Friday, June 6, 2014

Phallic Friday - raincoat-free bonking

Okay, another interesting story online yesterday. You can find it here.

An Aussie guy's over in Bali and says he's shagged over 100 women in the 4 months he's been there, all condom-free. For a TV show, he goes to get tested for everything - and finds he's STD-free. Pretty lucky huh? Or just a good story?

But the question I have is, are we going overboard with the sex protection stuff?

I know Lily and I have discussed, over and over again, the use of protection in books. And the last time I brought the topic up, I was having a dilemma about oral sex and STD transfer and if we (as responsible authors reflecting society, or whatever) needed to show our characters using protection during oral sex. The answer, from colleagues, interestingly enough was 'no'. Maybe this was because my scene bringing up the discussion of protection during oral sex was so bad! LOL.

I've been looking as I read. I haven't seen too many condoms/dental dams used during oral sex at all, in books.

Which leads me back to my question... are we going overboard with protection?

Sometimes, to make change happen, you need to shock people and push things to the limit. Is this what we've done with protection?

I think in erotic romance we probably have, or I have in my over-thinking. I think it's a tool to be used. Some couples/people may demand protection, others may not. And that's how I'm going to go about protection in my novels from now on.

In real life, I've no idea. This guy's results are quite surprising to me. Maybe he got lucky! Although, maybe STDs aren't as rampant as they were due to so much safe sex. Or maybe this is all TV spin.

I guess some people take out insurance, while others don't. It's about how much risk you're willing to take. I think my characters will be a little more risky. As for me, I'd take out insurance!

4 comments:

  1. Okay. Here's something that annoyed me. I read a book recently that I really enjoyed. 5 star read for me. This was from an author I've read previously, who was quite 'up' on the whole safe sex thing. Who was writing New Adult (which I think of all the genres/age groups - this is the one which really does need to keep it real - and in which I am sure in real life, safe sex is used). Anyway, in this particular book, no condoms were mentioned on grounds of safe sex. The heroine expressed a comment about 'being careful because she wasn't on the pill', upon which the guy told her not to worry in a way that led the reader and the girl to think he couldn't get her pregnant, so no big deal.
    But I got annoyed because the purpose was that the hero wanted to get the girl up the duff, and so a condom wasn't used. So the safe sex message in a New Adult romance - where the heroine KNEW the guy had multiple partners, up to as much as 2 weeks before they got together - and she still didn't push the issue of condoms... I grumped into my breakfast about this one.
    All that said, I don't like condoms but have taken to using them in my books or at least having some kind of clean sex discussion prior to the deed.
    As for the whole oral sex thing, yeeeww. Just don't go there. I mean, you can make fish sex the horniest thing around, but even you Cate, can't make a dental dam horny. Now there's a challenge for you.

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    1. Oh, that's strange re the YA. I would have thought safe sex was necessary. And bloody un heroic of the guy trying to get her pregnant. Bloody hell.

      Hmm...a challenge! I'll try to think.

      Dental dams just make me laugh. When I lived in a country town I was at a ladies lunch and someone produced one to ask if anyone knew what it was for. I did and told them...but after they'd decided it was a seal for home made jams, you know, to go under the lid with the little material cap on the lid. To this day I hear dental dam and imagine these women and their jam jars!! Decidedly not sexy!

      But I do like a challenge. Stay tuned ;)

      Cate xo

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  2. and the guy in Bali. That was for commercial TV wasn't it? Big grain of salt I reckon.

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    1. Yes, commercial TV...but what kind of a message is that sending?? That safe sex is hogwash? Weird. But TV is weird.

      Cate xo

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