The memory’s a bit of a blur now, but almost 7 years ago, I was standing in the bathroom at my parents’ house, mentally preparing myself to tell them I had a sex blog. I knew everything would be okay in the end, and it was — but I could’ve never anticipated just how genuinely my parents, and my mom in particular, would come to encourage and champion this unorthodox career. Coming out as a sex blogger was my second coming out. My first took place at age 14, when I wrote a letter to my parents confessing that I liked girls. Eons later, two years after revealing my sex blog, I came out as non-monogamous. Today, my mom is my . . . read more

[From Crash Pad, one of the best sites on the internet for feminist porn, censored to protect Tumblr’s delicate sensibilities.] As I write this, sipping a chestnut praline latte at my local Starbucks, I know I’m living on borrowed time. Last week, Starbucks caved to pressure from an anti-porn organization and announced that starting in 2019, they will be blocking “pornography and illegal content” on their wifi networks. This, of course, means the salacious and utterly disgraceful sex toy review blog you are currently reading will likely become inaccessible. Then yesterday, Tumblr hammered the final nail in the coffin of their increasingly-aggressive crusade against adult content, stating that such content will no longer be allowed on the platform. Yeah, on Tumblr, . . . read more

GAY BEACH GIRLFROND FUNTIMES SUPERBLORPS. That’s what our shared calendar said. We planned the trip on a whim: several nights at the coast, in an adorable house we found on Airbnb. A quick drive a couple hours from the city and there we were, on the beach, walking in the surf and holding hands. Squealing when the water rushed against our legs more strongly than anticipated. Aerie had brought some new sand toys, including a hilarious sand drill, so we picked a spot and began erecting a sand city together. Sure, we could’ve stopped after a few Taj Mahals and Leaning Towers of Pisa, but we were too invested. We kept dreaming up new developments for our city, scavenging for . . . read more

Why are sex games so bad? This is an eternal question I ask myself regularly. I have a whole label in my Gmail for sex games, and it’s filled to the hilt with shitty, offensive products I’d never want to play in a million years, often including pleas for me to review them. (People love to say stuff like, “it’s not a sex toy, but it’s KIND OF A SEX TOY!”) Ha. Ha. Hahahaha. Usually I just send the links to my girlfriend so we can ridicule the games in private, but I just got one that perfectly demonstrates everything that’s wrong with terrible sex games. It’s called Foreplay, and while it’s not the worst sex game ever, it manages . . . read more

Or: why G-spot stimulation is not the pinnacle of pleasure. Hi, my name’s Epiphora, and I almost always need clitoral stimulation to have an orgasm. I thought this was common knowledge, clueless as that may sound. I mean, I write about my genitals on the internet every day of my life — obviously people must know this about me? But something happened the other day that made me realize that may not be true. That perhaps I haven’t been explicit enough about the types of stimulation I like and how, logistically, that plays out in my sex toy testing. Recently, I struck up a friendship with a new sex blogger. She messaged me one day seeking advice. “I think I’m . . . read more

CN: sexual assault, consent violation, grey areas, Trump, Aziz. This Christmas, every time I hugged my grandpa, he feigned outrage and yelled “sexual assault!” At my boyfriend’s parents’ house, after dinner and presents and peppermint schnapps, our conversation veered into dangerous waters. Politics. Racism. Sexual harassment. Lies they’ve absorbed from Fox News, parroted back at us with alarming conviction. Beliefs so entrenched and toxic they felt impossible to dismantle; all our attempts seemed woefully inadequate. The topic shifted to the recent wave of sexual assault allegations. You can’t even hug people anymore! they declared. The words collected at the back of my throat, my cheeks flushing hot, desperate for the perfect rebuttal. I sputtered, we’re literally asking people to be cognizant . . . read more

“Buzzy” and “rumbly” are words you’re bound to encounter if you spend any time in sex toy circles. These words, popularized by bloggers and educators such as yours truly, refer to the quality (not intensity!) of vibration, with buzzy characterized as a higher-frequency, surface-level vibration and rumbly as a lower-frequency, more robust vibration. I’ve long posited — and, to be honest, stated as fact, because I’m just that presumptuous — the idea that rumblier vibrations are deeper and more penetrating. Well raise your glasses, mofos, because now I have SCIENCE and VIDEO to prove it! Below are some video clips made by Jeff Spitzer, a former aerospace engineer who spent over 30 years designing airplanes, engines, and scads of other . . . read more

Cupcake butt plug and Shilo. The cliché is true — it feels like just yesterday and like forever ago. This week marks 10 years since I first published a review of a sex toy on the internet. It was fall 2007, my junior year of college. That summer, I’d moved out of the dorms and into my first apartment. I was 20 years old, almost 21. If you’d asked me what my career was going to be, I would’ve hesitated and posited, “…writer? I hope?” A cautious optimism underneath which lied a practical fear. A fear that I could never make a living with writing, that I’d end up in an office job, probably, and that the only skill I’d spent my . . . read more

There’s a glimmer of recognition that crosses someone’s face when I ask, “have you ever encountered a sex toy that smelled like a new shower curtain?” The widening of the eyes, the slight nod. This is how I introduce the concept of toxic sex toys, and it is almost always met with understanding. That smell, I explain, is off-gassing from chemicals called phthalates, which are used to soften plastics. “Phthalates have been banned in childrens’ toys,” I tell them, “but the sex toy industry is completely unregulated.” It’s been nearly 10 years since I started in this industry, and yet — sadly — this teaching moment remains as effective as ever. It’s usually the point at which the person shares . . . read more