My recent column at GOOD* on Blue Ivy Carter has received some strong criticism, and rightly so. It erases the long, damaging history of white people (specifically white women) telling Black women the “right” ways to be sexual, as well as how to raise their children. Worse, it contributes to that dynamic. This was far from my intention in writing it, but intentions aren’t magic. I was wrong.

Obviously it would have been far better if I’d understood all of this from the get-go, and not written the column. The best I know how to do at this point is to offer my deep, sincere apology, commit to donating the fee I’ll receive for this column to SisterSong, and redouble my ongoing efforts to understand and undo racism, both within myself and beyond. These efforts take many shapes, but one specific approach I’ll be focusing more energy on is increasing my reading and listening to women of color who work on sexuality issues.

(*I’m publishing this here and in the comments at GOOD, but the piece will stay up as GOOD has no-retractions policy.)

Sorry for the long absence everyone. But I’ve got a good excuse: my new book, What You Really Really Want, has finally been born! You can order it here, and you can follow news about it, tour dates and more at whatyoureallyreallywant.net. Hope to see lots of you in my travels…

The reviews have begun to come in!

Honestly, I can’t imagine how to properly express my gratitude for the reaction some of my heroes have been having to advance copies of What You Really Really Want. But as much as I’m humbled by their endorsement of my work, I’m also bursting with pride and can’t wait another day to share them with you. So, without further ado, the very first sneak-peek reviews of What You Really Really Want (which you can, incidentally, pre-order at this link or at your local independent bookstore. Just sayin’.):

Susie Bright:

“In a world full of Pussycat Dolls and virginity pledges, What You Really Really Want carves out a path for real women to have real sex on their own terms. The information and exercises in this book have the power to change your sex life for good.”

Jessica Valenti, founder of Feministing.com and author/editor of four books, including The Purity Myth:

“Don’t have sex before you read this book! With her usual wit and candor, Jaclyn Friedman writes a manual for sex that teaches, engages, surprises and – most importantly – puts the reader in charge. What You Really, Really Want will change the way a generation thinks (and acts!) about sex.”

Anna Holmes, Washington Post columnist and founder of Jezebel.com:

“Jaclyn Friedman’s new guide — detailed, intelligent, and fun as hell to read — is a sorely needed addition to my bookshelf. Think of it as the anti-Cosmopolitan: A 21st century primer on fearlessly discovering and owning your sexuality while staying true to yourself without cutesy gimmicks, absurd tips and patronizing assumptions. It’s not an understatement to say that I wish WHAT YOU REALLY REALLY WANT had been around when I was first coming into adulthood. Actually scratch that: It’s as relevant to me now that I’m in my late 30s as it would have been in my late teens. Everyone can benefit from Jaclyn’s personable, progressive perspective on female sexuality and feminism.”

Tristan Taormino, sex educator and author of 7 books including The Secrets of Great G-Spot Orgasms and Female Ejaculation:

“As a sex educator, I always encourage people to embrace their authentic desires to create an empowered sex life, but Jaclyn takes both the theory and practice of this one necessary step further: she gives specific, useful tools to help girls and women navigate the complex world of sexuality. She busts myths and shreds double standards about female sexuality, exposing the hypocrisy, misogyny, and sex negativity inherent in all the crap we’ve been fed. This book will simultaneously make perfect sense, blow your mind, and crack you wide open—and by the time you turn the final page, you will be changed. It should be required reading for every girl and woman—heck, every person—on the planet. There is more significant, sex-positive, shame-free, life-changing knowledge in a few pages of this book then you’ll find in the entire public school sex education curriculum. Clear, compelling, and courageous!”

Heather Corinna, founder/director of Scarleteen and author of S.E.X.: The All-You-Need-To-Know Progressive Sexuality Guide to Get You Through High School and College:

“If you’re like many women, you probably came into your sex like with a sense of what women should or shouldn’t want, but with little sense of what you, the one, unique woman you are, actually did want and all of what you could want. If you’re like many women, you’ve gone through your sex life trying to walk a shaky tightrope of everyone else’s shoulds and shouldn’ts, rather than enjoying the freedom and comfort that only shoulds or shouldn’ts you create and choose for yourself can provide. If you’re like many women, when someone asks what you do really, really want for yourself in a sexual life, the answers don’t easily fly off your tongue. Instead, you may struggle to find them at all or to voice them for fear they’re not the right answers, even if you’re very sure they’re right for you.

In a much better world, no one would have those experiences. Instead, the picture of your sexuality and sex life would start as a colossal, blank canvas where only you painted the picture, where only you chose the scale, proportions, colors and textures and applied — or did not — rules or limits. And the world that painting of your sexuality existed in would be a world without any art critics.

The bad news is we don’t live in that world.

The good news is that what Jaclyn Friedman has provided you with this book is an powerful, creative, truly useful and holistic panacea to the world many women have lived in.

I believe this book and all your process of utilizing all it has to offer can help heal the impact so much negative, soul-sapping messaging can have on you, can renew and recalibrate the way you see the limitless, first-person possibilities of yourself and your sex life and can help you experience and provide that much, much better world for yourself and for everything your sexuality can be. Yep, even though you still have to live in this world.”

Lyn Mikel Brown, Ed.D., Co-founder of SPARK and Professor of Education and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, Colby College

“Jaclyn Friedman is my new hero. If I hadn’t read it for myself, I wouldn’t believe a self-help book could cut through so much structural sexism and cultural subterfuge to reach a place of genuine insight and personal truth. Friedman is this generation’s version of Dr. Ruth—young, sassy, direct, and so very wise. As someone who teaches undergraduates and witnesses the gendered nature of sexual shame, blame, and fear, what I really really want is to hand this book out free to all my women students. I’ll settle for dog-eared copies in every college and university Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Resource Center.”

Lena Chen (of The Ch!cktionary and formerly of Sex and the Ivy):

“For every girl (and woman!) who’s ever felt condescended to or misrepresented by sex and dating manuals, What You Really, Really Want is exactly the kind of book for which you’ve been waiting. Choosing nuance over one-size-fits-all dating rules, Jaclyn Friedman treats her readers as equals in the quest for sexual empowerment, helping them sort through confusing expectations and desires without judgment or paternalism. Interweaving advice with personal anecdote, Friedman challenges readers to rethink how they make sense of their bodies, sexuality, and gender. All the while, she offers an honest take on risks like sexual assault, unintended pregnancy, and STIs. By interrogating assumptions about gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, and relationship models, Friedman reveals the diversity of the human sexual experience and the choices available to her readers. Most importantly, she emphasizes fulfillment not through relationships with others, but through one’s relationship with oneself.

Unlike other so-called ‘sexperts,’ Friedman isn’t prescriptive and doesn’t pretend to have easy answers. But then again, why should she? Any reader of this book will realize by its conclusion that the answers lie in their own hands. By teaching girls how to become more attuned with their own bodies and sexualities, Friedman doesn’t just give her readers the tools to say no to social expectations and gender roles, but also teaches them how to say yes to their desires — the very definition of empowerment!”

I’m beyond honored to be attending the Nobel Women’s Initiative’s conference on Ending Sexual Violence in Conflict, at which over 100 women from around the world – activists, academics, security experts, corporate leaders, and Nobel Peace Laureates Jody Williams, Shirin Ebdai and Mairead Maguire – are coming together next week to forge a new security, and a future free of sexual violence in conflict. You can read a great (though definitely trigger-warning-worthy) overview of the issue and the conference’s approach to it here.

I’m also super excited that I’ve been given permission to liveblog and livetweet some of the proceedings, so that y’all can listen in and I can share some of your comments and questions with this incredible group. I’ll be doing the liveblogging right here (as well as at Feministe), and I’ll be focusing on the three overview panels, which are:

Monday, May 23 @ 11:00AM Eastern

Where are we now and what needs to be done? This panel will review what is being done and what needs to be done to prevent sexual violence in conflict. Reflecting on successes and obstacles, speakers will discuss initiatives/techniques at the international, national and local level to prevent atrocities and protect women.

Moderator: Joanna Kerr – Action Aid International, South Africa
Speakers (TBC):
Joanne Sandler – UN Women (including special message by Margot Wallstrom)
Charlotte Isaksson – Armed Forces, Sweden
Binalakshmi Nepram – Manipur Women Gun Survivor Network, India

Monday, May 23 @ 3:00PM Eastern

This panel aims to give a round up of efforts to prosecute perpetrators at the international and local levels. From the International Criminal Court to grassroots mobile courts, women have spearheaded various alternative and innovative forms of justice. What is needed to strengthen these efforts to ensure greater accountability and prosecution?

Moderator: Susannah Sirkin – Physicians for Human Rights, US
Speakers (TBC):
Anuradha Bhagwati – Service Women’s Action Network, US
Naw K’nway Paw Nimrod – Women’s League of Burma, Thailand
Dr. Emily Adhiambo Rogena – University of Nairobi, Kenya
Andrea Medina Rosas – Red Mesa de Mujeres de Ciudad Juarez, Mexico

Wednesday, May 25, 10:00AM Eastern

What does a survivor-centered strategy look like? How are women activists on the frontline defending and surviving violence and risk? This panel is meant to spark discussions around possibilities and approaches for a comprehensive response for women activists and survivors of sexual violence in conflict. By drawing the links between trauma, justice, health, livelihoods, security and reconciliation, participants reflect on what is needed to support women in finding their voice and reclaiming their lives to forge a new security.

Moderator: Lisa VeneKlasen – Just Associates, USA
Speakers (TBC):
Wangu Kanja – Wangu Kanja Foundation, Kenya
Shereen Essof – Just Associates Southern Africa, South Africa
Safaa Adam – Community Development Association, Sudan
Patricia Ardon – Sinergia N’oj, Guatemala

You can click on the links in the panel names to get a reminder for any of the liveblogs, or just tune back in here at the start of the liveblog. I’ll also be livetweeting as I can from the rest of the conference – you can follow me at @jaclynf.

All of this talk is going to conclude with Thursday’s Day of Action to End Sexual Violence in Conflict — details coming soon on how all of us can get involved. I really hope you’ll join me.

I’m quoted in this great piece by Chloe Angyal, which is full of good advice not just for those who have involuntary pain during sex, but for everyone who finds V-Day a little too full of performance pressure.

Going to be on the Rick Smith Show tonight, talking about the GOP’s efforts to redefine rape and outlaw abortion, instead of creating jobs, like they promised. 9:15 ET. Tune in!

Tune in right here at 1:30PM EST — we’ll be talking about when progressive leaders FAIL, and taking live questions from everyone!

That’s right. I’m taking on Naomi Wolf for saying things like this about the Assange rape allegations, Monday, 12/20, about halfway through the Democracy Now hour. Click here to find out where to tune in!

Talking about Assange and justice for rape victims everywhere. Listen here – I’m around 15 minutes in.

I’ve got a piece in The American Prospect today, about why how we talk about the rape charges against Assange (or any rape charges in the media) matters:

This week, as WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was taken into custody by Interpol on charges of sexual assault, and pundits right, left, and center got busy painting the accusations as frivolous and the accusers as lying, scheming sluts, I joined a small but dedicated chorus of feminist voices calling for a serious inquiry into the charges. We didn’t do it because we support government secrecy or because we agree with the vicious international campaign to silence Assange. We didn’t do it because we’re masochists who like to get into fights on the Internet. We did it because once rape charges break into the news cycle, lives depend on what gets said about them.

Read more…

When it comes to sex, should I always avoid the things that make me uncomfortable? How do I know if the person I’m flirting with is safe to date? Is hooking up always damaging? What do I say to a friend who’s making sexual choices I think might be bad for her? What if that friend is questioning my choices? How do I encourage others to be safe and sane about sex without teaching them shame?

All women have questions at the intersections of sex and safety. And it’s no wonder: our culture bombards women and girls with mixed messages every day. We’re supposed to be innocent virgins who excel at stripper-pole workouts. We’re failures if we don’t act sexy, but we’re sluts if we actually pursue sex. We need to be protected from rapists lurking in bushes, but deserve “whatever we get” if we have a drink at a party and wear a skirt.

In her anthology Yes Means Yes, Jaclyn Friedman laid out a vision of a world in which we all have the right to experience the pleasure of our bodies without shame, blame or fear. Her second book, What You Really Really Want, due out next Fall, will help readers create that world for themselves, in their own lives. Using research, reality-based advice, revealing quizzes and creative exercises, What You Really Really Want will show readers the way to separate fear from fact, decode the damaging messages all around us, and discover a healthy personal sexuality. We’ll build new skills for safely expressing that sexuality with lovers, explore effective ways to talk about tricky issues with family and friends, and learn how to make the world a little safer for everyone else’s sexuality along the way.

But before the book can reach the page, Jaclyn is looking for a dozen volunteers to be the very first people to ever read the book, engage with the exercises, discuss the process with each other and with Jaclyn, and help shape the finished book.

The twelve-week workshop will be run by Jaclyn herself on Sundays at 3PM EST, from January 9 to March 27, 2011. We’ll use the unreleased first draft of the book as our text, and we’ll rely on the internet and conference calls to bring together women of a variety of backgrounds. Because this breadth of perspectives is crucial to the process, participants won’t be selected on a first-come, first-served basis. Instead, please write a brief (no longer than one page) statement, describing yourself and your interest in participating. Be sure to include the following info:

• your age
• where you live
• your racial, ethnic, and gender identities, your sexual orientation, and your class background/economic situation
• any mental or physical conditions that impact on your sexuality
• if you feel comfortable sharing, any experiences with sexual violence, harassment or abuse that have impacted the way you experience (or don’t experience) your sexuality
• any particular questions or challenges you’re grappling with that you’d like to address in the workshop
• whether or not you’d feel comfortable being quoted in the book. You’ll have the chance to approve individual quotes before they’re included, and you can absolutely use just your first name, a pseudonym, or contribute them anonymously, as your comfort level dictates
• if you can commit to making every Sunday conference call, plus doing approximately 3-4 hours of weekly reading, exercises, and class interactions between Sunday calls

Email your statement to WYRRW@jaclynfriedman.com. Statements are due by Friday, December 10. You’ll be notified by Friday, December 17 whether or not we’ll be able to offer you a space in the workshop.

What You Get:

• A free in-depth 12 week workshop on discovering and pursuing your own healthy personal sexuality, facilitated by the editor of Yes Means Yes.
• The chance to help shape a groundbreaking book that women will be using to get more in touch with their sexuality for years to come.
• Complete anonymity – use whatever name you like with the group, and where/if you’re quoted in the book. Only Jaclyn will know your actual name if you don’t want anyone else to know it.
• Two signed copies of the book once it’s published.
• Your name in the book’s acknowledgments if you want it there.