QI’m writing on behalf of a 19-year-old guy with cerebral palsy.
A“Your reader shouldn’t make assumptions about what having sex or being sexual means to his friend,” says Cory Silverberg, coauthor of The Ultimate Guide to Sex and Disability. What if your friend doesn’t want to get into bed with a girl, but head into a dungeon with one? Or two? Or what if your friend is gay? Or what if all he really wants is to make it with a plush toy or a picnic table?
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“Just like we do with everyone,” says Silverberg, “we tend to assume folks with disabilities are straight and just want to have penile-vaginal intercourse and some oral sex. We’re almost always wrong. So the first thing he should do is ask his friend what he’s interested in.”
QI was in a chat room today and a guy asked if he could see my belly button. Of course, my fetish alarm went off. Turns out this guy is 19, disabled, and feels like a total social/sexual outcast. Because of his physical problems and his fetish, he said he felt like he’d never have a normal relationship. I couldn’t lie to the kid and say, “Don’t worry, pumpkin, your soul mate will find you someday,” so instead I offered “Most people are assholes—and this comes from an able-bodied vanilla girl, so yeah, your life’s gonna be tough.”
“But a lot of devotees don’t think of themselves as fetishists,” adds Silverberg. “They compare their interests to someone who likes red hair or big boobs, more of a preference or something they have an emotional connection to rather than something they absolutely need to get off.”
Finally, all three authors of The Ultimate Guide to Sex and Disability—Silverberg, Miriam Kaufman, and Fran Odette—are happy to help others with suggestions and can be reached via e-mail at sex.disability@gmail.com. Silverberg also takes questions this week on the Savage Lovecast, my weekly podcast, which you can download at thestranger.com/savage.
