Living Vanilla: The Anti-Deviant Deviant

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Implicit in the ever-pervasive cultural fear of aging is the supposed decline of sexual urges and activity. While due in part to biology, in another to priorities, integral to this fear is one helluva loaded word: monogamy. Why? Because fucking the same person for years can get boring. The solution? To experiment; to unearth and explore your latent desires; to mix things up. But what if you’re simply not interested?

I’m not going to sit here and make some bullshit assertions that we as a culture praise “sexual deviance” – please take careful note of those blinding quotation marks – but there’s something to be said about the way we glorify and all the while fetishize certain preferences: the pathologized “sex-addict”, the happy-go-lucky swingers, the librarian-cum-slavemaster. I don’t like to throw around the word trendy, but what’s “in” always seems to tiptoe on the cusp of mainstream, yet what gets me off is the equivalent to goddamn Lady Gaga – the analogical irony isn’t lost on me: I feel like sheep in wolf’s clothing.

I’m very sex-positive and find myself constantly arguing the case: “You think face-fucking is degrading? As long as you’re both into it, degrade the shit away!” I’d love nothing more than to have safe and legal spaces for sex work to function. I’m all for bedroom experimentation, as long as it’s fair: if I want to fuck my girlfriend in the ass, then I’ve no choice but to grit my teeth and offer her the same privilege, albeit on slightly more rubbery terms. But I don’t want to get fucked in the ass. Is that wrong? No. But my insecurities lead me to believe that it’s fucking boring.

Further media representation of the topic presents the notion of the “inner-kink” waiting to emerge; deeply repressed and rarely capable of rearing it’s head, bullshitty-Freudian-style! As if it’s certain that one harbors at least one sort of bizarre desire, anything up to wanting to screw my own mother. This further problematizes my seeming ailment, as if my lack of niche desire implies psychological dysfunction. Remember when we used to treat homosexuality as a disorder? Apparently not.

The opposing social archetype – one which I find equally unfitting and unappealing – is that of the machismo womanizer: poor in bed, uninteresting, brutish, driven merely by their innate desire to jam their cocks into holes and ultimately lackluster in ever sense. This representation lacks sexual intelligence, passion. Another, the celibate-save-twice-monthly husband and wife. If you’re gay, you’re in the clear: even the proudest of boyfriends get some sort of irrational credit merely because there’s more than one dick present. How kinky! Like my interest in public sex, the love for vehement vanillas seems to be lacking.

This isn’t, however, a cultural criticism. I’m not delusional enough to liken my lack of adventurousness with the lived experiences of those who face constant stigma and unfair treatment based on their sexual preferences or identities. Instead, this is a selfish monologue regarding my desire to be freakier than my erection will sometimes allow me. This is a confession of the fear I carry that one day, my partner may wish I fancied leather more. But most importantly, this writing is celebratory: when a dull white, heterosexual male can feel left out – or at least a bore – in our culture, then things may just be going in the right direction after all.

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