The Everything To Do With Sex Show

This past weekend I had the pleasure of playing intrepid reporter at the Everything To Do With Sex show in Toronto and I must say that it was quite an adventure. The Automotive Centre, where the Sex show is held, was packed with booths selling everything and anything remotely related to sex: sex toys, porn, floggers, costumes, bondage bed-sheets, instructional videos, rope, even "romantic get-away" trips like to Hedonism in Jamaica .

The building was also pretty full of people — but I knew that I couldn't let myself get distracted by the multitudes of women with T & A hanging out, nor by the men who had their tops and bottoms open, if not off.

There was plenty there to distract the average person; besides the paid scantily clad models and booths overflowing with various sex related goodies, around practically every corner was a television screen showing hardcore pornography. In fact, the Roger's booth had about seven screens all showing a different pornographic scene. Mysteriously, we kept finding ourselves standing in front of this booth to re-group, and somehow I ended up switching my home phone to Rogers. To quote my cameraman, "Whoa! I've never seen so many blow jobs going on at once!"

But as I said, I couldn't allow myself to get too distracted by all the goodies; I was a reporter on a mission. I knew that a handful of adult celebrities were going to be at the sex show and I had researched each of them in the hopes that I would have the chance to do a few brief interviews.

My first target was Nikki Benz, a Toronto native who now lives in Arizona. After a successful career as an exotic dancer, Nikki got into the adult film industry at age 21. Since then she has been in over 40 adult films and has appeared in photo spreads for a number of adult and mainstream magazines, like Hustler and Maxim.

I caught Nikki at the sex show signing autographs in the "Screaming O' Cock Ring" booth; she was happy to answer a few questions and even took a photo with me. Here are some highlights from that interview:

Imprint: I know you're currently doing a radio show on KSex. How did you first get into radio?

Nikki Benz: I started off doing guest spots and eventually was asked about doing my own radio show. I really love doing my radio program because it gives my fans another way to enjoy and get in touch with me.

How do you feel about condom use in pornography?

I find that it is easier to do a scene without using condoms. It also looks better on camera. But on our radio show we always promote safe sex for people who are having sex in the "real world." In the porn industry, we have very stringent testing so it is not as dangerous for us to not use condoms in our sex scenes.

What kind of crazy things happen on set when you are filming?

Oh! It's so hard to come up with one on the spot like this! I guess one crazy thing that has happened was when this one guy "finished" before he was supposed to in a scene. When this happens we have to wait around for a while to see if he can be ready to perform again quickly or the studio will have to call in a back-up guy to take his place. It can get expensive for the studio when this happens.

After my interview with Nikki, I thanked her for her time and let her get back to her line of drooling autograph hounds. It was time for me to get over to the dungeon area and track down my next interview, Rubberella (her stage name).

The dungeon area of the sex show was not very big; it was off to the side and mostly curtained off in black with a sign informing us that photography was prohibited in this area.

Inside, we saw a variety of floggers, ropes and other bondage equipment. We even caught a glimpse of a woman being tied up in an elaborate rope corset.

I first spotted Rubberella on The Dungeon Stage (where photography was permitted with permission) giving a demonstration about the joys of wearing latex.

Rubberella is a fetish model who enjoys wearing latex outfits, like her cat-suit and torpedo boob suit. Because her site has some pretty intense photos, Rubberella was actually the person I was most nervous about interviewing that day, but she was very sweet in person. I hopped up on stage to try on some tight black latex gloves and see how they felt.

To get into her tight latex outfits, Rubberella has to lube up her body with water or silicone based lubricant and then rubs another type of coating on the outside to keep her latex looking shiny and to keep it from sticking.

After dutifully rubbing the lube on my hands and slipping on the gloves I could see why Rubberella loves wearing latex so much — it was pretty fun! I then felt ready to meet her at her booth for an interview.

Imprint: What is it like wearing latex all day?

Rubberella: It's very sensual; the latex is tight and I love how it feels squeezing my body. I also find that the latex heightens sensations, so rubbing even just your hands together when you are wearing latex gloves feels much sexier than without. But it is also very hot wearing whole outfits made out of latex; I'm pretty much sweating lightly the whole time.

What do you look forward to after a long photo-shoot or a show like this?

(Laughs) A nice long hot bath.

You wear a lot of different costumes for your photo-shoots, which one is your favourite?

My torpedo boob costume; I use condoms inflated with air to create incredibly huge breasts to wear under this bodysuit. It's part of the character and makes me feel even more like a super-heroine. It is a very fun costume to wear.

Do you find that you bump into a lot of things when you wear that costume?

Yes! It's hard to get used to suddenly having gigantic breasts, so I do sometimes bump into things when I am backstage.

As you can see/read, there certainly was a lot to see at this year’s The Everything to Do with Sex Show. I managed to snag two more interviews that day, as well as attending a seminar on how to strip, Undress for Success, led by Mary Taylor. I also saw a woman have a mould made of her nude upper body, watched some pole dancers defy gravity, and clapped along with the audience to vote for my favourite couple in a blow-job competition (using plastic dildos). And before I headed for home, I even managed to go for a ride in a very comfortable sex swing. All in all, it was a very full day.

For full interviews, keep watching this blog!

Tickling Tentacles

Many people consider tentacle hentai to be one of the most bizarre forms of hentai/ecchi out there. And some people think that's what all hentai is!

But there does seem to be something about tentacle sex that some people do love and that motivates them to see every episode of cult classics like "La Blue Girl" and Injukoshi."

It may surprise you to learn that tentacle porn is not a new thing — it's been around at least since the Edo Period in Japan (1603 to 1867).

Around this time, Katsushika Hokusai, a famous Japanese artist (trust me, you've seen his work), made a woodcut called The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife. " This celebrated piece depicting a woman making out with a small octopus while a bigger one gives her oral sex might seem scary to many Westerners but it is so well loved that in Japan you can buy key chains and other trinkets featuring this image.

There are many factors that led to the production and popularization of tentacle porn in Japan.

Firstly, the Edo period saw an increase in the number of people practising the Shinto religion — Japan's national religion at one point. Shinto is a very friendly religion, involving the worshipping of many gods and spirits connected to nature ", gods and spirits who sometimes had sex with humans in animal or semi-animal form.

A second big factor was the popularity of shunga art, shunga means "pictures of spring" - which is a euphemism for pictures of sex. Hokusai's The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife and his other erotic art were and are still considered beautiful examples of shunga work, though tentacle sex was not destined to be wildly popular until many decades later."

It wasn't until after World War II that tentacle porn resurfaced and soon became extremely popular in Japan. The occupying forces put laws in place banning the representation of genitalia in sex acts. This put a damper on the erotic art being produced at this time — how were people supposed to draw graphic sex acts when they couldn't include any pictures of vaginas or penises?"

If artists couldn't legally draw a penis in their work, what could they possibly use to simulate sex acts? Let's see here, they would need something long and firm and... phallic - hmm, what do we know of that's pretty darn phallic? Hey! How about a tentacle?

That's right, a tentacle — the tentacle could deflower young, horny women and if anyone asked, the artists could safely assert that the tentacle wasn't genitalia, it was just a monster limb that happens to look phallic."

And so tentacle sex took off for the most part because it was the only kind of sex people were allowed to see at the time. Penises were not allowed to be seen in vaginas (or asses or mouths) but the tentacle had free reign. *evil laugh*

Today, even though we now have fairly easy access to "regular"� hentai and porn, many people still enjoy and even prefer images of tentacle sex.

For some it's the power play — the dominant tentacle beast taking the young woman or man and having their way with them.

For others it's the bondage — when you have sex with a tentacled beast, they have enough limbs to hold your arms and legs in any position they want and still penetrate you in every orifice.

For others, it's the multiple penetrations they enjoy. Because of the nature of tentacles, their "victim's" body can be further away. The penetrated characters — what I like to call "fuckees" - can be depicted in ways that would be impossible if the artist had to draw bodies to go with every penetrating tool; thus, there can be more penetrating tentacles than there ever could have been penises.

And for many it's a little of all three of these reasons.

Men and women can look at tentacle sex and see it as symbolic of satisfying and being satisfied by a lover in every possible way and all at once.

In fact, a lot of women do enjoy tentacle hentai because it is a way to indulge in rape fantasies, bondage fantasies, power play fantasies and/or multiple penetration fantasies while staying completely safe — since none of it is or ever can be real.

Yaoi and Yuri H anime

The world of anime and H anime fans is rich and diverse, with many subcultures and niches. Two such subcultures are Yaoi and Yuri.

Yaoi (pronounced "yah-oy" or "yah-oh-ee") is not a real Japanese word, it is "otaku", slang created by anime fans. It refers to manga and hentai that feature men in romantic relationships. This is similar to shōnen-ai and BL (boy love), which also deal with romantic relationships between (young) men, but with one major difference " Yaoi is sexually explicit.

One thing that might surprise you about Yaoi hentai is that is generally created for women. The art is drawn by women, the plot lines are written by women and the target market is women who find sex between two male characters erotic/romantic - similar to the many men who are turned on by lesbians. But despite its female-centred production, Yaoi has generated quite a following among gay men as well.

The relationships in Yaoi, interestingly, tend to repeat the same clichés seen in hetero relationships " but using two men instead. In most of the couples, there is usually a designated "feminized" male called an "uke" (or receiver/bottom) who is often shorter, weaker and/or younger than his partner and a "seme" (or attacker/top), who tends to be bigger and have darker hair. Often, many traditional female stereotypes will be applied to the male uke, such as reluctance, shyness, "romanticness," etc.

Some Yaoi artists like to play on these cultural stereotypes, moving toward characters that are more interchangeable or using characters with reversed stereotyped personalities.

There has even been a trend towards making "muscle yaoi," where both male characters are strong and muscular, with less feminine character traits.

Similar to the Yaoi genre is "Yuri ", manga and H anime with stories of lesbian relationships.

Actually, two words are used to describe anime/hentai with female-female romantic relationships: Yuri usually is used when referring to more explicit sex between two women (that is, lesbian porn) and the term shōjo-ai is typically used to refer to non-sexual (but still romantic) relationships between two female characters.

Similar to the term Yaoi, Yuri is also considered an "otaku" term " Japanese lesbians do not actually refer to themselves using the terms yuri or shōjo-ai.

The word Yuri is Japanese for Lily. Often noted as the first to use of the term "Yuri" to refer to lesbian relationships is Ito Bongaku, the editor of "Barazok," a gay men's magazine, who, in 1971, called lesbians in Japan "the lily tribe", yurizoku.

Some suspect that the term Yuri became commonly used for this style of hentai partly borrowing from Ito's "lily tribe" as a cliché and partly as a reference to the ideals of women being beautiful, pure, innocent, etc., which is symbolically associated with a white lily.

In fact, Yuri plots often do start out quite innocently, typically with two girls who were originally presented as straight or inexperienced, who are then are inexplicably drawn to one another and "get it on."

As with Yaoi, many people enjoy Yuri's twist of stereotypical gender roles, though often there is still a more dominant partner and a more submissive partner (just like in hetero hentai).

Typically, couples will consist of an upperclassman, the "senpai" and a less experienced lowerclassman, the "kouhai."

One famous Yuri couple that you might be familiar with are two characters from the series Sailor Moon: Sailor Uranus, who had short blond hair and wore a boy's uniform, had a lesbian relationship with Sailor Neptune, who was shorter with long aqua hair.

Even within Yuri there are sub divisions: we have "shonen yuri," created by men for a male audience, which tends to feature more explicit sex and less romantic plot lines; there is "shoujo yuri," created by women for a female audience, which often has less sex but more emphasis on relationships; and finally, what some call "pure" yuri, which is written by lesbians for a lesbian audience.

No matter the gender of the author, artist or reader, Yuri and Yaoi H anime is important because it provides options, demonstrates different lifestyles and contributes to breaking boundaries and changing how people view relationships in hentai and in the real world.

The Evolution of The Cat-Girl

It’s a known fact that anime artists generally like cats, so the inception of the cat-girl is no surprise, but the nature of cats surely plays a role as well. Cats have many important qualities that make them perfect for being combined with young women in hentai and anime.

There is something luxurious and sensual about cats, how they carefully clean their lithe bodies, strut around a home, and seem to look somehow mysterious. But cats are also cute and playful — getting into trouble, seeking pleasure and fun; and their perky ears and frisky tails are just too darn cute. Please excuse me, I’m having a cat moment. ^_~

Historically, cats have frequently been connected with women. In ancient Egypt, cats were linked with fertility and were considered the embodiment of the goddess Bastet. The Romans and Norse people picked up on this idea and cats were connected with their fertility goddesses as well (Artemis and Freya).

Fertility and sex were strongly associated with women because even what we might now consider our primitive ancestors, were able to recognise that having sex with a fertile woman led to babies — which was very important for cultivating the land, building civilizations and massing armies. This made women, with their sexuality and almost mystical fertility, important and valuable to these societies.

When Christianity started spreading across Europe, the cat (and women) maintained this association with sex, sensuality and fertility, but in a less positive light. This was a time when women were considered to be the weaker and sinful sex. The lustful mating behaviour and previous pagan associations made the cat an ideal symbol of Eve — who was now considered to be the first “sinful” woman.

For centuries, cats were used in European artwork to imply carnality, sensuality and temptation.

And, because of its association with sensuality and sex, the cat became the symbol of prostitution and courtesans in the 15th century.

Men in this era talked about chasing “cats tail” — this is where terms like “tail” and “pussy” (as applied to women and their genitalia) originated.

Even today, we still use terms like “sex kitten” in a play on the sensuality associated with both women and cats.

Cats were not just popular in ancient Europe, many other countries and cultures have prized the cat for thousands of years — and since they missed out on the European “re-education” of dark/middle ages, their cats (and women) did not tend to pick up any demonic associations.

In Japan cats were a favourite pet of the nobility and were connected with luck and good omens — today there is still a Buddhist temple in Japan dedicated to cats. In addition, many homes and businesses, even in North America, still display Maneki Neko statues of a cat with a raised paw, who welcomes good luck and fortune.

So, back to cat-girls and hentai.

A cat girl is essentially a girl/woman with cat ears. Sometimes they have a cat’s tail and/or whiskers. Cat-girls who want to look particularly cute will also wear big gloves and shoes or slippers that look like cat paws — but they do not usually have any fur on their bodies, aside from the ears and tail.

Because the main requirement to be a cat-girl is the ears, they are often called Nekomimi, which means “cat ears.”

Why do we like cat girls? In anime and especially in hentai, cat-girls are naughty, playful, and horny — what’s not to love? Maybe it’s because cats have been associated with women and sex and sensuality for so long that the cat-girl just seems to fit with our perceptions of playful sexuality. The cat-girl could be the personification of the sensual hedonist that lies inside every woman.

Oh! And there is also the suspicious similarity between semen and a saucer of cream. ^_~

Cartoon Copulation: H anime/Hentai

I’ve decided to declare October the official Hentai month for my column. When I mentioned this idea to some of my friends, half of them said “what’s that?” and the other half explained to the first half that it was “cartoon porn.”

Technically, I suppose that is an accurate description, but I think that the often beautiful art and culture of hentai deserve a more detailed explanation.

Hentai is pronounced “hen-tie.” It’s a Japanese word that literally means “strange appearance” though it is often colloquially defined as the Japanese translation for “perversion,” which doesn’t necessarily have negative connotations.

In North America, “hentai” usually refers to sexually-explicit or adult-themed anime, manga and computer games. But in Japan, this pornographic material is referred to with terms like “ecchi” or “H anime” (sexual/pornographic anime), “eroanime” (derived from erotic anime), or “seijin manga” (adult manga) — and a person might be referred to as “hentai” (perverted).

[For those not in the know, Anime is a certain style of animation that originated in Japan and features characters with big eyes and hairstyles that often defy gravity. Anime is extremely popular all over the world and there are different types of anime for different age groups.]

Erotic drawings and art have been around for centuries; in Japan they became widely popular in the Edo period. At this time, it was common for men to travel to the city and learn valuable skills before returning to their hometown to get married.

Controlled, legalised prostitution and pornographic art were introduced to fulfill the sexual needs of these men while they were away from home.

Even famous artists like Hokusai — whose work you would have seen at the poster sale — were supplementing their income by creating beautiful erotic woodcuts called shunga, which were hung in the houses of noblemen, turned into educational “pillow” books for newlyweds, or printed with a few descriptive sentences and used as a masturbatory aid.

Some people are confused by the attraction of hentai, “why would you want to look at cartoons having sex instead of real people?” There are different reasons why someone might enjoy H anime.

For some, it is the love of anime; they might have favourite characters from series that they watch, such as Asuka and Rei, from the popular series “Evangelion.”

Finding erotic drawings of the characters is just another way to enjoy and appreciate them on another level. Imagine if you could easily find erotic photos of your favourite live action crush from TV — that’s the fun for anime fans: no matter what series or video game you enjoy, it’s likely that you can find erotic drawings featuring your favourite characters.

For others it is the perfection of the human body and the sex act portrayed in the H anime. While researching this article online, I found an essay on catsonmars.com explainning that it’s “unlike real life sex that may be tainted by uncertainty or hesitation, there’s no bad sex in anime. Emotions are always at their most pure and unfettered in anime.”

You can also find any type of “coupling” — and I use the term loosely here — that you could possibly want: male-female, male-male (which is extremely popular with readers from both sexes), female-female, male-elf, female-demon, female-male-elf-catgirl-male-demon-female, etc., as well as any scenario you could possibly imagine!

H anime is about expressing a fantasy; whether it is sex acts that might run counter to social norms or acts that are humanly or physically impossible. It’s all about expressing carnal desires and giving in to your subconscious, primal motivations.

That’s why it’s not uncommon in H anime to see a woman being coerced into sex, but later taking the lead.

Many artists enjoy playing with their viewers’ socialised role expectations by creating characters who defy expected norms — like a blushing and innocent-looking librarian who actually runs a demon sex shop out of her basement; or a hunky man who is actually afraid of women.

Hentai isn’t sick or weird; it’s just another portrayal of the sex act, which is intrinsically beautiful. And whether you choose to enjoy your sex with a partner, with actors on a video or with pictures or videos of your favourite anime characters; as long as everyone involved is enjoying themselves, it’s all good.

Love Your Penis

Every so often I receive interesting questions from my readers like “Does evidence exist of high rates of masturbation by males increasing penis size?”

Ah, if only it were true. You fellas would be running off to get your lotion and tissues right now ^_~ — but a lot of masturbation does not really increase penis size.

Although the penis has muscles, they don’t work in the same way as the muscles in, for example, your arm where exercise does increase the size of the muscle. The most important muscles in the penis are in two groups.

One group relaxes to let more blood into the erectile tissue. The corpus cavernosum and corpus spongiosum make up the three sections of spongy erectile tissue that run the length of the penis (corpus cavernosom is also found in the female clitoris).

The two corpus cavernosum sections extend from the pubic bone to the head of the penis and they hold about ninety per cent of the blood in your erection, increasing the length and girth of your penis. The corpus spongiosum surrounds the urethra, preventing it from being crushed during erection and forms the glans or head of the penis. The penis head stays more malleable during an erection because blood drains from the corpus spongiosum more easily than the tissue in the shaft.

The second of the two groups of muscles contract to help keep the blood inside the erectile tissue of the penis. One of them is the ischiocavernosus muscle. This muscle also helps flex your anus and stabilizes your erection — in women it tenses the vagina, this is part of what women are working when they do Kegel exercises.

There isn’t really anything in the penis that can be “exercised” to increase its size. Supposedly you can increase the size of your penis by using a penis pump to extend the spongy tissue inside, but there hasn’t been any hard evidence to back this claim up. Tugging on your penis or hanging weights from it to try to make it longer is much more likely to result in hurting yourself and permanently damaging the tissue. You only have one penis, so please take care of it!

A lot of men worry about their penis size. You know who rarely worries about penis size? Women. You know why? Because we know that even guys with smaller-than-average equipment can still rock our worlds if they know what they are doing.

People always talk about how the media makes women feel inadequate and damages our self-esteem. But men are often neglected in these discussions and they can be victims of media, too.

Porn and spam mail are two of the biggest culprits for lowering men’s self esteem. Sure, guys in porn often have ugly hair and sometimes have ugly bodies, but what do they usually have? They have a penis that is, or appears to be, larger than average. Not only do they seem well endowed, but their partners seem to enjoy it! And if that’s what it takes to satisfy a woman (or man, or both), how can any “average” fellow hope to measure up?

The guys with long shlongs who end up in the porn industry are there for a reason. This is the concept of “over-representation” at work — because you’ve seen so much porn with guys who have big penises, you imagine that everyone must have one, except you. But this isn’t true! It’s called average for a reason; if you really are of average penis size then most guys have penises around the same size as yours or smaller! You shouldn’t worry about those in the porn industry.

Unfortunately, to add to the worries you might have acquired after years of viewing porn, spam mailers seem to have picked up on how common it is for men to worry about their penis size.

It doesn’t matter how often you might complain about the “increase your penis size” and “big willy 4U” e-mails filling up your junk mail folder — some of these messages seep into your subconscious (or conscious) mind and feed your own willy worries.

As an interesting side note, although many people like to look at huge penises, not many women actually enjoy one inside of them — there’s only so much space inside the average vagina. The average vagina is built for the average penis.

I think it’s reprehensible that spam mailers feed on this weakness that men have and try to convince them to try whatever herbal supplement they are hawking. By the way, don’t bother with the “miracle products” you hear about in your spam — they don’t work. If herbal supplements did increase you penis size, it would be all over the news and we would all know about it.

Like I said above, you only have one penis so take care of it and don't worry about what other guys might be "packin".