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Maya Friedman Arden Stern Critical Histories Spring 2019
Dismantling the Pleasure Taboo through Technology Design It is inarguable that Western Society has made great strides towards a culture that is open to talking about sex and pleasure. On top of an already growing cultural openness, the market has followed suit. The global sex toys market, for example, is predicted to grow by USD 9.92 billion from 2019 to 2023 (Global Sex Toy Market Report), characterized by an epic recalibration of the pleasure business. We’ve seen an increase in female-run sex toy businesses and pornography entrepreneurs that “emphasize stocking quality products and offering attentive customer service” and “technologies that offer sex education, intimacy skills and gender identity” (Comella 2). However, as much as a wider array of businesses, educators and designers have helped make a safe space for broadcasting sexual imagery and ideologies to willing listeners, there still exists a tabooed aura around discussing and embracing sexual pleasure and, deeper than taboo, there exists the continued prevalence of sex shaming of women and minority genders, including transsexuals and bisexuals. To paint a picture of the very real taboo of pleasure that still proliferates in Western society, consider that as of 2019, the most influential Internet gatekeepers by and large have a fairly closed-minded view around sexuality and pleasure. Companies such as Google, Facebook and Twitter do not allow any form of advertisements related to sex or sexuality. Even further, Facebook is explicit in its disregard for pleasure. It prohibits “Ads [that] promote the sale or use of adult products or services, except for ads for family planning and
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contraception. Ads for contraceptives must focus on the contraceptive features of the product, and not on sexual pleasure or sexual enhancement, and must be targeted to people 18 years or older.” They notably forbid “sex toys, or products focused explicitly on sexual pleasure” (Facebook Adult Products or Services Policy). Reactions of this pedigree to pleasure, in turn, cause businesses to disguise or sneak around advertising regulations by minimizing, manipulating or re-framing the purpose of their products to be more “acceptable” to the public at large. Consider the Hitachi Magic Wand Vibrator, arguably the most popular vibrator for persons with a vagina, which I will touch on later in this paper. To this day, the instructions for the famous sex toy still avoid any commentary on pleasure, and the device, rather, is still presented first and foremost as a “massage” product for aches and pains.
Fig. 1 (Hitachi Massager)
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The taboo exists far beyond Internet regulations. As such, it is important to acknowledge and share a series of other examples that show how far we are from freely acknowledging and promoting the importance of pleasure in sex. In January 2019, the Consumer Electronics Show, a major platform for showcasing consumer technologies, revoked an innovation award from female-funded sex toy company, Lori DeCarlo, claiming it was ineligible for the award it had won because it was not in keeping with CES’s guidelines. This instance ultimately sent the message that female pleasure was “immoral, obscene, indecent or profane” (Cole). Furthermore, in 2018, New York City’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority prohibited any advertisements that promote “sexuality-oriented business[es]” (Ettachifini). Advertisements for sex toys or devices for any gender fall within this category, “treat[ing] sexual pleasure as problematic to society” (Ettachifini). Founder of sex toy company Unbound, noted in relation to these regulations, “we're encouraging more sex but not encouraging that sex to be good” (Ettachifini). As our public infrastructures, digital platforms and technologies are linked in an intricate feedback loop with our cultural norms and politics, I do not take lightly their dismissal of the normalcy and right of everyone to have awareness of and access to pleasure as related to sexuality. Clearly, there’s still much work left to do across the board and with a rapidly growing sex tech market, designers have a responsibility to play a role in continuing to shift perspectives on pleasure. Stemming from the current context I’ve laid out, my paper will analyze past and contemporary discourses between the narratives around sexual pleasure and sex technologies and the current and future potential for designers to aid in the reduction of stigma around female sexual pleasure. As I speak about pleasure, I will be utilizing the definition of pleasure according to The Journal of Sex Research, which describes pleasure broadly, as “positive aspects of
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individual sexual experience[s], such as, positive feelings, arousal, sexual openness, and orgasm” (Pascoal, Narciso & Pereira). I will also continue to acknowledge throughout my writing that the relationships under which sexual intercourse and pleasure-seeking occur are ripe with power relations and systems of oppression that cannot be solved via the creation of products. However, I will argue the thoughtful design of sex technologies has and can continue to push the conversation towards the direction of pleasure positivity. I will also continually refer to the work of Donna Haraway in her impactful proposal for situated knowledges in science as a guiding light for critiquing objective ideas of pleasure inherent in sex technology design, ultimately to ensure we as designers are making decisions in the context of situated rather than objective knowledge about pleasure “that are not reducible to power moves” (Haraway 588). In order to propose a fresh point of view on how designers can contribute to further breaking down ideologies around pleasure and sexuality, I will first lay the foundation for understanding why the contemporary relationship between sexuality and immorality exists. As designers within the Media Design field, we must understand the context of modern pleasure in order to actively engage with pleasure through design. Within this part of my research, I ask and answer: What is the relationship between sexual pleasure and capitalism? A loaded question. Next, I ask and answer: What sex technology products have already made an impact on shifting perspectives on human sexuality both away from and towards pleasure? What can we learn from them? As a survey of all types of sex technologies is beyond the scope of this paper, I will not touch on dating apps, websites or pornography, but rather focus on case studies around two sex technologies, contraception and the Hitachi Magic Wand, and a virtual space called Second Life. My paper will then conclude with three design tactics paired with contemporary references as a way for creators to consider designing sex technologies now and in the future. As
Friedman mentioned, I will not argue that the design of sex technologies alone can normalize narratives around pleasure. As Raymond William argues against the idea of technological determinism in “The Technology and the Society,” I acknowledge that developments in sex technologies are in part a result of contemporary cultural, social and political changes. However, by analyzing past and contemporary sex technologies, I hope my recommendations can inform and inspire future designers to gain an awareness of their significance in furthering a closing of the gap between “the shifting nexus of titillation and taboo” (Springer 81). Pleasure and Capitalism Given that I will be analyzing purchasable technologies and their impact on narratives around pleasure, I feel it crucial to explore the spectrum of arguments around the pleasure taboo and sexual repression as driven by the rise of capitalism. I do this as a means to both fully confront the fact that capitalism has been greatly responsible for a number of the systemic inequalities that exist in our society and has contributed in many ways to a framework of sexuality structured from the “objective,” male point-of-view, ultimately denying or seconding female sexual pleasure. However, the market-driven economy has also at times skyrocketed a contemporary sex-positive wave, one that importantly notes that “people should not be embarrassed or ashamed for wanting more sexual pleasure in their lives” (Comella 13). On one side of the aisle are those that hold capitalism responsible for furthering the pleasure gap. Throughout history, ideas of socialism have been related to human liberation and sexual liberation at that, while capitalism is deeply linked to the formation of gender constructions and subsequent taboo notions of enjoying sex for any reason other than procreation, as a result erasing all publicly accepted ties between women and pleasure. Author Kristen J. Solee articulates this idea well in Witches, Sluts and Feminists as she recounts the
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history of “the witch,” an original term akin to the today’s “slut” and “feminist.” Through both a historical narrative and capitalist point of view, she argues that all three categorizations were aimed at suppressing female sexuality, pinpointing the consumer market as a major driver of “slut shaming” (Solee). Capitalism as a driver of the pleasure taboo is also supported by author Kristen Ghodsee in her book Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism, where she argues even amidst the progress of the working woman, female laborers still suffer from disproportionate salaries and still rely on male partners. This discrepancy subsequently forces women to make difficult decisions when it comes to sexuality, “being shamed for choosing a single-life and sexual freedom over monogamy and marriage,” for example (Ghodsee). More recent scholars begin to get at this relationship by asking whether sex products really “democratize desire” or are just continuing to reproduce “objectification” and subsequent stigma, through a market flooded with sex technologies (Evans & Riley 2). While capitalism as largely responsible for taboos around sex and pleasure is a popular argument for many scholars, John D’Emilio, in “Capitalism and the Gay Identity,” and prominent author on sexuality, David Allyn, argue opposing viewpoints. D’Emilio notes that the “separation of sexuality from procreation through medical and product advancements has created conditions that allow men and women to organize a personal life around their erotic/emotional attraction and their own sex” (D’Emilio). Allyn argues even more aggressively that capitalism was the main driver of shifting views around sexuality. He notes “the sexual revolution would never have gotten off the ground without the free market” (Allyn 243). And finally, in Vibrator Nation, Lynn Comella acknowledges the complex relationship between capitalism and pleasure, but argues that sex-toy businesses, beginning as part of the second wave of feminism in the 1970s, are in large part responsible for a complete shift in the pleasure market.
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While arguments in the camp of capitalism as one of the main suppressors of female sexuality are extremely valuable for us to be aware of as critical designers, given the deeply political and systemic inequalities that exist as related to sexuality, evidence shows that people, women especially, were still heavily involved in pleasurable sex behaviors, even while rooted in a capitalist society where “romantic fantasy of marriage and motherhood loomed large” (Comella 4). Often, sex toys were the only way women were able to experience pleasure outside of their marriages and are still largely responsible for shifting both private and public expectations around sex. Alfred Kinsey noted this in 1953 in Sexual Behavior in the Human Female, a report in which he described for much of the 20th century, that “women masturbated and had orgasms; they had extramarital affairs, and many indicated they were not exclusively heterosexual” (Comella 4). As such, I will argue that capitalism has not solely dismantled sexual freedom for women, but rather, the access to and design of sex technologies and their retailers, has resulted in a positive visibility towards female pleasure. This supports my argument that sex toys can have an impact on how we think about pleasure today and moving forward if they are designed with a deeper understanding of the context in which they are being packaged, marketed and sold. Sex Technology Case Studies As I’ve now argued in favor of the position that sex technology products can have an impact on our cultural views of pleasure, I will now analyze three case studies of sex technology products and how they have made an impact on shifting perspectives on sexuality and what we can learn from them. As such, I will briefly review literature on the advent of contraception, the virtual pleasurescape, Second Life, and the vibrator, the Hitachi Magic Wand, as examples of technologies that have impacted the sex taboo and our ideas of pleasure. These case studies will
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only skim the surface of the wildly impactful psychology, cultural and social consequences of these technologies on sex and pleasure, as I’ll only be diving into each briefly. Contraception: Creating Plurality of Choice by Moving Beyond the Transactional At the top of the list of technologies is contraception, including female (and more recently male) contraceptives, condoms and intrauterine devices, due it is massive influence on helping us shift the sex needle towards pleasure. Although contraceptives have been first documented in ancient Mesopotamia and Egypt, contemporary birth control really took off in the early 20th century and had a second wave in the 60s and 70s. Throughout its contemporary existence, it has been deeply embedded in conflicting values around sexual morality, gender and personal freedom, but ultimately played a major role in “breaking down taboos about sex and increasing knowledge of [and] pleasure during sex” (Hall). In The Future of Sex, the author seconds the stance that capitalism has shaped human sexuality as I’ve previously noted, but also argues for the major effect of birth control on beginning to create this separation between transactional sex, with an end goal of having children, versus sex for the sole purpose of a pleasurable experience. He proposes that the “single most important technological change in sex to date has been contraception — a tool that strongly shifted perceptions around human sexuality and decoupled the woman from the mother” (Neff 13). The author Anthony Giddens in Modernity and Self-Identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age takes this point even further, by not just speaking about birth control, but the myriad of contraceptive technologies. He writes: “with the advent of more or less fail-safe methods of contraception, reflexive control over sexual practices and the introduction of reproductive technologies of various kinds, reproduction is now a field where plurality of choice prevails” (Giddens). As a result, birth control impacted the pleasure taboo in two ways: first, sexuality was decoupled from the sole goal of reproduction,
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allowing pleasure to become a primary goal during intercourse and second, it created a space where sex and sexuality allowed for and made acceptable the possibility of personalized discovery, curiosity and choice, which has been crucial in its contribution to dismantling stigmas around pleasure. Prior to the advent of birth control, the public-facing view of sexuality fell into the binary zones of either family-planning (transactional) or sexual pleasure (immoral). The two more often than not did not overlap in public discourse: “In the Cold War era, human sexual desire of any deviation from the marital norm would have been considered incorrect and dangerous to the strengthening of the American people for the protection of the free world” (Rollins). Birth control gave women visibility towards broader definitions of sexuality that they could identify with outside of binaries or objective definitions of pleasure from the male point. This ultimately began the creation of a space in which sex could become a more subjective and individualistic experience, ultimately making very early strides towards normalizing pleasure. Second Life: Separation between Identity and Self in Virtual Pleasurescapes Next, I will cover sexuality in 3D virtual worlds, prior to the advent of virtual and augmented reality platforms. A large number of critics have been strong proponents of the virtual world as a way to explore pleasure. Sadie Plant, a British cyberfeminist, believes that sex tech and virtual space emphasize “the pleasures immanent in digital technology” (Wacjman). Authors such as Nicole Stenger and Donna Haraway promote the disassembly of the identity in virtual world as well. Stenger takes her vision in a utopian direction as she writes, “Our perceptions of everything - space, time, life, death and most importantly identity will be transformed” (Wacjman). Brenda Laurel, also a prominent writer on this topic, finds her own way to comment on identity: “these contradictions [will no] longer [be] bounded by the narrow vocabulary of realworld fashion and stereotypes and will “bring sexual energies to bear in the emergence of new
Friedman 10 media paradigms” (Springer). Taking this exploration even further, author of the book Virtual Reality, Howard Rheingold, formulated ideas around teledildonics, which deals with the pleasurable sensations of having a virtual sexual experience in a multi-sensory bodysuit. His prediction was that teledildonics would revolutionize sexual encounters, but more importantly it [would] redefine the notions of self. He writes, “Clearly we are on the verge of a whole new semiotics of mating. Privacy and identity and intimacy will be become tightly coupled into something we don’t have a name for yet...What happens to the self? Where does identity lie?” In reality, Rheingold’s vision of long-distance pleasure via connected devices has yet to achieve the explosion he imagined, but his foresight into the importance of proposing new ways to explore identity and sexuality via inventive sensory stimulation techniques will re-surface in products, such as OhMiBod, that I will speak to later in the paper. Virtual spaces, like Second Life, have been given a variety of unflattering reviews by critics who feel that the virtual world is simply a mirror to our current world, ripe with similar inequalities and dominant structures. However, the analyses of these spaces are incredibly important in the conversation of sex and pleasure. It is in this particular section, I want to briefly explore the relationship to pleasure in Second Life from the point of view of a “disembodied avatar” and the impact it has on our ideas of pleasure. From a number of analyses of this space, users and researchers agreed that “what it can provide is ‘possibilities of digital sex’—sex without corporeal bodies, without real names, without the constraints of gravity, often with elaborate textual commentary” (Jamison). While, the exploration of pleasure in Second Life was less utopic than the visions shared above by Rheingold, Plant, Stenger, Haraway, Laurel and more, a number of critiques are able to point out why. Most prominent among these critiques was the perspective of writer Judith Elund,
Friedman 11 who claims shifting views on pleasure was inherently unsuccessful because sexuality was always linked to gender and all the systematic inequalities that came attached to it. Elund explores this idea in-depth in her doctorate dissertation titled “The Gendered Body in Virtual Space: Sexuality Performance and Play in Four Second Life Spaces.” In this paper, I will only comment on the part of her doctorate that she talks about gender and participation. She notes about Second Life, “gender is seen as an essential element within the meta-text of [Second Life] as it is a necessary part of participation. Individuals are not only required to select a gender on signingup to the platform but are also compelled to perform gender as a necessity for social interaction and participation” (Elund, 14). Overall her thesis brings up the idea that if pleasure is only explored through the context of gender, a male-dominant pleasure playing field, similar to the one that exists within our real world, will follow. Although a number of the early feminist scholars’ predictions of virtual spaces did not always share utopic realities, these early writers on sex technology as well as virtual spaces like Second Life, bring up important ideas on how to further dismantle the pleasure taboos by rethinking the complex relationship of gender to pleasure as a barrier to normalizing pleasure. Hitachi Magic Wand Vibrator: Shifting Expectations about Sex Finally, I will return to the aforementioned Hitachi Magic Wand, one of the most iconic products in the pleasure space. Author Lynn Comella notes, “perhaps more than any other vibrator, the Magic Wand — formerly known as the Hitachi Magic Wand — has achieved a kind of iconic status as a symbol of female sexual liberation, with a fan base and popularity that has spanned generations" (44). Before I dive in, I want to give a quick overview of the sex technologies that have long been symbolic of and continue to proliferate society’s views on sexuality and pleasure prior to the Hitachi. Dating back to the late 19th century “even the
Friedman 12 intimate vibrating devices were [thought to be created] not created for the sole reason of bestowing pleasure to women, but instead were [labor-reducing] devices to give male doctors a reprieve from the grueling task of physically stimulating their female patients back from ‘hysteria’” (Silva). A more contemporary look at the majority of sex products available on the market only recently demonstrate how sex technology was characterized by low quality and potentially unsafe materials. Furthermore, stores were hidden in dark alleys and away from mainstream society and obscenity laws prevented the “straightforward sale of sex toys” (Heaney). Visually, women’s sex products came most often in the form of oversized, fleshcolored male penises with the use being penetration, as a nod to viewing women’s pleasure being strongly in the context of the male. Then the Hitachi Magic Wand arrived. Although, the true nature of this particular vibrator was and still is disguised as a massage toy, it has played an incredibly large role in shifting female expectations around sex as related to pleasure. The Hitachi was so impactful not only because it was not “wasn't overly phallic,” but its behaviors were completely “focused on women’s pleasure,” and it provided visibility to an expansive definition of pleasure (Hsieh). This sentiment is echoed by Michael Warner, a cultural theorist, who notes that achieving sexual autonomy one must have “more than freedom of choice, tolerance and the liberalization of sex laws. It requires access to pleasure and possibilities, since people do not know their sexual desires until they find them” (4). In the paper, “Intimate Transactions: Sex and Toys and the Discourse of Second Wave Feminism,” author Hallie Lieberman notes on the Hitachi, "sex toys helped women envision their sexuality in new ways” (Lieberman 1). In a more recent study conducted at the Medical Center for Female Sexuality in 2010, contemporary researchers noted the major shift in attitudes
Friedman 13 around pleasure that came as a result of a 4-week study using the Hitachi Magic Wand Vibrator. One participant notes, Well, here’s the thing. It seemed so benign. It seemed so not-crazy. Not radical. It’s really weird, but I found myself thinking, ‘What is the big deal?’ Then I start thinking ‘Okay. If this is not such a big deal, maybe other things are not such a big deal, either.’ ‘Anyhow, so back to the vibrator. It was amazing. I felt like it changed my sense of myself. I always thought that somehow I was like a sexual failure, that I must have psychological hang ups, or that my body is not responsive. And that is why it is hard for me to have orgasms. I certainly have desire, but why can’t I be responsive?” (Marcus). Among the Hitachi’s many benefits as related to shifting expectations around pleasure, Hitachi and vibrators as a whole played a large role in exposing women to and redefining their relationship to pleasure, providing confidence that their pleasure did not need to rely on or was not “less than” pleasure stimulated by a partner. Another participant in the study notes, “I [never realized before that I] fall into the category that believes “objective” ideas about pleasure [such as], ‘Yes, that the best orgasms in the world will happen naturally between penis and vagina, [and] will be easily accessible and easily performed’ ”(Marcus). The Hitachi Magic Wand contributed to exposing mismatched expectations around pleasure between the public discourse and the self. This sentiment about the harm of mismatched pleasure is echoed in Emily Nagoski’s book, Come as You Are, where she reiterates in an interview, “satisfaction's complicated, though, because [it’s] based on, 'I have an expectation of what it should be like and I either do or don't match that expectation.' And if your expectations are based on incorrect information, then you're going to be dissatisfied, not for medical reasons, but because your expectation doesn't make sense for who your body actually is" (Nagoski). Haraway’s work on objective knowledge underlies much of the sentiment covered in this section as she notes, there is always an imagined “we” and “they” in the discourse of science. “The imagined “they” constitute a kind of invisible conspiracy of masculinist scientists and philosophers. The imagined “we” are not allowed to have a body, a finite point of view”
Friedman 14 (Haraway 575). What was so significant about the Hitachi under Haraway’s proposal was its ability to give a body to the “we” — to redefine ideas about pleasure that were and still are outside the notion of dominant public discourse on “objective” pleasure. Approach for Designers Reviewing these three impactful sex technologies on their relationship to pleasure helps us discuss a number of different considerations when designing sex technologies moving forward. In my final section, I will share three design tactics that can apply to both the micro view of the product (physical design, interaction) as well as the macro-view (re-framing its role in the context of pleasure). 1. Consider designing technologies that are responsive to the user’s body as a way to work towards eschewing “objective” and “conclusory” ideas about pleasure. As noted during a number of the case studies, sex technologies that created a space for a plurality of choice and discovery allowed users to explore personalized and subjective definitions of pleasure rather than one defined by a partner or a dominant view of pleasure, which has played a role in shifting public perceptions. As such, designers need to consider how the products they design can provide access to user pleasure that does not fit within a predefined definition of pleasure. With the advent of responsive technologies, including those with artificial intelligence, designers can create products that exist with the tools to create experiences in which ideas of pleasure are defined only via an interaction with an individual user. Dr. Kristen Stubbs, a “queer/pansexual roboticist,” has suggested one such type of product within this vein, “one that shifts the feedback loop from open-loop to closed-loop controllers. In layman’s terms, a device with open-loop control responds only to its on/off switch: You turn it on, it does its job (in the case of a sex toy, by vibrating), and that’s the end of the story. A
Friedman 15 closed-loop control, on the other hand, has sensors that provide the device with information about the outside world, allowing it to adapt its behavior as the situation requires” (Alptraum). One product that is beginning to make a shift in this space is the Lioness. It is built with sensors that “measure body temperature, movement and vaginal contractions.” The data is then sent to a corresponding app, helping women learn about a pleasure definition that suits them best (Coughlin). Rather than pre-defining a set of criteria for a pleasure, this product provides users with sensorial data that helps them define their own criteria for a pleasurable experience. These technologies also place users in a position of power, as they can define pleasure completely uncoupled from a partner, male or female. 2. Continuing to move beyond transactional sex: Toys that help expand the definition of pleasure, beyond reaching orgasm. As addressed in the section on contraceptives, one of the most crucial arguments surrounding the impact of that technology was its ability to shift sex away from the transactional (family production), towards sexual engagement for alternative goals, pleasure fulfillment being one of them. However, many of our current technologies that are in fact promoting pleasure still vie for an “end goal” of the orgasm. Rather, as birth control was able to do, designers can consider re-framing sex technology products to promote a wider definition of pleasure. If we refer back to the original definition of pleasure I use in this paper as the “positive aspects of individual sexual experience[s], such as, positive feelings, arousal, sexual openness, and orgasm,” designers should consider re-thinking their designs by expanding the definition of pleasure beyond the “goal-oriented” orgasm (Pascoal, Narciso & Pereira). Consider how some sex technology designers are beginning to embed tools beyond vibration, to communicate through the sensorial— sound, smell, touch and taste— that play a
Friedman 16 large role in changing the conception of what pleasure means. “Research has repeatedly shown that the kinds of environments we create can have effects on reconfiguring our perception of an ideology” (Lupton, 14). In Ellen Lupton’s book, The Senses, Design Beyond Vision, she writes, “by addressing multiple senses, designers support the diversity of the human condition (Lupton, 14). “When the engine for design is inclusivity or shifting perception,” we can begin to consider how certain technological design choices can help to reduce stigma around pleasure. Bardzell and Bardzell, speak about this same idea in their article ““Pleasure is Your Birthright: Digitally Enabled Designer Sex Toys as a Case of Third-Wave HCI,” in which they discuss the design of a product called OhMiBod, a toy that pairs music and vibration. This toy not only represents a way to think of a pleasurable interaction beyond orgasm, but also expands ideas about pleasure by using music to create an environment of arousal and intensified feelings. Bardzell and Bardzell write, “It is important to note, however, that the originating goal was to serve a deeply felt subjective experience, “getting sexy,” and not an intention to build a thing, that is, an interactive technology (Bardzell and Bardzell 4). Here, the duo brings up a crucial point that supports my argument – the creation of a tool that doesn’t just create an interaction that ends with a predefined result, but rather a tool to aid users in the discovery to explore a wider definition of pleasure. 3. Designing with the intention of putting gender identity as a secondary or tertiary driver of the product Influenced by learnings from Second Life, designers should consider ways to reframe products that focus first and foremost on the pleasurable experience and gender as a secondary focus. Referring back to what writer Judith Elund teaches us via her analysis of Second Life, gender as the required precursor to engaging in a virtual experience was a contributing factor to
Friedman 17 the space as a reproduction of dominant ideas of pleasure. In order to shift away from gender as intimately tied to pleasure, I am proposing designers begin to think of moving away from gender as a framing tool for sex technologies. By this third tactic, I do not mean completely turning a blind eye to the biological factors that play into pleasure for women or men. By this, I mean, designing for persons with a penis or persons with a vagina. By removing “for men” or “for women” from the sex toy conversations, we can begin to normalize ideas of pleasure by separating the traits of the self that are highly linked to objective notions of pleasure for each sex. Feminist writer, Alexandra Cashion, echoes this sentiment as she writes, “This may mean identifying toys that are capable of producing mechanically versatile actions that are not strictly garnered towards a specific gender-conforming function” (Cashion). Rather than designing exclusively male or female sex toys, which immediately pigeon-holes them into heteronormative, gender-confirming functions, designing toys for people with a penis or a vagina can help build a more inclusive view of sexuality and pleasure. Reflections and Conclusion As I conclude, I want to emphasize a few areas for further exploration that I was unable to touch upon. First, the particular points of view and design tactics shared here are in no way all-encompassing across cultures—a one-stop shop of design tactics. Ideas around sexuality and pleasure are extremely complex, rooted in religion, culture and politics and additional research would need to be completed to provide recommendations beyond the western world. Second, I do not touch on the neoliberal attitude that is prominent in the recent surge of sex technologies that disregards the idea that pleasure positivity is not simply rooted in taking hold of your own sexuality. Many of today’s current products promote narratives that seek to empower individuals to be in charge their own pleasure. The sex technology designers that are on the empowerment
Friedman 18 train, creating products that celebrate an “up for it” female sexuality this is “active, confident and independent” is a somewhat simplistic attitude that doesn’t comment on the system with which ideas around pleasure operate within (Evans & Riley xi). Future work could seek to take a deeper look at the neoliberal attitudes inherent in many of these companies and analyze their impact as related to dismantling stigmas around pleasure. Finally, future studies could do far more justice to the topic of pleasure by parsing the idea of pleasure into important sub-groups: transgender sexuality, homosexuality, bisexuality and beyond. By not explicitly stating what type of sexuality I am pertaining to, the assumption made is that I’m talking about heterosexuality: more could be done to recognize the meaning of pleasure for different sexual identities. In conclusion, the case studies and design tactics that I have chosen to present are in service of designing to dismantle objective ideas about what pleasure means, continue to redefine the definition of pleasure in public discourse and to consider how designers can further separate gender identity from sexual identity as a way to normalize ideas about pleasure untethered by their deeply complex relationship to a system of power. These design tactics are not provided as solutions that will completely transform norms, but locates these tactics within the context of our market-driven economy, as a way to energize designers to think responsibly about sex technologies and pleasure.
Friedman 19 Works Cited Alptraum, Lux. “Why the Future of Sex is Not (Necessarily) A Robot.” 16 Oct. 2014. https://www.fastcompany.com/3037191/why-the-future-of-sex-is-not-necessarily-arobot. Accessed 10 April 2019. Allyn, David. Make Love, Not War: The Sexual Revolution, an Unfettered History. Little, Brown, 2000. Bardzell, Jeffrey & Bardzell, Shaowen. “’Pleasure is Your Birthright:’ Digitally Enabled Designer Sex Toys as a Case of Third-Wave HCI.” Indiana University, 2011. Beekman, C. “1950s Discourse on Sexuality.” 11 April 2013, http://social.rollins.edu/wpsites/thirdsight/2013/04/11/1950s- discourse-on-sexuality/. Accessed 10 April 2019. Cashion, Alexandra. “LGBT sex toys: What’s out there for the queer folk?" 23 April 2015. http://archermagazine.com.au/2015/04/lgbt-sex-toys-whats-out-there-for-queer-folk/. Accessed 10 April 2019. Cole, Samantha. “CES Revoked an Award for a Female Pleasure Device for Being Immoral,” 8 Jan. 2019, https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/pa5ngn/ces-revoked-an-award-forlora-dicarlo-vibrator-female-pleasure-device-for-being-immoral. Accessed 10 April 2019. Comella Lynn. Vibrator Nation. Duke University Press, 2017. Coughlin, Sara. “Meet the Smart Vibrator That Tracks Your Orgasms.” 12 Feb. 2016. https://www.refinery29.com/en-us/2016/02/103186/lioness-smart-vibrator. Accessed 10 April 2019. D’Emilio, John. “Capitalism and Gay Identity.” The Lesbian and Gay Studies Reader, Routledge, 1993, pp. 467 - 476.
Friedman 20 Elund, J. (2012). The gendered body in virtual space: sexuality, performance and play in four Second Life spaces. Retrieved from https://ro.ecu.edu.au/theses/544 Ettachifini, Leila. “MTA Quietly Bans Sex Toys from Advertising on NYC Subway.” 10 Jan. 2019, https://broadly.vice.com/en_us/article/3k9gx3/mta-bans-sex-toys-ads-dameunbound. Accessed 10 April 2019. Evans, Adrienne & Riley, Sarah. Technologies of Sexiness: Sex, Identity & Consumer Culture. Oxford University Press, 2015. Facebook. Adult Products or Services Policy 2019, https://www.facebook.com/policies/ads/prohibited_content/adult_products_or_services. Accessed 10 April 2019. Fig. 2. Instructions: Hitachi Magic Wand House Hold Electronic Massager, https://www.lesexenrose.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/hitachi-magic-wand-manualinstructions.pdf Giddens, Anthony. Modernity and Self-Identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age. Stanford University Press, 1991. Hall, Lesley. The Life and Times of Stella Browne: feminist and free spirit. IB Tauris. 2011. Haraway, Donna. “Situated Knowledges: The Science Question in Feminism and the Privilege of Partial Perspective.” Feminist Studies, Inc, 1988, pp. 575-599. Heaney, Katie. “The 30,000-Year History of the Sex Toy.” 17 Nov. 2017. https://www.thecut.com/2017/11/the-30-000-year-history-of-the-sex-toy.html. Accessed 10 April 2019. Hsieh, Carina. “A Brief History of the Magic Wand.” 15 Dec. 2017.
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