, like the late teens, early 20s, they are starting to rewrite the story a little bit. So this concept of virginity and I get the idea that you want to mark it and the term I've heard sometimes, instead of using virginity as your sexual debut, but that's just.
Speaker 1:I know I'm like all right I like it.
Speaker 2:To me that feels very like you should have a dress and like an outfit, but it's more positive. Sexual debut is like your first time and this is fantastic. My students won't buy that term.
Speaker 1:I love that. Then you can even have sexual debut parties.
Speaker 2:Right, you could have a whole, yeah, it could be a whole thing. To me it's just yeah, that term always, but it sits better than the term virginity, because you don't lose a debut, you gain always but it sits better than the term virginity, because you don't lose a debut a debut, you, you gain.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I like that. I like, I love that term. But what my students? So we talk about this a lot and what my students are saying is that now, with their generation, when people are starting rumors oh well, you, steve, because that was the example you used you know you and steve did this that instead of just being shamed about it being like yeah and he, yeah, we had sex and it was like two seconds, you didn't know what a clit was and like really weaponizing it in a way that I've never seen women take power before. The other thing is is that virginity does not seem at least I mean there's. There were some stories about this in the Business Insider and I'm hearing it from my students. They're waiting longer to have sex and they're not as bothered. So that whole idea of this push, it doesn't seem to be happening right now with the kids in their late teens, so maybe Waiting longer to have sex, or babies Both Sex they're waiting longer to have sex.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and babies.
Speaker 2:Or choosing not to have babies, which is irritating some parts of the population, some people, some people, but the teenagers themselves are waiting longer to have sex.
Speaker 2:They just don't see, they're not rushing into relationships. They don't see that as their value as much as I think our generation and the generations between us and them did. So we are seeing a little bit, but that whole idea of oh, you're going to start a rumor about me and Steve, let me tell you how small his cock was Not that that's the defining thing of men, but let me tell you how bad he was. Let me tell you he was a two-pump chump, Like really weaponizing it back, and I don't think I've ever heard that from women in their 30s, 40s and 50s. Though, ladies, if you're listening, own that, totally, own that. Rebrand that story. Make it yours Right.
Speaker 1:That it's not something that diminishes you, and I think that when all of the genders have skin in the game meaning if you're going to be sexual with each other and then use it to degrade the other person, know the script can be flipped. First of all, what is shitty, shitty, shitty way to experience sex? If you are going to have sex, do something sexual with someone. Make it an amazing thing. Why are you weaponizing it If your bros or your girlfriends start teasing you about it? Bros or your girlfriends start teasing you about it, turn to them and just tell them shut the fuck up, you're just jealous. I got to have some pleasure. I hopefully got to have an orgasm.
Speaker 1:Ladies, it may come slower for you. I wanted to make I know I'm backtracking here, but we were talking about the pain with losing your virginity. I am not the pain with the breaking of the hymen and the first time you experience penetration, whether with a cock or whatever it may be. Here's a little trick for the person with the dick, like the rhyme or the dildo or whatever. Orgasms and pleasure release chemicals that minimize pain, maximize pleasure. So if, before you do the penetration, you have her in an orgasmic or very pleasurable state, or even have her having orgasmed and then you do some penetration, her experience of pain is going to be far less. She's also already going to be wet, hopefully lubed up. It could be an incredible experience, and that little discomfort she feels may be diminished to nothing or even be perceived as somewhat pleasurable. Just a suggestion.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it's a fantastic idea, and I talk about with a lot of people how, especially those who have chronic pain, that orgasm can be a great release, sometimes only momentarily, but even if it's a momentary break from pain. But what you just described puts a lot of responsibility on the person with the dick, because now they have to know how to pleasure someone, which some men do Right, some men do not, which some men do Right, some men do not. But they have to figure out how to do that without penetration all the way, if we're not breaking the hymen yet, which means they've got to figure out what parts of the body feel good for their partner, and that takes a lot of effort. But that effort can be fun. It can, it absolutely can. We just have to figure out how to sell men on that idea.
Speaker 2:Right, because they don't seem to get that. It's not about their pleasure 100% of the time. It's supposed to be about everyone's pleasure.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:That's, as a culture, not what we usually focus on.
Speaker 1:Well, see, when you're giving her pleasure, she can give you a little pleasure Plus you, I don't know. Look, I'm bisexual and anytime a woman gives me the opportunity to touch her lady bits and play with them, I recognize the throne I'm getting to sit in. For a moment. I'm like I know that I am lucky to be here and I am going to give it my all. I get a real high off of it. What's up? Dudes Like why aren't you getting a real high? I mean I get, or I can actually feel it's like an energetic kind of orgasm from giving someone else pleasure, and that's possible for all of us If you can just slow your roll a little bit and sit in that.
Speaker 1:oh my God, I get to be here doing this thing, I get to touch this beautiful body, you know.
Speaker 2:Where are they going to learn that?
Speaker 1:from Bisexual women.
Speaker 2:Only Fans Channel.
Speaker 1:Thank you. A little boost, in fact. In fact, I do teach fingering and, like yoni, massage techniques over there, so you can switch it up and get her there quicker, because people need to learn how to do these things and it's so much nicer when you've seen it in action.
Speaker 2:So but I think that's the problem. If we're not talking about sex in school, which our sex ed is abysmal and only going to get worse now, but if they're not learning it from school, which is fine, I'm not sure I would have wanted to learn that in high school from my teacher here. So here's how you finger the way. That would have been super awkward. And then women aren't supposed to enjoy it and or they don't have the language to explain to a partner. I could see where partners like well, where the hell am I supposed to learn this? I don't mean the bros aren't talking about it. My female partners aren't explaining what they want. You're not going to see a lot of that in porn because that's not what they focus on. So in his defense he may be like yeah, I'd love to do some of this, but I don't know how. And again, annette's OnlyFans page Exactly.
Speaker 1:You know, and I think it is interesting you bring up and when we talk about sex education, the way in which you are educated is for having babies. We are not teaching pleasure-based sex ed and 99.9% of the sex you're having is for pleasure. So where do you go? To be fair, most women don't know how to touch their own vulvas. Most women don't know the techniques that I'm teaching. You know over there and that there's so many different ways you know.
Speaker 1:How do we start teaching that in a way that our society accepts or people feel comfortable? I think the thing is you just have to get comfortable with sex so that our society can embrace it. We're not going to be comfortable with sex if we are devaluing people when they have sex for the first time, if we are devaluing half of the population as they gain experience with sex. I can't tell you how, since I've started this podcast, how many people in comments or you know in person people I knew who have tried to like devalue me based on the fact that I'm very open about having experience Right. Or you know, when I talk about how many people I've had sex with or the kinds of sex that I've had and and I know they feel they need that to feel comfortable with themselves. I don't.
Speaker 1:I'm over here living my best sexual life.
Speaker 2:Yep, that's what you're saying before I let them, let them right, because the the other.
Speaker 1:The other thing is is people will judge you no matter what you do. So so let's say, you only have sex with one person. I promise by the time you're at my age, around you will be like, oh, she's so unhappy. I mean, you know, she's only ever been with him. She wouldn't even know if she's having good sex. Yeah, she's not very. I think she's asexual, she's not very sexy. That's probably why he looks at other women. That is exactly the fucking conversation that will happen. You cannot win, so why not?
Speaker 2:make yourself happy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly, I feel like what I'm taking from this conversation is we're not going to get rid of the concept of virginity, but can we reframe it as something that could be this fun experience or a positive that brings people together and opens up the sexual potential for the future?
Speaker 2:into my podcast homework for the rest of their lives. This is your homework. I'm going to give you homework to work on this, and the reason I think we have the potential is that we talk about virginity in so many other places Like the first time. If you were to go do an extreme sport, you might be like I'm a virgin at this, and when you say that it's not, oh well, you shouldn't do this. It's going to devalue you. It's oh, you've never done this before. Let's talk about how to make the experience great. Why don't we do that first? We're capable as a culture for taking that idea of it's my first time and making that something fun and memorable and exciting.
Speaker 1:We just don't do it with sex, so we just have to figure out a way to shift that into the bedroom or wherever you're having sex For someone other than men, Because it's already that way for guys, Like they're getting the high five, and even their fathers guys' fathers are like way to go champ, and it's not that way for girls at all. I believe that that is shifting. I don't think that I'd like to think, and this isn't true because I know I'm in a bubble. I'm in a bubble, I'm in a liberal town. I know that girls who are raised here hear a different story, but I also know there's a lot of purity culture out there in conservative cities states, towns.
Speaker 2:I'm currently in the Northeast but before this I was teaching in Texas and I had students who were juniors and seniors in college who would not hold hands with their partner until they were married. Like, forget sex, forget kissing. They weren't even holding hands, and this was in the last 10 years. So that culture is alive and well being in the Northeast. I don't see it as much anymore, but it's definitely alive and well in certain parts of this culture.
Speaker 2:What is a purity ball? Everyone gets dressed up, they get prom that level of dressed up and it's young ladies. It's only young ladies usually. I mean there may be for little boys, but I haven't heard about them. If that's happening, please someone correct me. Young ladies are getting dressed up. Dad is getting dressed up, or dad figure, because sometimes it's a stepdad or a guardian and they are going to a dance and they are celebrating that their daughter is pure and she's gonna pledge to stay that way, and there's often a purity ring which is put on the girl's hand as a mark of this pledge. I'm watching your face.
Speaker 1:Your face is exactly how I feel right now and there's this they literally will take a pledge to save themselves for marriage and it's like they're pledging to their fathers that their purity is like their fathers, or something like that is what they're saying. Oh my god, if that is not like father sexualizing his daughter, you don't. There is nothing that is. That is the stuff that shows up in porn, like period.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but it also, I mean it carries through. When you think about traditional weddings, dad is giving away the daughter like she's property and it's it's his property. Yeah, so I mean that's, yeah, it's an extension of it. But yeah, we, we definitely have that idea and it's. It's fascinating because when we study the few studies that have been done on purity pledges, sure they don't work. People don't usually keep to them and then, when they don't, there's this sense of shame and failure and that's a lot for anyone, let alone a younger girl.
Speaker 1:Also, it severs the father-daughter relationship because the daughter hasn't upheld this pledge that she's. We talk about consent. The reason why there is an age for when a girl can, or a boy can, consent to sex is because there's a certain age at which we do not have the ability to make those kind of commitments or make those kinds of choices. Yet you're asking a girl that young to make a pledge about sex to her father. It really gives me that gives me a big, big time ick. And I have to imagine on some level that the girl feels the sexualization happening in connection with her father, like in some sort of like. I remember, because I remember and you and I are the same age, so I don't know how much you saw this in your youth, but when I started to become a young woman, I remember how, like my dad's, like workmates and stuff like that, would comment on oh, you're a knockout, you're going to be a knockout, every boy is going to want you. And I felt there was that feeling like something felt inappropriate, at the very least.
Speaker 2:Yet somehow acceptable, because no one was calling them out.
Speaker 1:Right, which this purity ball thing feels very similar, like it has to give a daughter a little bit of an ick.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and then if she does break it and she doesn't tell him she is now deceitful and dishonest and like she's hiding a piece of herself because she doesn't want to disappoint daddy? Oh, that felt bad. I didn't know it was appropriate.
Speaker 1:When you, you're oh, it even shocked me a little bit, but yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:And so either she's honest and then she's got the chance of like you're not my daughter, you, you disappointed me, you screwed up I can't believe you would do this to me as the father figure or she's to lie about it, in which case she's withholding part of this part of her experiences and maintaining this lie, which is exhausting, this lie which is exhausting. And this is all while people are like 15, 16, 17, possibly into their 20s, if that's how long they're maintaining it. That's a lot of pressure, like you said, for kids whose brains haven't fully developed yet.
Speaker 1:It's a lot of pressure and it's a lot of very strong messaging. It's weird, Now that we're near the end of this conversation, what I feel like because, again, I work with a lot of people coaching people who are in relationship and frustrated because usually, usually the woman in the relationship is like not as interested in sex. And I'm just listening to this conversation on virginity because it really is one of our first a woman's, a girl's first concept of sex. Man, how can there be an expectation that we would be, sex, would come easy to us or be interesting or something we want to pursue, when it's so awful from the get-go, the messaging is so bad from the get-go and what I hope, if anything, that all of the people who are listening to this podcast and God, I wish I could make everybody listen to it.
Speaker 1:This is helping you to step back a little bit and go oh shit. No wonder she feels stressed by this. No wonder this feels like work to her. No wonder it's not top of her list of priorities when, from day one, she's been told that doing this thing can ruin your fucking life, it can hurt the people around you, it can devalue your worth, it can like all these things. It's going to be painful. So it's in your best interest to get on board and start working on changing this messaging and maybe go to your partner if you are a man in this situation and sit down and start having the conversation. Man, what was the first thing you remember about sex? What were you told about virginity? Why don't you start over with her, Say, hey, let's talk about these things. How can we like, rewrite this and make sex fun for you again? This would be a great starting point, right?
Speaker 2:It really would be. It's unfortunately assuming women would be capable of having that conversation without guilt.
Speaker 1:I think men might be more willing to have the conversation than women.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think for men it would be a, because for them it's like I want to be a good partner. I'm just learning about this. I had no clue, because how would they know? They've seen the messaging but they didn't internalize it the same way. But for her, she has to say, wow, yeah, I was really fucked up by what happened to me early in my life. I don't even know how to begin to talk about that. That can feel overwhelming, but it's baby steps and having a part. You know. If you as a guy or a female partner or whoever, are showing like, I want to know like, how do we fix this? How do we undo it? We can't fix, it's not broken. How do we help adjust the course that we're going on? How do we make this better for you? You just made yourself that much more attractive to your partner because you want to be there with them and that's a huge step.
Speaker 1:It's interesting that, as you talk about that, I do think about how most of the experience I have right and most of the people who come to me no, I work with a lot of women, but I have more men and a shockingly large amount of men and from all sorts of backgrounds. Some are more conservative, some lean more liberal, but they come to me and they're trying to talk to their female partners and they can't get hurt. I hear this so much and, yeah, I think this conversation would be a great starting point and approaching with compassion and with no expectation of it resulting in sex, but saying hey, I'm curious about where did sex start for you? Can we learn this about each other and working from compassion and a healing perspective?
Speaker 2:And letting it be a two-part conversation, because while you are ready to have that conversation, your partner may not be. That may be very blindsiding to them, especially in a culture where good girls don't talk about sex. And now you want me to talk about my sexual experiences. So, realizing that it may be a hey, I'd really love to talk to you about this and your partner going, oh, okay, not now, I need to think about this and being willing to rehab that conversation. Having conversation in two stages is better than having no conversation. So just realize it may. Just because you are ready to have the conversation doesn't mean that she is.
Speaker 1:Right, you could just send a link to this podcast and sit and listen together. Blame it on us. Blame it on us. Listen to these two crazy ladies.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:New York and Portland. It's going to be trouble. Oh I, yeah. So this I didn't know coming into this conversation. For me it felt cut and dry. It was like virginity isn't anything, let's just. But the reality is it's something, because it's always been made into something, right. So now the question isn't how do we just teach people that virginity isn't a real thing, but instead I think, like you're talking about, we need to start reframing it.
Speaker 2:Okay, An opportunity to like try something new and let's make it fun and positive Try something new have a sexual debut.
Speaker 1:Look, there is a little rhyme too.
Speaker 2:Not good with the rhyming.
Speaker 1:I like no, but also I'm really loving this concept of sexual debut, like that's a whole party.
Speaker 2:Right, it's just that word changes the whole conversation.
Speaker 1:At what age did you make your sexual debut?
Speaker 2:Yeah, Right, like what age did you make your sexual debut? Oh well, I was like it's just a more positive term than virginity. When did you lose your virginity? You're already telling me how I'm supposed to react to that.
Speaker 1:I think we can make this happen. I believe in us All right, I'm on board. I'm going to start asking people that, though. I'm definitely going to start doing that.
Speaker 2:All right listeners.
Speaker 1:I want you to write in or leave a message, a voicemail, about your sexual debut. When did you have yours? I want to start there. Do you have any final pieces of advice? Some more homework to give my listeners before we sign off.
Speaker 2:Just start making the changes now and if you're a parent, watch your language because they're learning from you. But for those of you who aren't parents or your kids are out of the house, take that moment to really think about kind of what happened and don't think it's something that needs to be fixed. You're not broken. But let's think about how to reframe and make it better going forward. It can always get better going forward, but it may take some self-reflection and some vulnerability, so just be open to it.
Speaker 1:Love that. All right, tell my listeners, it's that time. Where can they find you?
Speaker 2:Hey, so Unzipping Taboos, candid conversations about sex. We have new episodes that drop at 8 am Eastern time, because East Coast, you can find the episodes on Spotify and Apple Podcasts and if you want to find me, I am on Instagram and YouTube and Substack as HeyDrSue. So H-E-Y-D-R-S-U-E.
Speaker 1:Perfect. And you said they drop at 8 am. On what day? Wednesdays, wednesdays, perfect. Well, thank you so much for joining me and listeners, look again, you know, if you have any questions, comments. You want to give us a sexual debut story. If you are on my YouTube channel, you can drop a comment in the comment section below the video. You can also email me at Annette at TalkSexWithAnnettecom. You can scroll down to the link below. There's a speakpipe link to the link below. There's a speak pipe link. You can leave me a voice note on that. So feel free to do that. Or, you know, head over to my socials and DM me. So again, thank you so much for joining me. This was a great conversation. I learned a lot. Thank you for having me. This was fantastic and my listeners. Until next time I'll see you in the locker room. Cheers Ring loop.