NOVANEWS

Reuters

If just one quarter of developed nations would stop consuming the following seven foods, the incidence of obesity and preventable disease would drop more than 50 percent.

by Natasha Longo

Prevent Disease

These foods are toxic to the body, offer no nutritional value and create systemic inflammation making their consumption precursors to auto-immune and other diseases.

7 FOODS TO STOP CONSUMING

1. Wheat

There are many health risks associated with the consumption of wheat.
Mainstream nutrition rarely focuses on all the crippling effects of wheat such as neurological impairment, dementia, heart disease, cataracts, diabetes, arthritis and visceral fat accumulation, not to mention the full range of intolerances and bloating now experienced by millions of people.

At some point in our history, this ancient grain was nutritious in some respects, however modern wheat really isn’t wheat at all. Once agribusiness took over to develop a higher-yielding crop, wheat became hybridized to such an extent that it has been completely transformed from its prehistoric genetic configuration. All nutrient content of modern wheat depreciated more than 30% in its natural unrefined state compared to its ancestral genetic line. The balance and ratio that mother nature created for wheat was also modified and human digestion and physiology could simply could not adapt quick enough to the changes.

If you experience joint pain, bloating, inflammation, weight gain or difficulty in losing weight, drop wheat and you’ll notice a world of difference.

2. Soy

If you stop 10 strangers on the street and ask them if soy is health food, most will probably say yes, of course, everyone knows soy is healthy. However many people are now realizing how toxic soy really is.

Even so, the public’s perception of soy as health food got a boost from the FDA with a rule that permits soy beverages, soy-based cheese substitutes, and soy-based butter substitutes which are all toxins.

Monsanto has control over as much as 90 percent of seed genetics. More than 95% of soy is genetically modified and it also has one of the highest percentages contaminations by pesticides of any of our foods.

Soy causes estrogen levels in men to be 6-8 times higher than the normal limits, often higher even than the levels typically seen in healthy women.

Soybeans are high in phytic acid, present in the bran or hulls of all seeds. It’s a substance that can block the uptake of essential minerals – calcium, magnesium, copper, iron and especially zinc – in the intestinal tract.

Although not a household word, phytic acid has been extensively studied; there are literally hundreds of articles on the effects of phytic acid in the current scientific literature. Scientists are in general agreement that grain- and legume-based diets high in phytates contribute to widespread mineral deficiencies in third world countries.

Analysis shows that calcium, magnesium, iron and zinc are present in the plant foods eaten in these areas, but the high phytate content of soy- and grain-based diets prevents their absorption.

The soybean has one of the highest phytate levels of any grain or legume that has been studied, and the phytates in soy are highly resistant to normal phytate-reducing techniques such as long, slow cooking. Only a long period of fermentation will significantly reduce the phytate content of soybeans and most soy found in the food industry is not fermented. Please review fermented soy is the only soy food fit for human consumption.

Most favorable studies done on soy, including organic, Non-GMO soy are biased and come from corporate or university sponsored backing from corporations vested in soy products.  The powerful soy industry has spent millions of dollars covering up the truth about the detrimental effects of soy.

Avoid absolutely anything made with soy, whether it be tofu, soy milk, soy sauce, soy protein, soy lecithin, soy flour, soy dairy, etc. If you must have soy, stick to organic, fermented sources. However, due to corruption and specific practices now employed by the soy industry, it can reliably be stated that there ARE NO SAFE SOURCES OF SOY and your risk of consuming GM soy (label organic) are high.

3. Corn

The second most genetically modified crop after soy is corn. According to one study, three varieties of Monsanto’s GM corn – Mon 863, insecticide-producing Mon 810, and Roundup herbicide-absorbing NK 603 – are approved for consumption by US, European and several other national food safety authorities.

“The gene flow risk that keeps me awake at night is the possibility of hybridization between crops engineered to manufacture poisons and related crops intended for human consumption,” says plant geneticist Norman Ellstrand. Indeed, this application of GM crops seeks to turn corn into cost-effective pharmaceutical factories and may bear the mark of unacceptable risk. It is currently the subject of intense debate. An open-pollinated crop, corn is known for its promiscuity–making it more prone to gene flow risks than other crops.

Effects of consuming GM corn are concentrated in kidney and liver function, the two major diet detoxification organs, but in detail differed with each GM type. In addition, some effects on heart, adrenal, spleen and blood cells were also frequently noted. Data strongly suggests that these GM maize varieties induce a state of hepatorenal toxicity. These substances have never before been an integral part of the human or animal diet and therefore their health consequences for those who consume them, especially over long time periods are currently unknown.

High fructose corn syrup is a sugar made from GM corn. It causesinsulin resistance, diabetes, hypertension and increased weight gain.

4. Processed Foods

Eating too many processed foods with high sodium levels contributed to 2.3 million deaths from heart attacks, strokes and other heart-related diseases throughout the world in 2010, representing 15 percent of all deaths due to these causes, according to research presented at the American Heart Association’s Epidemiology and Prevention/Nutrition, Physical Activity and Metabolism 2013 Scientific Sessions.

Scientists have recently found that a modern diet of processed foods, takeaways and microwave meals could be to blame for asharp increase in autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis, including alopecia, asthma and eczema.

Why manufacturers feel the need to can, package, and bottle nature’s goodness with excess sugar is a question we should never stop asking. Stay away from anything boxed or canned that contains added salt, sugar, soy (i.e. soy lecithin), corn, high fructose corn syrup, gelatin, sodium benzoate, potassium sorbate, polysorbate 80, propylene glycol, carrageenan, xanthan gum, liquid smoke, palm oil, hydrolyzed /autolyzed ingredients, aspartame, sucralose, butylated hydroxyanisole (BHA), msg, sodium nitrites, sodium nitrates, enriched wheat. For additional ingredients please review 20 Ingredients To Memorize and Avoid In ANY Food You Consume.

5. Refined Grains/Flour

Most refined grains and flours are also courtesy of Monsanto and GMO. Do you realize how much power one company can have over the foundation of the world’s food supply? Without stiff competition, Monsanto could raise its seed prices at will, which in turn could raise the cost of everything from animal feed to wheat bread and cookies.Stop eating them!

The food industry is inconsistently classifying foods as “whole grain” and, in many cases, misleading consumers. Most breads available at grocery retailers are simply NOT good for you because they made from ingredients lacking practically any nutritional value.

Just take a look at the products on the shelves of your local grocery store. There is a healthy multigrain substitute for everything – be it bread, noodles, biscuits or chips. Most brands are exploiting the multigrain craze that has caught the fancy of people of late. However, are they really healthy as these companies claim?

Most flours are derived from a whole cereal grain that has been milled into a fine meal and is then used for making baked goods of all kinds. Modern milling of whole cereal grains puts the kernel through a high-heat milling process that removes the germ and bran (which contain 90 percent of the nutritional content of the kernel), leaving only the endosperm (starch). The starch is then ground into different sizes for different purposes. The result is “refined” flour.

Not only are cereal grains deficient in vitamins but many contain substances that decrease the intestinal absorption of many other important nutrients. Both wheat and sorghum are not only low in biotin but seem to have elements within them that elicit a depression of biotin metabolism. Vitamin D utilization by the body can be inhibited by an excessive consumption of cereal grains.

Cereal grains are good sources of phosphorous, potassium, and magnesium, but are poor sources of sodium and calcium. The high phytate content of whole grain cereals forms insoluble complexes with calcium, so that the net effect is a low Ca/P ratio. Phytate is a salt or ester of phytic acid that is capable of forming insoluble complexes with calcium, zinc, iron, and other nutrients and interfering with their absorption by the body. Thus a high phytate content frequently induces bone mineral pathologies in populations dependent upon cereal grains as a primary food source.

Iron metabolism is affected negatively by a diet high in phytate and fiber. Iron deficiency is the most prevalent nutritional problem in the world today. An iron deficiency has been associated with an irreversible impairment of a child’s learning capabilities. The bioavailability of zinc, copper, and magnesium in cereal grains is generally low. The absorption of manganese, chromium, and selenium does not seem impaired. Zinc deficiency can result in hypogonadal dwarfism in which there is arrested growth. In countries with high cereal grain intake and hence low zinc absorption, hypogonadal dwarfism is nearly 3 percent and skeletal growth may be limited. The bioavailability of zinc from meat is four times higher than that from cereals.

Most people who begin refined grain elimination diets, including cutting out breads, crackers and pastas, find inflammation and pain dramatically improve in less than 30 days.

6. Conventional/Processed Meats

Conventional meat meaning factory farmed and processed meat meaning any meat preserved by smoking or adding chemical preservatives or refined salt.

Most meat eaters may be unaware that more than 70% of all beef and chicken in the United States, Canada and other countries is being treated with poisonous carbon monoxide gas. It can make seriously decayed meat look fresh for weeks. The meat industry continues to allow this toxic gas injection into many of the meat products people consume on a daily basis.

And then there’s the matter of the hormones and vaccines in corn-fed cattle. Hormones from cattle end up polluting the body. And not all scientists are comfortable with the idea of residues in meat: the European Union has refused to import American beef raised with hormones.

Another problem is the antibiotics used in corn-fed animals to prevent or treat disease. Meat from corn-fed cattle is also far more contaminated with E coli bacteria, partly because corn interferes with ruminant digestion, and partly because the animals are crowded together in filthy conditions. E. coli levels are much lower in grass-fed cattle.

The largest percentage of beef offered at your grocery retailer is via corn-fed cattle. Corn-fed beef is tender, with the marbling consumers have come to expect–and thus is high in fat, especially saturated fat. A four-ounce serving of grass-fed beef typically has 7 to 10 grams of total fat, compared with 14 to 16 grams in the same cut of corn-fed beef.

More than 95 percent of all processed meat is not organic. It is linked with an increased risk of colon cancer and other diseases. Some experts suspect that certain substances such as artifical nitrates and nitrites used as preservatives in meats may change into cancer-causing compounds in the body.

High intake of processed meat may increase the risk of developing type-2 diabetes by 40 percent. Nitrosamines in processed meats can be formed by the interaction of amino compounds with nitrites in these foods and they have been linked to beta cell toxicity. In addition, even low doses of the nitrosamines are found to induce type 2 diabetes.

Stay away from any type of meat at the deli counter unless it’s organic and cured (via sea salt) rather than preserved. Avoid all red meat and chicken available at your grocery retailer unless it comes from organic farming practices that emphasize hormone free, unvaccinated, grass-fed and hormone-free sources. Most major grocery retailers do not offer this type of meat. So you may be limited to something like Whole Foods or a local organic farmer or butcher shop.

7. Conventional Dairy

Some studies have linked high intakes of dairy to increased risk of cancer. But others have found no connection, and even a reduced risk. The question is, which ones are unbiased studies and which ones are sponsored by the dairy industry?

US scientists suspect this is because milk and other dairy foods contain the hormone oestrogen, which encourages tumour growth.

Pasteurized milk is perhaps one of the most nutritionally deficient beverages misappropriately labeled as a “perfect food.” Raw milk enthusiasts have known for a very long time that unpasteurized milk is the ONLY milk worthy of consumption. Pasteurization destroys enzymes, diminishes vitamin content, denatures fragile milk proteins, destroys vitamins C, B12 and B6, kills beneficial bacteria, promotes pathogens and is associated with allergies, increased tooth decay, colic in infants, growth problems in children, osteoporosis, arthritis, heart disease and cancer.

Raw milk drinkers definitely have an edge in the nutrition department as at least they drink a beverage which has the potential to prevent disease. Unlike conventional, pasteurized milk which can cause heart-disease and diabetes, raw milk can actually prevent these conditions. But raw milk drinkers should know their cows intimately before making consumer purchases of raw milk.

The United States is the world’s largest producer of pasteurized cow milk, but oddly enough it is also one of the world’s smallest consumers. The dairy industry thus has a vested interest in eliminating all raw milk suppliers from the market place to enforce and increase per capita consumption of pasteurized milk which is lagging behind most of the world.

Pasteurized milk is perhaps one of the most nutritionally deficient beverages misappropriately labeled as a “perfect food.” Raw milk enthusiasts have known for a very long time that unpasteurized milk is the ONLY milk worthy of consumption.

For example, researchers have discovered that cows on organic dairy farms are healthier and less stressed than conventional cows, largely thanks to a more natural, forage-based diet instead of the grain and ground-up bones that usually pass as cattle feed on factory farms. Raw milk from pasture-fed livestock provides the most benefit, promoting the cultivation of healthy bacteria and some active enzymes that enhance immunity, digestion and nutrient assimilation. So if you drink raw milk, make sure it comes from an organic farm, for your health, safety and the nutrient value. If you can’t source raw milk, very simply don’t drink it. Chances are you don’t need it anyway and you’ll do fine from a nutritional standpoint without ever consuming milk.

Avoid all yogurts, ice creams, cheese and other milk products, regardless of fermentation, if made with conventional sources of milk.

If you’re still eating any of these foods, try completely eliminating even just one of these seven groups from your diet. See how you feel. I can almost guarantee your body won’t thank you enough until you’ve eliminated them all.

Sample Menu Avoiding All of The Above

Use as many organic fruits and veggies as possible.

Breakfast:
Try a smoothie for breakfast filled with fresh and frozen fruits, add some chia seeds and green your smoothie with kale, spirulina or spinach. Add a scoop of almond butter. Need more protein? Mix in some hemp protein powder or raw sprouted protein powder. Still hungry? Have some nuts, pumpkin seeds or some dates with coconut butter.

Lunch:
Need a sandwich for lunch? How about egg salad? Try sprouted Ezekiel bread (now available at many grocery retailers). Use organic eggs, hardboiled (cook them to perfection using this method). Mayo recipe on that link as well. Add the mayo with some finely chopped celery and red pepper. Add a pinch of pepper and you have a healthy great tasting sandwich.

Dinner:
Make yourself a beautiful large salad with a high quality olive oil and mix in your favorite greens and veggies. Shavings of some raw unpasteurized Parmesan cheese is always a nice addition along with olives and walnuts. This is a wonderful meal that should keep most satisfied until bed time. If it doesn’t, have another hemp protein smoothie, on the lighter side with minimal fruits, but add celery and cucumber with a pinch of ginger and some honey
.

NOVANEWS

Human Pesticide?

“In the last ten years, respiratory disease in the US has moved from 8th to 3rd highest cause of death. Asthma rates have more than doubled in the western world and Alzheimer’s’ disease, a condition that is caused by aluminum poisoning, has also skyrocketed. “

If we don’t organize to stop this scourge, we deserve what we get.

by David Richards
(henrymakow.com)

There has been an increasing awareness of chemtrails in recent years. Protests have been organized, movies have been released and whistle blowers have come forward. Most significantly, former Los Angeles FBI chief Ted Gunderson made a video denouncing chemtrails shortly before his death in 2011.

The heavy spraying began in NATO countries in the late 90s, but today chemtrails are being recorded pretty much everywhere, from Russia to Brazil, South Korea to Cuba. This is a program of extraordinary scope and importance. However, while we know a chemtrail program exists, there is very little hard information on how it functions and what its goals are.

I have been researching chemtrails and, while I don’t yet have the full picture, I present this information will plug a few holes.

•    Most politicians are as oblivious as we are. AC Griffin, a former CIA and NSA operative, says: ‘The monies that go into CIA projects don’t necessarily come from congressional appropriations. The congress as a whole is completely oblivious to the aerosol program.  They are afraid to ask.’

People on the inside who oppose the program are punished. ‘One of the key people who designed the aerosol is now sitting in federal penitentiary. They still go to him to ask him questions.’

Griffin also revealed that former Clinton era Navy Chief  of Naval Operations, Jeremy Boorda, left, was murdered because he opposed the program. Boorda was found dead in 1996 with three shotgun wounds in his chest. The authorities were quick to claim he committed suicide, and the autopsy results were never released to the public.

•    Commercial airliners are involved in spraying. In the very beginning, the aerosols were sprayed solely by military planes, but now the program has been expanded and commercial airliners have been outfitted with aerosol units controlled by computers and satellites. Photos provide evidence of this, like this Lufthansa jet flying over the US (below,left).

In the airline industry, the operation is known as Project Cloverfield. In 2000, a high level executive at an American airline revealed his office was visited by two men from an unnamed government agency:

‘They told us that the government was going to pay our airline, along with others, to release special chemicals from commercial aircraft. When asked what the chemicals were and why we were going to spray them, they told us that information was given on a need-to-know basis and we weren’t cleared for it…We were made to sign non-disclosure forms that basically stated that we would go to prison if we told anyone what we knew.’

Delivery by commercial aircraft raises the possibility that many countries have not given consent to being sprayed, and may be unaware it’s even happening.

•    Weather manipulation is a daily occurrence – Chemtrails are used in conjunction with HAARP for geo-engineering (the technical term for weather control). Much is written about the ability to create disasters like earthquakes and tsunamis against an enemy, but we don’t realize that weather patterns are manipulated all the time. Scott Stevens was a TV weatherman in the US but quit his job upon realizing that this was happening on a nigh daily basis.

GAMBLING ON FOOD: ‘WEATHER DERIVATIVES”

Global warming is the cover story for the increasingly severe and bizarre weather worldwide.

•    Geo-engineering is used to force GMO crops on the world. Manufactured floods and droughts damage harvests and put farmers out of business.

Monsanto has the patent for GMO seeds that are drought and flood resistant, as well as resistant to the poisonous effects of aluminum, one of the key metals in chemtrails.  Any farmer who refuses to grow GMO crops will not be able to guarantee a good harvest and will go out of business. Even worse,Monsanto sells  ‘Terminator’ seeds: the crops don’t produce seeds, meaning the farmer has to buy new seeds from Monsanto every planting season!


•    Weather Derivatives are chemtrail insurance. – You may wonder how the big players protect their interests from weather warfare. Say, how does George Soros, who owns thousands of acres of farmland in America, protect his profits from engineered drought?

Companies use financial instruments to hedge against risk of adverse weather conditions. They first appeared in the late-nineties, the same time the heavy spraying started! Michael Agne, a trader at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, explains how they work:

‘You’re betting there’s going to be a weather disaster within a particular time-frame, at a particular location, and when it does happen there’s going to be a big pay-off.’ Obviously, insiders can make big bucks making bets based on the geo-engineering timetable.

CREATING A SICKLY DEPENDENT POPULATION

•    Chemtrails are a ‘soft kill’ operation – Soft kill attacks primarily aim to disable and weaken the enemy, not kill him. As Dr. Len Horowitz has explained, wars are an inefficient way to lower population numbers because they destroy infrastructure. The preferable scenario is to create a sick population dependent on the military-medical-industrial complex for their health. In this way, you have population control, make vast fortunes doing it and keep the infrastructure intact.

Chemtrails are a multi-pronged attack.

Firstly, the metallic salts used in the aerosols are highly toxic and require our bodies to waste tremendous amounts of energy removing them. Millions of people cannot do it. In the last ten years, respiratory disease in the US has moved from 8th to 3rd highest cause of death. Asthma rates have more than doubled in the western world and Alzheimer’s’ disease, a condition that is caused by aluminum poisoning, has also skyrocketed.

The second thing is the release of diseases. A high placed military insider claims that bacteria and viruses are freeze-dried and placed on fine filaments for release. The metals released along with the diseases heat up from the sun, creating a perfect environment for the bacteria and viruses to thrive in the air supply.

Third, chemtrails contain nano technological weapons. Surprisingly, this fact has remained so low-key in the alternative media. It is well proven by researchers like Dr. Hildegarde Staninger and former government scientist Clifford Carnicom.

The nanotech consists of genetically modified organisms that are basically bio-robots. When we inhale them, they take up residence in our bodies and live as parasites. When the infestation becomes advanced, the individual develops what is termed Morgellons disease.He is so weak that he can barely do anything and suffers an array of bizarre and ghastly symptoms: scabs that don’t heal, hair that falls out and is replaced by pseudo hair and unceasing crawling sensations beneath the skin.

Morgellons is a new condition that has appeared in the last decade – the same time the heavy spraying kicked in! There are an estimated 60,000+ sufferers in the US alone, and their symptoms are chronicled by the Morgellons Research Foundation.

BIO WARFARE   

There is evidence that the nanotechnology in the aerosols creates genetically modified red blood cells.Clifford Carnicom has found these cells in the atmosphere and in the blood samples of most people he tests. They are quite unlike normal red blood cells; they can grow outside of the body in a petri dish, survive high temperatures and withstand being doused in acid. Clearly, this is highly sophisticated bio warfare!

We don’t know for sure what purpose they serve, but the answer may have been provided by Ray Kurtwell, one of the biggest names in the transhumanism movement. In a recent speech he said: ‘In the next 25 years we will have bloodcell -sized devices that go inside your body and keep you healthy from inside, that go in your brain and interact with your biological neurons and merge with our biological intelligence.’

When an establishment scientist tells us with certainty that something will exist, assume that it already does. There is a chance that the ‘blood-cell sized devices’ that Kurtwell mentioned are the weaponized red blood cells being discovered, and that mind alteration is currently underway.

•    How do the perpetrators protect themselves? The Illuminati never launch an attack without making sure they’re protected first. For instance, President Bush took an anthrax vaccine two weeks before the anthrax attacks in 2001. They may drink a solution once a day that removes the toxins from their bloodstream, or have a chip put in their arm that acts like a tiny dialysis machine.

Many involved in the operation probably don’t know the true agenda. Dr. Bill Deagle was a doctor at Buckley air force base and claims to have treated the pilots who were spraying the aerosols, ’95% of them told me they were up there spraying to reflect the sun to stop global warming, so most of them are dumb enough to believe that garbage.’

CONCLUSION

The Illuminati are vandalizing the skies, as visibly as a graffiti artist spraying a wall, and yet most of us remain oblivious. Like little else, chemtrails bring home just how desperate our predicament is.

Despite this, I think anti-chemtrail activism has tremendous potential. The existence of the operation is easy to prove and we have the testimony of many whistle blowers. The protest movement can continue to generate momentum because chemtrails will persist for decades to come. 

dailymail.co.uk

–Since 2000 13 known cases of herpes have been contracted from the religious practice
–Two deaths and two babies suffering brain damage have resulted
–Department of health warns there being no safe way to perform the ritual that dates back more than 5,000 years

Two more infants have been infected with a deadly herpes virus in the last three months after undergoing a controversial religious oral circumcision in New York City.

The latest cases bring the count to 13 infants since 2000, two of which suffered brain damage and two died from the virus which can rapidly spread throughout its body.

The ultra-Orthodox Jewish practice of metzitzah b’peh requires a practitioner to orally suck the baby’s penis to ‘cleanse’ the open wound following its circumcision, making them susceptible to the virus.

The department of health says one of the latest infants to contract the virus developed a fever and a lesion on its scrotum, seven days after the procedure. The boy later tested positive for HSV-1. That virus differs from HSV-2, the genital herpes, which is contracted during sexual intercourse.

‘A herpes infection in a newborn baby has the risk of leading to severe illness and death,’ Jay Varma, deputy commissioner for disease control at the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene told ABC News.

‘The reason is that the baby doesn’t have the same fully developed immune system as an adult. Instead of staying in the genital area, it extends throughout different organs in the body,’ he explained.

He said it’s too soon to tell whether the boys will suffer permanent effects.

The identify of the rabbi who performed the circumcision is being withheld by the boys’ parents, preventing the health department to step in, they said.

 

Dangers: Since 2000 13 known cases of herpes have resulted from the practice, two of which suffered brain damage and two others died

The religious practice that dates back to more than 5,000 years defies warning by the city’s department of health which says there is no safe way to perform the oral suction on an open wound.

More modern Jewish practices use a sterile aspiration device to clean the wound or a pipette opposed to the oral sucking.

But some rabbis stand grounded behind the practice, calling it a religious freedom while noting its long history.

In September the department voted to require parents to sign forms consenting to the risks of the practice after the death of two children who contracted the virus through the practice.

The parents of those newly infected boys are said to have not signed those forms.

According to Rabbi David Zwiebel, executive vice president of the Orthodox Jewish organization Agudath Israel of America, two-thirds of boys born in New York City’s Hasidic communities are circumcised in the oral suction matter.

The health department claims they’ve had complaints in past by parents who say they weren’t made aware that the oral practice would be performed on their child.

NOVANEWS

According to a large-scale survey of American adults, women have about  one orgasm for every three a man enjoys.  We call this the “orgasm gap” and it’s been a point of contention since feminists identified it during the heyday of the sexual revolution.

In the U.S. we tend to explain the orgasm gap by suggesting that women’s bodies are somehow bad at orgasms. Sigmund Freud infamously posited that women should have orgasms in response to intercourse. If they didn’t, he argued, there was something fundamentally wrong with their sexuality. While his theory has been roundly debunked (as few as 25% of women will routinely have orgasms from intercourse), many female college students who don’t have orgasms this way assume there is something wrong with their sexual response. College students bring some other interesting ideas too. I’ve been asked to confirm if it’s true that women are physically incapable of orgasm before the age of 30. I’ve explained to a truly confused listener why, anatomically speaking, women are unlikely to orgasm from anal sex. I’ve clarified the location of the clitoris ( 30% of women and 25% of men don’t know where it is). 

These are the stories we tell ourselves about the clitoris: that women’s bodies are simply more difficult. The clitoris is hard to find and complicated to operate; it’s shy and persnickety; it disappoints its owner and mocks the efforts of her partner. And perhaps it doesn’t matter anyway, we continue, because women aren’t as interested in orgasm, right? They don’t need them like men do. They’re a more giving sex. Their pleasure is more diffuse and empathic. In any case, they’re really in it for the eye contact and the cuddling.

Freudian echoes, anatomical mischaracterizations and gender stereotypes are part of the logic naturalizing the orgasm gap, but there is nothing natural about it. We know this because women who sleep with women have  many more orgasms than heterosexual women, almost as many as men who sleep with women. Women also have no problem experiencing  orgasm through masturbation and the same women who frequently have orgasms during masturbation report  many fewer orgasms when they’re with a partner. Men are also not faster to climax than women; it takes women the same amount of time to orgasm during masturbation as it takes men, on average, to have an orgasm through intercourse:  four minutes.

Instead of being driven by biology, women’s rate of orgasm relative to men is a function of social forces. For one, we often bifurcate the sexual experience in line with gender norms: men are sexual (they experience desire) and women are sexy (they inspire desire). The focus on men’s internal wants and sensations also draws our attention to his satisfaction. Thus his orgasm, but not necessarily hers, becomes a critical part of what must happen for a sexual encounter to be successful and fulfilling. This is part of why intercourse – a sexual act that is strongly correlated with orgasm for men – is the only act that almost everyone agrees counts as “real sex,” whereas activities that are more likely to produce orgasm in women are considered optional foreplay.

Meanwhile, the idea that women’s primary goal in sex is to deliver a sexy body can focus her attention on how she looks instead of how she feels. This can lead to spectating, being worried about how she looks from her partner’s perspective, which decreases the chance a woman will have an orgasm. It can also lead to active avoidance of orgasm because of worries her face or body might do something unattractive.