Since I wrote some posts blaming things on porn–including the new enthusiasm for facial cumshots and FFM threesomes–I’ve gotten multiple reader mail requests to discuss one more staple of mainstream hetero porn: anal sex.

A disclaimer before we start: I am not arguing against anal sex. There’s nothing wrong with it. It can be pleasurable and enjoyable, and–as with any sex act–if two consenting adults want to engage in it, I don’t judge and neither should you.

Okay then.

Recent scientifc data–which we’ll get to in a minute–suggests that heterosexual women, and especially young women, are having anal sex more frequently than ever before. For our mother’s and grandmother’s generation, anal sex was just about the ultimate taboo, a perverse act that couples rarely did or at least, never admitted to. Not anymore. Now it’s one of the most popular searches on Google, joked about and referred to endlessly on reality TV and in scripted popular shows like “Entourage,” “Sex and the City”. Even good-girl Renee Zellweger has a go with Hugh Grant in “Bridget Jones.”.

As with any trend in women’s sexual behavior, I think it’s fair to examine what cultural influences might account for this change. People are more likely to engage in a formerly taboo sex act if depictions of it are widely available, even celebrated. And where is anal sex eroticized, and depicted as not only normal, but totally hot?

Why porn, of course.

A recent feminist call-to-arms by Janice Turner in the Times of London (which I’ve quoted from before and is worth a read) blames porn and the “raunch culture” it creates for exalting anal sex. Not because it’s wrong, mind you, but because it’s yet another sex act women feel obliged to perform–enthusiastically–for male pleasure, usually at the expense of their own pleasure.

As the academic Rosalind Gill has pointed out, in raunch culture women are not passive sexual objects, but active, even voracious agents. Or so they appear. Mostly, though, they are acting out the scripts, the exaggerated desires of pornography. When porn lived on the top shelf it was clearly fantasy, removed from real relationships. But once porn was omnipresent it suddenly gave the appearance of being true. Porn has “groomed” young women until they don’t even address their own pleasure. Instead they are expected to get off on men getting off on them. Today [sex] is perceived as something women perform for men…And anal sex, that Act 4 of every porn movie, which gives little female pleasure and often much pain, is now firmly in the sexual repertoire of many 16-year-old girls.

Turner describes the work of Jessica Ringrose, a sociologist specializing in gender issues at the University of London. Dr. Ringrose, in her research on teen girls and culture, discovered that on the social networking site Bebo:

“Hi I’m Daniella And I Like It Up The Bum” is typical of the taglines she came across among girls as young as 13.

Because the way to get attention and be sexy is to talk about how you like it up the ass–even if you’re still in junior high! (Excuse me while I head/desk).

I’ve watched a lot of anal sex in hetero porn, and in nearly every case, the actresses are writhing and moaning in obviously fake–or at the very least, heavily exaggerated–pleasure, while the male actors piston away. I find those scenes wince-inducing, and the descriptions, like “blond slut gets her ass pounded,” are even worse. But they’ve become a staple of hetero porn DVDs and popular free porn websites like RedTube and YouPorn. As a result, anal sex has joined hairless crotches, FFM threesomes and facial cumshots as the beau ideal of hetero hotness.

And in case you think Ringrose and Turner are being alarmist, there’s plenty of data from credible sources that leaves little doubt that more–and increasingly younger–women are having anal sex. A study recently published on-line by The American Journal of Public Health reported on both the rise in heterosexual anal intercourse among teens and young adults:

A new study by researchers at the Bradley Hasbro Children’s Research Center suggests that the incidence of heterosexual anal sex is increasing among teens and young adults particularly those who have recently had unprotected vaginal sex. These findings mirror recent data that show anal sex rates among adults doubled between the years 1995 and 2004.

The study, published online by the American Journal of Public Health, is among the first to report on the little-known factors associated with heterosexual anal intercourse among adolescents and young adults. “The topic of anal intercourse is often considered taboo especially when discussed in the context of youth relationships even though we know that this behavior is a significant risk factor for HIV and other sexually transmitted infections. It’s critical that we recognize that more and more young people are engaging in anal sex so we can open the lines of communications and help them protect their sexual health,” says lead author Celia Lescano, PhD, of the Bradley Hasbro Children’s Research Center (BHCRC). Researchers assessed the sexual behavior of 1,348 adolescents and young adults between the ages of 15 and 21 who had unprotected sex in the previous three months. They found that 16 percent had engaged in heterosexual anal intercourse within the timeframe, with condoms being used just 29 percent of the time.

The study also suggests that these young women are having anal sex not for their own pleasure, but acquiesce to the desires of their male partners:

Females who had heterosexual anal sex were more likely to be living with their partners, to have two or more sexual partners and to have previously experienced coerced intercourse (ed: that’s science-speak for “rape victim”). “These findings suggest that the factors associated with anal intercourse among females in the study relate to the context and power balance of sexual relationships,” says Lescano, who’s also an assistant professor of psychiatry (research) at the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University. “We must teach teen girls and young women how to be assertive in sexual relationships, such as refusing unwanted sexual acts and negotiating for safer sex, whether it’s anal or vaginal.”

A different study by the Hutchinson Cancer Research center also found a distinct uptick in the number of women engaging in anal sex:



…among the female control group studied, 21.5 percent had reported practicing anal sex, a significant increase from a previous case-control study, published in 1987, in which 11 percent of female controls had reported ever having anal sex.

Incidentally, Hutchinson studied the popularity of anal sex because doctors believe it’s linked to rising rates of HPV-related anal cancer. As part of its research on STIs, the CDC also studied the trend, and reports that 34% of women 25-44 reported having had anal sex.

When you see a new or expanding trend in sexual behavior–or any human behavior at all–it’s illogical to assume that it just sprang up all by itself. Sexual trends are rooted in the larger culture. It makes perfect sense to assume that repeated exposure to eroticized depictions of anal sex is going to make both men and women curious about it and more likely to try it. No harm there–that’s certainly how and why I decided to try it.

Problem is, hetero mainstream porn isn’t depicting the kind of careful, attentive interaction that makes anal sex pleasurable. In fact, in porn there’s no attention paid to the woman’s pleasure–or even her comfort–at all. The male actors just plunge in and start pounding. It’s not the kind of sex teens–or anyone else–should aspire to. Unfortunately, in our pornified popular culture, male pleasure is king, and young women are buying into that message, instead of expecting equal focus on their own pleasure (or the chance to say “no thanks, not for me” without repercussion or ridicule). What’s even more discouraging is that they seem to think they must do it in order to be seen as sexy, or popular.

Thanks, porn.

(Public Service Announcement: For excellent, road-tested, woman-friendly advice on all aspects of anal sex, look no further than the sexy and sex-positive Tristan Taormino and her book The Ultimate Guide to Anal Sex for Women, as well as her website, www.puckerup.com. You can also check out Toni Bentley’s ridiculously self-indulgent but enthusiastic erotic memoir of anal sex and submission: The Surrender)



