Yeah I agree with that totally, but I think it’s a lot more honest to own that and talk about that reality. Rather than to make it sound like there has been some giant societal shift that explains your own personal and totally valid preferences. It seems like the most important lesson, especially for young women, is…

That's true too. Unfortunately, I've found that people who are virgins into their mid 20s (or later) have a lot of anxiety around sex and it does affect their life.

I know you aren’t asking for advice and anyway I’m not a mom so I can’t fathom what that is like. But I think the less emphasis on virginity the better. It’s not a big thing. It’s not really even a thing once you start thinking about it- most of us lose our virginity in stages anyway so it’s weird to attach all this…

Good response. My problem with the cow metaphor is that it assumed you were looking to be purchased. I mean, maybe I want to "give away my milk" because it's fun? That was the whole problem with saying "living together before marriage"- like, maybe I'm not even thinking about marriage at all? I'm not trying to snag a…

Yea I did that too. In fact, my BFF and I did it when we were really young- like 11 or 12- and set up a fake account saying we were adults and chatted with loads of grown ass men who took a while to figure it out. We never met with them for real, but we did exchange messages and had a few phone conversations. Kids…

Yes I was terrified too. TERRIFIED. I hope your dad made it through the darker times alright and he's managing it now. Sex was really stressful, and probably I was like 25 before I really realized that I did not have HIV for sure and was probably not going to get it. It’s still the main thing about monogamy for me.…

Do you mean now? I’m an old married woman now. But in reference to hook ups and casual dating when I was young, we did not go to one another’s parents houses. Because we weren’t in a relationship- we were hooking up or FWB or casually dating. But when I did go to the houses of boyfriends or when they came to my house,…

Really? I can’t relate to it AT ALL. The only people I heard say these things were WW2 generation folks (who would’ve been Gen X’s grandparents) and members of the then-burgeoning religious right (purity pledges!). So maybe you heard it more because the WW2 people were still in the workforce - they were teachers and…

Yea, my mom would find it REALLY bizarre if I'd brought home all the boys I hooked up with.

I think of course there are differences. Hormones are real things! But they also affect people differently. I'm a complete emotional nut the couple days before my period because of hormones. I know plenty of women who have never experienced PMS at all. Likewise with menopause. And situations affect how your hormones…

I am emotionally connected to my vibrator. I'm even more emotionally connected to some of its settings than others. It's complicated.

The really weird thing about this is that it assumes people who date and hook up are like in high school or something. I mean, adults usually don't have their parents nearby on a regular basis enough for this to even be a possibility. Even college kids, but it gets even more ridiculous the older you get. Like, oh…

Yes. I do understand the push-back against the idea that all women should be able to enjoy casual sex though. The trend does seem to be against monogamy- that seems to be the difference though, not hookups which surely are happening now at the same rate as they were then. Some people are into it and some aren't. It's…

This exactly. The only thing different about hook up culture in the 90s and hookup culture now is that we didn't have apps and we were way more afraid of AIDS.

Yeah, I was wondering that too. I mean, make me feel old and all, but 20 years ago was 1996. I was in college. Lollapalooza was a thing. The president was getting blow jobs in the Oval Office. Friends was the hit show- and they were hooking up right and left. We didn’t have dating aps, but we had hilarious classified…

I think that’s true, and it’s one of the reasons being pro-choice must go hand-in-hand with feminism. I’m opposed to legal / bureaucratic / financial obstacles to abortion. I can concurrently support programs that make childbirth and parenthood an easier choice. We are not really a family-friendly country when you…

Of course that's what they are intending. That's why it's ironic that the people they are directly hurting right now are women who desired to continue their pregnancies, some of whom were no doubt anti-choice before they found themselves in this situation.

My family talks constantly about Partition (India and Pakistan) and what it was like to have neighbors who’d lived side by side for a century rise up and murder one another. You wonder how radicals can stoke that sort of anger, violence, scape-goating, hatred- it’s by pointing out differences, being dogmatic, refusing…

Yup this. To be fair though, Chomsky has always advocated that swing-state voters vote for the Democratic candidate. His advice has stayed the same for decades, but this is the first time I remember him saying he actually likes a candidate (Bernie). But you are absolutely correct- what Chomsky and other progressives…

The ironic thing about these later term bills is that it often targets mothers who actually wanted their babies. Second trimester is when you get tests for birth defects. There are anti-choicers who find themselves in a position to abort when unforeseen complications happen to them. Also pro-choicers would’ve aborted…