Pleasure
What we don’t talk about when we don’t talk about kink
I realise that a lot of men want (and need) to dominate women not because it is mutually pleasurable but because it reinforces patriarchal hierarchies. The taboo around kink, as a larger space of exploration, and BDSM, as a part of it, only furthers the violence, intensifying the apparent mystery of these subjects.
By Trijita
March 17, 2023
Love belongs to me too
I see people and places,
Couples and crushes
I hear giggles and whispers.
These are the secrets untold to me.
By Gayathri
March 1, 2023
Sex Question Mark
Looking back, it seems strange, almost sad that he couldn’t contain his anxiety, couldn’t bear the shame of what he did wrong. He must have skimmed over so much turmoil, that he couldn’t accept the reality of harming someone.
By Megha
March 1, 2023
Loitering towards desire
We had gathered to [discuss] digital self-determination for people with disabilities… focusing on its core component: the self. How can I be myself in digital spaces? What gives me more of a sense of self in these spaces? How can design, technology and policy contribute to helping me determine myself in digital spaces?
By Bishakha Datta
February 16, 2023
Sexy Crip Desires
Many disabled people in India live with their parents and any expression of sexuality is suppressed as a rule within the confines of their homes. Sexual desires of persons with disabilities are seldom a priority issue for families or civil society. More is said through silence than words. Be grateful that you are alive. Isn’t that enough?
By Abhishek Anicca
February 4, 2023
Unscripted
She turns towards me when I speak, and I can feel her eyes thinking over my words, sensitive to any hint of criticism. Her thighs slide against mine, and for a moment we are both distracted by the naked coolness of our bodies. For a moment, we look at each other.
By Sami S
January 3, 2023
A Letter To My 16-Year-Old Self
You see, you are being pushed and pulled in all directions because people around you, whether family, friends or the larger society, expect you to behave in a particular fashion and stick to existing norms. However, your inner voice is telling you to challenge these norms and follow your own path.
By ElsaMarie D'Silva
January 3, 2023
Editorial – Queering Sexuality
Queering transcends the confines of symmetry and is a way of looking, of breaking established meaning, of making new meaning, and of being and becoming that offers us the promise of fluidity, flux and freedom.
By TARSHI
December 12, 2022
साक्षात्कार – श्रीनिधि राघवन
ऐसी जगहों की बहुत कमी है जहां विकलांगता के साथ जी रहे लोग अपने यौनिक अनुभवों या यौनिक जिज्ञासा के बारे में खुलकर बात कर सकें। खास तौर पर विकलांगता के साथ जी रहे युवाओं पर हर वक़्त निगरानी रहती है जिसका मतलब है कि वे यौन अनुभवों से वंचित रह जाते हैं और अपनी यौनिकता को समझ नहीं पाते।
By Shikha Aleya
December 12, 2022
Video: Anahita – Queer
Watch Queer, a hard-hitting spoken word poem by Anahita Sarabhai, co-founder of QueerAbad.
By Curated Content
December 12, 2022
When the Game is Set Against You, Why Play By The Rules?
“It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society.” — J. Krishnamurti Sexuality for…
By Simran Kewlani and Vasudha Ramani
September 19, 2022
Editorial – Movement and Sexuality
This issue of In Plainspeak while inviting us to embrace the joys and pleasure in movement, also questions the ways in which movements are facilitated or obstructed, visibilised or invisibilised, and the spaces that we must envision to find freedom in/to movement.
By TARSHI
May 19, 2022
Issue in Focus
Expanding contexts give the word ‘movement’ different meanings and value. Physical, conceptual, technological, relationship, emotional, mental, power, knowledge, ability, access, may be amongst the contexts immediately identified.
By Shikha Aleya
May 3, 2022
Editorial – Spaces and Sexuality
A space can make us feel constricted or liberated, and sometimes even both at the same and at varying times. The combination of spaces that we may be occupying in the moment, as well as those we have in the past, predisposes us to act, feel and experience our sexuality in different ways.
By TARSHI
April 18, 2022
Locating the ‘Nagar’ in ‘Nagarkirtan’: Identifying the feeling of socio-sexual rootlessness in the Transgender community
The plot of the movie narrates the tale of the love that grows between two people who are struggling to survive in a world of rootlessness and are continuing to make a cosy home for themselves. The love between Madhu, who works as a food delivery boy, and Puti, who survives by singing at traffic signals, blossoms while they cross paths everyday at the traffic signal and the look that they exchange appears to us as if each of them is trying to find a home in the other.
By Ria Basu