Tuesday, October 03, 2006

what does normal look like?

yesterday i prepared a worksheet for my high school students. we were doing the general sexual anatomy (which ducky doolittle refers to as "pleasure anatomy" in sex with the lights on) lesson and i wanted something to compliment the illustrations.

i was so pleased when i stumbled upon the soft hard gallery http://www.erectionphotos.com/softHardGallery/SoftHardGalleryP01.htm
i used many of the soft images to build a collage for my students. I also used images from the-clitoris.com's The Vulva Revealed gallery http://www.the-clitoris.com/n_html/n_v_image1.htm.

so i made a worksheet with ten penises and 8 vulvas (because the vulva pictures were larger and of better quality) and in the middle had the words "what does normal look like?"

i passed around the worksheet to my 11th and 12th graders, letting them know the images were graphic and they were free to decline to look at them. i asked the question "which one is the normal one?" they each voiced differing opinions, tending to choose the straighter circumcised penises or the more symetrical vulvas. then i popped the mind-blowing statement:

"they're all normal."

the reaction were immediate. " but miss, what's wrong with this one?" or that one or why are here lips so large or why is his head so small. The answer: "there is nothing wrong with any of these. they are all normal healthy vulvas and penises."

it blew their minds.

no pun intended.