judas h christ, the leathermen are coming

*Sigh* This is one of the days I wish I lived in San Francisco, if only to get my grubby mitts on a copy of this poster. (NSFW)

Which reminds me: Catholics -- do they come in any flavor other than kinky? Answers on the back of a postcard.

so, how many feminists does it take to change a lightbulb?

One, and there's nothing funny about it.

faq 2: meet the anthropologist

During fieldwork curious locals constantly interrogate me about my origin, my homeland and my strange foreign customs. It's only fair they get answers -- after all, I get to write a 90,000 word thesis about theirs.

Here are a few of the natives' most Frequently Asked Questions.

How much does it cost to buy your ticket from here to back to Europe?

More than the annual school fees of your latest-born child, but less than you'd get fined for having another one.

Do you speak our native language?

I can say "pig", "piglet", "pork", "no problem" and "titties". Other than that I know enough to know when you're talking about me, so don't go telling your husband to add a forty percent laowai tax on the price of those noodles.

Do you drink?

Not the 120-proof rice liquor you're chugging, papi. If there were toilets here, you could use it to clean them.

Are you a Christian missionary?

No. Nor am I a Russian prostitute, a Red Cross doctor or any of the other Alias-style identities I've been attributed. I'm an anthropologist, goddamit. How hard is that to...? Never mind.

All the western countries are really rich and there are no poor people and you're all super-happy, right?

Yes, and we drive flying cars to work and the Democratic Republic of Congo does what it says in the title / Paris Hilton is a failed cloning experiment using my buttcheek cells / Nicolas Sarkozy will win the next season of American Idol with a tear-jerking rendition of "I'm a transvestite from Transylvania".

Will you marry me?

My brideprice is at least twelve cows more than you can afford.

Well, how about a quickie in the bushes then? We don't have to use condoms. I'm a virgin, I swear.

Pull the other one, it's got HIV on.

Will you take me back to Europe with you?

I only have 23 kg checked luggage allowance and you look to weigh at least 50. Perhaps I could take your latest-born child instead.

Tastes Like Vanilla, Too [Don Mace]

Hello, Charmaine fans! Char, thanks for the keys, and the flattering introduction.

Hi, my name is Don, and I'm vanilla. I'm one of the supportive straights that Char was appropriately grateful to below. (Now that I think about it, it actually is pretty cool that a stuffy middle-aged married guy would accept, and even be friends with, a kinky bisexual french chick, because that's not something we fantasize about at all.) So no kink from me. If I label anything TMI, it's purely to scare off Char's Aunt, so I can talk about my secret crush on her. (She's really cool.)

So wtf am I doing here? Charmaine's always been about more than the sex, titillating and eye-opening though it is. (Eye-watering, even. Anyone yanks my head back by my hair, and I'll tie theirs to the bed... and leave them there. Reading about the flying experience with Xavier made me think of the end of Last King of Scotland. God I'm square.) Char's a multi-dimensional woman doing interesting and important academic work, and her blog naturally reflects that, and so my job is to talk about all that other stuff so she can get back to the sex.

But, just to throw you overheated lot a bone, there is one diversion that Charmaine hasn't mentioned that needs to be brought out of the closet parents' basement. The lust that cannot shyly stutter its name without giggling like a donkey: cybersex! I might talk about that.

Until next time, chaste kisses (unless you're a bloke),

Don

mastering the art: how i should have lost johnny yesterday

Polyamory has got me thinking about my last fling with monogamy, and all that ensued. This is how I should have lost Johnny Yesterday.

...

I get all my things for the trip and lay them out on the bed. The light is drab, a grey and gusty afternoon outside. My jaw aches.

A text message: "Can I see you?"

"I u r fast", I reply.

"I'll be there in 10."

Johnny Yesterday comes to the door looking pale and drawn, hair a mess of black.

I don't smile. "I thought you took the train to Southampton."

"I couldn't leave." He chokes on the words. He clasps one hand in the palm of the other and leans forward in his chair, the way he does when trying to establish rapport. We're both hungry for connection. We read body language, analyze imperceptibly, mirror the hidden signals. One reason why we're anthropologists.

I'm not giving him anything this time. Last night after the club, we lay side by side on his bed until morning, our legs entwined then unentwined. We moved slowly, fascinated by the merest touch, the most minute grain of each other's skin. The E made our heartbeats reverberate across the room. We sang the body electric.

As I walked from his door, we kissed for the first time. His lips felt damp and flat. My head already hurt. I didn't sleep.

His voice breaks. "I had to see you."

I stare at him. I've never been so cold. "What did you want?"

He looks stricken. "I... couldn't go. I had everything ready." He clears his throat. "I stood there in front of the college gates, and I couldn't move. I couldn't move."

He's almost crying, and I feel dead.

"What do you want from me?" I ask.

"I want to you understand."

"I can't do this. I can't be with you while you're with ______."

He looks away, decisive at last. "I've never had any intention of leaving my girlfriend."

That's when it should have been over.

...

I called him the moment I got back from this first trip to China. He told me about Christmas dinner back home. He sat at the table silent, unable to eat or speak. He felt sick to his stomach.

For the moment at least, our vows of chastity unforgotten, we remain caught in the contradiction of fidelity and desire. The evening after my return, we make a pilgrimage to a cemetery hidden round a winding lane, where we make atheist prayers at the tomb of George Frazer.

We come back into the warmth of his college bedroom. The sandalwood scent of his cologne and the fragrant pine of the building overlooking the cobbles become imprinted in my brain somewhere near the smell of my father's shaving foam, a deep pull and tide. In that moment I notice the words of the poster above his door:

The art of losing isn't hard to master:

so many things seemed filled with the intent

to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

...Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture

I love) I shan't have lied.

"How do you think she meant it?"

John is resigned. "I think she was bitter."

Still, there's a glimmer of hope in the words we haven't spoken. Every word we do share brings us closer to the obvious conclusion.

I look at him. "I think she was ironic."

...

Losing is an art. I see that now, in the thousand moments it should have ended before disaster, before we had begun.


One Art by Elizabeth Bishop

smells like vanilla

Most esteemed readers,

Under European Union Directive BS-HBB69, Charmaine X general management has been advised of its legal requirement to hire from a wider range of sexual abilities and inclinations. Hence we are pleased to announce the impending arrival of a token SWMMM (straight white monogamous married male) as our new Mystery Blogger. Keep your eyes peeled for Don Mace, coming soon to these very pages!

feminist douche

While e-mailing Violet about the native who assaulted me with a tea fruit, I was prompted to muse on the reasons why "douche" should be reclaimed as a feminist insult:

1. It's something you put in your vulva that doesn't feel good.
2. It's bad for your vaginal flora.
3. It's made of polluting chemicals.
4. What, you think my vagina is a bad, dirty place that must be cleansed of sexual contact? Fuck you very much, douchebag.
5. It sounds funny.

Which reminds me, how many feminists does it take to change a lightbulb?

quote of the day: james joyous

" I have done so much and so often that I am afraid to look to see how that thing I had is after all I have done to myself." James Joyce to his wife Nora, 13 December 1909.
James Joyce's Dirty Letters (not safe for work)

would the real charmaine shady please stand up

"[T]here is something to be said for being shamelessly public about one's perversions -- it certainly removes anyone else's ability to blackmail ya." -- Sex Geek, Are All Writers Perverts?

A few years ago former Marine and Secret Service specialist Harvey John "Jack" McGeorge was considered for the UN weapons inspection mission in Iraq. Then the Washington Post's James Grimaldi wrote a lurid expose about Jack's secret BDSM identity.

Except it's no secret. McGeorge is an open and out member of the kink community, by all accounts a highly respected workshop leader and activist who promotes safe, consensual BDSM play. As Mistress Matisse put it, "Mr. Grimaldi's leering fascination with Jack's BDSM activities would be amusing if he weren't claiming that Jack should be fired from his job because he's kinky."

McGeorge responded in a most noble, self-sacrificing way, saying he would resign if reports of his private life reached the press: "I cannot allow my actions, as they may be perceived by others, to damage an organisation which has done nothing to deserve that damage," he said (quoted in the Telegraph article). But how does it make sense for a qualified individual to sacrifice themselves for the sake of another's prejudice? (Eminently sensible chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix thought it didn't. He refused Jack's resignation, saying it had nothing to do with his job.)

Hmph. Maybe that's why we didn't find any WMD in Iraq. All the good weapons inspectors were leather daddies.

That was five years ago. Have things changed?

Well, for one thing, we still haven't found any WMD *try to act surprised* although we have catalyzed a Mass Destruction of Iraqi cultural artefacts.

Regarding discrimination at work, I belong to an Oxbridge College known for its liberal, even radical politics and its active queer community. When I joined, the Senior Tutor and Graduate Tutor were both out gay men. We have an Anglican chapel; the Chaplain is a flamboyant former opera singer who is or was in a monogamous gay relationship for a good two decades or more. Also, don't say anything, but I've heard rumors about what the Lay Dean gets up to with some of the choir boys (who are all over eighteen and consenting, I hasten to add).*

However, being gay and being kinky are two entirely different things. I'm happy with who I am: bisexual, kinky, polyamorous. (Some people mistakenly assume these identities go hand-in-hand. They don't: read Pepper Mint's excellent article deconstructing the "bisexual slut" myth.) But how does the Grad Tutor feel about it?

Empirical evidence suggests that being queer-friendly at Oxbridge has limited impact on an individual's likelihood to be tolerant of BDSM and polyamory. Oxbridge gays are a conservative bunch, on the whole. They like their formal dinners, their big donors and their ancient grass-treading priviledges**.

The other milieux I'm considering joining are: NGOs. That means the UN and various aid organizations, where I'd like to do freelance anthropological consulting work. Aid organizations are rife with fundamentalist Christians who tend to be at least superficially hostile towards the non-vanilla, non-monogamous and definitely the non-heterosexual. Meanwhile Harvey "Jack" McGeorge is a good example of what happens to freelance UN consultants who happen to be BDSM players.

The trouble with discrimination is that it's so Darth Sidious. It creeps up on you in the form of a grant you miss out on, or a post you're not considered for. No matter what they might tell outside applicants, Oxbridge and NGOs work largely on the basis of personal networks, which makes discrimination even easier for those making the chop.

This is, of course, a call to arms. I've been involved with queer activism for years and I fully intend to do my part to eliminate ignorance and intolerance affecting the kink and poly communities.

This leads me to my question. How out should I be?

As McGeorge's example shows, being out can have a devastating effect on one's professional life, not to mention the distress of having one's privacy invaded by hostile journalists. (It will be a happy day when I have a good enough job to give a toss about what a journalist would write, but that's another matter.)

On the other hand, with a little digging, it wouldn't be hard for a tricksy hobbit to stalk me down via online identities and make a meal of my private proclivities. Being out would have the advantage of giving me a strong foundation to fight back, should that ever become necessary.

Charmaine X won't be taking off her cape and lycra leggings anytime soon. I'm having far too much fun making up pseudonyms for people, and really, who wants their professor to hear about the time they shagged a native on the riverbank? Nor will my BDSM alter ego whisper her legal given name to strangers.

I've never hidden my bisexuality at work or in college: that's a political principle. The question is, should I make less effort to conceal my kinky and/or polyamorous leanings? Would the real Charmaine Shady please stand up?


*"Where are the lesbians?" I hear you cry. Don't look at me -- they all went to Newnham.

**For those not familiar with Oxbridge (i.e. Oxford and Cambridge University) regulations, only members of the Senior Common Room, i.e. professors, are allowed to walk on the quad, i.e. lawn. Also, only the Chaplain may pet the College Squirrel on alternate Thursdays. Fact.

charmaine's guide to life in china, lesson 1: basic spitting

The Lonely Planet will tell you: many Chinese customs are incomprehensible to the average frustrated western chump. Even if you were lucky enough to be born with a parent who hails from Hong Kong or Fujian, you still might find your uncle's shady business practices difficult to fathom, or struggle to know when it's okay to shout at the waitress. Without further ado, I present to you: Charmaine X's Preparatory Anthropological Guide to Real Life in China. In this tutorial, students will learn the basics of spitting: where, when, and how loud.

Spitting 101

There are few acts as widely practiced or as frequently misunderstood as the Chinese spit. Spitting in China is not regarded as a vulgar habit but a necessary purgative to renew one's health, without which one risks contamination by malevolent humours (or in Californian, "toxins").

Spitting is not strictly class-dependent as it is in the west; nevertheless, Chinese who have strong contact with western culture, a sophisticated education or marble floors may look upon the act as unrefined.

For PR reasons with regards to foreign visitors, Chinese authorities frown upon spitting and the selling of girl-children in urban areas. As a foreigner, do not flaunt your right to spit, as it may be seen as an affront by locals who must refrain from uniting their own mucous gobs with the pavement. Know the right place and time. A good rule of thumb is: spit second.

Foreigners' how to

For instance, let's say you're playing a game of xiang qi with your new Chinese friends who go by the English names Cherry and Leprechaun. Does one of them discreetly turn his or her head to the side and hack up a good one? You may take this as your cue to join in. Don't be shy.

Start by gathering the unwanted debris in the back of your throat, approximately around your larynx. The movement should be similar to a swallowing motion, but instead of going down, the sticky stuff stays there in a little green pool. If you feel nauseous at any point, simply imagine koi carp frolicking merrily in your throat.

Next, use the muscles in your throat to raise the glob to the back of the throat (where the dandling thing is, if you didn't get it removed as a child). Now silently use your tongue to pass the saliva and assorted nasal issuings towards your lips, and rapidly release.

There are two schools of thought on the release mechanism. One method is to bend one's head so that one's lips are at a 45 degree angle to the pavement, allowing a gentle release without sullying one's clothing. The second method is to produce a rapid movement accompanied by a pursing of the lips which has the effect of projecting the spit towards a desired target, such as a pigeon, or a passerby's sleeve.

The secret to an authentic Chinese spit is to make a hacking sound at the throat-clearing stage, before anything issues from your mouth. The release should be silent, for maximum surprise impact on the next person to walk in the gob. Especially effective if they are wearing open-toed shoes.

Additional tips

If you are confused about the proper hacking sound, simply try saying the word "Hanukka" with a Swiss-German accent.

When you spit, try aiming at the same spot as a comrade to foster esprit-de-corps and improve your lip-eye coordination. (Avoid spitting on actual comrades, especially the ones wearing the green uniforms with epaulettes.)

Spitting will add gusto to your respiratory infections and the aftereffects of challenging meals.

You've now completed Lesson One of Real Life in China. You know what to do now, folks. That's right: spit it out!

justify my love

Maggie Gyllenhaal justifies our love with this photo shoot for Agent Provocateur (not safe for work). AP's garments may be overpriced, underkinked capitalistwear, but their visuals are oh so vogue, baby groove to the music.

bisexual health

Good news for ethical sluts: The National Gay and Lesbian Task Force Policy Institute, BiNet USA and the Fenway Institute have created a report dealing specifically with sexual health issues affecting bisexuals.

Sexual health issues affecting bisexuals have been largely ignored and underrepresented in academic and professional literature. ... This report serves as an introduction to bisexuality and a model programming guide for HIV/STI prevention.

(Thanks to Freaksexual for the link.)

confessions of a hot bi babe (or, i'm perfectly comfortable sitting on this fence here, thank you)

Disclaimer: the makers of Charmaine X would like you to know that all labels have been approved according to ISO 9000 Box Verification Process, and would also like to inform readers that being bisexual and polyamorous is not really the same thing as being vegetarian, because you're born a vegetarian whereas you become poly & bi only by the grace of God. Amen.

Since the age of 12 I've made several life decisions to slap on a whole new label: vegetarian, bisexual, polyamorous.

Perhaps "decision" is the wrong word. In each case, it was more like a discovery of something fundamental, orienting my worldview on a different axis to turn everything right-side-up.

When I stopped eating meat, many ex-vegetarians (there should be a word for it like hasbian) said I would last a month; three years; a decade. Fine, I said. If I feel like eating meat again, I will. When I moved to China, Johnny Yesterday, himself a former keeper of the green, told me about his first meat and two veg after ten years, which he consumed upon leaving for fieldwork among the yak herders of the Mongolian steppe.

Certainly I've widened my definition of the v-word from "no rennet-filtered beer" to "nothing cooked on top of an actual pig hoof", but more than thirteen years on from that initial adolescent lifestyle choice, the only flesh I'll bite into is still breathing.

However, I reserve the right to change my mind. In China I've tried -- count them -- a salmon sushi roll; a single oyster; and a large pot of pork dumplings eaten for reasons of face (-giving rather than -sitting, unfortunately).

Hold on, we're getting to the hot bi babe part.

When I first realized I was attracted to girls, I was confused. I liked boys as well: was this allowed? I'll spare you the soul-searching; go read one of the dozens of realizing-I'm-a-sexual-fencesitter memoirs. Because that's what a lot of bisexuals are: fencesitters. We don't want to decide in advance who we're going to jump in the haystack with. Or fall in love with. Or even raise babies and go to political rallies with.

In those early mind-bending days of babe-in-the-woods bisexuality, my attraction fluctuated from males to females to intersex to butches to femmes to pomosexuals... etcetera ad nauseam. It's taken several years for it all to settle into the knowledge that I can be attracted to men, women and several ambiguous shades in between, at the same time -- and even, have emotional attachments to several people at the same time.

But being one of the mythical hot* bi babes isn't all it's cracked up to be. How can that be, I hear you cry.

Well, first of all, not nearly as many orgies as you'd think. Having fewer pre-decided selection criteria doesn't mean I'm any less picky about who I sleep with, or in what combinations.

But seriously: straight priviledge. Great, right? Yes, in some ways: I've never been beaten up for looking queer, or denied visiting rights in a hospital because of my lover's gender. In other ways, though, no, I don't feel all that f***ing priviledged, thanks for asking. I've never been pleased with myself for "passing". It just confuses people when I snark at them for making homophobic comments. Quite a few, both straight and gay, doubt my sincerity, and put me into whichever category they fear or desire me to be. And then there's the assumption of straightness, which means girls don't hit on me so much.

Boo-hoo, poor me, I have to hit on girls myself instead of standing in a corner waiting for Big Daddy Butch to ask me to the lesbian prom. Aside from that, no complaints. Being bisexual is great. Really. Not that I have a choice in the matter.

So what about polyamory?

I didn't come out as polyamorous until I was damn sure it felt right. Once again, I reserve the right to change my mind. What else can you do? Life fluctuates, changes, never lets us stay in one place for long. People who thought they'd be married forever find themselves divorced lesbians at the age of fifty-five, and they weren't even born in a woman's body.

On the whole, friends who know about this state of affairs have been wonderfully supportive. They're pretty smart, nice people, so any skepticism about my future happiness or concerns for my potential as a hub of sexual disease transmission have been expressed in a fair and loving way. That's cool. It's nice to know your friends care about your well-being.

I've answered objections to the best of my ability. I might have made a wrong-headed decision (discovery?). But I'm perfectly happy sitting on this fence here, thank you. Hell, maybe I'll get rid of the fence and make a big free love playground with gelatin-free marshmallow flowers.

Call my sexual / relationship orientation "greedy" if you must. Let them doubt my sincerity, my maturity, my sanity. I'm not really bothered. I don't care if I prove them wrong. It's not about pride, you see: it's about fulfillment. And I don't need straight, monogamous beef to feel full up on lurrrve.


*For the purposes of this blog post let's assume I'm hot in somebody's idea of the term. Otherwise why would all those foot slaves keep throwing themselves at my, um, feet? And if I hear somebody say "hot from the ankle down", kneecaps will be busted in a very non-consensual pain-inducing manner.

quote of the day: doppelganger

"Whenever I get too impressed by you, I just remember you're only half the kinky bisexual French chicks I know." -- Don Mace on Charmaine X

can't buy a thrill, part 5: angel

Is it a date? Is it a non-date? Whatever it is, it's a teaspoonful of TMI.

Violet and Xavier, read or don't at your own discretion :)

***tmi***tmi***tmi***tmi***tmi***tmi***tmi***tmi***

"You know, since I started this whole BDSM adventure, I've come out to quite a few friends and even some family members. I've been kind of surprised by how few people have turned around and said, 'You know, I'm into that stuff."

"Really?" asks Angel.

We're lying in a tangle of limbs on a mattress that takes up eighty percent of the bedroom, green plaid sheets crumpled beneath us, all semblance of order long since abandoned. In about half an hour, the sun will rise over Kunming.

"Maybe they just don't talk about it, or maybe they think I'm much more hardcore than they are?"

Angel shakes his head. "From my experience it's not so uncommon."

"What, like the girls you go to bed with? Lots of them like their hair pulled?" I'm smiling, smirking even, just a little bit.

He turns to face me and reaches over with a hand as big as a pitcher's mitt.

"Well, there's a difference between this..."

He grabs the hair close to the root, tugs gently so I'm looking up at him, head tilted back, ready to kiss.

"...and this."

He pulls hard, bites my neck and I go limp as a cat.

Some hours later, we head to Salvador's for coffee and breakfast. I requested a western cafe; it's my last chance for a cappuccino before heading to the field.

"You responded pretty well to the hair-pulling last night." Angel grins.

"Are you kidding? I went right into sub space. You're very good at that."

"Thanks. You too, you were fantastic."

"Really? Thanks." I'm oddly touched. "You know, I think there are four kinds of good sex. When sex is bad, it's just bad -- well, that's not strictly true but you know what I'm saying."

"Go on." His interest is perked. "What are the good kinds?"

"First of all, there's workout sex. For me there has to be some kind of connection no matter how casual the encounter, otherwise it just doesn't work -- it's like going to the gym, I might as well lift weights for the satisfaction I get." Angel nods in agreement. "But if there is a connection, you can still have a good, basic workout shag. Hits the spots, feels good, wears you out, satisfying all round."

"Okay. What's next?"

"Well, then there's the sex that's good because you're madly in love. It doesn't really matter what the other person's technique is like or what you do in bed -- it transcends. It's like your souls are touching."

"Yes." Both of us look wistful for a moment. Like most ethical sluts, we're badly disguised romantics.

Angel lights another Chinese cigarette from the case with the maple leaf design.

"Number three: the mindfuck. This is when someone's playing with your brain. Will they, won't they? You get high on the power games.

"And finally, every now and then you meet someone with amazing sexual technique." I smile at him. More of a smirk.

Angel blushes. "So am I the games?"

"I would put you in categories three and four."

He's pleased. He likes having that effect on people.

He looks at me with intense blue eyes. "Now imagine how good it would be if you were madly in love with me."

I don't know quite what to make of that.