pill magazine #2: The 'feelin' myself' Issue

pill magazine

the

f e e l i n ’ m y s el f issue

prescription notes

hey, cuties!

pill magazine educate your fucking self! issue two ch i c a g o , i l w w w. p i l l m a g . c o m fo u n d e r a n d e d i t o r - i n - ch i e f k t h aw b a k e r - k r o h n

a big, sloppy, wet one to all of this issue’s contributors. you are cosmic gut balloons made of love. another smooch to christian gion for putting on madonna while i finished this zine. thanks for being my mental health’s underwire. and, of course, a ton of affection and a healthy amount of dependency to my sweetheart, kate hawbaker-krohn.

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welcome to the sophomore issue of pill magazine. i’m pleased as punch to introduce the ‘feelin’ myself’ issue, which feels around the different nuances of masturbation: how do we discover it? is it always an act of self-love? how do porn and erotica fit in? it’s a complicated issue, but one that needs to come out of the dark — or at least out of stigma. when i was an itty-bitty, i remember discovering a “magic button” and wanted to take my discovery onto figure it out — ya know, that game show from mid-’90s Nickelodeon where kid inventors would come on and celebrities would have to ‘figure out’ what they’d invented. yeah. i thought i invesnted the weird, wonderful feeling that i just had to satisfy every time morticia adams showed up on tv. here’s hoping that this issue gets you thinking, talking, or rubbing one out, if you’re inclined. with glitter and gratitude,

thank you for being a friend

the wind beneath

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in w s ’ l pil

our indiegogo fundraiser brought out a small crowd of badass individuals.

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KR M cAleer Mary Ann Rasmuss en om Taylor Yoc Mollie F. Martin A Secret Admirer Cassandra White Nicolette Ward rzi ta h c a B e in d d ie h a M 2

An Illustrated Masturbation Survey Brooke Brooke Dearborn Dearborn Huston Huston of of the the act act Mollie Mollie F. F. Martin Martin technique technique Ashley Ashley Wilkinson Wilkinson Ages Ages K.R. K.R.MMcAleer McAleer A A‘Crash’ ‘Crash’Course Course With WithPorn’s Porn’s Coolest CoolestCollective Collective KT KTHawbaker-Krohn Hawbaker-Krohn

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Unsolicited Unsolicited Advice: Advice: Is Masturbation Is Masturbation Healthy ?

Healthy?

KT Hawbaker-Krohn KT Hawbaker-Krohn hail hail to to the the queef: queef: presidental presidental candidates candidates as as sex sex toys toys Lyndsey Lyndsey Lesh Lesh

Mollie F Madison,. Martin lives in sells vint WI, where she constant age clothes and is ly disapp the turnin ointed b Oldsmobil g radius of her y e Intrigu e. current n o s n i ly 7 Wilk Ashley s approximater body. ly store of blood in he e repounds sical structur where Her phy Madison, WI, how to sides inches children and she tea an. She is lesst means be hum tain what tha less cer ay. every d K.R. McAleer graduated from the University of Iowa with a bachelor’s in English and Creative Writing, and now lives in Chicago, Illinois. When she is not busy having a quarter-life crisis, she can be found rewatching Orphan Black episodes, or telling anyone who will listen that they need to watch Orphan Black.

Brooke Dearborn Huston lives in Iowa City, Iowa, amongst a mountain of craft supplies. She spends her days as an armchair sociologist while running her two handmade brands, Forever Broke and Mind + Mineral.

Lyndsey Lesh is a Chicago-based illustrator with a deep love for her hometown of Kansas City. Follow her on Instagram!

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K O N O R R B ARBO N KEE O O K E USB N O TO E O R R N K O O R R B E N O HBRO B R K R B N A O O O N E N O B A T R O D R R S E O N T B A D U B S O E H T R U D HDU S A H E USTON H “I to rpeodsdtietdasakninang onymous survey tifi d as female those who idento list the tools theye’v e u s e d t o m illustrated their asturbate and answers.”

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ofmolliethef. martin act

I’m just rediscovering the heat of shame – digging through old files like I expect to find something I already know is there. Awash with it – the video is a few years old rotting data and I am naked save for the long hair accumulated sex appeal or so you tell me later after watching it – here I am – It was then and you were far from me and I was soaking in a bathtub all the time, touching myself thinking the heavy swaying of the water was you and awakening to the fact that no it wasn’t In the video I am so thin – thinner than I ever have been and later you told me “you’ve never looked better” like suffering fit me, the way I carry myself. Quietly it begins – this as an offering and then escalates – it’s true I thought this would solve us me as pixels on your screen, eyes tight waiting for the end – I did it well – raking the surface skin of my thighs as I came I don’t know you anymore – when I think of you I think of me searching, drawing pictures on my navel and whatever parts of me wished you were there also – water feeling like body on top of body –

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cross and squeeze

cross my legs and hook a heel on something

squeeze

(the pressure is pleasure) think about the boy with a black patch

of hair, quarter-sized, in all that blonde wonder how it got there and if it will spread. Don’t spread my legs

keep them tight & pressing clenching in on myself

think about the magazines turning my tummy fuzzy

think about if he would be mad

technique ashley wilkinson

I found in the ceiling

at me but of course I’m not even

using my hands and god is not in the ceiling where the ladies are nude except shoes

they came for me for years when I was squeezing

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AGES AGES AGES

AGES AGES AGES

Twenty-two.

The thing about slutty boys is, you naturally assume that

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they’re going to be good in bed.

But here I am, in bed with a manwhore whose entire arm is now thrusting as he attempts to stab my vagina to death with his fingers, as if he is the bayonet and I the enemy soldier circa World War I. Honestly, it’s not exactly painful but it is disconcerting and definitely not going to get me off.

I bit my lip, trying to think of a polite way to steer him in another direction. But then he pulls his hand back.

“I thought you said you were done with your period?”

There, on his damnable pointer and middle finger, is a light trace of blood. My blood.

“I did,” I say, choking on the rest of the sentence. I was definitely done with my period; that blood is from a wound. “I guess there’s some blood lingering,” I say faintly, my mind still spinning over the fact that this little bastard just fingered me bloody.

I am twenty-two, well into my sexual awakening, and I am struggling with bedmates who fail to make me orgasm. And now they’re out-and-out causing me injury. Still, the alluring idea of orgasming in a two-player game is what keeps me jumping from bed to bed.

So far I’m still the leading expert on how to make myself orgasm.

Sixteen.

I look up from my AP World History textbook to glance at

my mum. She’s responding to emails on the basement computer again, which means I have to pretend to be studying instead of watching my Panic! At The Disco concert DVD.

But, as long as she’s down here... “Hey Mum?”

“Hmm?” Her fingers continue clacking the keys, her eyes never leaving the screen.

I get up to stand beside her in an attempt to win her focus.

“So like... I kind of want to try using tampons now? Instead of pads?

But I don’t know… how.” (Or more precisely, where. Where does that thing go? And how do I stop it from hurting as much as Cassie Santiago swears it will?)

Mum barely pauses. “Well, you don’t have to worry about using tampons. They’re sort of an after-you-get-married thing.”

Clack, clack, clickity clack.

“Oh.” I ponder about what the logic could be behind this. “So, I should have sex first before I use tampons... And you want me to wait until after I’m married to have sex?”

This time she actually turns to face me. “Of course,” she says, in the voice reserved for when I’ve said something particularly daft.

“Right.” We’ve never talked about sex or waiting in any capacity, though I should have figured that my mother considers us Catholic enough to follow such rules. Even if you can count our annual church visits on an amputee’s hand.

I guess she gives up on that notion in some form, because a year later my mom is explaining the logistics of tampon insertion to me. I use the damn things all of three times before deciding I’d rather stick to pads.

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Fourteen.

The afternoon sunlight is shining through Molly’s bedroom

window straight onto the pages of the Cosmopolitan magazine I’m trying to read. Morning sunlight usually hurts my eyes and makes me grumpy, but now it’s a metaphor for my Holy Shit Moment – my first epiphany.

I feel like I’m doing something illicit, reading a grown woman’s magazine like Cosmo. There are pages filled with words like sex, vagina, orgasm. And some words for male parts I never knew until I became friends with Molly and Carmen. These articles even talk about women “masturbating” – a concept I haven’t come across in any of the many books I read. Not the ones about girls in high school who daydream about boys asking them to the dance, not in steamy historical fictions narrated by court concubines, and not even in the “romance novel” I stole from my grandma’s house two vacations ago. Sex? Sure. Female masturbation? Nonexistent.

“Masturbating” was something only boys did in books. The characters talked crudely about “jacking off” when they were horny, and it sounded so degenerate; a messy activity for pervy boys, totally degrading. It was never implied to me that girls ever could, or did, or wanted to do the same thing. Until now.

I think of Calvin, the boy I am currently in love with. He gave me the Cheetos from his lunch so I wouldn’t have to buy my own from the cafeteria. I sometimes daydream of getting Diabetes like he has so I can go with him to the nurse’s office before lunch.

I’m certain that getting our insulin shots together will eventually lead to a deep, lasting love. I only recently realized that the thing I did (sometimes while thinking of Calvin) didn’t make me a monster – it was only masturbating – and now I realized regular women did it, too. I had known about the mechanics of sex for years, but now I was realizing too that sex was not just a physical ritual strictly used for procreation. Being naked with someone else wasn’t weird just like fantasizing about it wasn’t gross, it was…

I glance up at Molly, who’s busy reading another back issue of Cosmo. I know about the romance stories she writes down and keeps locked in her closet. So I don’t feel self-conscious sharing my revelation:

“I can’t wait to have sex. Sex sounds like fun.”

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Six.

I stare at the outside of the exam room door, stamping my feet so the lights in my new shoes flash red in the hallway. I stare at the grey door, waiting for my doctor to come out and give me an unhappy grown-up look that makes my stomach hurt. My mom is in there with her right now, telling her about it.

“Do you want to tell her or should I?” Mom had asked after the doctor quit her poking and tickling me.

“You,” I muttered, because I didn’t even know how to explain it. I called it the “pee-pee thing,” which was as specific as I knew how to be.

I don’t know when the first time I heard the term “vagina” was.

That area between my legs was my “pee-pee” as a child, as in my mother’s reminder of “Kelly, don’t forget to wash your pee-pee” when I was in the tub.

At some point I figured out that boys had different pee-pees, which led to a stand-off between me and my neighbor’s nephew, Danny. A playdate filled with Tinkertoys and half-built lego houses devolved into a classic game of “show me yours and I’ll show you mine,” except that after Danny showed me his – frankly, disturbing – equipment, I backed out of the bargain. “Come ON,” Danny pleaded but I just shook my head, urged on by the anxious butterflies in my stomach.

By the time I was six years old I had been flashed by another neighbor boy, Andy, and was thoroughly disenchanted by the no longer-mysterious “weiner.” What led me to the doctor’s office was the realization that there was more to my own vagina than simply peeing.

I had rushed out of the exam room, trying to close the door behind me before my mom started talking. All I know is that what I do helps me fall asleep at night, and that my mom told me to stop more than once but I didn’t. It must be a Bad Thing.

I don’t know what’s the Bad part, exactly: the touching? Anything to do with that area? Should I not talk about my pee-pee, either?

So, now I stamp my feet. The floor flashes red again and I measure the radius of light with my eyes, while the door stays an unmoving grey. I can’t hear a thing from within. I don’t feel good.

Stamp. No one had told me not to touch myself, but now that I was my mom was telling me to stop, and taking me to the doctor, and adults were having talks! Stamp. So it must be bad! Stamp. Stamp.

Then suddenly, we are leaving. I am trailing after my mom’s power-walk from the exam room through the waiting room and out to the car, jogging to keep up.

In typical Catholic fashion, all I got from my mom after that doctor’s visit is, “She says you’ll grow out of it,” but I don’t, and that’s all that is said on the matter for years.

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pillma coming m

(we’re totally on facebook a

ag.com may 2016

and medium in the meantime)

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i discovered the ‘crash pad series’ as a college student sharpening my teeth in a gender studies program. i had a few friends who constantly discussaed the idea of feminist porn — i’ll admit i had ZERO idea what this actually entailed. though i totally pilfered my mom’s stash of nora roberts books as a preteen, porn was a big no-no in my house growing up. nevertheless, images of hetero, mainstream porn still managed to make their way to my consciousness (i.e. i went to high school). blonde, hairless, augmented, and, frankly, disturbing glimmers of staged sex showed up all over the darned place and really did a number on my sexual psyche. it was confusing: porn was super alluring, but the ways it came at me felt icky and degrading. long story short: it turns out a lot of the folks in those films didn’t actually wanna be there. coercion and a lack of consent are loaded slices of this industry, which can make the exploration of porn dangerous in a number of respects — for the viewer, for the model, for entire sexual cultures. buuuuuuuut, ‘crash pad’ wants to change that. ‘crash pad’ is a really badass collective of models led by shine louise houston (this issue’s cover human), a bay area-based filmmaker who began the project after graduating from san francisco arts institute with her degree in film (GET IT). now a well-established group of queer porn models, ‘crash pad’ is a part of pink and white productions, houston’s company. i reached out to a few of their members and talked about what it means to work in queer pornography. here’s what’s up with their gettin’ down.

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hair she comes: an interview with

nikki silver, naughtyandnatural.com Crash Pad-regular Nikki Silver is the founder of a body hair fetish site called Naughty and Natural, where she melds porn with body positivity. I spent a Sunday afternoon talking capitalism, age-play, and Madonna with the Bay Area-based artist.

KT Hawbaker-Krohn: Let’s talk about your experiences with Crash Pad. I know they’re trying to create a more equitable and affirming porn culture. Do you feel like they’re holding up that mission?

Nikki Silver: I’ve shot with Crash Pad twice. I was friends with Jizz [Lee, one of the series headliners] and familiar with other people there, so I had a good grasp of the community.

At that point, I’d done a lot of self-produced and mainstream porn; the on-set differences with this group were immediately apparent. I’ve gotta say, they feed you really well. There’s tons of coffee, and it’s super comfortable.

KHK: Food and coffee are hella important. What other positive protocols do they have in place?

NS: Crash Pad also lets you pick who you shoot with. Fortunately, most of the porn I’ve done has been self-produced— whether or not it’s been for my own site—so I’ve had a lot

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more control than most models. In terms of picking my scene partner, they didn’t give me a lot of parameters. It could be a person of any gender, body size, race, age, and all that other stuff. In terms of the scene, they ask you what you want to do. Crash Pad asks you to come up with a game plan with your partner, and then they review it with you so they know how to film it. It’s 100% consensual, and the crewmembers are little flies on the wall. I’ve forgotten they’re there.

KHK: Sounds pretty comfortable.

NS: Yeah, the production crew doesn’t pose you or ask you to do anything over again, stuff typical to the mainstream stuff.

KHK: Your personal brand of porn, Naughty and Natural, showcases body hair. How did that begin?

NS: I started modeling in porn when I was maybe 21 or so, and I had already stopped shaving. I found a few gigs where I had to shave, but then I found a job where I didn’t have to remove my hair. I was thrilled. I hated shaving. I did well as a hairy fetish model and stuck with that—I have no desire to shave or trim any of my body hair. My niche shocks most people; I forget that surprise, since this is my day-to-day thing.

It’s just hair, but people are dying over it. There are many different reasons why people get into it. My clients are mostly straight, cismen in their 50s, and they’re not around this subversive body culture. It’s unseen. They have to find access to it.

KHK: This work seems progressive compared to mainstream porn, the stuff where everyone’s waxed and screaming. How do you respond to anti-porn feminists, if you’ve ever met any?

NS: It’s a big question. You’re asking me to summarize my philosophy on porn.

KHK: You caught me. What’s your philosophy on porn?

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NS: I used to be a bit of a lesbian separatist. My worldview expanded beyond that, though I still empathize with this perspective. I think the patriarchy and capitalism are fucked. If someone is going to completely remove themselves from that equation and go off into the woods, then fine, critique away.

Most of us don’t have the privilege to do that. For me, porn has been a way of surviving in capitalism that often gives women, queers, and trans*folks a lot more agency than other kinds of work. If people can find a way of surviving that gives them more agency then why criticize that?

KHK: This is pill’s masturbation issue. Do you have any stories or wisdom you’d like to impart to our readers?

NS: I’ve got a really funny story about sexual exploration.

You remember Madonna’s sex book? I don’t know if I had even seen it at the point when I decided to make my own, but I had heard about it. I was 8 or 9, maybe 10. My friend and I were like, “Oh, this is great, we’re going to make one, we’re going to teach girls how to be sexy.” But, we didn’t know what sex was. I knew nothing about penises, nothing about heterosex, or what masturbation was—I only knew it as the “magic feeling.” At any rate, we took pictures with my camera. This was back in the ‘90s. My mom would buy me film and get my photos developed; she was trying to be supportive of her weird, creative daughter. My friend and I took turns taking pictures of each other naked, in whatever pose we thought was sexy. We totally forgot about the roll of film, but my mom found it one day and took it to be developed. The guy at the store had developed the rest of my photos and had been developing my mom’s photos for a long time. He knew I was her daughter. It looked like she had just taken all of these pictures of me. I got in some trouble, but probably not enough.

My mom didn’t want to shame me for exploring, but she also had to explain to me how she could get in trouble for stuff like this.

KHK: What about your experiences as an adult?

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NS: I love cartoon porn—that’s been a recent revelation about myself. I’ve gotten into age-play stuff and mommy-boy things.

With the amount of porn I create and edit, I sometimes get oversaturated, so finding porn I want to watch is hard. That’s what makes cartoon porn so good. Sometimes, they’re not even moving. They’re just pictures.

KHK: In your own work, is there a scene you especially enjoyed shooting?

NS: I’ve done a lot more stuff lately as a top or a dom, which I dig. I like wrestling scenes. And tickling! I love tickling people.

KHK: How do you discuss this work with your family members and new friends?

NS: I am pretty selective about who I engage with. Most of my friends are in the sex industry and super familiar with my work. With my family, I downplay the escort role, but they know what I do for a living. They’ve been supportive and even stayed at my house; my housemates are mostly sex workers and there are naked pictures all over. My parents crashed for a week, and I didn’t have to censor myself. Nothing had to be removed for them to be comfortable.

•••

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complicating porn: aq&a with nenetl avril

In a conversation about the rubber and feminist glue holding her career together, I recently spoke with Nenetl Avril, queer porn star and Crash Pad Series actress.

KT Hawbaker-Krohn: Fun fact: we both have English degrees! I know the two often intersect, but tell me how you jumped from Proust to pornography.

Nenetl Avril: I was broke—I wish there was some radical reason behind my decision. A closeted, Mexican lesbian in the Bay Area, I would listen to wealthy classmates discuss my very experiences with distance in their tone. I’d pull 30-hour weeks along with schoolwork, but there were still nights I ate saltine crackers. So, I started camming and selling custom videos. Then, I started a savings and an IRA. The intersection between college and porn for me was really business. I wanted security.

KHK: Does your Chicana heritage inform your work?

NA: I have indigenous blood from Mexico and the US on my dad’s side, and my mother is Mexican. Being “Nenetl” tells an honest story about where I come from while owning my choices and sexuality. Crash Pad asked me to perform based on my intrinsic knowledge of myself, not to be a token Mexican pussy. They asked me who I would to shoot with and treated me with respect.

KHK: How do you discuss your work with friends and/or

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family members?

NA: I slowly lost friends when I came out. They tried hard to seem supportive or neutral, but many could not shake their misogyny. It got really hard to hang out with them. Some of my friends are in porn and some are not; we all talk about it like it’s business. With my family, I gotta plead the fifth. They’re a very private thing for me.

KHK: Can you describe a performance you especially enjoyed?

NA: Four Chambers asked me to part of their One Year Anniversary Orgy, The Decadence. It just magically happened to be on my birthday and I already knew everyone in the shoot. Because we had all had sex with each other previously, it was really natural, low pressure, and pleasing. At some point we began pouring wine on each other. Best shoot and birthday ever.

KHK: What’s your response to anti-porn feminists?

NA: There are certainly things about the adult industry I oppose.

Of course, I don’t believe a person’s worth is determined by how much sex they have or in what context. Exploitation happens because we don’t stand with victims; we don’t work to provide them the choices they need. What is bad is a society putting money into the hands of violent people, who then use that money to demand and regulate pornography that is misogynistic, racist, homophobic and transphobic. As a society, we have created the market for exploitative pornography. Exploitative everything, really.

KHK: What’s up with your rubber stuff?

NA: The rubber community is about objectification and human dolls. There are less codes of conduct and mythology surrounding it; there’s gender play and cross-dressing, and rubber’s almost exclusively femme-leaning. I did a runway show for Vancouver Fetish Weekend back in 2014, but I wouldn’t say I’m part of the community just yet. I’m still new to everything. Enthusiastic, but new.

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the new flesh: my conversation with jessica creepshow

Jessica Creepshow’s Twitter page features the accoutrement one might expect from a porn star: stills from her latest bondage film, cleverly censored self-portraits, and some killer black-ink tattoos. In her profile picture, she poses in all black, fingers raking through her long dreadlocks; her tongue-incheek tank top reads “Satan Is Waitin’.” In her bio section, Creepshow identifies herself as a “butt lover, smut lover, filth maker, poly/pansexual,” all categories represented in her porn work with Crash Pad.

Woven through the first few posts on her page are GIFs celebrating the recent birthday of David Cronenberg, director of Videodrome and other bleak thrillers. Next to Creepshow’s own promotional posts, the celebration of Cronenberg’s “body horror” says a lot about the actress’ view of the world: irreverent, dangerous, and sexy. Here’s our recent conversation.

KT Hawbaker-Krohn: Crash Pad has a mission of showing “authentic female and queer sexuality.” Do you think they’re fulfilling this mission?

Jessica Creepshow: With Crash Pad, everything is up to you and your scene partner; I think that’s phenomenal.

KHK: Is that unusual in porn?

JC: It’s a unique approach. The whole staff wants you to have full control over the content you want to create, from the type of scene to how you look. It’s 100% in your control. It’s the closest thing to directing your own videos. I really respect and admire that. I don’t mean to imply that I haven’t had freedom with any other company I’ve shot with. Everyone

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has been so wonderful so far. Crash Pad is just stripped down: it’s you wearing your favorite ratty t-shirt and not wearing makeup if you don’t want to, as long as you’re doing everything within your comfort level and with consent. It’s super cool.

KHK: You describe yourself as a “jock-femme.” How would you explain that to a really bright 10th grader?

JC: (laughs) “Jock-femme” is a term I came up with last year.

When I was younger, I identified as bisexual and genderqueer.

I thought for some reason that genderqueer was the only way to describe my teetering between my masculinity and femininity. I have always been a grungy kid from the hood who never really fit into any category, and it really bugged me that I couldn’t fit into a solid home-group.

KHK: What does a grungy gender look like?

JC: Whether it was in the music scene or art scene, I distressed over being told not to get my dress dirty (but not wanting to take it off because I felt like a princess) and wanting to go play with my friends. Later in life, I realized I’m a pansexual, acrylic, gel-polished femme who likes to play volleyball, jump in the mosh pit, wear taped-up Chucks, and sport bodycon minis while working out at home. I didn’t want to fit into categories anymore and it was okay.

KHK: But, you still felt compelled to give identity a name.

JC:The world likes to categorize, in order to simplify — it makes processing easier for some people. I figured if I had to have an identity, I’d come up with my own. Jock-femme is my identity. It’s rough from time to time, because breaking an acrylic nail fu**ing hurts, but I like having them and I like to do things that often cause nail breakage. Sure, plenty of people of all identities do the things I do, but I don’t want to belong to a specific group of people anymore. I like to float in and out. Creating my own idea of femme is just what helped

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me understand these things about me. I hope that makes sense.

KHK: Are there any performances that stick out as your favorite?

JC: It’s really hard to say, but I’m going to go with my solo scene for Yanks. I don’t often masturbate in front of people, so it was especially unique for me to do it in front of a camera. The one-woman crew came to my house, and we shot 3 solo scenes as well as an interview. She was awesome, really funny, and sweet and helped me feel comfortable in my own home, as odd as that sounds. It’s not every day I invite strangers into my private space to film me doing something completely sacred.

KHK: Did having people watch you affect anything?

JC: I had so much fun, multiple orgasms, squirted all over my couch, and then took myself out on a date afterward. Masturbation is just something I usually don’t do in front of other people, so it was rad to completely lose myself on film without a personal or scene partner. It was a new experience for me.

KHK: Since this is pill’s masturbation issue, do you have any other stories about masturbation?

JC: I don’t remember when I started masturbating, but I was young. I had this Beanie Baby named Erin, the larger version of the green “luck” bear. It was a present for my birthday, and I slept with that bear every night. When I masturbated, it was on my stomach, with his nose. He’s gone now, but I’ll never forget the help!

KHK: A lot of the folks I’ve talked to said that they made this discovery at a young age.

JC: I found early in life that I like to be on my stomach or side when I’m fucking myself, and I prefer the feel of my fingers to

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toys (unless it’s a magic wand). I like to keep my ankles crossed when I use my Hitachi because I get over-stimulated, and I also like to tease myself.

KHK: So, you’re more into manual stuff than toys?

JC: That’s my favorite thing about it: everyone has their own specific way to get off. Your way is yours and that’s totally fine. Explore your body, experiment with setting, toys, concepts, try it in front of a mirror. Just be safe, research, clean your toys, know your allergies, and always have a way out if you’re participating in something potentially harmful, like self-tying. Sex is rad, orgasms are amazing — you should be having fun, and if you aren’t , find a better way to love on yourself. Knowing your own body will help if you decide to be with a partner. You’ll know what you like, which will make for a much better experience most of the time.

KHK: How do you discuss your work with new friends and/or family members?

JC: Funny you ask that — I just came out to the majority of my friends in a mass post. No one was shocked. They all know I’m an extremely proud ho, and most people know about my past as a stripper, so I think this career turn was expected in a way. Everyone knows how miserable I was in my “civilian” life. My mom described me as a quiet, but very outspoken child. That still rings true to this day. I have always been an unapologetic person when it comes to who I am. I always inform people that I don’t need them to like me, as long as we’re civil. I can be perturbed and upset about someone not being into what I’m doing or who I am, but it won’t shift my life.

KHK: How do you broach the topic?

JC: I pick the right time to bring it up, and I mostly tell people I actually trust since doing anything involving sex sometimes makes people uncomfortable, I do my best to make sure I can trust a person not to divulge personal information that

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might put anyone I love in harm’s way. I have an extremely large support group, and I make my own path. People either have to accept that I’m a slut or move on. Luckily, everyone has stayed. I’ve got some wonderful people in my life who I would hate to cut off because of ignorance. But again, I have chosen a wonderful group of people to be involved in my life; we only get bigger and bigger. I come from absolute love and support, both my blood and chosen family take in folks who have shi**y families. That’s just who we are, so everything has been ultra positive every time I come out.

KHK: There are members of the feminist community who oppose pornography–how do you respond to criticisms from other activists?

JC: Everyone has a right to feel how they feel — I was not put on Earth to teach people how to think. However, I am always open to creating safe dialogues to talk about concerns and listen to ideas. I find it hard to be critical about something I have no stake in, something I have never experienced. My experiences are not another person’s. People need to be open, and as long as a person can approach me with that mindset, I am willing to have an honest dialogue.

KHK: How would you begin that kind of conversation?

JC: I want anyone who might have inquiries about my doing porn to know that I thoroughly enjoy it. I don’t do anything I am not comfortable with. I’ve tried to live a “civilian” life, and it took me a very long time to understand and become comfortable with the fact that I love making porn. It’s nothing to be ashamed of, regardless of what society might think. I have never been as happy as when I’m expressing myself, whether that’s through painting, dyeing my hair or having my fingers in someone’s orifice.

•••

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qt patootie: an interview with q tip

Q Tip was the last interview I conducted in this series. On the Crash Pad Wesbite, he calls himself “a sensation junkie who loves trying new things and is greedy for intense connections however brief or enduring.” Here’s what the Libra and “activist at heart” had to say about his experiences in porn.

KT Hawbaker-Krohn: How did you begin your career in porn?

Q Tip: I started my career in porn on the distribution side of things. I was living in Charlotte, NC and started working at AEBN (AEBN.net) one of the largest adult streaming media companies in the world. Part of my job was watching a variety of porn for quality control and compliance. I watched so much porn! In watching all that porn I never saw someone who looked like me or fucked the way that I did. So when a friend of mine reached out to me about an opportunity to shoot with them for Crash Pad I jumped on it.

KHK: What distinguishes your experiences with Crash Pad from other previous gigs you might’ve had?

QT (Editor’s Note: AWWWW “QT!”): I feel very fortunate, I only actually work with queer companies. At least on the performance side of things. So I can’t really speak to the difference in working with a more mainstream company vs working with Crash Pad.

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KHK: On your Crash Pad profile, you identify as an activist.

Tell me how you view working in pornography as a form of

activism.

QT: I feel, as a person of size who is masculine of center, POC, queer, and kinky shooting for CrashPad gives me the opportunity to share that with other folks like me who may not be seeing themselves in the porn that they are currently enjoying. CrashPad gives me a safe, comfortable space as a sex worker to create body positive, relatable, accessible, hot porn for other queers like myself.

KHK: There are members of the feminist community who oppose pornography­—how do you respond to criticisms from fellow activists?

QT: I say that I can understand their opposition in that fundamental way of respecting another being’s own thoughts and ideas. That this is my life...these are my choices and ask that they respect my right to self determination. I absolutely understand if they don’t feel comfortable working with me and they don’t have to but, their discomfort around my choice to participate in pornography will not deter me from showing up. DeRay McKesson, one of the leaders of the Black Lives Matter movement, was recently quoted as saying “I’m not ashamed to be gay. All of me gets to show up and you don’t get to decide how,” Similarly, I am not ashamed of the pornography I am involved with and no one else gets to decide how I show up.

KHK: What do you enjoy about the leather community?

QT: The sense of family I get. Everyone’s experience is different so of course, your mileage may vary. For me, I have found an amazing family of folks who love support me, a logical family if you will. They have supported me in everything I’ve wanted to do, called me out on my shit, taken care of me when I was sick, housed me when I was penniless, helped soothe my broken heart, and networked me with other amazing people and opportunities outside the leather community.

The leather community has provided me with the most amaz-

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ing container to be my authentic awkward self and have that be valued.

KHK: You also identify as an educator. How does this intersect with your other roles?

QT: I was born and raised in South Carolina, not notorious for being a bastion of progressive thought. I came out when I was 18 and still living there. I decided then that I would do my level best to remain open to people asking me about my lived experience around my sexual orientation. It just sort of grew from there. I’ve been speaking about who I am and what I do, for such a long time to such a wide variety of people that I have a well-honed ability to meet people where they are to have meaningful conversations about the dimensions of me that they are curious about.

KHK: Since this is pill’s masturbation issue, do you have any stories about masturbation (discovery, advice, etc.) that you’d like to tell us about?

QT: I was a latecomer to the whole masturbation game. I grew up in a household that didn’t talk about sex or sexuality and always had open doors (except my mom’s). I was 19, hanging out with a couple of friends when one of them mentioned “the little man in the boat”. I asked her what was she talking about and she looked at me with this expression of sheer horror. So she explained to me who the little man in the boat was and how to jerk off. She then proceeded to march me down the hall to the bedroom, shoved me in the room, shut the door behind her, and yelled from the other side of the door that I was not to come out of the room until I got myself off. I am super grateful to her for that.

KHK: How do you discuss your work with new friends and/or family members?

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QT: I have not come out to my bio-family. I also don’t spend much time with them. My mother, I think, is still wrapping

her head around having a gay daughter. When she’s ready to know about the queer, polyamorous, porn star, leather boi she raised I’m happy to share details about those aspects of my life with her.

As for my friends and logical family, they all know. Some of them because they’ve seen my work, others because I’ve donated DVDs to raffle baskets, or they’ve seen me on porn panels. When it comes to folks I’m interested in hooking up with or dating, I ask them pretty quickly how they feel about hooking up with a sex worker.

•••

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is masturbation healthy? kt hawbaker-krohn

not to be an asshole, but do you know what nah masturbation is?

check out these resources!

• • • •

Trans Bodie Our Bodies, Scarleteen Planned Par

nah

eh, not really. yeah

cool! what have you heard about it?

it’s natural and awesome

yaaass!!!

it’s deadly it’ll make you blind

a few methods, like self-tying, come with risks, so a lil’ extra reading wouldn’t hurt before you start exploring.

only if you’re sticking a vibrator in your eye

it’ll make you grow hair on your palms

as long as women, transfolk, queers, people of color, and the elderly don’t do it

wait a minute! that’s bullshit!

you’re right! it is!

masturbation is for anyone who wants to do it.

nope.

according to Scarleteen, 95% of adults masturbate. y waxing is not

ew, yeah.

should i worry ab how often i do it

es, Trans Selves Our Selves

renthood

actually,

those resources don’t fit in with my religious practices

okay, let’s explore that.

bout t?

what?!

the good book says—

no

is your religion or spiritual practice opposed to masturbation?

do you

sure is

shame others who might masturbate?

are you cool with that?

sure am

yes

.

no

, s in the u.s. yet, palm t a thing.

. gross.

the kinsey institute found that most religious texts don’t even mention it.

actually, i’m not

try again.

are you

calling in sick, missing meals, and staying inside all day, every day?

well,

keep in mind that religion and masturbation are both personal experiences.

no

yep

so, you’re telling me that masturbation is 100% healthy?

you’re fine.

sounds like

a counselor might help you more than an infographic. check out mental health america’s website

hail to the queef presidental candidates as masturbation tools and sex toys illustrated by lyndsey lesh

JILL STJILL S

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STEIN

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