When my older sister was about 14 years old, she was given one of those ‘what every girl should know’ books. You know the kind of thing I mean – a sex education book for teens.

It explained biology, hormones and the nuts and bolts of sex, with a bit of morality thrown in for good measure. Sure, I’d seen sex on television, but being a child, I didn’t really have much of an idea about what people actually did once they took off their clothes and got under the blankets. This was enthralling stuff.
Thus began a life-long fascination with books about sex. I’ve read hundreds. Some of them have been informative, interesting and well-written, others as dull as dishwater.
There are lots of bad books about sex out there. By bad, I don’t mean turgid prose, inarticulate descriptions or poorly designed diagrams, although there are plenty of those too. I mean ones that are full of harmful misinformation, bad psychology and junk science, and that’s despite the authors being doctors, psychologists or having some other qualification you’d think would make them experts.
We live in a culture of experts. There is no sphere of life that does not come without a slew of authorities to tell you just how badly you’re doing things – and promising to make your life better if you follow the prescription they set out. They are on the telly pontificating about how you should dress, raise your kids, decorate, cook, clean your house and spend your money.
It is easy to dismiss lifestyle experts, but stick a PhD behind someone’s name and some of us at least tend to listen. Their theories find their way into magazines, and onto television, radio and the web. That’s why sex experts can be a dangerous lot. They talk about what’s supposedly normal, but ‘normal’ soon becomes a blueprint for normative, and if you don’t conform, well then, there’s something wrong with you.
Having read loads of bad advice, I thought I’d have a look at some of the sex myths, half-truths and downright bullshit peddled by so-called experts. Here they are.

Sex is a biological need
Yes and no. Sex is partly biological of course, but many a book will compare sex to more urgent needs like eating or sleeping. I hate to say it, but this is wrong – no one dies from lack of sex. You might not like doing without, but it won’t kill you.
If sex were really a biological need, no-one would have long-term lack of interest in having it. You may lose your appetite for food once in a while or suffer from insomnia on occasion, but almost no-one gives up eating or sleeping entirely. If you do, you die.
Another common idea is that our sex drive is essentially a deep-seated biological urge to reproduce. Which might make sense at first glance, but only if you deny the fact that gay people exist.

If sex were indeed just physical, all sex problems would be some sort of medical issue and lack of desire could be sorted out with a pill.
In fact, no-one has been able to produce a ‘pink’ Viagra for women with low sex drives for a reason. Millions of euro have gone into research but no one has cracked it. There has been some success with testosterone treatments for women, which can work if a woman has a problem with hormone production – but the vast majority of women who have low sex drives are not ill. They may be overworked, unhappy in their relationships, feel bad about their bodies or suffer from religious or cultural guilt about sex, but they are not sick.
The point being that sex has cultural, psychological
and emotional dimensions, a fact that many experts tend
to overlook.
Besides, some people do actually have naturally low sex drives. There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with them, but plenty of sex experts make money promising to cure ‘sufferers’. This is bullshit. Having a naturally low sex drive may simply be like having curly hair. You do or you don’t.

Men Have Higher Sex Drives
Meh. This one is only a half-truth as well. Low sex drives tend to affect women more than men. At least that’s what you’ll read. This is not the whole story. Male lack of desire is vastly under-reported. This is because popular culture, and many sex books, tells us that men are always raring to go. If he’s not, a bloke may feel his masculinity is in jeopardy and because of this, he is a lot less likely to seek help. This is a sad state of affairs and sex experts who refuse
to acknowledge this are not doing much to rectify it – they’re just making it worse.

Your Sexuality Is Pathological
Back in the day, anything that deviated from straightforward heterosexual intercourse was seen as a perversion of one degree or another. Masturbation was an unhealthy habit, oral sex a crime and proper ladies were not supposed to enjoy sex. Sex experts have proven all this to be false and for that we should be thankful.
Things have now swung so much the other way that many sex books imply that unless you are engaging in the whole panoply of possible sexual experiences there is something wrong with you. So let’s turn the tables at least temporarily. If you don’t like porn, find the idea of deep-throating frightening, prefer face-to-face sex instead of doggy style or have no interest in pole-dancing for your partner, you are not horribly repressed – that’s just who you are.
Having said that, it’s good to keep an open mind and experiment. The best way to do this is by pushing your boundaries slightly with a partner you trust. If you go from A to B to C you’re more likely to have a positive experience than if you go from A to Z. And if it turns out you don’t like C after all, well, that’s fine. People’s tastes in sex are as varied as our tastes in
music, movies or food. The trick is to find someone whose likes and dislikes are similar.

Men’s Needs Are More Important Than Women’s
As a woman, this one pisses me off big time! There are a whole load of books, some written for men, others for women, and plenty for couples where authors tend to give primacy to men’s sexual needs and not women’s.
They’ll talk about how certain things may be physically uncomfortable or indeed painful for women, but tell female readers they should do them anyway. No thanks!
There’s actually a proper academic term for this kind of sex. It’s called the ‘sex of prostitution’. This is because a prostitute’s pleasures are generally not part of the deal when someone pays for sex. At times a sex worker may actually have an orgasm. If not she may fake it as part of her trade. Either way it is the customer’s needs that are being met, not the service provider’s.

Sex is best when it is about mutuality. As two or more people are involved in any sexual interaction, everyone’s happiness should be taken into account. At times you may be giving more than receiving, at others your partner does the same for you. Nothing wrong with that, but that’s not the same as sucking up physical pain or doing something that makes you feel bad about yourself in order to service someone else.
Now it may seem a little disingenuous of me to be complaining about sex experts when I write a column about sex. But I do not pretend to be an expert. I like to think of myself as ‘an enthusiastic amateur with a keyboard’ – a person who is curious, opinionated and honest about my feelings and experiences.
Disagree with me, by all means. Harangue me if you like. Use the sex tips that come with each issue if you wish – or ignore them. Just don’t let anyone tell you what you should do sexually as if there is only one way. You know what’s best for you. You decide.