Story by Nina KaPow
Illustration by Bailey Meyers
Welcome one again to the dog days of summer, duckies. Though it’s still relatively early in the whole vacation game-there’s still plenty of time to hit up the fairs. Or pick blackberries. Or climb a tree without wearing shoes. Actually, no. Don’t pull a Michael Jackson on one of the trees on the U of O campus without shoes.  Or in a sundress without panties. Or in hotshorts, if you happen to be a penis owner. Actually, I take that back. No one should climb a tree in hot shorts. Anyone that does so is risking a blow dart to the ass from Miss KaPow.
Send your sex and relationship questions to [email protected]. I’m no doctor or shrink, but I can definitely show you how to take off shoes super quietly. Why would you need to know this? No one like a noisy summer reader in the Knight Library, that’s why. Now shut up, I’m writing.
 
Is it true that girls gauge if they like a guy based on what he drinks in a bar? I drink margaritas, martinis and other “girly” drinks, and I haven’t gotten laid in a long time. —Hate Beer But Love Sex
Maybe you’re not getting laid because you talk like a douche. Ever consider that?
Sure, your choice of cocktail sends off a signal about who you are. But it seems like no one can really agree about what means what. Take martinis. Some people see them as pretentious drinks, but they’re also viewed as the drinks of men who are picky about who they take home. Margaritas are supposedly for Jimmy Buffet-esque dudes, but drinking one can also send off the vibe that you have horrible taste in music. My point? Drink what you like, and don’t be a poser. Even if you love drinking obscure shit like Bocce Balls  or Burnt Fuselages, rock that shit. The most attractive guy in the bar is always the one having the most fun.
 
I like growing out my hair down there, but a lot of the girls I hook up with prefer girls that wax down there. I mean, I get that there’s probably girls out there who want muffs. But I can’t find them.  Maybe things would be better if I just shaved? What do you think? —Debating the Razor
I’ll be honest with you: if you want to try something new just to try it out, I think you should. But if you’re doing this to just get a partner that  you think will find you and love your forever if you just shave, don’t do it. That’s a bullshit idea. Experimentation, especially with your experience and sexual self, is a fun and healthy part of being human. But if you shave yourself and find that you don’t like it, then fuck it. Grow out the fluff again. Because it’s your body, babe. Whether or not someone else like it, it’s yours. I guarantee you, there are girls out there who love bushes. But until you find the one you’re supposed to be with forever (or not! Some people are meant to be terminally single; more power to ‘em), have a muff if it makes you goddamn happy.
 
My boyfriend wants to know if I’d be willing to try a crazy new sex position with him (doesn’t matter which one it is). I totally want to try it, it sounds like fun! But I told him that I’d have to think about it, because I didn’t want to seem like a total whore. But it’s been two days. Should I keep holding off on telling him yes, or just say I’m game? I don’t want him to think I’m easy because I want to do the more adventurous stuff. —Not Slutty!
Okay, now I really want to know what he asked you about.
You should have told him yes in the first place, kiddo. Any man who thinks a woman is easy if she just gives an enthusiastic “yes” to something is a fucking idiot. But you were dumb too, because you played games with your man. Turn over a new leaf, and resolve to be as enthusiastic or unenthusiastic as you feel. You’ll be an open partner, and will probably have a much better sex life.
 
My partner and I like it rough. I mean really rough-he’s left bruises from where he sucked on my breasts and me scratching his back has drawn blood sometimes. But my friends have seen some of the marks that have resulted from our sex life, and they’ve seriously asked me if I’m being abused! How do I convey that I’m not, and that my boyfriend and I just have a different kind of sexual relationship? —Cat Woman Loves Non-Beating Man
This is a tricky one. Usually, well-meaning friends can actually be good alerting forces for someone suffering abuse. But if you’re honestly in a situation where everything is consensual, it can be hard to convince people who aren’t at all aware of S&M relationships that everything is indeed okay. My heart goes out to you, kitty.
For now, keep being your confident self, and hopefully your friends will get the hint that you’re not in an abusive relationship. If you feel comfortable, introduce your boyfriend to them. Hopefully they’ll pick up on the functional vibe you two give off. Sadly though, you’re most likely going to have to be more careful about the visibility of the marks you give each other. It sucks, and it feels like surrendering to The Man. But our society still views S&M as a dark and scary thing, and you could face very real backlash if you appear like a battered woman (straight male culture, for good and ill, often views scratch marks and the like as trophies of studliness. This usually makes abuse harder to detect, but it also allows more cultural leeway for S&M acceptance). Be proud of your love, kitty. If you’re proud of the monstrous hickie your hellion boyfriend left on you as a token of lust and love, wear a v-neck if you want to. That’s your right as a sexual being. But please be ready for the backlash, and be ready to possibly make some hard decisions about what the world sees of your sex life.
 
What Ruffling Feathers This Week: One reason you should encourage your kid sister to go for a summer job? It might keep her from getting knocked up. A study by the economists Phillip Levine and Melissa Kearney reports a trend that teenage girls who feel that they don’t have any chance of advancing economically have a higher rate of becoming pregnant. The article in Buzzfeed describing the study has a really nifty chart attached, and it basically implies that the U.S.’s high rate of teen pregnancy might be due to the income gap between the country’s rich and poor. The study itself suggests that if girls feel that they have “little chance of advancement” out of wherever they’re living, they might just say “fuck it” and have a kid instead of striving to get out of their current situation. As if to feed this notion, a fairly ominous chart is presented later in the article: rates of pregnancy in women by age 20 in relation to their social standing and education level. It’s pretty startling to think about how much both of these factors affect whether or not a  young woman will get pregnant. No matter where you came from, if you’re a woman reading this on a computer on a college campus, you’re less likely to have an unplanned pregnancy. Meanwhile most of the mothers on 16 and Pregnant are wondering if they’ll ever make it to college. Just something to think about.

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Ruffled Feathers #30