sugar and spice

Looks like everyone’s getting in on the action. Sexblogs—the way to make new and exciting the everyday monotony of a blog. A daring and interesting alternative to the endless accounts of what someone did today, what kind of toast they ate, where they went and who they saw. A sexblog is spicy, interesting, erotic, and well-written, the dirty cousin of the boring blog.

Or is it? Can sexblogs fall prey to the same mediocrity that eventually swallows up the daily musings of every other narcissistic blogger out there? Hell yes. They may be more audacious in their choice of topic, but without some sort of dialogue, some kind of ideas being discussed, beyond the mere retelling of daring sexual exploits, sexblogs are just the same as Joe Blog* who wants to tell you all about what he dreamed last night. (*No harm intended to Joe’s Blog or any other similarly-named websites.) While at first glance a typical sexblog is scintillating, and for sure it is educational, too soon some of them become just like all the rest, only instead of “Today I went down to main street and walked around taking pictures,” its “Today I went down to main street and picked up and had an amazing screw in a phone booth.” Unfortunately, this gets just as boring.

The fact that sex bloggers are out there having their say is good, to counterbalance the somewhat prudish attitudes of a mainstream culture that comes down heavy on experimental sex while flogging the images of a wild sexuality in practically every venue. The double standard of the media can get confusing, especially to young people just beginning to explore sexuality and decide for themselves how they feel about the whole issue. I’m, of course, all for free speech and people having all the options in front of them, and being able to make up their minds free (somewhat) of the biases of their culture, and to that end sex bloggers provide information on some of the many options available to people. And as a young woman who is honest and open about her own sexuality, there is little on the sexblogs that offends me; to the contrary, I find the good ones entertaining and educating, witty and worth spending the time reading. Like any good blog.

There are some that bring something more to the sexblog genre, and they do this by talking about something else, even if that ‘something else’ is theories on sex or other related topics. (See nakedloftparty, et al.) It looks like that golden rule of ‘diverse topics’ applies to everyone, even those who already have the ultimate topic. In any case, at least by bringing into the discussion some ideas and thoughts on sex itself or on how we as a culture feel about sex, there’s something here for the brain as well as the imagination. That’s the formula Playboy hit upon fifty years ago: combine sex with some sort of intellectual pursuit, even if it’s just for show.

In any case, though at first the subject draws our attention like a car crash and holds it for quite a while, and though we can all relate, in some way, a sex blog without an intellect behind it soon gets boring, much like a love affair. Here's to interesting blogging, of all varieties.