"One learns a lot in orgy rooms. Camaraderie. Patience. Humour. Being gentle and generous with strangers. It's not all the depravity it's cracked up to be. Just a lot of frightened children being sweet to one another in the dark."-'Babycakes' by Armistead Maupin (1984)
What is the attraction of group sex?
One's fist thought is, of course, that it is naughty. Extremely naughty. It's a forbidden fruit, if you will. The long-established tradition is that sex is for couples. Even if you have sex with someone who is not your reglar partner, it is still supposed to be one on one. To have sex with more than one person at the same time breaks that convention. It breaks a taboo and creates a frisson of excitement as any naughtiness does.
The thrill of taboo-breaking is made more intense by doing it with your regular partner. There is something even naughtier about fucking someone while your partner is participating with the same person as you. An experience shared is an experience doubled. There is also a heightened intimacy. But that's not the whole attraction. At the level of immediatephysical sensation, the activities that comprise group sex are ultimately the same as one on one sex. Vaginal penetration is still vaginal penetration, even if it's accompanied by other activities. But group sex is one of those phenomena where the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. the thing is, it's hard to focus on more than one sensation at the same time. Men especially find this difficult, right girls?
Isn't that what you are always complaining about? Attention span? Well, here's your solution. Not only do you give him a treat, but he instantly begins to perk up when you want to talk about curtains during the Chelsea match.
I mean, if someone is sucking my cock while I'm going down on a woman, which sensation do I focus on? The sucking or the licking? To which part of my anatomy do I direct my attention? My cock or my mouth? But to focus on just one action at a time is really to miss out on a key joy of group sex.
By relaxing into the gestalt of the sensations, a wholly new experience emerges. Conciousness expands to encompass a new emergent quale. A new, integral sensation arises that is not just the conjunction of individual constructive sensations. The simultaneous feelings in my penis in this instance and on my tongue conjoin to form a new sensation to be enjoyed.
In the food industry, 'mouth-feel' refers to the essential sensation produced by the taste, smell, texture, crunchiness, viscosity and other perceptible qualities of a food stuff. Food technologists designing a new chocolate bar will work not only on a good taste but a good mouth feel.
It's not easy to be fully conscious of group sexual action, especially if you are playing an active role. It's like rubbing your tummy and patting your head at the same time. It requires practice and active integration. But if you are playing a receiving role, then its like having a four handed massage. You have to let go of tracking each individual hand that is stroking you and fall into the experience that is the whole sensation.
This is not automatic. The concious mind has a strong natural inclination to zero in on one thing at a time. But there is a built-in capacity to hold seven different things in the concious mind at the same time, forming them into a new quale. This means that you can have sex with up to seven people at the same time and with each new person, the concious exerience rises to a new dimensionality. How great is that? Beyond seven, there is no more capacity to expand the conciousness of the event. The practicality and/or opportunity of seven-way sex though is another matter. But there are a wealth of places to go for that.
Many people use the term 'swingers', which actually puts a lot of people off the idea of group sex. I think it's the perception of the lifestyle within the media that's the problem. It's changing but it's still so hypocritical, especially as those are exactly the types you consistently meet at swingers parties. I'm serious. It's rife with people who work at newspapers, news channels, freelance journalists. Honestly. I can guarantee you that one of the most exclusive monthly London parties is even ran by a broadsheet columnist, but you would never think this as a newspaper reader.
But then the whole media's attitude to sex is the mirror of British society and the term 'swinging' harks back to that old attitude, handed down to us that sex is between a singular man and a singular woman. Period. I mean, that's great if it works for you, but it isn't the only way. The very existence of the Kama Sutra and the art you see above from the 1830s by Peter Fendi just as an example, not to mention the very existence of differing, more open relationships from World War Two and back, is that there is an previously accepted alternative attitude that has been lost. Two recent books ('Lady Worsley's Whim by Hallie Rubenhold and 'The Bolter' by Frances Osborne) highlight this.
But the term does fit. When we engage in group proclivities, we 'swing' with others. we swing from our union, swing from our mundane, everyday lives, swing from convention, swing from society, supposed morals, beliefs, fears. Maybe it's because of the negative and hypocritical connotations and the spin the media put upon any alternative lifestyle. maybe it's because of the denigration from the media of the lifestyle that prompts us to feel that. I mean, since when did pleasure become a bad thing?
Thankfully, groups exist like The Sexual Freedon Coalition who actively raise sex positive awareness about the absurd attitude of the media consistantly demonzing any form of activity and also stick up for our rights, as consenting adults, to engage in pleasure with another one (or seven) of our fellow man, without apology or attracting stigma.
Group sex is a great thing. I'm a hearty supporter. one of its strange attractions is the expanded range of concious sexual experiences and bed gripping experiences you can have, as well as the lasting friendships that can be created. it's not wrong. It's not seedy. It's not something you do because your relationship is in trouble or needs spicing up. It's something you do, as consenting adults, for fun. Like Bridge. But with fewer hands, obviously. It just feels good and is as liberating an experience as you will ever find.
But don't just take my word for it.
You can find out more about The Sexual Freedom Coalition at: www.sfc.org.uk
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