I'm confused and can't find an answer. It's about our use of language. It starts with the fact that the use of the masculine neuter is frowned upon in the German language. Today, it is no longer simply "der Partner" but "der Partner und die Partnerin". If you want to shorten it, you can also use the academic capital I as in "die PartnerInnen" or the gender asterisk * as in "die Partner*innen".

Although I think it is absolutely right and also important to explicitly mention women in this form when both genders are meant equally, it still leads to confusion. Firstly, texts written in this way become unreadable at some point. And I write a lot of posts, as you may know. I mainly write from a heterosexual perspective. So my texts sometimes feature women, sometimes men and usually both together. And I sometimes use the capital I and sometimes the *, sometimes I write everything out. Why is that again? Because I can't decide which form to use.

Without the feminine form, the women disappear

If, on the other hand, I did without all that and only used the masculine neuter as in "the partner", you might think I was only writing for homosexual men. And that's my second point. I think it's almost worse, because at some point it's no longer clear who it's actually about if someone doesn't explicitly mention both genders. There are a lot of people who say that they don't care whether the female form is mentioned or not. There are also a lot of people who don't care if their phone is tapped until someone tells them that the date for cheating or moonlighting is also being listened to or read. Oops.

Who do you think of when you ask: "Has anyone here lost their lipstick?". Well, I immediately think of a group of boys with red-painted lips, giggling and nodding eagerly. Another example: The other day I read an article about scientists who hadn't found the G-spot. Of course, I thought, it was men doing research again. A little later I wondered whether the authors of the article were actually talking about male scientists or whether they had simply used the masculine neuter. In the latter case, female scientists would also be implied. So women wouldn't have found the G-spot either. Hm. Do you understand the difference? At least then I wouldn't just be able to get upset about the narrow-minded men.

Erotic genital names? No way!

So, that was one thing. The other is sexual terminology. And now I finally come to my confusion. Because sometimes I sit in front of a line for ten minutes and think about which word I want to use.

• Let's take sexual intercourse, for example. What a stupid word! The sexes having sex with each other. Perhaps with a top hat on their heads. Apart from that, in my opinion, sexual intercourse is far too often equated with sex. Coitus. Hm. I can also use that in my posts as a synonym for my beloved sexual intercourse. But we're imagining someone in a white coat and not someone who wants to advise couples. Ha. Someone who wants to advise couples. After all, I am a woman. There it is again, that masculine neuter.
  And what does a couple say? "Lovers, do we want to coitus?"??? "Do we want to have intercourse?" No, of course they have their own terms like fuck, shag, make love. Or they just do it without words. But what do I use when writing?
• It's even more difficult with the genitals. Penis is fine. It's also great for scientific texts. I could just about use cock without anyone taking offense. After all, the word is male and has sexual connotations. Scrotum? Far too urological. But again, I find scrotum so un-erotic! It really creeps me out. "Men love it when their partner sucks on their h-o-d-e-n-s-a-c-k?" Difficult.
• Vagina, vagina? Sometimes one goes with the other. But again, we mustn't forget that the vulva and vagina together make up the vagina. I first heard the term vulvina from sex therapist Ann-Marlene Henning. Sounds good. The word clitoris is generally used for the small pearl between the labia minora - and I'll come to that term in a moment. Strictly speaking, however, it is much more than that. So I say clitoral pearl when I mean this little pearl of pleasure. But do you still understand me then?
• And do you actually know that the correct plural of penis is penes? One vagina becomes two vaginas and it's called the genitals and not the genitalia.

"May I kiss your love lips?"

Let's finally come to my consideration today. Labia majora pudendi and labia minora pudendi. The labia majora and labia minora. S-c-h-a-m-lips. Shame comes from shame. I don't know who came up with that. But do we really still have to be ashamed of it today? Whereas I understand the paraphrase "women's shame" to mean something mysterious again. And mysterious is good in times when EVERYTHING is laid bare. From this point of view, the labia should be seen in a positive light.

There is now also the name Venus lip. It doesn't come from the delicious mussels but from the goddess of love of the same name, Venus. Nevertheless, I always have to think of mussels and the erotic actresses (and here it was really only women) who used oysters to teach inexperienced men how to perform cunnilingus. Or the licking. Hm, delicious oysters... Should we eradicate the labia and replace it with the lips of Venus? Or what do you think of my own creation, the love lip? I have also rewritten the title of an old famous song: "Pink lips should be kissed by men, because they are there for love".

Anja Drews - qualified sex educator for ORION