A thing that puritans, especially religious conservatives, often say is that sex is funny. He, and it’s always a he, will talk about how he and his wife like to have a good laugh when they’re having sex. They’re always laughing. 

I don’t believe them, or if it’s true I’m sorry for them, especially the woman. Sex is a peak of emotion and raw physical body need; there’s no place for “funny” in there, at least if you’re a participant wanting to commit yourself and enjoy yourself. 

Sex matters: humour is sexual anti-matter.

There are exceptions, of course. If my partner is trying to do something ambitious and she accidentally sticks her elbow in my eye, say, I’m going to laugh, to relieve tension and let her know it’s ok. But that’s going to be quick, a moment, to keep the sex going. That moment itself, and an “ah, stuff happens” laugh are momentary to keep the overall mood going.

In itself there’s nothing sexy about the problem, or my response. 

The funniest thing that ever happened to me during sex involved trying to put a contraceptive diaphragm into the twat of a lovely girl who thought the stars were god’s daisy chain and used that form of contraception. I coated the diaphragm with spermicide, which got it mildly slippery, and tried to slip in in. 

Yeah, it’s simple, so long as you or your lover are a cut-away cartoon woman…

But diaphragms have springy sides, and sure enough it escaped my fingers and sproinged off to the other side of the room. Flew like it yearned to be free. So I picked it up, washed it, and coated the fucking thing with spermicide again.

I lined it up to the squishy cunt of my lovely girl, who thought that every time a pixy sneezed a flower was born, and slid the first few centimetres in. Triumph, and hardening cock. Until the fucking thing sproinged free again. Hit a different corner of the room.

So I collected it, cleaned it, and applied slippery spermicide again, and came back to the bed.

Readers, this happened four times before I successfully got the thing in. Into the yummy cunt of my lovely girl who thought that the weeping of angels causes the rain. And, readers, believe me when I say my cock was soft.

Believe me, these things can fly. And they want to.

It was funny, sure. And my patience and ability to not get too upset was probably a good thing. But sexy? If sex is Madrid, and it might be, then that was Christchurch, a ruined city on almost exactly the other side of the planet from sex. 

Anyway, we were in our twenties, so motivation was extremely high, and we managed to recover and get down to fucking.

But the lesson I learned was this. Spare me, please, from all things funny during sex. 

I think the “sex is funny” crowd actually don’t like sex. They are uncomfortable with the emotional and physical nakedness and need, and by the way that cocks get hard and spurty, and cunts get plump and wet and slippery, and people make strong faces they’d never make if they were self-conscious. So they say it’s funny, all those bottoms bobbing up and down.

But the claim that sex is funny is just an acceptable way of saying what they really think, which is that sex is disgusting. There’s no dignity in it, and precious little self-control and self-presentation.  And it’s got… bodies.

So when I’m doing sexy things, I hope to be a lot of things, intense, kind, cruel, competent. But funny? No. Fuck off with your funny. 

Postscript

I’ve never really expressed my cold, congealed contempt for the Literary Review‘s annual Bad Sex Awards. Maybe that’s a post for another day.