The President of Yale has cancelled Sex Week at Yale, a student organized week with all sorts of events promoting sexuality. Babeland participated in Yale Sex Week a number of times, and there is a special frisson at bringing Babeland’s style of feminist sex positivity to such a bastion of establishment power broking.

People, especially young adults need sex education. Some folks like to think that sexual knowledge leads to sluttiness. But that’s not true.  Sex information helps people have more satisfying sex and happier lives. Good adult sex ed. goes beyond procreation and disease prevention, it teaches the anatomy of pleasure and the physiology of arousal. It also encourages people to notice their feelings, communicate their desires and to expect sex to be pleasurable. Chaste or promiscuous, the sex they have will be better. Encouraging people, especially women, to insist on their right to sexual pleasure helps undermine a culture of drunken groping that leaves women feeling used.

One of the concerns of Yale President Richard Levin is that sex week is overly commercial. Babeland, for example, has offered workshops and discussions on the G-Spot, Oral Sex Tips, Sex Toys etc.,  and of course we always mention babeland.com. The fact is there are still very few resources for adult sex education, and Babeland is a good source of the accurate sex information and encouragement that is so needed. Although there are a few new academic programs in sexuality studies (SF State has a great one) and a handful M.D.s who have focused their practices on sex, there isn’t a large credentialed professional class of sex educators at the college level. For the most part today’s sex educators come from a grass roots movement of pleasure activists who have trained each other in non-institutional settings.

Sex education is a big part of our mission at Babeland and we do tons of outreach and in-store workshops that teach various aspects of human sexuality. Helping to empower folks around their sexuality is the juice that makes selling vibrators a thrill. Going to Yale has been a fun part of that. But if Yale wants a less commercial sex week, I hope they pay that forward with a program to train those educators at Yale. I’d love to see a pleasure focused Sexuality curriculum in every college and medical school in the country.

Until that happens the students at Yale are regrouping and are planning a new SWAY- Sex Week All Year. If they invite us we’ll be glad to be a part of it.

If you were on a news blackout this week, you might not know that a woman opened her suitcase after a flight to find a note from the airport security agent who searched her checked bag with this message, “Get your freak on, girl”. She was traveling with a Babeland Silver Bullet vibrator and was so creeped out knowing that someone had handled it, she threw it away. We took notice and sent her a new one (having to replace your sex toy after inappropriate conduct from a government employee is just adding insult to injury) and we included a nice gift, too.

The woman, Jill Filipovic, blogs at a site we love, Feministe, and posted an articulate and insightful follow-up to the incident today when news hit that the Transportation Security Administration had disciplined the note-writing employee. She was frustrated that the issues about privacy and the government’s invasive security measures post-9/11 weren’t dissected in the media coverage. We agree, but also have to point out the positive side here, that a woman traveling with a sex toy didn’t become the issue. In the dozens of articles and posts we read, the vibrator was a non-issue, and that’s progress.

Culturally and socially, a woman’s right to sexual pleasure is gaining mainstream acceptance. Many people could relate to this story and wonder about the many times their personal items have been reviewed by security agents. We always worry about what someone else is thinking about our personal choices, it’s a good thing that we tend to worry less about our sex toys. If you want tips about traveling with sex toys, you can view our tips here.

Do you have a story about traveling with a sex toy? Share it in the comments. We’ll choose a random winner and send you the infamous Babeland Silver Bullet! A winner will be chosen at noon on Monday, October 31st and notified.

Have any links to share? Let us know what you’re reading in the Comments section.

This article sounds techy but the Luddites will appreciate it, too, and it features our friends at Jimmyjane prominently. Lessons Interface Designers Can Learn from Teledildonics: Third-wave human-computer interaction, where users engage with machines on an emotional and even physical level, saw little expression in the marketplace, until a bunch of geeks jumped ship for the sex toy industry.

Joan Rivers teaching sign language for “orgasm” on The View. Hilarious!

20 Songs About Cunnilingus, can you think of others?

German Greens Warn of Dangerous Dildos  Phthalates are an issue we’ve talked about extensively and Babeland’s toys are all phthalate-free so you can shop with confidence and peace of mind for your health.

Top 5 Female Sex Fantasies … And What They Mean by Ian Kerner

What’s with the “sexless” trend? Recent reports of a backlash against sex are bogus, but they do reveal very real fears.