Sex Talks With Emma-Louise Boynton - *LIVE* Sex and the Female Pleasure Taboo

Episode Date: November 2, 2021

*This episode is a live recording of a previous Sex Talks event.* “Respect for female pleasure is respect for women. It is respect for gender equality, and for the fact that women's feelings and emotions are as important as anybody else’s.” So why is female pleasure still taboo? This month, host Emma-Louise Boynton is joined by Lucy Litwack, CEO of Coco De Mer, the luxury lingerie and erotica company whose mission is to champion female pleasure in all its forms, and Billie Quinlan, co-founder of Ferly, the app designed to help you explore eroticism, prioritize pleasure and cultivate your sexual confidence to discuss all things sex and the female pleasure taboo.

Hi, everyone. Thank you so much. I'm sorry, I don't want to have my back to you. That's so rude. Oh, no, sound we all love. It's so nice to see everyone together in a room. I cannot tell you how much joy this brings me. because this is the first event they've hosted post-lockdown, which obviously isn't that crazy because events only just come back. But it feels incredible. So thank you so much, everyone who's come today.

It's going to be such an interesting conversation about sex, so obviously. But seriously, I'm so excited to speak to both of you. We are recording this for a podcast, so I know you're not going to be noisy during it because that'll be so rude. But just as a little side note, yeah, this is being recorded.

I think we are good to go, Lanaya. Are we from a recording perspective? We're good. Everyone happy in their seats. Excellent. Then we'll get it started. I need to close my phone here. So, this feels so weird because I'm not on Zoom and I'm like, whoa, how do I navigate my body in a 3D scenario?

No, exactly. I'll keep on, I'll keep on turning to you. Exactly. So, okay, welcome. So I am so excited to be joined today by two fabulous guests who also look wonderful, very, I feel they're all kind of really unbranded. Yeah, I mean, we've got a little bit of breast-hidden color. Yeah, I've got leather, I've got the hot pink,

I'm just not wearing anything on top, exactly. I'm just not wearing anything. Yeah, the bra is actually a bit too small, so I've just got loads of fat hang down the back, but it's fine. So just to introduce for it, so Lucy Lick, who's the CEO of lingerie and erotica company, Coco de Mare, which is worth noting. Lucy has grown from a niche business to a global luxury brand. Just smile, laugh and get in a bit.

Yeah, you did. If you did, you did, exactly, yeah. During her six-year tenure at the helm of the company. And Billy, who's a dear friend of mine, Billy Quinlan, co-founder of the sexual wellness app, Thurley, which is currently helping thousands of women overcome sexual issues, explore their sexual desires, sometimes for the first time, and have more mindful sex,

which is something we will definitely get on to later today, and which Billy and I talk about often between ourselves. All the time. Too much. Too much. Can't shut us up. Too much. Actually, Lucy and I also, we did a quick pre-interview the other day.

And I think I said, you know, five minutes just to have it, like, make sure that we're okay for the event. We both feel happy with everything. I think it was way half an hour, 40 minutes. I mean, it was long. By the end, I came up for air after about 45 minutes and you were like, okay. I had a really, really long reading list afterwards as well, which was great. I was like, God, okay, more books to add to my list. So what a great panel, welcome.

I love that I've written this script really like, what a great panel, full stop, welcome, full stop. Okay, no more full stops. Make it natural, Emma, make it natural. Where's our script, Emma? Yeah, I know. Exactly, you don't get them, you don't get them. This is just the power of hosting, so thank you.

The seat that I feel most comfortable in. Before we get started, can you both briefly tell us What initially made you go into the sex and pleasure industry, please? Billy, do you want to start us off? I will, yeah. I feel like, Lucy, you're going to have to bring it up after my initial conversation here. So, yeah, a slight trigger warning in the room. Mine comes from a sort of negative place as a starting point.

So in 2015, I was sexually assaulted in the workplace. And as you can imagine, it had quite a dramatic impact on my mental health, my relationships with others, but also massively with myself and my sexuality. And I went on a whole healing journey, felt really let down by our kind of medical system and the support that was available to me. So it took it into my own hands and became a health coach, started speaking to hundreds of women.

And I think because of my experience, I opened up a conversation about sex and allowed them to talk about it for the first time. And it was just so powerful. I mean, the minute you say to someone, and what about your sex life? and they're like, fuck, this is a safe space to talk about that. And the floodgates literally open.

And it's a little bit like Emma on sex. You can't stop, shut her up. Which is such a new thing. We'll get on. And then I met my co-founder and she had a very similar sort of experience back when she was a teenager. And the both of us were like two very angry feminists, sat around a table, thumping our hands,

screaming and shouting about how fucked up the system is and how much has let us down. and then Fairleigh was born. Yeah, so that's where it came from. Amazing. And Lucy, what about you? So... Close to the microphone, remember?

Strict instructions. Yes, really close to microphone. I... My sort of career background is lingerie, so I've worked in lingerie for the last 20 years until I sort of came into Cocoaumere, which opened up sort of the more of the world of erotico as well as laundering. so that's how I originally started

and it was sort of that and sort of the confidence that we found that great lingerie could give a woman and how it had always frustrated me how people had talked about the fact that women just wore lingerie for men

or for their partner and not for themselves and actually we found that it was something it was that it gave you that inner confidence and it made you realize how intertwined self-confidence and female empowerment and female pleasure were. And, you know, I was talking to this woman who was a surgeon

and she said, you know, whenever I've got a really big, really kind of scary op I need to do, I will always wear my best lingerie under my scrubs because it gives me that inner confidence. And no one knows I'm wearing it but me, but that's enough. And that gives me that extra. edge. So it came from that and you sort of think, you know, there is something so powerful about the potential of female pleasure and how that can affect so many parts of your life. And then I came to work at Coco and we, you know, we developed lots of pleasure products

and we do lots of surveys around, you know, how women feel about themselves and about their pleasure and and how different that is to male pleasure and how that is affected in in the world and I think you know we've had conversations where people feel like female pleasure just isn't that it's like not really that big a deal like it's just a luxury right you know and you think whereas if you kind of turn around and said to a man well yeah but it doesn't matter if you never have an orgasm again right who cares it's not a big deal or if you never wank again and a man would be like well fuck no you know and then it's like but so we think it it's crucial and then we've just sort of grown on grown from there and just got you know more and more fired up

and more and more passionate and more excited about the way that it affects so many elements of your life and what what we can do to improve it I'm just going to up with two things before you start jabbering on go on then two things off well one there's a whole point of discussion so you better not go too deep right now it's in the knowing off squit I've got going off script I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm Sorry. You're going to fuck up my pages later. She's like, where am I now? That's page three, Billy.

I just want to know if Lucy's got her best underwear on tonight for this panel. Oh, great question. Okay, you could be off script on that. You're a bit of course I do. Yes, wonderful. And the second thing I wanted to say is this statistic just like blew my mind or this kind of fact blew my mind. The way, the different ways in which men and women describe bad sex or good sex. So good sex is for men.

an orgasm and good sex for women is a lack of pain the absence of pain is considered good sex for a woman how fucked up is that well that's great material for us to delve into not material that's actually wrong word

but you know what I mean a really important topic into which people delve shortly when it comes up on page 3.5 exactly and just a quick introduction my name is Emma Louise and I am a writer, a presenter. I'm a co-founder of the women's media platform,

Her Hustle, and my co-founder, Elspeth, is sitting here, front row, having just rudely had her bag taking up an entire space on the bench. She's still very territorial. Her hustle room. Okay, fine. And I, this is not a topic that I thought, I mean, pre-COVID. I would never have guessed I'd be sitting here hosting a discussion on sex. Not because it wasn't a topic I wasn't interested in.

I actually wrote my dissertation at university on sex and power. So it was something that's always been interesting to me. But, I mean, not like this, not sex and female pleasure. And the thing that got me interest in this topic is actually doing sex therapy. So I started sex therapy at the beginning of this year. And anyone who knows me is bored of hearing about the fact that I started sex therapy. FYI, two things. I had COVID in summer and I'm doing sex therapy.

It's like my two key talking points. at the moment. We should have like a game of bingo how many times Emma can bring that up. Oh yeah. It's amazing. And I'm as if I'm the only person that's had COVID and the only person that cares about sex. It's not true. Anyway, so I started sex therapy and it was totally illuminating just before disclosure. I basically couldn't orgasm since I was like 23 and broke up my ex-boyfriend and just kind of it wasn't just like whatever. Like it's just a thing. I just, I guess I just can't. That's fine. And I said it to a friend and my friend was like, whoa. And I was like,

what she's like you know you can like address that and I was like really I can like how sex therapy I was like sex therapy I mean I just started with a normal therapist because of COVID lockdown and it was really tough and anyway she introduced me to the sex therapist and it's been totally eye-opening because it's made me realize and we'll you know as Lucy just touched in this and Billy did too it's not just sex like how you approach sex and how you are during sex and how you can communicate during before, after all the bits in between, with sex is so emblematic of so many other issues, thoughts, things in the rest of your life. It's not just what happens behind closed doors.

And for me, it's been such an eye-opening experience in part at a bad eating disorder when I was growing up. And that's been a huge component that's played a massive factor in how I approach sex. My body's always been a source of immense pain and something I've seek to, like I've hurt continually. I've kind of sought to run away from it, starve it. make it sick, all these sorts of things. And so it's not been something that I've seen as this amazing source of pleasure. And it's only in doing sex therapy.

I have been able to kind of begin to reconnect and be like, huh, I guess this can be kind of nice. Pleasure is a thing and all this sort of stuff. So any, that's my kind of journey to becoming really interested in talking about sex. And now, as Billy very kindly mentioned, whenever I start learning about something new, I'm like, you're all coming with me

because I am fascinated and I love to chat. So, like, let's all go on this journey together. So with that in mind, setting the nice context for that, let's go on this sex and pleasure journey together. Now we can go back to the script. That was a bit off-peased, but nonetheless, I can get back into script mode. So I've got us in three sections.

We went off-scripts and then she had to do that. I've got three sections for us, and I've actually left out in my script, the line which explains what the three sections are, but, you know, we move. But we're going to begin. Section 1, colon. What are the taboos?

I thought literally Section 1 was about the colon. Really? We're going to begin. I thought we should begin with the colon. What do you feel about that? I thought, let's go for the... Disgust. Open to the floor.

I want everyone else to experience the colon. No, so I thought, as I was thinking about how to break this up, I thought it would be... I love sections and I love Power of 3. So I thought what we'd do is discuss what are the taboos around female pleasure? So kind of why are we here today? Why does it matter? Then what is the impacts?

So what are the ramifications of there being so many taboos around female pleasure? And then how are these taboos reinforced both at a personal level at a societal level? I can't be very remembered that without my script. Sorry. On a bit of a high. Yeah, I know, but I'd forgotten the lie. So I want to begin then looking at what are these two? taboos that we're talking about. So what are the one of the taboos exists around female pleasure?

Where do we see examples of these taboos in play societally? So Lucy, maybe you could you can start us off. What are some kind of key examples that you see perhaps in the work that you do that are emblematic of how female pleasure is still this kind of, not scary, but just not discussed topic matter? I mean, where to start. Well, I think that, It almost feels like it's one of those kind of last taboos in society because it feels like, you know, from art to culture to education to pornography, you know, wherever you look, there is a lack of conversation around female pleasure or female pleasure is just still newsworthy.

You know, if there's a TV show that has a woman masturbating, that is worthy of a journalist writing an article. Whereas the same would just not be true of male masturbation. I mean, a American pie franchise was based on that from years ago, whereas still here. And it just feels like so much has changed, but so little has changed. And, you know, you can say that with sex education never talks about pleasure. Even vocabulary, you know, there's not a female equivalent for the word virility, for instance.

So it just feels like at every stage in sort of existence it's just something that isn't discussed as openly sort of male pleasure is a fact of life and great for the guys. I'm not saying we don't want them to have pleasure too. Two guys in the room. You and you. No pressure, but we're just...

We're here for your orgasms too, boys. Just ours first. Exactly. How many jealous women in the room? But yeah, so I think it's it just comes at you from every angle and I think it's you know you can talk about

each of those elements in detail and I think obviously the kind of increase in online pornography over the last few years I think has really brought that to light because it's had an effect on on how younger people and younger kids are learning about sex

and I think you know pornography is great in itself but if you are a child who cannot distinguish between fantasy and reality, it becomes a problem. And it's, if that's what their, that's their sex education,

that's where it becomes problematic. And that's where you see all of these statistics of, you know, the increase in young girls losing their virginity to anal sex, for instance. And you just think, you know, there is no way that, you know, a 14 year old boy

knows how to have pleasurable, safe anal sex. with a girl and it's so it's elements like that of where it shows the bigger ramifications because we see you know how much um respect for women's pleasure has an effect on so many different aspects of life that that may come a bit later shall I stop shall I rein that in you segued on to point one turn to Lucy power dynamics so you did segue nicely but I just I want to pick up I think I mean education. That'll be woven into this whole conversation. It's so bad. I mean, I remember sex

education at school being, they genuinely showed a video of a woman giving birth and that was our kind of entry to sex education. So you have this fear. Instead of about, it's the complete opposite of pleasure. It's about fear. It's how not to get pregnant, how not to get an STI, you know, and maybe how to put like a condom on a banana. Oh, we did the condom on the banana. Exactly. But actually, there was a scene in sex education, which I'm obsessed with, which has done a better job at educating me about sex. I think a lot of people than, how old, my, 29 years of crap sex education. But when they had that scene with a new head mistress makes them all, their sex education is watching a video of woman giving birth.

I thought back to year, I think it was year eight, when the same thing was done to us. And you just had this room full of girls. You came in, we filed in, we sat down, and then we were like, because there's just a woman screaming with a child coming out of her and there was no so it works for what they were trying to achieve right no wonder I was terrified of sex their asses exactly I mean I thought that was just reserved for mean girls don't have sex you'll get chlamydia but actually that was pretty reflective the type of sex education we got and I think it's interesting to point out as we think about how these taboos and what the kind of female pleasure taboo really is it's only recently that company's line

Furley, I'm thinking like, Hanks, for example, which is a condom brand. Actually, I know Billy, she was one of the first people I interviewed for her hustle, and you're on a panel with the founders of Hanks. And I couldn't believe Hanks is the first female founded, female-run condom brand, as if, like, condoms are just, like, for men, that women aren't involved. And a lot of the, like, lubrication used on standard condoms can be quite, like, irritable for women. And it's just, the sex industry has for a very long time been set up with men very at its center. We talk about the pleasure revolution, don't we all the 60s and 70s, but that's really the male sexual pleasure revolution.

And now in 2021, 2020, we're finally getting to the female pleasure sexual revolution. And it's really exciting. But how many years later is that? And we didn't really have it back then. But yeah, as you said, it was all centred through the male lens and the male gaze. And now it's the tide of shifting, which is really exciting, but it's about of time. I mean, I second that. Sex Talks, a little plug there.

It's an ongoing series once a month in perpetuity. Essential, I'd say. So now we can segue back to your point, Lucy. Power dynamics, colon, Lucy. No, so you alluded to earlier to the... why it actually matters to be talking about pleasure because I think it's easy sometimes

and certainly this is a response I've got when I've brought up sex therapy did I mention I'm in sex therapy bingo there we go that it's just an orgasm I mean this is a kind of

there's so many more important things I mean Lucy and I were on a panel only recently where I mean we were talking about the other day it was about female pleasure and it was about sex and then it was also brought in like about COVID and COVID deaths.

And it was kind of quite a confusing conversation because it was saying, well, you know, but people are dying when they can't feed their children, but female pleasure matters. And it was just, it was just, it didn't make any sense as if like, okay, we get that that does matter, but that doesn't discount the fact.

It's not just like orgasms and female pleasure as if it's this kind of like side note that can be put to the bottom of the list. And Lucy, I thought, can you maybe describe a little bit based on the conversation we had the other day why it is so important, why it isn't just about a woman having an orgasm, why it's so much more than that, why it's so emblematic of a broader suite of societal issues, and we're talking about this. I mean, that conversation that we had, that was really awkward.

Because I'm like going on about it and they're like, yes, but you can't put food on the table. I'm like, okay, but I didn't realize that was like it exists at the same time. I thought that, you know, I realized that being able to put food on the table is crucial. But it was, yeah, it was difficult. But I think for me, it's the fact that it's, it is emblematic of so many other things. And at the end of the day, it is about healthy gender dynamics. And so, you know, respect for female pleasure is the same as saying that it is respect for women. And it is respect for gender equity and for women's feelings and emotions to be as important as anybody else's.

And, you know, there are statistics. it does show that healthy, healthy sex life and the importance of female pleasure does have an effect. It does lead to less domestic violence. It does lead to a healthier life, less depression and that respect. And it's almost like, why wouldn't you? I think we push to really bring girls into this world and we say to them that, you know, you can be anything you want to be and you can take control at work

and at home and everything is open to you but not in the bedroom. You know, and it's that's where that isn't discussed in the same way. We don't give women that feeling and I think at the end of the day a lot of women have grown up in different and you know obviously the world changes

and things change a bit but women have always been kind of pleases we like to make other people happy we like you know to be and it's kind of that can have an effect because then it's like well I don't um you know I don't want to tell him that I'm not enjoying this because I don't want to hurt his feelings um if you're in that kind of and you know we get it and obviously you don't want to hurt the feelings of someone that you would hopefully not want to hurt the feelings on you but at the same time you your own happiness and your own pleasure has to be as important

it doesn't have to be more important necessarily but it needs to be as important and that confidence to be able to say what you want and I think and you know a lot of there are issues for us as well like don't fake orgasms

like I mean if that is like one thing to take away because you can't be bothered now I'm become too lazy I'm just like oh it's just but I think what I think but it's true Because it's like, that is, you know, egg, if you are having sex with a man and you fake an orgasm, he is going to think you're enjoying it and he's doing a good job and he's going to think, and so he should, oh, great, she loved that. I'll do the same again next time. So it's not, you know, all it's going to do is cause the same issue again. I just had this really visceral image come to my mind when you were saying about like women not saying they're not having a good time. And I just thought about the same in the other way. Like imagine if you were like nibbling on a guy's,

dick. Like he would have no qualms being like, this doesn't feel good. Yeah, when someone's going down on you doing something really funky, you're like, oh yeah, yeah, okay cool. But we genuinely feel awkward to be like, I don't want to hurt your feelings by telling you this is bad. That's mad. And what it comes back to is ultimately the primacy of male pleasure. And I was just saying to someone earlier, we were just chatting about this. It's on a continuum, I think. So at this end you know in the context of the bedroom when you kind of privilege a man's pleasure over your own pleasure and oh my god I've been guilty of it for 29 years just like how do I make sure you're having a great time like it doesn't really matter about me or what I'm thinking of feeling so that's at one end in the bedroom but I think you can then look how that translates societally and like date rape that is the primacy of male pleasure that's saying I I have a right as a man to be able to have like a right to play pleasure, again, doesn't really matter. And I was just listening to something for the damn woman's hour

that was saying there's a new type of date rape happening at universities where people are being injected with date rape drug. And so women are now wearing thick denim jackets to clubs in the UK to try and ensure that they don't get date raped by way of injection. And I think it can sound a bit extreme to put that in the context of female pleasure, but it's not. it's the same thing because it's still it's a man asserting his right to

pleasure over a woman's and I think it's really important to highlight that. Sorry, Billy, you were raising your microphone now. Da-da-da-da, got a point. But it's so true and so we run, within Furley we run cohort-based

courses to help women overcome sexual difficulties and we're currently running one and I have this sort of one-to-one with a woman every Tuesday morning and she's in her 30s, she's been with a partner for eight years, and she said to me we were talking about her needs and her desires and she said to me that the

nights that they have sex so when they're engaging in sexual activity those nights are for him and the nights that they're not having sex are for her and I was just like when she said that I mean I was supposed to keep you know very neutral looking face and no judgment

but I was like Libby like listen to what you've just said like the nights that you have sex when you're engaging in sex with your partner is purely for his pleasure your body is just a vessel for his pleasure and you are not enjoying it you're not showing up you're not there you're not communicating and the nights that you don't have sex are for you and I think that was the first time that she'd really reflected on that and that's just so problematic and we and it really speaks to what you're saying is that we don't even

recognize the kind of disconnect between female pleasure and our and our needs and what men are getting versus what women are getting and it's so nuanced it's so hard to see you sometimes until other people are able to look in and say that's so that's so wrong like listen to the words that you're saying there and Lucy you just mentioned earlier on your point how sexual well-being is such a critical component to overall well-being it can't just be disconnected and Billy that's a conversation you and I have had frequently about it's kind of there can be a tendency sometimes when we put a when we kind of privilege male pleasure of female pleasure and we don't have these conversations to think that like kind of sex can

be a bit of a side note. So your sex life, your sexual well-being, your relationship to sex is a bit of an afterthought. It's something that you can maybe get to one day, but like life is busy. There's a hell of a lot of things you've got to prioritize. But actually, just like you exercise and eat healthily and fill your mind and see friends, it's really important as a lot of the points you guys have just made to, to cultivate a good relationship to sex and that doesn't have to be with a sexual partner

that can just also be with yourself and Billy that's, can you maybe talk a little bit about that, about how the role that sexual wellness plays in a kind of holistic sense? Yeah, I think it starts with how we sort of define sex. So we define sex as sexual intercourse normally. It's a physical act rather than recognizing that our sexuality is a living, breathing part of who we are.

And it really determines our personality, it shapes our interactions. And exactly as you were saying, Lucy, it really kind of, yeah, determines how we show up in the world, how we present ourselves, how we engage with others. And so maybe we don't have time in our life for the physical act of sex right now, or maybe we don't have a partner that we're engaging with sexual activity. But that doesn't mean that our sexuality isn't still there and present and needs fostering and cultivating. And I think that's the problem is because we reduce it to this physical act, we say, oh, well, we're not having sex, or I haven't got time for sex, or there isn't someone to have sex with. Therefore, I just ignore and shut down that part of me. But it is living, it's breathing, it's there. And if you're not cultivating it, if you're not nurturing it, it really does show up in your confidence, your self-worth, your self-efficacy. These are all things linked to your sexuality and being able to live authentically in your sexuality. And that's so important. And that comes from an understanding of your needs and your desires. And what's really interesting about that is it shows up in how you can communicate your needs and desires in other areas of your life as well.

There was an amazing researcher called Peggy Ormene, and she did this whole research piece around young women at university. And her study found that women who were sexually happy, sexually authentic, were more successful in their careers. They were happier in their overall lives because they were able to create better boundaries with their friendships, better boundaries at work. They were able to communicate their needs. They were able to communicate their desires. And that's not just sensual and erotic desires, but actually the desire for a career change, the desire for a promotion. And they didn't feel guilty in expressing those needs.

They felt empowered. And that came from nurturing their sexuality versus the women who were completely disconnected and shut off from their sexuality, who didn't prioritize it and didn't prioritize their pleasure. And again, it showed up in how they came across in the rest of their lives. So it is really, really crucial to our overall health and well-being, but also our overall empowerment and our overall success and all these other areas of our lives is a model called the biopsychosocial model. And so this is where women, we are a bit more complicated than men.

And for us, our arousal desire is influenced by our biology, our psychology, and our sociology, which means our body, mind, and the world around us. And it's looking at our sexuality in this kind of holistic Venn diagram. that we can see how much it's influenced by other areas of our lives. And that's why it's influenced by work, it's influenced by loss, it's influenced by relationships in different contexts, and it feeds into how we see ourselves. So it's so fundamental to our overall health and wellness

to look after our sexuality, and it doesn't have to be an erotic way. It can be through breathwork. It can be through central movement. It can be through the exploration of your skin during a bath. It doesn't have to be of your genitals. but it's just connecting to yourself in a sensual way and recognising yourself as a sexual being for you

rather than for someone else and getting in touch with yourself as a sexual being again for you rather than for someone else. Which is such a key point. It was one of the first things my sex therapist had me do when we started was to keep a pleasure journal which we'll talk about momentarily Lucy which was to essentially

it wasn't about like okay go and fuck three men and then tell me how it was or I thought she'd get me to track my masturbation habits and take notes and then report back which I was like well I'm a pretty open book but I think that's maybe pushing it a bit but instead it was actually just every day write down five points moments in the day when you feel pleasure from your body

so that could be when you stand the shower and like the water's going down your back and it just feels amazing when you have that first sip of coffee in the morning which ever since she said that I really do appreciate that and the point was to just reconnect with my body and being in a way that allow me to see it, again, as a source of pleasure. And as you just said, it's like, it's about being, yeah, connected. And also, as you spoke to said, I think it's a lot to do with, like, self-worth. Like, I am worthy of pleasure.

I am worthy of enjoying this moment and of enjoying my body and enjoying this space. So I think it's a really, a really key point to pick up on there. And as we think about how, like, the impact that the taboo around female pleasure has on how we approach sex and how we approach ourselves. I think at the heart of so many of the issues that we have drawn on now and we'll continue to discuss is communication. Because if you can't communicate with the person that you're sleeping with, whoever they may be, you can't have good sex.

You can't have, and you can't, you know, if you need to show up, you need to ask for, And even as you say, exploring your desire, exploring what pleasure looks like for you. And I was listening to a podcast yesterday with Emily Nagasaki, who wrote the book, Come As You Are, which is amazing, and everyone keeps talking about it. And she said, if it's easier to have sex with someone rather than talk to someone about sex, which is something that she hears a lot, then that's a massive problem. And she gave an example of, like, for example, if you need to drink, have a drink before you have sex in order to be able to get in the, the moment and escape your head, whatever's going on your mind, in order to be able to enjoy it and show up. Again, it shows that there's something in your head that you probably need to deal with, and I thought back to all my tragic dates. Well, I have sought to drink as much

as I can just so I can bear having sex with this awkward man. And so, Billy, again, it's something that we have talked about previously, and I'd love to kind of hear your thoughts on What happens when we're not able to communicate properly with our sexual partner? So you talk about communication in terms of communicating with another person. Yeah. But actually, the first place in you start is being able to communicate with yourself. Oh, great point. Thanks.

She did it. That was a good on. That was with an own goal. So yeah. Bye, guys. Learn to communicate themselves. End of the night. No, but this is showing up a lot in the women that are going through our programs because language is so important.

And getting comfortable with kind of the words that you use to describe your body and to describe your pleasure are so important. And that's one of the biggest taboos and kind of areas of shame when it comes to sexuality as well. Like I don't know what you ladies call your vulva, vagina, pussy, like whatever it is. But a lot of you will probably feel really uncomfortable using that terminology. I literally just had a shiver as you said pussy. I was like, oh my God, she said pussy in a talk. That makes me feel funny.

Right? But it does. And I've actually done a lot of work to kind of like reclaim that word and to understand what that word means to me and how to use it. But if you fundamentally can't use the language and feel comfortable using language to describe your own body parts to yourself, how are you supposed to communicate that to another person? So one of the conversations I've been having with women on the course is like, what do you

call your genitals? And they're like, oh, God, nothing. I can't call it anything. The thing down there. And you're like, well, how the hell are you going to tell someone, can you move a little bit to the left on the thing? Or can you leave a little bit down on the thing? Like, do you know what I mean? Like, you have to first be able to communicate with yourself and be able to feel comfortable with the language.

Because if you hold shame around that language and you feel awkward around those words, how are you supposed to make someone else feel comfortable and how are you supposed to make that already heightened experience where there is a bit of awkwardness and uncomfortable feel chill and relax? and, you know, gentle with the ego that is present in the room, which they often is with men. But it's, you bring out, shame is just, shame is just such a powerful mechanism for patrolling our, like, relationship to sex in relation to, like, societal norms.

Like, shame, I was just recently talking to someone about this, this very thing saying how I even having done sex therapy for you, I find it so difficult to verbalise what it is that I want and what it is that I feel like I need and even like

in the process of exploring that to the point where I was sleeping with someone recently and just like couldn't bear to say anything so just like going along with it like yeah yeah yeah and then I certain things that I wanted that like I just hadn't mentioned he didn't do and I just like assumed that just wasn't his thing and then my mind

also went to maybe he thinks I'm gross, maybe he thinks my body's dirty, like all my mind just went into that tailspin of shame, shame, shame, shame, shame. And then after sleeping together for about three, four, five times, he was like, by the way, we've never done this. Like, are you into it? I was like, oh, yeah. That's my favorite thing. That's the thing I like most. The only thing I ever liked. It's the only thing I really like. And I was like, and he was like, yeah, I thought it was weird that we hadn't done it. And I was like, oh, I mean, I'm literally like fingering by the way. It's like I'm literally making it. Because we were totally all. thinking, I don't know what you've never fingered you?

After five. I was like, I think as soon as you can't talk about sex, they think like, bondage, she wanting to be like tied up and spanked. I'm like, I'm so, I'm so vanilla. I literally just like to be fingered. And I just like, basic human right, Emma, you're not weird. I couldn't even say that. I was too embarrassing. I was like, God, I mean, he's going to stick his dick in me.

You can stick his fingers in me. Like, come on. Warm a girl up. Yeah, exactly. But I think you can be kind to ourselves as well. I think it's like, I don't think you can just expect everyone at the start of a relation to be like, okay, so before we get going, you know, these are the things I like. There's my contract. Here's the manual for dealing with me.

Here's the script. Please note the full stop semicolons. They're important. And I think, so we've got to realize, you know, it can be awkward. I mean, we've got to admit it's like, yes, we want to say that we should always say how we, you know, what we want to be. But, okay, let's be realistic. And so I think it's taking, so in thinking about how you have that communication, you know, and it doesn't have to be a really aggressive list of things that, you know, that person's got to do

or you are not going to enjoy yourself. And, you know, and it's like, but there's ways of bringing in. And I think it's about making it positive reinforcements. So always talking about how much you are enjoying the bits you do enjoy. and then it's the pillow talk and the ways of do you like X, Y and Z and you know shall we try that

or you know and it's rather than saying I don't like this I don't like what you're doing it's like do you want to try that you know it's like and it's and that's the way that you would talk about anything in you know in business if you're going to you're going to a colleague needs help you know it's not like it's not saying you're shit at this it's like have you considered this option

CEO tactics. Your crap, get out. But it's also in the verbal and nonverbal as well, right? Like it doesn't all... Yeah, exactly, yeah, yeah. Shudder, like, oh, God, didn't like that. Get off. Grab the hand.

Roll out of bed. I don't want to say with Emma. No, but it's true. But you can, you can say things without actually having to say things. I mean, you can move their hand a little bit, or you can show them with your... You could finger your... yourself, Emma, and then they could be like, oh, I'm into it. Do you want to drink?

You can finger your pussy, Emma. You know, if you don't want to have some drink before. I can't believe I'm talking about sex in public. I'm going to blush about fingering. But it's so interesting as you say, I think there's also this assumption that I've definitely made personally that when you go into a sexual experience, that you assume that the other person, like, knows what they like, they're super-sex. actually experienced. I always assume this is the guys I sleep with. I'm like they just they know

their body, they've slept with loads of fit girls and you know they just they've got this so I'm just trying to like pretend that I know I'm like yeah I'm sexy like look at my bra that doesn't even fit like and I think what I found fascinating in and talking about this more is just how many men as well as women have said to me God yeah I actually feel like really awkward and this happens I like you know it's such a point of vulnerability but this again comes back to like language and narratives and the kind of like the broader social kind of environment that we live in like we talk about orgasms is something that are given to us oh I've given her an orgasm oh yeah it's like an ownership it's like an ownership thing and also it's it's that we and this is

where we get frustrated with women because we offload the responsibility to men and I think that comes again because we're like well they give us these orgasms so it's on them to know how to give it to me rather than it's on me to help them and coach them around my individual body. And when we started fairly, we spoke to so many uni students, so many uni girls. And they all said, like, oh, sex is only good with a guy that's got loads of experience.

And it was this kind of total, yeah. And I mean, it is. It's always better. But it's this kind of offloading of responsibility of your pleasure. Again, like, I don't take any responsibility for my pleasure and for knowing my needs and for knowing my body and being able to communicate that.

you sexual partner need to know it all and you need to give me this orgasm and it's such a kind of distancing and you know what it is there's just so much performativity happening then on both parts like as a woman you're going into sex thinking like oh I need to be sexy

and I need to be all these things I need to pretend I know what I want like I remember the first time someone asked me what do you like by the way I was 26 so and I lost my virginity at 16 so that was a decade of no one asking me that but I freak like I didn't freak out

in a like visceral sense but in my head I was like I don't fucking know I have no one's ever asking that before and I haven't explored it myself like I have no idea I think fingering now I'm now I know it's my favorite and now I'm like I know exactly what I love fingering but like I had no idea like I hadn't explored that

and I think so you know that's a hard open-ended question though to be fair I think it's it's quite broad totally and also at what We know, which level do you start? I was also just like, I don't know, it's different with every person. I was like, I have no idea. It's like, never been that good. So just have a go and we'll see what sticks.

Give it a shot. But you're right, Lucy. Like, how, like, kinky do you, like, how far do you go on that first question? You don't know how much you're going to. You can kiss my neck. Like, you can wee on me. Like, I love water sports. And they're like, oh, you like to do it.

Fishing. While you're out, yeah. But it says, I like to think. of like, I have this visual image, which is so unspeakably unsexy, but here we go. Both men and women go into sex, or women and women and men, men, with these backpacks of worry and anxiety and vulnerability and all the things that just they can't bear to say. So we show up in this super intimate, vulnerable space with our backpacks full of anxiety, and then we don't say anything because we assume that the other person is backpack free.

And we're the only one with luggage. Do you see where I'm going with this? I think it's very clear. I am a bag lady, as I say it. So I do come literally with backpacks to everything I go to, including sex. But I think, but it's just like that, I often think of it as like this kind of golf of silence that sits between two people in a moment that is supposed to be so close and so intimate. And I live listening to another podcast, you can tell it's a favorite pastime of mine, with uh oh i know that's coming oh she knows i've used this line her before it's a really good one it's a great quote love me a quote

glen and doyle the author of untamed book i'm sure everyone in this room has read or at least knows about adele did recommend it so therefore became required reading for every woman in the country she has done uh she did a podcast interview with elizabeth gilbert and the other day the woman who wrote eat pray love and loads of books and she's great and she summarized it so perfectly in this sentiment. It's a pretty long quote, but bear with me. We get so many confusing messages about our bodies. We don't see our bodies. We've been so used to being objectified, we being women. We objectify ourselves. We only know how to be desired. We don't know how to desire. We only know how to be wanted. We don't know how to want. Women get shamed out of their

bodies. Men get shamed out of their feelings. They're trying to love with their bodies, but we don't live there. We're trying to love with our minds and they're not living there. When you're trying to love someone, you have to unlearn so much. I'm just going to let everyone sit with that for a minute. Yeah, I know. Anyone else shedding a tear? But I just thought that was so beautiful and so poignant and I think so perfectly summarizes the myriad of issues that exist around sex, just people unable to communicate in part because they also don't really know what they need want to say. And I actually didn't have a question on the back of that.

I just really wanted to bring that up because I thought it so perfectly fits into what we're talking about. And I think if we don't learn the language of personal desire in order to be able to make that connection with someone, it's a huge problem. Billy, what are you going to say? I was going to say, we're expected to be experts. And by the age of 30 in our 30s,

we're expected to have a pretty good grasp of what we know and what we like. And that doesn't respect the fact that life changes us and we grow as individuals and we evolve. And I think sex is one of the only areas that we stop learning when we're 16. You know, we have this sort of sex education period at school, which is crap by all accounts, especially for our generation. And then the idea that you would continue your sexual education is really weird. Like if you're someone that's like, oh, I'm going to a sex talk or I'm going to do a workshop around my pleasure, people are like, ooh.

But if you're like, oh, I'm going to learn about digital marking and SEO, they're like, yes, girl boss, love that for you. That's so true. Right. So then you get to this age and you're expected to be like this absolute expert. Like you're not in any other area of your life. And as you said, like we then assume the other person is an expert. And so we're too embarrassed to say, I don't know,

or can we take it slow? can we figure this out or I'm not feeling good, we just show up with this, like, front and say, like, we're amazing. The backpack. The backpack. We show up with the backpack. And, I mean, Lucy, Coco de Maire creates a range of wonderful sex toys, including the wonderful range of backpacks.

Do you do sex backpacks? Oh, my gosh, a backpack for your sex toys. Imagine if you showed up on a date. That's a better backpack than a backpack of issues and shame, right? That's so true. That should be a thing. You should create that. Pillows of shame.

I will have any excuse to have more stuff on me at all times. I will gladly take up. So if you create a backpack for sex toys, which one could bring to a date as a way, good conversation opener. Would you admit, though, what was in yours? Or would you tell them there were sex toys in there? You know, yeah, I love.

You'd be like, are there so many toys? I love shocking people. I love, shocking people. Shame, anxiety. Exactly. Each sex toy, represents a point of vulnerability. So this ginormous dildo

represents the fact that I'm actually terrified of the penis. That would be, I think, fantastic. Do you think maybe women overthink things somehow? Just like, could we ever just go into it and just try

and have a bit of fun or have a laugh as a face? It's a crazy thing to say. I wouldn't have a business, do you see if that was the case? But you kind of think, you know, it should be fun and it shouldn't we shouldn't be that you know it's it doesn't have to be perfect like again like women being people pleases it's like we're also perfectionists and it's like you know we're not

going to do it unless it's absolutely perfect and the reality is is that you know in the same way as you know the the sex you see in porn isn't real but also the sex you see in a Hollywood movie or the sex you read in a book are not real they're like the perfect version but reality is is that things can be a bit messy and things can go wrong or things cannot work out and sometimes you'll shut yourself after anal right it goes wrong there it happens oh and let's sorry the scene in macaela cole's um what's they called yeah yeah exactly i mean destroy you with a clot of period blood that's real i love seeing that and it's so true it's messy and it's undefined and that's all okay yeah it doesn't matter as long as you're having fun and you're having a good time

because that's what it's for, right? Exactly, and you feel comfortable in that space and you're enjoying it and you don't need to... And I agree with that. But sorry, you were saying something about something we sell at Coco. Yeah, no, I was going to... Well, I was going to keep in the backpacks. Not shit for me.

To highlight all the wonderful toys that you create. You're pushing my business better than me. I completely change the subject. You tried to tell me out backpacks that you don't sell, so you want to promote a product. Don't come to us. Don't come to Cocoa if you want a backpack to put sex toys in. That's disappointing to say the least.

I have to, but I want to, look, we'll talk about that later. I can be the ambassador for. New her hustle range. Yeah, exactly. You see a collaboration right there. Exactly. It sells one to me. But, I mean, these wonderful sex toys that you're creating, anal toys I've got,

I looked at strap-ons, couple toys to name a few. Literally gone onto our website and read out the list. Look, I wanted to plug your stuff, okay? But all these products are wonderful and they are fantastic for sexual exploitation. But again, communication is such a key thing.

And I think that I've definitely grown up with the idea that sex toys and stuff like that is for the kind of like crazy sex people. That's for the like leather clad... Oh, you know you're wearing leather dress, but like leather cladboard. Wipe dry. Leather club like bondage people who are doing fetish and spanking stuff

and that freaks me out especially someone who has like issues around sex and so I just want to... But it's interesting because my generation it's actually really different because I'm a lot older than you and in when I was growing up

what I can remember but sex toys were not considered for the crazy sex people sex toys were for the lonely single people that couldn't get real sex, so they had to use something made from silicon. Now they had sex dolls. Yeah, exactly. And that's how it was considered. And it was like, you know, you only used a sex toy if you couldn't get the real thing. And so that actually is something that has really changed because now it's, I mean, listen, the last two years has had a massive

change in that respect because lockdown has absolutely changed people's perceptions of sex toys. and sex toy sales have rocketed globally in the last 18 months with lockdown and whether that was couples home alone and just really bored of each other and thought well we may as well try something else because one of them just goes to hide in the bathroom to use them at you. Everyone's building a garden shed for their workouts. Or people that were in lockdown alone and didn't, you know. So it did really improve and you did people suddenly see, and you also saw the kind of progression from lockdown

one to lockdown two and how everyone was like, by lockdown three, it was like hardcore. Like literally, they had like the cute bedside table ones. Exactly. Because it's a bit like 10 years ago when 50 Shades of Grey first came out and whatever you think of the books

it was absolutely provided a step change in the erotic industry and it made suddenly people were talking about BDSM on the tube which just wasn't any, there was a lot of hidden desires that came out that people hadn't been comfortable talking about. So it did, you know, commercialise that world. And people did.

And we would have people coming into the shop and it was kind of, there was a sort of slight connection because E.R. James had called Christian Gray's red room after the Coca-a-Mess store, which is red, because she'd always shopped with us. And so she put that. And but people would come into the store and they'd, you know, ask for stuff that they'd read about in the book.

And he'd be like, have you ever used anything like this before? Like, do you want to go five steps back and not go straight in for this? It's like, you know, you want to build up. But it's like, you know, they read it and there's something like, oh yeah, that sounds fun. And, you know, and it's again, it's that reality versus fantasy. But, you know, it has, you do, it's kind of since then, it all sort of went a little bit quiet. And then it sort of picked up. And in the last few years, I think, you know, it's really felt like these topics are being discussed more.

And they are becoming just more mainstream. You know, as a business, lingerie used to be the only thing we could ever talk about publicly. Everything else was just a bit niche. You know, and it was like, the toys were one thing, but then there was the bondage and then there was the latex and all this. And it was like, you couldn't market any of that.

That was just for people in the know who'd know to come to you. The crazy sex people. Those crazy sex people. Yeah. We're like, the lonely people here, so we don't call them crazy. No, I know. Now I'm like, hey, take me in. I want to be crazy. I want to, well, it's fun.

It's also pleasurable. I mean, I only got a vibrator at university because a friend was like, don't you have a vibrator? And I was like, no, that's gross. Like, I don't have a vibrator. And then I got a vibration and was like... She says using her toothbrush every night. No, legit once.

I actually have shared this personal story previously and probably shouldn't do it now, but I will. You are going to die. I read... Sister in front rows, like, was it my toothbrush? No worse. It was... I read on this feminist self-pleasure site

run by Betty Dodson, who's a sex, yes, who's like, you know, the... Exactly, she's an icon. Therefore, I took her word as gospel. And she said on a website, I was, okay, let me set the scene. It was Christmas. I was at home for holidays. It was her sisters.

And I didn't have anything... We were in Christmas forever. I didn't have anything like. with me and I was like oh you like kind of you know it's Christmas so Santa baby Santa baby got me feel rarled off in my you know parents house and she said

that we should get more in touch with nature and how we masturbate and suggested using vegetables we obviously had a fridge filled with vegetables the Christmas carrots suffered well there was nothing left well so by the time I had these the urges I could no longer resist

all we had left in the fridge was carrot like cold ginormous carrots and so I was like followed Betty Dodson's instructions and she's like you know make sure you shave the skin off I was like obviously Betty what do you take me for

got off all the dirt and crap with that and then yeah use the carrot which I would say Betty maybe an icon but like don't do that it was Emma did it go into the Christmas dinner that's something you really want to know it was

circle of life baby it's just you know nothing to be ashamed of it's all natural stuff exactly so i wouldn't recommend that um a hundred percent but anyway yeah i'm really glad that sex toys have a progress do not christmas is coming up christmas is coming up and i would say go home armed with whatever you need to get to the cocoa de mare go home the cocoa de mare order rather than the carrot i think in retrospect i think a courgette or something softer would have been a more preferable option and not refrigerated because the coldness is unpleasant

to say the least. Or that finger that you love so much. Maybe you can just use your fingers. Get back to nature like you can use these. They do the job. Be a vegetable. A natural baby, I tried it, whatever. But just before you move off on that point

like let's take it away from a little bit longer. But we're talking about like pleasure, female pleasure tonight and the taboos around female pleasure, but we do have some male guests with us tonight. And actually, sex toys for men, I think, is still quite to be. I think more so than women. Like, I think we are starting to turn a corner where, especially for our generation,

it is okay to have a sex toy. It's less okay to use a carrot, but we'll take it. But a man shoving a carrot up his bottom, I mean, that would be a whole other thing. But seriously, but sex toys for men, I think, is still quite a taboo, right? on that point, Billy, actually, how would you go about bringing in a sex toy with a sexual partner, new

or old? Mark, over to you. I think I just need to go to the room. This is my partner in the room. But if you were, more generally not specific to you, Billy and Mark. It's a bit late for that, I feel.

Sorry. How did we? bring sex toys into the bedroom. Listen, I just admitted to using a carrot at Christmas. I think, you know, we've all come out of our box tonight, or I have anyway. But, you know, I remember with a previous partner bringing up that I'd like to try using, I think I got like a cock ring from the pound shop that I was obsessed with. And I basically bought anything that was on distance.

Your sex life has been so low end today. I'm really, I'm really, I just, can you just, like, fit her out? Can you just sort her out? Please, I know. I just can't take it. Thank you. We just our petitions, saw our MSSX line,

off to the pound land and mum's carrot. You're a sophisticated woman, honey. Look at you. You can do better than this. You would think so, but sadly not. Anyway, look, I bought this one pound cock ring alongside whatever other crap that we could get for a pound. And I suggested it to my partner at the time.

I was like, I got this one pound cop ring. Like, I'd like to try it. And he was shocked. about the fact that it was a pound, but the fact that I was suggesting using a cop ring. It just, I think for him it was, you know, Billy, as you've just highlighted, it felt like it was, like affronting his masculinity. It made him feel, I think, like, I was, yeah, that he wasn't good enough. It had nothing to do with that. I just wanted to be, you know, to explore. Be one of those crazy sex ladies. I just wanted to be a crazy sex lady with a one pound

conquering. Did you put both in front of him, the Kara and the, and the ring and say, which one do you want to use? I think shopping together and talking about it together is key. Rather than presenting well, but walk me through this. Particularly with the, look what I just bought from a pound. And she peels off the special

price sticker. But genuinely, how would you recommend either both of you bringing up welcoming in a sex toy into having sex with partner? So Lucy, I'm sure you, you're where we're talk much more to this one, the actual toy component. But I think it starts, like we've

spoken about already tonight, around communication. So it starts before you even bring in a sex toy into the bedroom. It starts with communicating your needs and your desires and your pleasure. And so that starts with you first, understanding that for yourself. And again, we've already said this tonight, but being able to communicate that without sending shivers down your spine, like Emma. But it starts with you being able to articulate that to yourself and have a language that you feel comfortable using and articulating and then articulating that to your partner in a way that is in a non-sexual setting often like often when we're in the heat of the moment it can feel very vulnerable and very intimate and there the vulnerabilities can show up that backpack that emma is talking

about feels heightened and more sensitive and actually taking that outside of the bedroom on a nice walk on a nice stroll and just talking about you know what's working in our relationship what's not working, re-framing it as a positive. I'm still growing in the role as CEO. I need some lessons. But taking it out of that bedroom context where things are heightened, where emotions are a bit more fragile and there are kind of vulnerabilities. And being able to discuss, you know, I love it when we do this in the bedroom or I really enjoy this element of our sex life.

I just shivered as you said that. Like, what is wrong with me? I'm like, oh, you're on a journey, honey. You're on a journey. Was it once a month here, though? Communication is so hard. Oh, gross. But this thing is if you can't communicate to your partner outside of the bedroom about your sex life in any way, suddenly bringing in toys into that environment during the moment, that is actually quite a stretch

and there will probably be sensitivities, baby steps. Because you're almost going to go one back and it's be like, do you know what you want yourself, number one? Do you know what you like? It's like understanding your own body. Like, I don't know what this is, but it was cheap. It was so cheap. But this is the other thing, right?

It's like women, like we don't, we see pleasure as indulgent. And so we're so happy spending like 150 quid on a pair of trainers. But the thought of spending 150 quid on a vibrator. Tell me about it. And we're like, oh no. And you're like, you'd rather put a one pound, like, cock ring like into that. That's probably what he didn't want. That really cheap silicon on his penis.

If you put a special offer tag more than you do. it. I literally don't care what it is. I love a discount. I can't help it. Lucy, can you do a sale for me, especially on me? Don't what you be so cheap? On what you, on anything. If it's full price, it's a half sticker saying special price, I will buy it. We love people like you. Marketing advice. The crazy sex people of me being one of them now. So Lucy, where would you begin? But it is becoming, I think the thing is it is becoming less of a taboo already, particularly amongst couples. I mean, we have so many couples that come in together to buy toys. So I think that is a positive sign that, you know, it is starting. But it is a hundred percent about the

communication, but it's, it's number one about understanding yourself, understanding your own body, knowing what you like, knowing what you want, experimenting on yourself so you do know what you want, because you're never going to be able to describe and talk to somebody about what you like if you don't really know yourself or you haven't done it to yourself if it's anatomically possible to do it to yourself. But, you know, and then it's about that communication and that is about having the relationship where you can.

And it is going to be different. You're going to communicate differently with someone that, you know, you've known for a couple of weeks to someone that you're in a long-term relationship with. So it is about determining, you know, how you have that conversation. But you need to be able to.

And that is about respect. for yourself and confidence to be able to express your own desires, you know, comfortably and without shame, because in the same way as, you know, sex toy, you know, there are so many things that are starting to change, but, you know, back in the day with sex toys, you know, if you ever considered talking, like nowadays, you think you're a crazy sex lady if you use a vibrator, as opposed to, oh my God, you're such a loser and you can't get a man, which is what it was 30 years ago. Me and my carrot

would have just been such a pitiful story but I would have been socially outcast. Back in the day as well there was shame around using lubricant and it was like

you know oh well obviously you're just since I said the word lubricant computer can't communicate is like no qualified like you are

that's their version of shaking tech being embarrassed but it's the same you know it was like that attitude that a woman had again of

overthinking and shame of, oh, well, if I need lubricant, that must be because I'm like old and dry and I can't get wet. I'm broken, I'm not wet enough. Yeah, exactly, as opposed to it is totally normal. And actually, the world of BDSM and the fetish world absolutely normalizes all of that.

Like, lube is everybody's best friend in that world. And there's absolutely, you know, not no shame, but it would be really weird not to want to use it. And it's got nothing to do with whether a woman is, broken as you say or whether she's issues and and so it's just you know all of these things get broken down you know eventually it just takes a long time but but i think there is and and there are still you you know and also i think you find heterosexual relationships are where the majority of these taboos come out because there's no taboo about sex toys with in male gay

relationships the there is basically no orgasm gap in lesbian relationships but there's a huge orgasm gap in heterosexual relationships. Sorry, the orgasm gap is ginormous. I was looking up my stats and ahead of today and I was like what the fuck, it's not just me. But again, in heterosexual relationships. But also...

Just, sorry, stat. A study found that 39% of women said they always orgasm when they masturbate compared to 6% during sex. Another study conducted by Durex found that 20% of women said they don't orgasm compared to

2% of men. Three out of four women said they can't achieve orgasm during sex, while 30% of men said they thought the best way to help a woman orgasm is through penetrative sexual acts. Sex education is working well. Sorry, we just had to get some stats in there. I just want to make sure that everyone was aware of the extent of the problem. It is big, it is big.

But just going back to what you were saying there, we just talked about sex toys in terms of a long-term relationship. But actually, again, if you're having a one-night stand or you're kind of quite casual in your sexual relationships, what is the goal of that? Surely it's about your pleasure. Like if you're taking someone home to have sex with them and you have no interest in that being a long-term relationship,

then that evening is about you and your pleasure and that person's pleasure. And so if you really enjoy a toy and you bring that into that evening and they try and shame you for that, or they try and, yeah, tell you that's weird or get really uncomfortable, that's pretty telling in whether you should continue having sex of that person that night. Like, are you really going to get your needs met anyway? Are they really respectful of your pleasure then?

And so I think it's also determining, like, are you in a long-term relationship? Are you single? What are you trying to get from that experience? And as you said, Lucy, like, feeling confident enough in yourself and your needs and desires that if someone else tries to shame you or feel weird or make you feel awkward about it, you're confident enough that that's not strange and it's not weird

and it's your pleasure and it's your needs and they can leave if... I so agree. And I think so much of that is about boundaries and boundaries are something about

I talk about frequently at home because we've both ascertained that we have porous boundaries. Is Elsworth like stop using my carrots? Is that like the one boundary that you have at home? Just setting all these unreasonable boundaries in our flat and I can't stand it.

And all the veggies now like labelled I'm going to regret having shared that story. I feel certain. No, it's the best. But, yeah, well. No judgment. Yeah, really. But I think, I've been thinking a lot about boundaries recently because I think I have typically

really not known what my boundaries are and have always, there's a kind of, in two ways. I've one, I'm super curious and always want to like, oh, what is that? Oh, yeah, I want to try, that person wants to do things like this. Okay, cool. Let me see if, like, that works for me. and also then not really taking the time and it goes back to that kind of self-worth component of this conversation which we began on

about really actually respecting, acknowledging and then honoring how I feel in certain circumstances and an incident recently which I'm actually not going to share but really made me sit back and think about what my boundaries are because I felt so deeply uncomfortable from like what happened and I really had to sit with that for a while

and my sister is often telling me and I never listen, but then on that moment I listened, that whatever you're feeling in the moment, like, it is legitimate. You don't need to have, you don't need to, like, you know, seek to justify through external, like, through rationale or whatever, how you feel, like how you feel is legitimate,

and it's worth listening to. And I think that's so important in the context of sex, being able to build up an understanding of where your boundaries lie. And that doesn't preclude you from being exploratory, and from being sexually curious but I think it's just important to be able to feel safe in the context of sex and it's what I've realized

in not doing that I have a lot of like trauma around sex because I've never been able to say no or been able to say stop I've never felt empowered enough to be that and so I've oftentimes continued having sex and I've really really not been okay and I've really

not been enjoying it and through not saying no I think it's built up this idea in my head that it's a road in any sense of having boundaries. And I was reading this newsletter by Galdem's CEO recently, and she talked about this idea of emotional safety, which I thought was so pertinent to this topic. And it's this idea of, like, what does emotional safety mean to you personally?

And I'm going to quote her, because I have to quote her, because it's such a good thing. Yeah. She said, her therapist began describing responses and symptoms of being or feeling emotionally unsafe in a session. And she described it as being, relative absence of sensation,

inability to defend oneself, passivity, all these things felt all too familiar. And so did ideas like racing thoughts, impulsivity, hypervigilance and rage. And just reading that, I thought that's so often, like how I feel, I feel emotionally unsafe in a lot of sexual situations, unable to assert my boundaries

because I haven't defined them well enough with myself, and therefore I don't know how to define them in the context of someone else. And so I think, as we think about what having happier, more gratifying, more mutually beneficial sex means, I think like the first most important thing is understanding what your personal boundaries are and feeling safe enough to be able to set them down.

Yeah, I think that's a really powerful point that you brought up there and I think, yeah. That was good. Thank you. Yeah, well done. You can leave happy tonight. But it's what you said was around how your feeling is really valid.

But actually, for a lot of us, even understanding our feelings and recognizing that we're feeling something in the moment rather than retrospectively is really hard because we've switched off our feelings or we've not taken time to get in tune with our feelings. And that's a lot of the work that we do with Furley that we spoke about mindful sex at the beginning of this.

And the idea of mindful sex isn't about creating a meditation practice and becoming a monk. It's about tuning in and being present. and aware in the moment and for a lot of us we have these constant racing minds where we're worried about how we smell, how we taste, how we look

are our stomach rolls attractive at this angle, is alighting doing anything for our double chin? Like all of these constant worries is his pleasure, is he enjoying himself? Have I said anything weird that in the moment you're so disconnected from how you actually feel that it's

not until afterwards that you kind of sit there and reflect and suddenly these emotions come up, we're like, oh, I don't feel good, and I'm not sure why, and I'm not sure when I didn't feel good, and I'm not sure when that boundary was crossed, and that stops us from being able to set boundaries from a more kind of negative way, and being able to create safety for ourselves, but also experiencing pleasure as well, because we're not tuning into how we're feeling, so it's not until afterwards that we're like, oh, that thing felt really good, and I could have gone further on that, but I wasn't actually aware that it was feeling really nice, and I

wasn't communicating though it was feeling really nice and that again comes back to that performative piece that you were speaking about we're so sometimes lost in the performance almost lost in the performance yeah and we're like oh this is how I need to do sex rather than this is how I feel about sex in the moment and it comes back to what we start the conversation with this the expectation around what sex should be like how we should feel about sex how we should feel in sex how we should communicate or not communicates all these shoulds and the should are essentially, I think they're like the symbols of the taboos around female pleasure that exist. And so I think it's about unlearning all the things we've grown up thinking about sex

and actually tapping into what we genuinely feel in certain, you know, certain sexual situations. And why we need to have more conversation about it and not conversation as in communication, but conversation. Sex talks. Yes, Lucy. That's exactly what we need. Exactly more sex talks. A monthly talk would be helpful. That's a page. Made for by the edition. Exactly. Budget. Please.

Yeah, but it, but you know, it is about what you, what girls are going to grow up just thinking is normal and hearing about in society. And that's the bigger picture of just seeing it there. And then maybe that will just naturally take away the shame and not, obviously, if you have specific issues, but the general, if you don't and it's just, because you just think, you know, we talked about before how. this manifests in business, for instance. So, you know, as a business, we cannot advertise on social media. So the, you know, the advertising of sex toys is banned on Facebook or

Instagram. And even, you know, as Coca-and-a-mare, we call ourselves the home of pleasure. And we were putting forward an advert to get approved on Facebook, which was just showing our lingerie, which is allowed to be advertised. And we had Coca-Nameer, the home of female pleasure, and the advert got banned. And then we removed the word female, and we had the home of pleasure, and it got approved. So I think it just shows that, you know,

the algorithms that are keeping, you know, social media and the internet going, are very biased against women. It's not even the algorithms. Yeah. Because it's actually the policy teams, which makes me even more much. Like, if it was the algorithms,

you'd be like, okay, we've badly trained the algorithms. But we have this, and the policy teams have come back and said, the words, pleasure, arousal, desire are not allowed. They are scientific words, but apparently they're obscene. And also pleasure isn't necessarily about sex. It doesn't have to be sex. You can get pleasure from other things, right? It may be a different type of people, but you know, you can have pleasure from reading a good book, having a bath, seeing a friend. I mean, all of these things can give us pleasure.

and as I was saying we're bringing out a campaign next week that is about reveal your pleasure and it comes from that conversation about wanting to champion female pleasure and by the fact that we are stopped from doing that in so many ways and how there has been so much change and yet so little change over the years and we started this campaign by we were reading this book called the awakening from the 19th century. It was written by an author called Kate Chopin, and it's kind of considered now

to be one of sort of the early works of feminism. But at the time it came out, and she was vilified, the book was hugely criticised for focusing on female pleasure. And when I read it in 2021, I mean, I read it first of all, and I'm like, am I missing something?

There's no sex in here. Literally, I was like, what's the big deal? But it was just because it was a woman talking about feeling pleasure or imagining it, not even acting on it, just having those thoughts about another person that, you know, it got banned and actually she died a few years later kind of basically in exile from bringing out this book. And you just think, you know, since then, so much has changed, but so little because we are still in that situation where we are being censored today. And it's, you know, we're trying to get.

people to, you know, post on social about what does give them pleasure, an image of themselves and pleasure, which doesn't have to be sexual in any way, with that hashtag of Reveal Your Pleasure, so that it's just, again, it's about that raising awareness and normalising it, so that it just becomes something that we see all the time, and therefore the generations coming up will see all the time, and we'll hopefully then start changing how we feel about it and how we're games. Just on that point, though, as well, because we've talked a lot about sex education

at school being really bad. But actually, we as parents, as future parents, play one of the most important roles in educating the next generation. And actually, we place a lot of emphasis on schools providing that education. And again, it's that offloading of someone else's responsibility to do this.

But actually, we start to develop our sexual identity as young. as two and three years old, and we're learning that from our parents and seeing the types of relationships that they have, the way that they do intimacy, the way that they do touch. And so this is not just important for ourselves, you know, the exploration of our own pleasure and our own joy and that sexual relationships, but it's actually so important if we want to create change and bring up sex positive children. You know, children that have respect for women, respect for themselves, respect for men,

understand that their sexuality is more than just this physical act of sex, that it is a really important component of our well-being, and that is our responsibility as women and as men and as parents. And so, you know, even if we don't do it for ourselves, you know, even if we can't get over the taboo or the shame of saying pussy or vagina or vulva, we need to find that level of comfort for our children and for the next generation. Totally and not be skimish about it. I mean, so many fasting points raised just then,

and I think we'd have a whole other discussion on the male centricity of the way that advertising policies are implemented on social media platforms. I have a lot to say on that. However, I am aware that we have been sitting here for a while and I don't want people

to get itchy in their seats. And I'm thinking that some people might have some questions that they'd like to ask. So I want to turn it now over to the audience to potentially raise your hand, ask a question or two before we wrap up and have a last drink

and hopefully chat openly and without shame about sex with one another. We want to hear all your carrot stories, basically, is what I'm just saying. Make me feel less alone. Lord, help me. Does anyone have any questions or anything? You don't even need to have a question. Just something that you've been thinking as we've been talking that you'd like to share. No pressure, but I mean, come on, I've overshared.

Yes. Hi, guys. I just wanted to ask a little bit of a personal question of sex. Is it like you feel like you have moments

where you're like shit is it not working with these guys who've got email Is it like? It's like dire 100% personally me

100%. So, you know, building this company and going through this has been as much as a personal development journey as it has been a professional development journey. And it's almost a little bit like Pandora's Box. The more you know, the more you're like, oh God, oh God. So sometimes, you know, we're in the moment and all I can think about is all of these statistics and all the things I should be doing it right to do it right. And I'm like, I'm doing it so badly. God. And then you get in your head again. So yes 100% I still don't do it right but from where I

was to where I am now is amazing and I'm going to speak on behalf of both of us but I do that this is the healthiest relationship I've ever been in. We are able to really communicate freely and openly with each other and that means sometimes we're getting it wrong and sometimes we are like

this isn't working and this isn't happening for us and sometimes that's huge droughts and sometimes it's lots of sex and you know And that's just recognizing that there is no perfectionism to it and there is no sort of end goal and you're never going to be an expert and you're never going to get it right all the time.

You don't want to be an expert either. You know, I think it's... And there's like no such thing as normal. Yeah. And that's the thing, it's constant learning. And because our sexuality is influenced by the world around us, every kind of new life stage will present a new sexual identity for you and you have to step into that and be ready to explore that,

whether that's living with a partner for the first time or having a baby or divorce or loss or really stressful job and the idea that we can just learn this once and then we never have to revisit it is such a myth and that is so true because particularly as women our bodies and our feelings

and all of our emotions and hormones change so many times throughout our life from puberty to giving, you know, to being pregnant to giving birth to having young kids to going through menopause whatever it would be, you're all feeling different and our body reacts differently at all of those times. So it is going to be a

constant learning curve. And if anything, it's almost the more you know is probably a negative. I mean, with my industry, I feel like working in the industry I work in, if I meet a guy, they're normally like, oh, she's going to be total freak.

I'm not going back to her house. I'll be like, you know, she'll have a gimp in the basement. That'd be like, padded walls. and they're literally like, you know, they come back and they probably are just like, oh my gosh, she's so boring. I expected so much more. But, you know, there is that, you know,

understanding and sometimes you have to be like, well, it's my business. You know, I'm not that I'm literally living that every minute of the day. I do have to do other stuff. But on a lesson, no, I actually really empathise that. I think because I keep talking about sex all the bloody time now because the sex therapy thing,

I think there's an assumption that I'm also going to be really, the crazy sex people, And literally something the other day, basically, you didn't say it in so many words, but has very clearly alluded to the fact that I just like quite vanilla sex at the moment. And that's fine. But there's that expectation. I almost feel like a bit of a failure in that. Like I'm not being like, woo, bring my backpack and my carrots.

But stuff with me. And I had a puppy at home and I'd put down all this. An actual puppy. Yeah, yeah. A real, a canine puppy. The new sex toy coming soon for Christmas. a horse out the back. And I'd put down all this like plastic sheeting for him to we.

Like when I was training in. And this guy came back and he was like, oh fuck. It's just like, what are you going to do? Why does it need to be, why does there need to be plastic covering all this? And I was like, oh, no, no, no, no, no. Get on the bed. Hands up. Let me get my, I don't think cuff links, not cuff links.

My, handcuffs out. Handcuffs out. But what's actually really interesting that we're talking a lot about these assumptions that if you're interested in sex or exploring sex that you're like very sex positive or sexually weird as Emma kind of said it. But actually what we, you know,

our app has been used by 250,000 women now and the majority of those are coming from a negative place with their sexuality, struggling with sexual difficulties, and they're trying to explore it because it's having a detrimental impact on their overall health and well-being. And so actually this is what kind of said it already tonight but it's when you're not in a good place of your sex life it can have such

a profound impact into all other areas of your life and so many people are coming at it through that lens rather than the lens of like I want to become some sort of sexual ninja is actually like I want to get like to a really just like healthy place and then like oh my god honey when we're when you say it me too yeah sounds really sounds really fun but no I and actually just to continue that point like so much of like kind of what I've learned the past year for me it's just been like not hating my body and not feeling gross in my own skin and translating that in the context of then being intimate with someone else and yeah that's not like crazy sex person vibes but for me like it's kind of being able to like yeah to step into my body in a way that feels peaceful and I feel like that

then can be the opening up of a new chapter that could be potentially then more exploratory um do we have any more questions you can see I've cast aside my script I'm everyone's coming to listen to us I'm anyone with a drink. Sorry, God. Do we... We've got one down here. Oh, so, thanks, Billy. Really honest to the question.

Georgia. Hi. You kind of have a little bit about it, almost even to, like, you know, just getting into a little bit of women. So you're talking about the, like, sexual revolution of men and stuff like me and now just get a bit like a female sexual revolution.

Yeah. And kind of interesting to be, like, what comes next? Like, apart from the skiing, like, or a couple of a thousand or like totally actual time but like I don't know like

you've seen any really interesting friends or like who's a bunch of fine or what is a great question well I can't really talk to toys and things because I'm not I'm not specifically about as I'll lead that to Lucy but I think

we're still so far away from healthy and like happy so actually like I think we've still got you know unfortunately decades ago until every woman can say that she has a healthy relationship to her sexuality and has got the power to do that. So the kind of blue sky for our space is when we see an investment in your sexual well-being as normal as your physical well-being and your mental well-being. And we're just starting to get there with our mental well-being. And it's been, you know, a decades-long kind of journey over that and really in the last 10 years.

And I think that will be really exciting, you know, when we are, we've got sexual well-being. pop-ups and you go in there at lunchtime to have a masturbation or a meditative session around your sensuality. That would be incredible and exciting. Masturbation at what? Furley coming 2022. That's mad.

How about mad is that? Making pleasure realising that pleasure is a necessity and not a luxury. You know? It's just normalised. And so it's like about continuing to catalyze that conversation.

Carrots in the office place. Yes. I mean, minibals and vegetables. When they start offering that as employee benefits, you know, when they start offering apps like Furley as an employee benefit and they recognize the importance of sexual well-being,

I mean, I like can't even quite imagine that future yet. And that feels in this room probably quite ordinary and like it shouldn't be that far away. But we were just talking about earlier, like, oh no, sorry, Alana, but we were talking about it. Men are still, investors are still asking the questions, like, do women actually need this?

type of service. Do women actually suffer with sexual difficulties? Do women actually... Or do they care? Are they interested enough in sex? Because, you know, there's all that. And we did something recently to see, because you know that kind of classic statistics

of, you know, men think about sex every six seconds or something. And just doing that of like... I do now. Do women. And actually, you know, women do. And I think it was something about 80% of women thought about sex at least five. five or more times a day.

So it's kind of, you know, it is that. But it is still, again, it's just part of that taboo that it's not normal, it's not thought of as every day and there is that concept. Because it's just those old school, like old wives tales from years ago if you know the woman's got a headache and doesn't want to have sex and all of that. And that just kind of perpetuates because it's been going for so many years.

And that's where science is only just catching up as well. and like where the scientific literature is finally starting to come into the mainstream into the consumer. The biggest myth that I want to debunk and I've told Emma this already is this idea that men and women's desire and arousal operates in the same way.

And this is I think one of the biggest myths that has helped create this narrative that women just aren't that intersex. The majority of men have something called a spontaneous desire, so they see someone gorgeous that they think is very attractive and they're immediately like,

oh, yeah, I'm aroused and that's got that. going. And for women, most of us is responsive. So we need a wider context to be all in alignment for us to feel the same way. And it's easy to achieve when you know what it is. But if you've got no idea that your aroused on desire operates in that way and you have no idea what your context is for getting aroused, then you're not going to set it up. And therefore, you're going to have these lower areas of desire and feel like I'm just not into sex. But it's something that can be cultivated through these practices.

That fucking narrative really pisses me off because we are just as sexual as men. Just as sexual. I couldn't agree more. And on that note, I am. On that note, we are going to wrap it up

because I feel like this is a conversation that we could continue having all night. And we've only just scraped, scratched the surface of what actually will conveniently, what we really need is a monthly series in which we can continue this conversation in perpetuity and oh my god that's exactly what sex talks is so buy your ticket now buy your ticket now buy your advance 12 month package um

lucy billy this has been totally fascinating thank you so much for joining me on the first sex talks and thank you everyone who's who's been here today i found that totally fascinating and i think as i said there's just so much more that we still need to explore and need to talk about and breaking down the taboos that exist around female pleasure is, as we've highlighted, it's an ongoing process and it involves a lot of unlearning and a lot of learning. So that's exactly what we'll do in these talks. But thank you so much for your time and for your contributions. And thank you everyone for listening. Thank you. Thank you. And just so you know, just to plug it, next sex talks will be on November the 25th and I will be speaking to Dr. Karen Gurney, who

She's amazing. Sex therapist who will be doing kind of sex therapy live kind of session followed by an activity writing smutty love letters so that we can all get into the practice of how to write like sexy, dirty. Yes, I'm squirming already, but there we go. Thank you so much, everybody. Thank you. Thank you.

Oh no, I know! I know! I've got, actually, we've got a week for time. Almost an hour. Yeah. Well, no! Well, the thing you're so much. That's really fun.

You're so good. You're so good.