For a long time, and for many people even still, anal sex has been seen as a fetish, a kink, something abnormal people might do on occasion to break up the monotony of vaginal but certainly not a frequent, normal, equal sex act. This simple fact, I think, keeps a lot of people from considering it seriously and recognizing what it has to offer as a regular part of one’s sex life.
Recently, though, there have been signs of this starting to change. Anal play, rimming, and anal sex are becoming treated as normal by a growing number of people—often younger people who aren’t as affected by fading stigmas, but people of all ages are opening up to anal and starting to see it as a normal option for pleasure and intimacy as they start to hear more positive things about it and experience them for themselves.
How people talk about it is a big part of this process. For too long, the topic of anal has been dominated by a mix of people who haven’t actually tried it and people who have only done it a few times and had bad experiences. They assume their experiences are typical of anal and talk about it as if they are an expert on the subject, scaring others off from trying it themselves or cementing in the minds of others with a few similar experiences that anal is a negative thing. It becomes, to such people, something to talk down and tell others not to try, a joke, something women only do to make men happy.
Others enjoy it, but treat it as some very kinky thing, something degrading or dominating. And while it can be used as part of kinks, it is less the act of anal itself and more how you choose to frame it as part of your other play. Anal in and of itself is simply a sexual act. It can be intimate, it can be pleasurable, it can be rough, it can be degrading. It all comes down to what you want it to be. But the core act should be separated from those ideas in recognition of its versatility and the fact that not everyone wants the same thing out of it.
Both these issues can be countered by anal enthusiasts being a little more open and positive in how they talk about it. If anal comes up in a conversation with friends, share your thoughts and experiences, be positive and enthusiastic about it. If someone tries to badmouth it, give a friendly counter-example of how great it can be when done right. A lot of people are really curious about anal in spite of the negativity that still lingers around it, and hearing people be positive instead can spark their interest significantly and encourage them to try it themselves. Don’t be surprised if you get more questions about it, and feel free to offer advice and encouragement as well to help them enjoy it.
Another issue at play is the fact that, at least in North American culture but no doubt elsewhere as well, there’s still so much of a puritanical connection between sex and reproduction in spite of the fact that sex is rarely if ever about reproduction for the majority of people the majority of the time. People think of the vagina as a woman’s sexual center, and even if other sex acts feel better, they think they have an obligation to remain focused primarily on vaginal sex rather than embracing sex purely for recreation and pleasure and intimacy instead of any sort of duty to the vagina and procreative tendencies. But this is starting to change. A lot more people are making the decision to not have children, and that combined with increased recognition of sex as a non-procreative act is slowly starting to separate it from its closely-linked past, making it much easier to embrace anal sex for what it really is—an incredibly pleasurable way to have sex without any of the reproductive baggage of the vagina.
So, in summary—let’s continue taking anal sex from a rare, unusual act to something completely normal and at least comparable to oral and vaginal sex—if not a higher level, the new normal and default.
