WEBVTT

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In our culture we tend to see sex

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as something that's more important
to men than it is to women.

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But that's not true.

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What is true is that women often feel
more shame in talking about it.

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Over half of women quietly suffer
from some kind of sexual dysfunction.

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We've been hearing
more about the orgasm gap.

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It's kind of like the wage gap
but stickier ...

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(Laughter)

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Straight women tend to reach climax

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less than 60 percent
of the time they have sex.

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Men reach climax 90 percent
of the time they have sex.

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To address these issues
women have been sold flawed medication,

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testosterone creams ...

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even untested genital injections.

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The thing is, female sexuality
can't be fixed with a pill.

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That's because it's not broken:

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it's misunderstood.

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Our culture has had a skewed
and medically incorrect picture

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of female sexuality

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going back centuries.

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If over half of women
have some kind of sexual problem,

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maybe our idea of sexuality
doesn't work for women.

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We need a clearer understanding
of how women actually work.

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I'm a journalist,

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and I recently wrote a book

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about how our understanding
of female sexuality is evolving.

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So sexuality itself was defined
back when men dominated science.

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Male scientists
tended to see the female body

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through their own skewed lens.

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They could've just asked women
about their experience.

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Instead they probed the female body
like it was a foreign landscape.

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Even today we debate the existence
of female ejaculation and the G-spot

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like we're talking about aliens or UFOs.

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"Are they really out there?"

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(Laughter)

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All this goes double for LGBTQI
women's sexuality,

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which has been hated
and erased in specific ways.

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Ignorance about the female body
goes back centuries.

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It goes back to the beginning
of modern medicine.

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Cast your mind back to the 16th century,

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a time of scientific revolution in Europe.

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Men of ideas were challenging old dogmas.

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They were building telescopes
to gaze up at the stars.

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We were making progress ...

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sometimes.

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You see, the fathers of anatomy --

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and I say "fathers" because,
let's face it, they were all dudes --

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were poking about between women's legs

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and trying to classify what they saw.

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They weren't quite sure
what to do with the clitoris.

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It didn't appear to have
anything to do with making babies.

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The leading anatomist at the time declared

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that it was probably
some kind of abnormal growth --

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(Laughter)

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and that any woman who had one
was probably a hermaphrodite.

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It got so bad that parents would sometimes
have their daughter's clitoris cut off

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if it was deemed too large.

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That's right.

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Something we think of today
as female genital mutilation

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was practiced in the West
as late as the 20th century.

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You have to wonder:

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if they were that confused
about women's bodies,

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why didn't they just ask women
for a little help?

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But you must be thinking,
"All that was history."

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It's a different world now.

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Women have everything.

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They have the birth control pill,

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they have sexting
and Tinder and vajazzling.

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(Laughter)

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Things must be better now.

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But medical ignorance
of the female body continues.

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How many of you recognize this?

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It's the full structure of the clitoris.

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We think of the clitoris
as this little pea-sized nub,

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but actually it extends
deep into the body.

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Most of it lies under the skin.

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It contains almost as much
erectile tissue as the penis.

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It's beautiful, isn't it?

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It looks a little like a swan.

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(Laughter)

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This sculpture is by an artist
named Sophia Wallace

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as part of her "Cliteracy" project.

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(Laughter)

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She believes we need more "cliteracy,"

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and it's true, considering
that this structure

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was only fully 3-D mapped
by researchers in 2009.

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That was after we finished mapping
the entire human genome.

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(Laughter)

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This ignorance has real-life consequences.

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In a medical journal in 2005,

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Dr. Helen O'Connell, a urologist,

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warned her colleagues that this structure
was still nowhere to be found

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in basic medical journals --

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textbooks like "Gray's Anatomy."

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This could have serious
consequences for surgery.

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Take this in.

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Gentlemen:

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imagine if you were at risk
of losing your penis

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because doctors weren't
totally sure where it was

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or what it looked like.

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Unsurprisingly,

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many women aren't too clear
on their own genital anatomy either.

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You can't really blame them.

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The clitoris is often missing
from many sex-ed diagrams, too.

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Women can sense that their culture
views their bodies with confusion at best,

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outright disdain and disgust at worst.

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Many women still view their own genitals
as dirty or inadequate.

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They're increasingly
comparing their vulvas

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with the neat and tiny ones
they see in pornography.

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It's one reason why labiaplasty
is becoming a skyrocketing business

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among women and teen girls.

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Some people feel
that all this is a trivial issue.

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I was writing my book
when I was at a dinner party

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and someone said, "Isn't sexuality
a first-world problem?

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Aren't women dealing with more
important issues all over the world?"

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Of course they are.

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But I think the impulse to trivialize sex
is part of our problem.

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We live in a culture
that seems obsessed with sex.

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We use it to sell everything.

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We tell women that looking sexy

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is one of the most important
things you can do.

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But what we really do is we belittle sex.

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We reduce it to a sad shadow
of what it truly is.

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Sex is more than just an act.

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I spoke with Dr. Lori Brotto,

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a psychologist who treats
sexual issues in women,

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including survivors of trauma.

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She says the hundreds of women she sees
all tend to repeat the same thing.

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They say, "I don't feel whole."

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They feel they've lost a connection
with their partners and themselves.

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So what is sex?

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We've traditionally defined the act of sex

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as a linear, goal-oriented process.

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It's something that starts with lust,

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continues to heavy petting

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and finishes with a happy ending.

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Except many women
don't experience it this way.

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It's less linear for them
and more circular.

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This is a new model
of women's arousal and desire

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developed by Dr. Rosemary Basson.

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It says many things,

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including that women can begin
an encounter for many different reasons

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that aren't desire,

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like curiosity.

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They can finish with a climax
or multiple climaxes,

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or satisfaction without a climax at all.

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All options are normal.

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Some people are starting to champion
a richer definition of sexuality.

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Whether you identify as male,
female or neither gender,

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sex is about our relationship
to the senses.

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It's about slowing down,

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listening to the body,

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coming into the present moment.

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It's about our whole health
and well-being.

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In other words,

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sex at its true breadth isn't profane,

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it's sacred.

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That's one reason why women
are redefining their sexuality today.

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They're asking: What is sex for me?

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So they're experimenting with practices
that are less about the happy ending --

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more about feeling whole.

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So they're trying out
spiritual sex classes,

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masturbation workshops --

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even shooting their own porn

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that celebrates the diversity
of real bodies.

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For anyone who still feels
this is a trivial issue, consider this:

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understanding your body
is crucial to the huge issue

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of sex education and consent.

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By deeply, intimately knowing
what kind of touch feels right,

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what pressure, what speed, what context,

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you can better know
what kind of touch feels wrong

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and have the confidence to say so.

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This isn't ultimately about women
having more or better sex.

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It's not about making sure
women have as many orgasms as men.

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It's about accepting yourself
and your own unique experience.

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It's about you being
the expert on your body.

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It's about defining pleasure
and satisfaction on your terms.

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And if that means you're happiest
having no sex at all,

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that's perfect, too.

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If we define sex as part
of our whole health and well-being,

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then empowering women
and girls to fully own it

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is a crucial next step toward equality.

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And I think it would be
a better world not just for women

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but for everyone.

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Thank you.

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(Applause)