Midnight Sex Talk

BABIES ROUNDUP

My biological clock is digital, so I can't hear it. Glenda just presses the snooze button.

There are lots of us around who aren't going to have kids, for many different reasons. Some of those reasons are nobody's business, but the main one is that we always just knew. Check out Glenda's lively description of her life as a happily married woman with no children.

With his usual conciseness, Dr Ben clarified the biological side of it all, and we had an excellent interview about IVF with Charlie, a healthcare worker. It's definitely on the increase, and seems to be becoming just another option, particularly when a couple is too busy to have sex with each other. It's putting an increasing burden on the NHS. If you want to pay your own way, here's a sample cost list.

Don't forget, folks, there are loads of pre-birthed babies and young children out there who'd love a nice home.

The media always has plenty of material with baby stories: the encouragement of quiet births, to spare the feelings of those present, baby included; the 16-year-old who gave birth to triplets; the Romanian woman who gave birth at the age of 66; and this cracker, the three teenage sisters who became mothers at 16, 14 and 12 respectively.

Yes, it's marzipan. The urge to sentimentalise babies and children is strong, often expressed somewhat grotesquely, and usually at the expense of the child as an individual. Again, I feel it my duty to link to the following: Becky Carter photography and the "Charlie" doll. If you've got any similarly toe-curling examples, send them over.

SUNDAY 23rd OCTOBER - BABIES, DO YOU REALLY NEED THEM?

You'd think society would finally have moved on from putting pressure on women to reproduce, and would now lay off all attempts at forced decision-making on their behalf, preferring to use its moral energy for things like stopping wars. But no.

Whatever a woman does, it's wrong. There's much ranting about perceived overbreeding by (usually working class) teenage girls, but you'll hear just as many accusations of 'selfishness', (definition, please), on the part of middle class, professional women who've got no intention of having kids. It's funny how no-one ever truly ties these arguments together, isn't it? Because the word eugenics just might come trickling out of the woodwork.

There's still a taboo about not wanting to have children, due to a lingering misogyny that says that a woman who is not a mother is somehow incomplete, and has not fulfilled her true role in life. It's even worse for those who've already had children, and regret it. The writer Lionel Shriver has done more than anyone else to open up this debate, in her prizewinning novel We Need To Talk About Kevin. The story behind how this book finally came to be published in the UK illustrates her point even more firmly, and depressingly.

The flipside of all this is the legions of women rushing to have IVF when there are thousands of babies and children who are desperately in need of a home. Are we still so dynastically obsessed?

In the studio we've got a healthcare ethicist to unravel the cat's cradle of arguments around the issue of IVF and reproductive choice; we'll be hearing from Glenda, who is happily married with zero children; and Dr Ben is returning to help us understand the medical side of it all.

Tell us what you think. You can text us during the show on 07957 362 182, or email us anytime using the 'Email me' link on the left.

Where & When: Sunday 23rd October, 11.30pm-12.30am UK time, on Resonance 104.4 FM in London, and on the internet at Resonancefm.com everywhere else in the world.

The image at the top is taken from scarybaby.com, a site that seems to date from 1999. Please drop us a line if it's yours.

Don't forget, Sunday night is Cross Bones night, at Red Cross Way, SE1. We'll be hearing more from John Crow and co in the very near future...

MASTURBATION ROUNDUP

How we laughed. We hope you did too. Dolly invited us into her world of thermos flasks and secret sanding, excerpts of her secret diary included(!), and Al reported from the frontline of self-love.

I feel it my duty to link to the following horrors, as lovingly inventoried by Al. If you must, check out the Fleshlight, a selection of standalone female genitalia, and one that actually talks. :-(

Just one thing. The word 'japseye' slipped into the conversation a couple of times during the show. Later on, a friend pointed out its racial overtones. Hmmm. He has a point. I think it's one of those words that somehow melts into the language without anyone thinking much about it. Hope we didn't offend, however inadvertently. There are, of course, sizeable ironies lurking here, but I'll save them for another day, as I've been away and I've got to get on the case with various things, including this Sunday's show. Theme: Babies, do you really need them? A debate will surely follow...

Back soon.

SUNDAY 9th OCTOBER - MASTURBATION

Do I really need to explain this week's subject matter? The rise of net porn has elevated the humble wank to a status beyond all imagining. As we shall see, however, past societies have not always been so kind to the masturbator. For the sake of academic gravity, you can study more here. Note the cute product placement further down.

We'll be hearing from Al Needham, (left), who's in fine form as usual. And in the studio we've got Dolly Ginsberg, girl about town and all-round creative artiste, who will, among other things, be explaining the similarity between having one off the wrist and the family-friendly pastime known as DIY.

Send us your stories! Win a prize! Text us during the show on 07957 362 182, or email us using the 'Email me' link on the left.

Where & When: Sunday 9th October, 11.30pm-12.30am UK time, on Resonance 104.4 FM in London, and on the internet at Resonancefm.com everywhere else in the world.

INCEST ROUNDUP

Midnight Sex Talk this week was a feast of information. A big thank you to clinical geneticist Dr Adam Shaw for explaining so much so clearly.

We started off by talking about The Cement Garden by Ian McEwan (1978), which I think, for a lot of people, was a seminal early introduction to incest; in literature and elsewhere. I well remember the smells from that book, and the giggles at school.

You'll here the word consanguinity a lot. A consanguineous marriage is between any blood-related people, but not necessarily closely; it's more accepted in some cultures than others. It improves the odds of genetic diseases in children, and the more closely related you are, the worse it gets. The basic medical conclusion is, if you're going to have an incestuous affair, for god's sake don't have children.

The flipside of Genetic Sexual Attraction is called the Westermarck effect. Have a look at the studies of kibbutz children and Chinese arranged marriages, where tiny girls were sent off to the future boy-husband's family for pre-marital conditioning. The studies tell us that familiarity breeds contempt, and after growing up together as children, most people would rather go and live in a poorly-heated shed at the South Pole than get it together as man and wife.

We also played a clip from Chinatown. (See picture above). If you haven't seen it, go and get it now.

Housekeeping Note #1
Due to the fallout from flu, my explanation of Tiresias, a key player in sexual mythology, was pretty rubbish. Apologies for that. Someone made a reverse charge call [tsk!] to the station during the show, which I ended up answering, thinking it might be an enraged classicist - but it wasn't even for us! In fact, perhaps Somebody Up There decided to punish me for mumbling here's the science! at an inappropriate moment, as this week has, frankly, been awful. Kim, very sensibly, has been having a nice time in Wales.

Housekeeping Note #2
I only noticed last night that we've been missing from the Resonance web listings for the last two months. I have no idea why, and I'm sure its just one of those glitches, but I hope we'll be reinstated soon.

We'll be back on Sunday 9th October, with a full and fruity discussion of masturbation. Al Needham's going to be joining us again. Don't miss it!