Naomi Wolf: live webchat TODAY, Thursday 6 September, 12pm to 1pm

[RachelMumsnet]

Naomi Wolf is joining us for a live webchat on Thursday 6 September at 12 noon. Naomi's latest book, Vagina - A New Biography, has attracted major media attention this month and we're delighted she's joining us to tell us more about the book and answer your questions.

Described as 'exhilarating and groundbreaking', Vagina combines cultural history, physiology and personal memoir to explore the role of female desire and how it affects female identity, creativity and confidence.

Naomi Wolf is author of seven books including the bestseller, The Beauty Myth. She travels regularly to speak about gender equality and social justice. She lives in New York and is working towards a doctorate at New College, Oxford University.

Please post your question to Naomi in advance, or set the date in your diary to join us this Thursday at midday to chat to Naomi 'live'.

Is the brain-penis connection as strong?

@mcmooncup

I can't quite put my finger on it, but all this 'traumatized vagina" thing makes me very squirmy. I realise you are trying to reclaim the word, and all that goes along with that, but it just doesn't sit right. Is it just me??

Is it that you are isolating one part of my womanhood for scrutiny when I am much more than a vagina?

I did not understand why for throughout recorded history, the vagina and female sexuality had been targeted, abused etc. Now I do, because of the brain-vagina link. The point of the book is that you are much more than a vagina and your vagina is much more than a 'mere' sex organ.

That said, I work with young women training them for leadership all the time and so many have the constellation of struggles post-sex abuse that my research docoments and for their sakes, knowing how to address those issues is very healing and helpful for them.

Naomi
Are you surprised by the line of questioning prevalent on this thread? Were you expecting such a grilling? Do you get such feedback in real life? Do your friends agree with the line you took on Assange?

So if I am much more than my vagina, why call the book Vagina?

I think I am obviously not getting the point of the book.

@FastidiaBlueberry

Is the brain-penis connection as strong?

Different. Men's innervation for instance is much more regular women's innervation is much more diffuse and complex. Men's sex responses aren't as tied to their autonomic nervous system and freedom from 'bad stress'. Whereas 'bad stress' can just shut down a woman's engorgement, lubrication, arousal etc. Women are potentially, if treated well, multiorgasmic capable of more than one orgasm -- and men have a refractory period (another reason I think society has feared female sexual self-knowledge).

Naomi
Why do you think make masturbation is so acceptable in popular culture, whereas female masturbation remains very low profile, even taboo?

Male masturbation

In the light of the strength of feeling about your letter in the Huffington post and if you genuinely regret it now, have you considered submitting an open-letter apology to the two women?

I think your ideas are really interesting, and it would be a shame if this incident overshadows your future work.

I always have respect for people how are honest enough to fess up when they get it wrong!

@Margerykemp

So are you advocating daily masturbation for all women to keep us happy and confident?

Is this what you do?

It isn't me advocating in this book -- all of the science confirms that society, physicians, everyone should make sure that women are empowered to know how important a sexual relationship with themselves is.

I think, for discussions like these, I would prefer to talk to Cordelia Fine who is a neuroscientist and understands the science behind the body/brain connection, not just a journalist.

@aufaniae

In the light of the strength of feeling about your letter in the Huffington post and if you genuinely regret it now, have you considered submitting an open-letter apology to the two women?

I think your ideas are really interesting, and it would be a shame if this incident overshadows your future work.

I always have respect for people how are honest enough to fess up when they get it wrong!

That is a good idea.

*who not how!

Don't we just know this though? I know that if my husband has been a prick then I won't want to shag him. Surely I don't need an experiment on a rat to tell me that?

And I never thought my vagina was a mere sex organ. It does lots of other things too. I think men think it just is a sex organ because they don't know all the other stuff it does and because of porn, but I don't. Never have either - it does all sorts of stuff .

Why does victim anonymity result in a low rape conviction rate?

My vagina is positively tying itself in knots trying to work it out.

I am interested in that question too turnip

@Greythorne

Naomi Why do you think make masturbation is so acceptable in popular culture, whereas female masturbation remains very low profile, even taboo?

So right!! Male masturbation is the very basis of tons of comedy and female masturbation a kind of icky or titillating secret. A young woman told me that the only time she saw female masturbation addressed in pop culture was in sex in the city. I think it is for the reasons I keep showcasing female masturbation is the first way we learn about our responses, our pleasure, and it puts the power in our own hands so to speak. This self-knowledge and self-pleasuring is the foundation of what Dr Jim Pfaus calls the boost for the dopamine loop ie that it is being IN CONTROL of our pleasure, which first happens by ourselves, that we are in an optimal state later in sexual situations and in general.

@TunipTheVegemal

Why does victim anonymity result in a low rape conviction rate?

My vagina is positively tying itself in knots trying to work it out.

Because it covers up malfeasance and prosecutorial neglect, no one is accountable to rape victims for low conviction rates and rapists go free.

I think the brain-vagina link is actually fascinating.

I think the arse-mouth link is also an area worthy of further research. Just how do some people come to talk out of their bottoms?

I think there is a phrase "blinded by science". Naomi, this science stuff about how to get yourself off is really diverting from the true problems that women face in their sexuality.

@UnnamedFemaleProtagonist

Don't we just know this though? I know that if my husband has been a prick then I won't want to shag him. Surely I don't need an experiment on a rat to tell me that?

Yeah but he might want to know how to not be a prick and how to make you really happy and relaxed, which my chapter on tantra and the neuroscience that confirms it will teach him if he reads it.

So when rape victims didn't have anonymity, were reporting and conviction rates higher and were fewer women raped?

@mcmooncup

I think there is a phrase "blinded by science". Naomi, this science stuff about how to get yourself off is really diverting from the true problems that women face in their sexuality.

I invite you to write to me after you have read it at dailycloudt.com and see what you think.

We can safely say that he won't read it. Thanks for answering me though.