Yesterday Dr. Carolyn Bennett a Liberal Minister of Parliament in the Canadian government sent a letter to the Federal Minister of Health, Leona Aglukkaq, asking the health minister to look into developing regulations for the adult toy industry in Canada.

Bennett, who has a long history of advocating for women's health issues and generally talking about public health issues most politicians wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole, was inspired to write the letter after visiting Red Tent Sisters, a sex shop in her riding.

The letter (which you can download here) calls out phthalates and BPA in particular, pointing to what little research has been done on sex toys, and suggesting that there is an "urgent need for responsible regulation in the adult toy industry." The minister wants products to be safety tested before they can be sold, and the chemical composition of all sex toys to be made publicly available.

I think it's great that these entrepreneurs sought out a politician willing to speak out on a subject that intersects sexual health and pleasure and that she followed through in this public way. Most good sex shops already offer a wide range of products that are phthalate and BPA-free. But better quality sex toys are always a good thing.

At the same time, as someone who cares about the sexual rights, health, and freedom of all people, and not just middle-class women, I have to admit to having an uneasy feeling about this letter and the assertion that sex toys pose a significant risk to public health.

To the extent that the trend to "eco sex toys" is producing thoughtful public discussion and encouraging everyone who wants to buy sex toy to educate themselves, I think it's great. But if you read what's written on this topic much of it lacks any critical analysis. Sex toys were once emancipatory tools of empowerment and I fear they're becoming luxury accessories with little more meaning than deodorant or mouthwash.

I wish it didn't have to be an either-or situation, but the fact is that the public, the media, and certainly the government don't have a history of managing more than one public discussion about sexual health and pleasure at a time. The minister is absolutely right when she writes that the government shouldn't "shy away from legislation that protects us" because the topic of sex may make us uncomfortable.

But given the disparities in access to sexual health and experience of sexual pleasure among Canadians, I just can't help but feel like this is a much easier topic to deal with than the known threats to public sexual health, which are routinely ignored, by most politicians and citizens every day.

Read more - Globe and Mail: 'Urgent need' to regulate sex toys, MP says

When you write for the web you begin to appreciate the extent to which search engines, and the experience of "search" as a concept and an activity, is changing more than how we find information. Search is changing how we think about and how we use language to construct our experience.

Every year, for example, I take a look at the sex questions that were most often searched for and read by About.com users. It's tempting (and editorially desirable) to frame this list as a kind of window into the sex lives of the hundreds of millions of people who come to About.com every year looking for information. Everyone wants the "real" story, what people "really" want to do in bed. But how much do the words people time into a search field reflect either how they feel, think, or have sex? At best I'd say the relationship is suspect.

After all, we search so often that we end up learning how to search, and we learn from the search engine results. You type in "edging" hoping for some gardening tips and instead come up with my how to edge article. Next time, you try something else. Or you type in "lubricant" because you want to find one that won't give you another yeast infection, and you end up on an automotive site. What we search for may begin with an interest, need, or desire from within, but how we search, and the words we use, become as conditioned as any other response.

And of course anyone offering to tell you what people are really into is only answering that question based on what they talk or write about. People aren't searching my site asking questions about sex with chickens, because I don't have any content on sex with chickens. So if you were to ask me I'd say there aren't many people interested in having sex with chickens (actually if you asked me I'd direct you to some other sexologists who could answer that...but you get the idea).

It's complicated but I still love digging through my statistics and theorizing about what they mean (it's like doing a crossword puzzle without any clues, or any boxes, or even a grid). So in the spirit of educated guesses and sharing data over the holiday season, below you'll find the ten most popular sex questions of 2009.

How Do I Find My PC Muscles?

Does Penis Size Matter?

How Much Masturbation Is Too Much Masturbation?

Can You Alter Vaginal Taste?

Do Penis Pumps Permanently Enlarge Your Penis?

How Long Does Sex Usually Last?

Can You Tell When a Man Is Going to Ejaculate?

How Can I Tell If I've Had an Orgasm?

How Do I Measure Up?

Is It Okay to Watch Porn?

From the Sex Workers Outreach Project website:

December 17th is International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers. This event was created to call attention to hate crimes committed against sex workers all over the globe. Originally thought of by Dr. Annie Sprinkle and started by the Sex Workers Outreach Project USA as a memorial and vigil for the victims of the Green River Killer in Seattle Washington. International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers has empowered workers from over cities around the world to come together and organize against discrimination and remember victims of violence.

During the week of December 17th, sex worker rights organizations will be staging actions and vigils to raise awareness about violence that is commonly committed against sex workers. The assault, battery, rape and murder of sex workers must end. Existing laws prevent sex workers from reporting violence. The stigma and discrimination that is perpetuated by the prohibitionist laws has made violence against us acceptable. Please join with sex workers around the world and stand against criminalization and violence committed against prostitutes.

If you're wondering what this has to do with you make no mistake that your life has been touched by sex work in some way. People who do sex work aren't nameless, faceless others who you only hear about in grizzly news reports or see on 20/20. They are our lovers and spouses, our family members and co-workers, our teachers and students, our service providers and waiters. So too for the people who pay for sex. Yes, you may have never had a conversation with someone in your life about the time they paid for sex, but that doesn't mean they didn't. Or you didn't.

You can check out SWOPUSA's site for a list of events around the world. If there's one in your city or town, check it out. If you go with an open mind and open heart I promise it will make you a more thoughtful person by the end of the day (which is not to say it will make you happier or less confused or anything like that).

If your not the marching type, Annie Sprinkle offers this advice on how you can participate.

Annie Sprinkle's Ten Things You Can Do to Participate

Absolutely EVERYONE is invited to participate. Here's how.

1. Organize (or attend) a memorial in your town. Simply choose a place and time to gather. Invite people to bring their stories, writings, thoughts, related news items, poems, lists of victims, performances, and memories. Take turns sharing.

2. Hold (or attend) a candlelight vigil in a public place.

3. Do something at home alone, which has personal meaning, such as a ritual memorial bath, or light a candle.

4. Call a friend and discuss the topic.

5. Send a donation to a group that helps sex workers stay safer. For example, some teach self-defense or host web sites that caution workers about bad Johns.

6. Go to the Sex Worker Outreach Project's, www.swop-usa.org, read it, and add something to the site. Do let others know about any planned Dec. 17 events by listing them on the SWOP web site.

7. Spread the word about the Day to End Violence Towards Sex Workers and the issues it raises; or blog, email, call, send a press release, or forward this text to others.

8. Go to Washington DC. This December 17, 2008 there will be a National March for Sex Worker Rights. People will converge from all over to take a stand for justice and safety. Info at www.swop-usa.org

9. Organize a panel discussion about violence towards sex workers. Procure a community space and invite speakers like sex workers, police, and families of victims.

10. Create your own way to participate.

If you're traveling by plane to be with family over the holidays you have at least two kinds of baggage to contend with. There's the emotional baggage, which is old and worn and won't hurt your shoulders but is may wrench your heart. And then there's your physical baggage, in all it's over-stuffed-telescopic-handled glory. This doesn't feel like a good place for me to properly address the emotional baggage, but I do have four simple tips to hopefully prevent one of the lesser joys of airline travel, the sex toy security scare.

If maintaining your cool over the holidays means travelling with your favorite sex toy, this may be the best ten minutes of research you've even done.

Read More - Vibrators on an Airplane (and Other Sex Toy Travel Tips)

Often journalists fail to "do" sexuality well when the cover it because they aren't willing to ask basic questions. Like most of us they are uncomfortable enough talking about sex that they're willing to take for granted that we all know what sex is, who has it, why we have it, what it means to be a man or woman and be sexual, etc...

It's one of the simple and refreshing things about Natasha Singer's short piece in the Times today about the new drugs to treat premature ejaculationthat are being pushed through the testing pipelines, each hoping to make it to the FDA approval finish line first (mental note: being fast is good in business, bad in bed).

It was probably Singer's experience covering both the beauty and health care pharma industry that gave her the knowledge and confidence to set aside the how-does-it-work and how-many-people-will-it-cure questions and start by asking; is there an actual illness in need of treatment here? Here's how she breaks it down:

"...creating a blockbuster quality-of-life drug like Viagra involves more than just being innovative or being first. Sometimes it requires a drug maker to create and market a whole new category of disease.

"The template goes something like this: Start with a legitimate quality-of-life issue -- like fitful sleep or shyness -- that does not yet have its own prescription medication and is debilitating to a few people a lot of the time. Next, position the quality-of-life issue as a medical condition with symptoms so common it covers vast numbers of people who had previously not identified themselves as having a health problem, or who thought they were just experiencing an occasional and normal annoyance."

We're used to most journalists completely suspending their critical faculties when covering sexuality. If Singer maintains an interest in bio-medical sex research we'll all be better informed for it.

The bottom line of the piece is that we should all get ready for a lot of carefully managed public discussions about premature ejaculation. Apparently I was six months early in singing the praises of premature ejaculation.

Read More - Sure, It's Treatable. But Is It a Disorder?

Related - Myths About Premature Ejaculation ; What Causes Premature Ejaculation? ; How to Stop Premature Ejaculation

This weekend you have a chance to do some good and support one of the most unique, least funded, and generally coolest sex education resource for young people online: Scarleteen. Since 1998, Scarleteen has been offering free inclusive, comprehensive and positive sex education, information and support to millions of youth. They've done this for eleven years on an almost entirely volunteer basis. No other site has managed to do so much and stay alive for so long.

What they talk about:
From body image to pleasure, from sex and drugs to sexual assault, from orientation to identity, Scarleteen offers information on so much, and they do it in multiple formats including message boards, blog posts, long form essays, and Q & A's. Recently they launched a text service where youth can text questions and get a real live person texting back. There are only a few organizations in the country that are offering this service, and frankly none that take the unique Scarleteen approach.

Why Scarleteen is important:
There are plenty of other online resources for youth around sexuality, so why do we need Scarleteen? In a nutshell, what they do and how they do it is smarter and better. Their approach is complicated, passionate, riled up, empathetic, never condescending, never pitying. They speak directly to youth who are most marginalized, the ones who don't see themselves represented in sex education content produced by larger national organizations.

I was lucky enough to survive being a teenager, but to be honest I just barely made it out alive, and I remember many people who didn't. Scarleteen is the kind of space where you can ask questions and get answers from people who may know a bit more than you do, but will never talk as if they know better. The belief that they don't know better, but can still help, is what sets Scarleteen apart and makes them so successful at what they do. Lots of us (whether because we're young or queer or disabled or poor or imprisoned or, I could go on) have the experience of being surrounded by people with power over us telling us that they know better. That if we only follow their rules and do as they say, we'll be fine.

When we have questions a lot of the time we just need someone to listen, to respond without freaking out, to offer some context and some information, and then help us get there on our own. We don't need a perfectly packaged 3 step plan to sexual health, we need to figure it out on our own.

Scarleteen has managed to do this for eleven years for millions of youth. You can help them continue to do this work, and if you help them now you can make double the difference.

How you can help:
From Friday December 11th to Sunday December 13th, I'm taking part in a matching donation campaign. For every dollar donated during this weekend a few other donors and I will match your donation (up to $2500). So give now and you double the impact of your generosity.

I hope you'll consider checking out their site and learning more about what they do. I hope that if you have any youth in your life, you'll send them the link. And finally I hope that whatever you can donate, you will.

Help Lift Sex Ed to a Higher Plane: Support Scarleteen!

If you're thinking to yourself that it's too early to be publishing a holiday gift guide consider the fact that there are exactly 18 shopping days left until Christmas, 5 until Hanukkah, 20 days until Kwanzaa, and your two months late for Diwali this year. Plus, it's much better to get your sex toy holiday shopping out of the way first, so you have at least one thing to dream about as you take abuse from fellow shoppers and disgruntled salespeople. Between now and the end of the month I'll be featuring some of my favorite gift picks for all budgets, but let's start with the high end stuff.

About.com's Luxury Sex Toy Gift Guide

_{Image courtesy of LELO}

The week in sex news, four words at a time:

simulacrum of a swoon

it was a consensual relationship

manipulating testicular hormone levels

misuse of bio-terrorism law

With black Friday and, lord help me, cyber Monday behind us it's hard to live in a state of denial any longer. If you have people in your life who celebrate some kind of holiday, and you have the financial means to do it, it's time to start making lists of whom you want to give gifts to, and what on earth you're going to give them.

In the coming weeks I'll get to sex toys, but I want to start with my favorite gifts to both give and receive; sex books. I also want to share another suggestion. If there's a local independent bookstore that's accessible to you, consider shopping in person instead of online. As a socialist who also loves to shop I figure if you have to spend money, at least give it to people you know and like. Use your money to buy something you're happy to put out into the world. Every book on my list might not be to your personal taste, but I promise that they're all authors and titles you can be proud to support from a sexual karma perspective.

There were other great sex books published in 2009 that I didn't have room for on this list, if you've got your own recommendations, add them in the comments.

Read more - Sex Book Holiday Gift Guide 2009

After the highly publicized halting of research trials looking at the impact of circumcision on HIV infection among African men (the trials were stopped because early data showed such a large protective effect that it was deemed unethical not to immediately circumcise all the participants) researchers have been analyzing the data for more clues as to why male circumcision offers such a dramatic reduction in risk of HIV transmission.

The methodological and ethical questions about the research remain unanswered and as far as I've read unaddressed, which in some ways makes it even more important for us to keep following the research.

Last week researchers at Johns Hopkins University published a paper in PLoS Medicine, parsing out one aspect of the protection, the relationship between circumcision, genital ulcers, and the herpes simplex virus that causes sores (HSV-2). From the study:

Genital ulcer disease, particularly when caused by HSV-2, is thought to increase a person's risk of acquiring HIV, so could male circumcision reduce HIV transmission rates because of its beneficial effects on genital ulcer disease rather than through its removal of foreskin tissue with its rich source of HIV target cells?

The researchers analyzed data from the study including which men came into the study with and without herpes, which men got herpes during the study, and which men who developed genital sores (sometimes caused by herpes, sometimes not) during the study. The men were examined at 6, 12, and 24 months during the study.

They found that circumcision cut risk of genital ulcers almost in half, whether men had herpes at the beginning of the study or not. They also found that while circumcision reduced the risk of HIV in men without herpes it didn't reduce the risk of acquiring HIV in men who had herpes at the beginning of the study.

Their analysis leads them to suggest that circumcision protects against genital sores mostly by reducing the risk of sores developing from "mild trauma during intercourse" and that the protective effect of male circumcision against HIV is primarily due to the removal of what they call "vulnerable foreskin tissue containing HIV target cells" and not because circumcision protects against other STDs which in turn increase the chances of acquiring HIV.

This is interesting stuff, even if it's early on in the theorizing of it. It would be nice if the researchers pursued a parallel agenda of addressing the ethical concerns raised by such highly racialized research (or you know, at least acknowledged it).

Read more - Gray RH, Serwadda D, Tobian AAR, Chen MZ, Makumbi F, et al. (2009) Effects of Genital Ulcer Disease and Herpes Simplex Virus Type 2 on the Efficacy of Male Circumcision for HIV Prevention: Analyses from the Rakai Trials. PLoS Med 6(11): e1000187. doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.1000187

Related - About Herpes ; About HIV/AIDS