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Have a Pleasure filled, Fun, Indulgent AND Sexy Women’s Day you all

08/03/2012 in People We Like, Pleasure News & Views by Annie | No comments

Well this international Women’s Day we at The Pleasure Project  hunted for some feminist slogans on pleasure.

We also looked for some slogans on indulging our desires on International Women’s Day and enjoying ourselves.

We even searched to happiness and women’s day.

It’s a poor show I’m afraid.

There are loads of great posts and articles (including this rather brilliant one by zoe williams): but little very little on us women and our male comrades in the struggle being pleasured or enjoying ourselves today.

In fact we got depressed when we found a website that highlighted” pleasure and women’s day” and turned out to an international bridal search service.

Please cheer us up by sending glorious, luscious, feminist, naughty quotes.

In the meantime we have decided that we need some images of women who like sex, know what they want, have fun and  would use women’s day as an excuse to tickle themselves pink , touch themselves up, have a beer and ignore stupid advice.

We hope you do the same , Just stay safe we need you on the front line of the pleasure revolution.

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The sexiest three little words: I want to

16/01/2012 in People We Like by Annie | 1 comment

The Pleasure Project was lucky enough to run into two amazing women from YP Foundation in Goa recently. Ishita Choudery and Gopika Bashi. They rock. They made us laugh and inspired us.

Ishita Choudery started the the YP Foundation to fill the a political gap in India -  ensuring that young people get heard when it comes to policy decision about their sexuality, political rights  and right to information (amongst other things).

They have done heaps to get young people recognised as valid political partners in decisions about their futures and have worked with 300,000 young people since 2002.

And the reason we love them is because they lobby for comprehensive sex education in India with their “know your body know your rights” campaign.

And then we love them more but they don’t shy away from discussions of pleasure and use our Pleasure Project materials to stimulate discussions. We were fishing a bit (just a little) so we asked them why.

Istita says they used our promising practises in safer sex posters to “start conversations about pleasure and whether it is a right” .  She says that the images do not make young people feel uncomfortable, as might be expected, and it also helps start a discussion about consent and what is your own personal “line of consent“.

So this got us talking about how sexy consent is. How the best thing you can hear from a romantic or sexual partner is “I want to” or “please do”.

Because (as all the pleasurists know)  having safer sex is not just about condoms but about making sure you are doing what your partner wants, what makes them feel good and vice versa. And rather than thinking our partners should automatically know what we want;  it would turn them on to tell them.

As we concluded girls are not meant to ask for what they want; but boy, do men like it when they do.  As Ishita said “it is sometimes easier to have sex rather than talk” and I added that this plays into our romantic myths of “you must know me and therefore I should not tell you what I want”.

So how do we start to learn to ask and see consent as sexy as it is ? The YP Foundation start with body mapping exercises and let people know the facts. For example the clitoris is not between the toes (as they found some people thought in one workshop ). They then have conversations of what people like and don’t like and what might be their “line of consent”

And they found some surprising twists: it is often assumed that the middle class urban young people of India are better informed about sex with their i -phones and internet connectivity. Not so, not so;  rural young people have more time for sex and  talking about sex and so surprised them with their lack of conservatism. They have more imaginative ideas about sexuality.

So that’s why YP Foundation rocks. Actually speaking as and for young people and telling us things we did not expect.

 

Perfect Poster girls for the "know your rights" campaign

 

 

 

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Our (safe and sexy) wrapped up 2011

05/01/2012 in *What We're Up To, News About Us, People We Like, Sex in the News, Sexy Tips by Annie

Dear Pleasure Seekers, here is our round up of good.safe.sex in 2011. Let us know if we missed anything…Happy New Year, The Pleasure Project xx

January – Sexy Texts

So we started off bright and breezy in the new and interviewed many authors at Jaipur Literature festival on why there is just not enough good safe sex in the texts and how to write “that condom” moment.  We loved what Candice Bushnall, Jerry Pinto and Abha Dawesar had to say.

And how we also thought about how we need to get more good safe sex into Indian Pulp Fiction.

February – Crown Jewel Condoms

We were most pleased that sexuality and pleasure got a mention at an important UK Department for International Development event when Professor Lawrence Haddad, from IDS, spoke about our work and the need to include and address romance to deliver better sexual health programmes.

We finished off the month getting outraged because we loved the launch of “Crown Jewel Condoms” with the strap line “Truly a King amongst Condoms” in time for the UK Royal Wedding. But excitement turned to outrage when we realised that they did not actually work. I suppose we are meant to just put them on our mantelpiece and admire them?

March – Can Public Health learn from Porn?

The fabulous Tehelka magazine quoted us in March, right chuffed we were, because we told them that the Pill needs to ne sexed up and the health world needs to learn more from the Porn world.

Alongside having that rant we also had a go on the UK Guardian website about how pleasure and development should not be strangers.We said that development professionals needed to look beyond all the negative consequences of poverty or poor people as always victims; to see a possible positive vision of good sex, as empowering, raising of self esteem and joyful.

April – A festival on the art of lust

April was our art ‘n’ crafts month. We went to an exhibition that showed us what orgasms looked like and we featured in an Indian Express article about using the arts to promote good safe sex.

And we got lucky. Really lucky. Traveled to Sydney to learn all at the festival for the art of lust t. It was certainly mind-blowing and the bits that we could comfortable blog about, we did; ethical sluthood, naked yoga, play fighting and a novice orgy workshop.  We were exploring lusty safe sex on the frontline of lust; and it wasn’t like the usual sexual health conferences we attend. Oh no sir ree.

May – We came, we read we shared our pleasure

We were full of the joys of spring celebrating national wanking month and whilst we were at it (conveniently) also learnt LOTS more about what Delhiites fantasise about.

We organised a “Share your Pleasure” fantasy evening in the wonderful many many cold fantasies including;   cool garden sprinklers, cold showers, BDSM in a chillyJacuzzi but there were also a few tasty surprises (Cheeki Dilli, Cheeki Dilli).

Delhiites also fantasised about “men in top hats, making names in jam on bellies and clits, the falling petals of the jacaranda tree“  and last and not least (surprise surprise) some mutual self arousal in a dark small bookstore in Haus Kaus village !

Hurrah for sharing our fantasies and expanding the global fantasy bank for us all to enjoy. Let more hot Delhi fantasies rain on us cooly this summer.

June – diging deeper into delhi’s fantasies

We got a little deeper into the fantasies of Haus Kaus Village in steamy June. We collected 150 fantasies during the Haus Kaus Village event, and man, were they hot.  We thought the Delhi heat might knock back the collective libido a little; but we were wrong.

Oh Delhi, you are a sexy, kinki, imaginative bunch. We ranked your fantasies according to popularity and there are a few surprises I can tell you. Read them here. Our personal favorite (today) is the “salt touched breast” of the mermaid lover and whose tail you would “love every fishy scale”.

We were also quite chuffed to get our sexy article published in a quite serious posh journal. Read about how we think there should be more pillow talk between academics and porn film makers here.

July- orgasm prizes, play doh porn and ethical condoms

In July our wonderful pleasure propagandist Arushi braved the weather of Glasgow to report back from the frontline of the World Sexual Health Congress and did she find out stuff.

Wowzer.  Did we learn. We learnt that orgasms should be part of the journey not the station we get off at (well we kind of knew that already) , we heard about soggy saos, play doh porn and if we are the high desire or low desire partners in our bedrooms.

We also loved the new ethical condoms and decided to wrap with care and save the polar bear…

August – desperately seeking pleasure in Korea

Another brave pleasure propagandist ventured forth to report back from the AIDS conference in Busan, Korea. Revati found little pleasure we are sad to report. Although she reported later on a couple of brave souls who mentioned the need to recognise pleasure in sex in HIV prevention.

But we consoled ourselves by discovering that men who wank more also use condoms more. Another plus point for the boy wankers then.

September – Condom use still a distant dream in porn

On we got on our old hobby horse again this month, safer sex in porn….but then got onto that tricky ride bareback sex.

How to replace the intimacy of it with something that feels equally as exciting and as intimate. And we loved the creative ideas you pleasure propagandists had. Keep them coming.

October – demos in London (sexy female condom ones)

On a quick trip to London we loved talking at the offices, in the very funky Shoreditch, of Plan International and Interact Worldwide, two international NGOs. We loved them and they kind of liked the pleasure approach and want to include it in their work internationally.  Sadly, but coincidently, that week a big news story in the UK was how dissatisfied young people were with the sex education they get.

November – Coffee flavoured condoms

On my goodness in November we got really busy, we rocked for the Right to Romance whomsoever we wanted whilst also reminding those who attended this brilliant concert that followed Queer Pride that playing with themselves was their right.

But we also popped over to Ethiopia and savoured the delights of condom flavoured condoms.

December – ranting again about group lust fests

We finished the year by having a good old rant in Man’s World Magazine about group lust fests, porn and pleasure.  The usual stuff.

We finished the year with a tirade about women loving sex.

So there.

Happy New Year to all your pleasure seekers out there.

Keep safe and see you in 2012.

 

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Rock for the Right to Romance

26/11/2011 in *What We're Up To, News About Us, People We Like, Pleasure News & Views, Uncategorized by Annie | No comments


Delhi is gearing up to a fantastic concert tomorrow and we are just a little bit over excited here at The Pleasure Project.

Rock for Rights will follow the city’s growing queer pride march – letting us all continue the party. It’s only two years since same sex relationships were de-criminalised in India, but since then the flourishing of queer arts and culture is obvious. Rock for Rights celebrates this with some amazing artists the Bollywood singer Rekha Bharwaj, the multi-talented Ma Faiza, The East India Company, Alisha Batth and Indian rock group Papon.

As all us pleasure seekers know learning about good safe sex is challenging the world over when sex education tends to tell you what you should NOT do and how many diseases you will get when you do IT. But trying to get good information about how to have sex you want and be safe at the same time is near impossible when the type of sex you like is illegal. Decriminalizing same sex relationships allows us to talk about sexual health in an open way.

I had a lovely chat with the marvelous Ma Faiza who will be playing her brilliant brand of sexy, uplifting electronic music tomorrow at Rock for Rights about just this. I asked her what events like Rock for Rights could do to help deliver good safe sex messages.

“Entertainment is a great platform for a social message -it reaches a more diverse audience and makes the message and the process fun”

We could agree more – after all we are all over the fun sexy safe sex message here at Pleasure Project. Traditional sex education tends to bore people and then moralise to them. But Ma says

“Access to sex education is limited in India – and especially women’s right to pleasure. Many women here don’t feel that they have the right to enjoyment – that their life and their sex life should be a journey of sufferance. That has to change.”

So roll on Ma Faiza’s set tomorrow – we love her positive attitude and think we have found a true pleasure propagandist to add to the growing ranks..

See details on how to get to Rocks for Rights and get tickets here

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Rock for Rights : Come this Sunday

22/11/2011 in *What We're Up To, Meetings & Publications, News About Us, People We Like by Annie | No comments


To all those lucky pleasure propagandists who happen to be based in India.

Sunday will be a special evening of music for a good cause – to advance human rights and have fun.

The Pleasure Project is very pleased to be a promotional partner – and keep your eyes peeled you might get to see some images of good safe sex and get some postcards all for yourself.  Come say hi and share a sexy tip…..or two…..

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Coffee flavoured condoms in Addis Ababa

18/11/2011 in People We Like, Pleasurable Products by Annie | No comments

The Pleasure Project is lucky enough to be in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. As well as enjoying beautiful views, delicious coffee and a variety of adventures we are most impressed by this poster we regularly see around the city.

It’s a new kind of eroticism of safer sex. Selling good safe sex as an exclusive club, with privileges. And it comes to us courtesy of the brilliant condom social marketing organisation DKT.

DKT Ethiopia provided 85 million condoms in 2010 in Ethiopia alongside other family planning methods and  provided a stonking 2.4 million “couple years of protection” in that year alone.  But their talent does not stop at the “members only” ribbed and dotted brand but stretches to include  a “sensations” brand.

Sensation condoms come in a whole ranges of tastes – including mint and cinnamon. However our personal favourite is coffee flavour and has been pleasuring the population since 2008.  Even better cafes in the city have been offering free coffee flavoured condoms with cappuccinos.

Ethiopia is the birthplace of coffee, has amazing pavement cafes and a traditional coffee ceremony  where coffee is roasted and drunk sitting together. Every house and shop  has a small arrangement of coffee pot and cups for all of us addicts. So how refreshing to get your delicious condom in the saucer of your coffee rather than sloping off to pick one up behind the closed door of a toilet or from a late night petrol station.

Thank you Ethiopia for coffee and a new take on the coffee ritual.

Watch out soon for more blogs about DKT and their amazing good safe sex products. For starters here is the intriguing DKT Ethiopia advert for mint condoms that combines basketball and  breaking pots to the tune of a Michael Jackson song.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eomsu4aoxAQ

 

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