254. Queer Joy as Collective Resistance with Dr. JJ Wright

[00:00:00] Dr. Nicole: Welcome to Modern Anarchy, the podcast, exploring sex, relationships, and liberation. I'm your host, Dr. Nicole.

On today's episode, we have JJ join us for a conversation about building joyful queer sexual cultures. Together we talk about. Eroticism Beyond sexuality, embracing the feels and pleasure, liberation, consciousness raising. Hello, dear listener, and welcome back to Modern Anarchy. I am so delighted to have all of you pleasure activists from around the world tuning in for another episode each Wednesday.

My name is Dr. Nicole. I'm a sex and relationship psychotherapist providing psychedelic assisted psychotherapy, author of the Psychedelic Jealousy Guide and founder of The Pleasure Practice, where I support individuals in crafting expansive sex lives and. Intimate relationships. Dear listener, queer joy.

Mm. This episode is so powerful. One of my big takeaways from this episode was how JJ shared that our liberation is not only about what we resist, it's also about what we create, right? For years, the queer community has been. Dancing as an act of collective resistance and liberation to all of the systems that are here.

And it's so important, right? We talk about the research in our communities and the different stats of pain and suffering that we're going through. And it's so wild to me, right? When we, when we plant, uh, you know, a seed and soil and the plant starts to struggle as it grows, we don't go, what's wrong with the plant?

Right? We go, what's wrong with the soil? What's wrong with the conditions? The water? Is it getting too much sunlight, not enough? Right? And that is so important to remember when we're looking at research in our communities, right? Many of us have not been given the communities to grow and flourish and blossom into the beautiful queer people that we are.

Okay. And that queer joy is absolutely possible. I really hope that this podcast can be a testament to that. All of the activists that come on, I wish, dear listener, I wish I could show you how many people are downloading these episodes, joining my educational newsletter, downloading the free worksheets on my website, because every time I get one of those, I'm like, Hey, there's people waking up to this.

There's people who are searching for a new way of relating and being in relationships with people. And I just want you to know and have that hope, right? There's so much going on in the world. It's so, so true. And also your joy, your pleasure is political. Devote time to that as a part of our collective resistance, and I'm so glad that you're here studying your pleasure, learning about your pleasure, and sharing these episodes with your community and continuing to.

Bring that liberation again, not only in what we resist, but also what we create. Ah. Alright. Dear listener, if you are ready to liberate your pleasure, you can explore my offerings and free resources@modernanarchypodcast.com, linked in the show notes below. And I wanna say the biggest thank you to all of my Patreon supporters.

You are supporting the long-term sustainability of the podcast, keeping this content free and accessible to all people. So thank you. And with that dear listener, please know that I am sending you all my love and let's tune in to today's episode.

Dear Listener, there's a space already waiting for you. Where you are invited to let go of every old script about Sack. And relationships and begin living a life rooted in your pleasure, empowerment, and deep alignment. I'm Dr. Nicole, and this is your invitation to the Pleasure Liberation Groups, a transformative, educational, and deeply immersive experience designed for visionary individuals like you.

Together we'll gather in community to explore desire, expand relational wisdom, and embody the lives we're here to lead. Each session is woven with practices, teachings, and the kind of connection that makes real trans. Formation possible. And I'll be right there with you. Guiding the process with an embodied curriculum that supports both personal and collective liberation.

This is your invitation into the next chapter of your erotic evolution. Say yes to your pleasure and visit modern anarchy podcast.com/pleasure practice to apply.

And the first question that I ask each guest on the show is how would you introduce yourself to the listeners?

[00:05:33] JJ: I'm a professor in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada at McEwen University in Treaty six Territory Treaty four Metis territory. And I researched at the overlapping fields of L-G-B-T-Q, justice and gender-based violence prevention, and I'm housed in sociology and gender studies.

[00:05:54] Dr. Nicole: So exciting. I am so delighted to see how we, uh, co-collaborate and make a deeper conversation on the concepts of agency today.

[00:06:04] JJ: Mm-hmm. I'm really excited to be here.

[00:06:07] Dr. Nicole: Yeah. Great, great, great. So I'm curious for you, how are you personally connected to this topic? How did you get to the space of this being your passion?

[00:06:18] JJ: Yeah. This is so deeply embedded in my own personal journey, so I could probably take the whole podcast just talking about sort of how it's interconnected to my own lived experience. But essentially as a teenager, I got. Just confronted with the reality that I was growing up in this time of, you know, spice Girls and Destiny's Child and all of these really sort of empowered women.

And then in my teen years I was like, well, why don't I feel empowered, you know, by self sexualizing or trying to sort of, you know, be like men sexually and be equal to them. It didn't really make sense. It didn't feel good, it didn't make sense. And I was sort of going, what's the contradiction here? And also we're told to be empowered, but you know, there's still so much violence that's happening against women, um, and against people more broadly related to sexual and gendered violence.

So. I kind of got planted a seed and then I started to go, what's that about? And in my undergrad, I found women in gender studies and science and I started thinking about it in an academic way, and I followed that right through to a PhD, and now I still research it as a professor.

[00:07:33] Dr. Nicole: Mm, beautiful. Beautiful.

So what are some of the ways that you notice now with the wisdom you have that maybe you were enacting scripts or maybe coming from a less empowered space? What can you see now with your wisdom?

[00:07:51] JJ: Yeah, well that's a really good question. I can see that I was buying into post-feminist ideas, ideas that were basically, that are still being circulated, including by, you know, trad wives and this new trad wife feminism that's appeared.

That's really telling us that, you know, women are empowered by being submissive to men. This ideology gets recycled in these twisted kind of ways, like feminist ideas get taken up, but they get twisted and garbled and then

[00:08:25] Dr. Nicole: mm-hmm.

[00:08:26] JJ: Um, kind of misused. So I can see now that when I was growing up, that's sort of what was happening.

And now of course we have a different context with the whole trad wave thing and the manosphere and all of that.

[00:08:39] Dr. Nicole: Yeah, absolutely. It's heartbreaking to know that the people in those spaces are often reenacting what's so normalized within their community. Right. I grew up very conservative Christian, and so it was completely normal for me to know that I should submit to my husband.

That was something I was absolutely indoctrinated with and would totally preach to other people in my community without any sort of awareness of another life, another world. Right. And it's that metaphor of lobsters, kind of like pulling the other lobsters down as they try to get out of the bucket and get towards freedom.

Right. Um, the ways that, that just becomes so normalized for folks. And so for yourself, when was the big shift when you started to realize out of that? Was there, usually I feel like people have a big community shift. Was there something that kind of. Propelled that transformation for you?

[00:09:39] JJ: Yeah. When you say community shift, I'm wondering what you mean by that specifically.

[00:09:43] Dr. Nicole: Yeah. I think, uh, that people and our, our concepts of reality area are so deeply shaped by our relationships, whether that's to people, to the earth, to a place, to a spiritual beings, right? All of those things form our reality. And so when someone's in the soup, I imagine of a trad wife or what I was in, in that soup, I had so many different friends that were getting married to pastors doing that sort of lifestyle.

And so I slowly started to step into new spaces. Even being in Chicago a huge shift, right? Um, stepping into more queer spaces, right? It was a very slow progress of shifting my community and then therefore shifting my reality. So I'm curious for you if you started to have any big shifts from that beginning to where you're at now.

[00:10:35] JJ: Yeah, I'm so glad I asked you to clarify that 'cause that just gave me such a better picture. And also I can see where I fit with that. I mean, also grew up, um, I grew up in Catholic schools k to 12 and with a stay-at-home mom. And even though she was a very powerful woman and run, ran her household, you know, that was what I grew up around.

I didn't know any people growing up. I didn't know any gender diverse people. I was growing up in the time of, you know, Ellen in the nineties and her almost career. And that was sort of a, you know, big icon, the gay icon at the time. And she was obviously facing a lot of backlash for coming out. So. I didn't have that growing up.

And then I didn't really have that in my twenties, like I identified as by light in high school. Um, or I think I was by light. I didn't say I was by light, but you know, the only way I could really be queer was sort of making it with friends at parties in front of boys. 'cause that was the only acceptable or permissible form of queerness in I'd say even the town that I was in.

And then, you know, as a community. And, uh, I grew up just north of Toronto. And so, um, it really wasn't until I was 31 and I, and I decided, you know what? I really need to stop dating men and I need to Yeah. Try dating a woman in a serious long-term relationship. That really shifted things in a huge way for me.

Mm. And that kind of brought me to research what I do now, which is more in queer and trans studies.

[00:12:13] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:12:13] JJ: Really looking at how. Queer and trans communities have so many lessons for how we can build these more joyful sexual cultures that are rooted in, you know, relationality that isn't so colonial and relation that isn't about conquest and competition and domination, but really about mutuality, reciprocity, and just being in deeply consensual.

Mutually beneficial relationships.

[00:12:42] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Huge shift. And a very needed conversation in terms of ending rape culture. Absolutely. A needed conversation. 'cause it's so deep. It's the water we swim in. Right. And so, yeah, when I think about, uh, the deeper fundamental religions like, uh, Christianity or Catholicism, yeah.

There's not, at least, I don't know, you can tell me about your experience, but for me, there was no women pastors. Definitely no queer pastors or non-binary. But, you know, we can't even go that far. But not even women pastors. Right. And so there was no space where that sort of empowerment was modeled at all.

And, um, the sex ed that I received was not ed, it was not an educational experience. It was absolute propaganda. I was, uh, abstinence only. I've talked about the paper test. Have you heard that one?

[00:13:36] JJ: No, I haven't.

[00:13:37] Dr. Nicole: What's that? It's, uh, they got up on stage and they did, um, a blue piece of paper and a pink piece of paper, and they put glue on both pieces.

They stuck them together and said, this is what happens when you have sex. Oh yeah. And then they ripped them together off of each other and they said, um, and this is what happens when you try to leave that person and you could see the, like, scrapes, the scraps of the paper are left on the other one. And they're like, and who's gonna want this broken piece of paper?

So that was my sex ed. Very like blue, pink. Right. And like yeah. Deeply problematic. Of course. Um. And so I've had a lot of conversations on the podcast about that, and I think that's the only reason I'm able to laugh about it now, is how I get through that. You know, you, you go through horrible things like that, try to find some humor in it all.

Um, but I'm curious for you, right, before we get into the empowerment of, of queerness, you're already speaking about your first queer relationship and how much that changed and got you into this education. I'm curious, what sort of sex education did you receive? What were some of the messages, especially in a CA Catholic space?

I'm sure it, it can't have been too empowered.

[00:14:48] JJ: No, it wasn't empowering at all, but it was barely existent also.

[00:14:53] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:14:54] JJ: But when you were talking about there not being any female pastors and what have you, I was thinking about, I was a bit of a shit disturber in high school because I just started realizing some of these things in society that didn't make sense to me and there were no answers for it.

And so I'll just share a sort of count this as my s awakening, but when I was 15, I had my first boyfriend and I was in my parents' basement and we were watching, um, oh, Jimmy Kimmel had a show at the time called The Man Show.

[00:15:23] Dr. Nicole: Okay.

[00:15:24] JJ: And, uh, people think of him now as I think like some progressive sort of, maybe even some social justice warrior type guy.

But I knew him as the guy who hosted the Man's Show, which was a show where women would jump in bikinis at the beginning on a trampoline. Um, and that's how the show started. And so I was with my boyfriend 15 at, I was 15 at the time, and I, I was so upset by seeing the show. It was distressing. I was like, I'm here with this guy.

We're supposed to be able to have a relationship, but how can that happen when on this TV in front of us, like the person that I'm represented by, these women jumping on trampolines or being objectified and like dehumanized and what have you. And then the ones in power are the ones that represent him.

So I went upstairs and I talked to my dad and I was crying and I was like, what do I do? He's just like, this is the way that the world is.

[00:16:16] Dr. Nicole: Ugh.

[00:16:17] JJ: And so I just, I had this thing inside me that knew that there was these, there, these injustice existed, but I didn't know what to do about it. So I became a bit of a shit disturber.

And in Catholic school I started, you know, looking into wca.

[00:16:31] Dr. Nicole: Mm. Mm-hmm.

[00:16:34] JJ: I'm gonna study WCA now. Yeah. Witchcraft against church. And, but we had to do a confession, I don't know if you did that in your school. So they brought these big black, uh, drapes and auditorium and set these little stalls up with the priest.

And so I went in there and I said to him, I wanna become a priest. And he was like, that's not your role. And I was like, I'm out.

[00:17:07] Dr. Nicole: Yeah,

[00:17:07] JJ: yeah. Out. So I really away from religion after that moment. But the sex, and to return to the sex ed piece, like all I remember is in grade four we were just told, don't have sex until you get married.

There was no discussion about what sex actually was. We were separated, I think it was grade six. And did boys and girls different classrooms? I don't really know what the boys learned about probably what dreams.

[00:17:32] Dr. Nicole: Mm.

[00:17:32] JJ: And we about, you know, menstruation products, right. And the only other sex that I remember is in grade 11 when my gym teacher really emphatically told us that we shouldn't take diet pills.

And that was the sex ed. There was nothing else. And I'm pretty sure he was the di so I don't know why she didn't help us out a bit more with, I mean, I think to her she was really passionate about us not taking diet pills. I don't know if she had a friend who had like a bad something situation. But yeah, so it's really pitiful.

This when I was growing up, the state of sex ed, I'm in Alberta, Canada right now, and you know, just a very recently they passed a new law where all sex ed has become opt-in. So parental consent is required. Which goes against decades of research on comprehensive sex ed and its benefits. So now students in Alberta, in the entire province can't receive any information about basic anatomy, any information about consent, healthy relationships, STIs, without their parents signing a sheet, which, you know, how many kids lose those sheets and it, it's, yeah, it's atrocious.

It's a public health. Issue. But yeah, that's where I'm currently located sex ed here. So it been worse than when I was growing up in the Catholic schools in the nineties and early two thousands.

[00:18:57] Dr. Nicole: Yeah, absolutely. Taking a deep breath for that one because yeah, as you said, how many kids lose the paper or just feel too afraid to even bring the paper home to express to the parent that I want this.

That's a huge and extremely difficult conversation, I think for most teenagers.

[00:19:17] JJ: Totally. And we're even talking about younger, right?

[00:19:20] Dr. Nicole: Yeah.

[00:19:20] JJ: Even elementary students, they might even be more embarrassed because it's just so taboo at that age too.

[00:19:27] Dr. Nicole: Yeah. It makes me wanna ask the dumb question of what do you think that teaches them about sex?

[00:19:33] JJ: Yeah. I mean, not a dumb question. Uh, I think that it teaches them that it's forbidden. They shouldn't explore it for themselves. Yeah, they should just perform these really prescriptive roles and routines.

[00:19:48] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:19:50] JJ: And that's probably what they pick up in major media. You know, movies and stuff. Obviously we know consent is not, I always think about that scene in, uh, what was that movie with Rachel McAdams and Ryan Gosling,

[00:20:03] Dr. Nicole: the Notebook.

[00:20:05] JJ: Yeah. When he hangs off of the Ferris wheel and he's like, I'm gonna kill myself if you don't go out with me. Um, yep,

[00:20:12] Dr. Nicole: yep, yep. Full disclosure, I loved that movie growing up. I did.

[00:20:16] JJ: I know it was, yeah, it was very, a very compelling movie.

[00:20:21] Dr. Nicole: Yeah, I know, right? I know. You look back and you're like, whoa, wow.

Because it was all that, and Taylor Swift for me back in the day when I even watched something like Sex in the City, right? There's many scenes with Big and Carrie where Carrie will say, no, I don't want you. I'm leaving. And he pulls her in against that. No, and they like have the scene. I forget what season it's in, but they make out in an elevator through that.

And the way I watch that now is I just cringe. The listeners can't see my body, but I'm like, recoiling and protection because if I say no and someone were to pull me like that, that is. Not consensual. That is not a sign. Which I think what back in the day was like, wow, he's so infatuated. He pursues her despite the no.

Right. It's like, it's very jarring to even come back to that consciousness. That was what, only 20 years ago?

[00:21:14] JJ: Yeah. That was the progressive sex ed that I got with Sex in the city. That was risky thing in high school that my deviant high school or public school friend, high school friends showed me, oh, sex in the city, let's watch this together.

You know, that was like the best I was gonna get at that time, and probably for lots of other people too.

[00:21:36] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:21:37] JJ: So, yeah, it's just really concerning. Um mm-hmm. When we can only turn to media for examples for sex ed,

[00:21:46] Dr. Nicole: right? Absolutely. Absolutely. And something so basic as the anatomy, right? Like. Like that's, I mean, we can separate sex ed, I guess hopefully from basic anatomy and what these different areas of the body are and the purpose, right?

But God forbid you talk about the clitoris and pleasure, like, wow,

[00:22:07] JJ: yeah, no, if you start anatomy, we have to talk about bone or whatever. Um, but we do know from research that when kids can name anatomy, they're more likely to seek help for having experienced childhood sexual abuse. So, uh, there's just so many layers that are disturbing to why, to the situation of why the government is taken away.

Sex ed essentially in the province here that I'm in.

[00:22:34] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I'm curious of your awareness too, of context of other societies around sex ed. Is that something that you have like knowledge in of what's, is this a common practice that's happening right now where there's a lot of restriction?

[00:22:49] JJ: Yeah, there's a lot of rollback.

Generally that's happening. There's a lot of moral panic that usually gets attached to sex education.

[00:22:58] Dr. Nicole: Yeah.

[00:22:58] JJ: As the site of, oh, the kids are being corrupted. You know, I think every generation, it's like, oh, the kids are being corrupted in some kind of way. And sex education is often a site where that moral panic plays out in the public sphere.

Yeah. But it, it just gets blown up as an issue. And it looks like more parents are upset about it than they are in Canada. At least. The majority of parents, at least from a survey, from a num, you know, like fairly recent years, most parents were on board with comprehensive sex education. But I think when we start hearing about things like they're teaching masturbation to grade ones, which is something that, there was a pamphlet that went around in Toronto about that last time.

The patient curriculum in Ontario, the province of Ontario, where Toronto is, last time the sex ed was updated, there was a lot of misinformation. And we're in a totally different world now with, you know, uh, AI and the ability to create lots of different videos that say lots of different concerning things.

So yeah, there's, I think a lot of worry that I have around, um, where we're going around this moral panic that seems to be building around sex education, accurate information about our bodies and healthy relationships. Yeah, and it's obviously related, I think, to other panics, like around trans rights, um, abortion rights.

And so it's all tied to this, I think, conservative agenda to take to strip people of their autonomy.

[00:24:33] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And it ruins me also of the drug war as well, and the research we know on drug education, you know, leading to less deaths and overdoses. Right? The more people are educated with that, the safer they can be, right?

And so it's heartbreaking to see all these different areas where the education is being pulled away and to know that, yeah, it's gonna cause so much continual harm down the line from all the folks who are lacking in this base and this foundation. And for me, it's always so jarring to understand that this, you know, there's a lot to sex, of course.

And I, I love to talk about the play and the creative power and all of that, but even kind of working within the frame of just pure procreative sex. I mean, like, come on, this is the reason that all of us are here, right? Unless you had IVF. Right. But for the rest of us, we are all here from this one act and we can't talk about it.

And of course, sex is way more than that act. I wanna be so clear, but like, just thinking about the conservative thought frame, it's like, how, how do you hold that cognitive dissonance?

[00:25:39] JJ: Mm-hmm.

[00:25:40] Dr. Nicole: It hurts.

[00:25:43] JJ: Yeah. I just think we're living in this really unfortunate era where some people have too much power, they have too much wealth, and we've made a lot of progress on some issues, right?

Black Lives Matter, queer and trans liberation has advanced, um, even disability justice. And I think we're seeing backlash. And obviously Me Too was a big part of, you know, uh, women and gender diverse people's rights and freedom from safety or freedom from violence. Pardon? But. I think we're in a, a really unfortunate era of backlash and people who have too much wealth and they just really don't want the underlings, which, you know, that's the majority of us to gain power, to gain freedom, to gain imagination for a different world where a certain group of people are, you know, aren't in charge and aren't, you know, maintaining that control by force and violence.

And, I don't know, I just think we need to keep dreaming of alternative futures because that's all we can do. Um, but certainly there's a lot of efforts right now to tamp down our imaginations and bringing it back to Alberta for a second. We also just had a book ban. Oh God. So I'm surprised like to hear that this stuff is happening in Canada.

'cause they imagine it to be really kind of a lot more progressive than the US But Alberta where I am is a super conservative province akin to Texas or Florida. And um, yeah, we just had a book ban and. You know, people know Margaret Atwood's, Handmaid's Tale because Margaret Atwood is a Canadian author and she ended up speaking out about the band because her book was taken off of library shelves in Edmonton, the city that I'm in.

And so there were a bunch of memes that were made about, you know, the premier of this province being in a blue dress and being in The Handmaid's Tale. And, um, even Margaret Atwood spoke out about it. And so the book bands were paused for now, which is huge triumphs. Yeah. Wow. But, you know, there's just like a big tamping down of knowledge and the ability to be critical thinkers in this world right now.

[00:27:52] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:27:53] JJ: Yeah.

[00:27:53] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm. You're seeing this as a pendulum swing back into conservative thinking. Are there any other factors that you think are contributing to this big shift that we're seeing culturally in that way?

[00:28:04] JJ: Hmm. Well, I mean, the first thing I think of is. Populist politics. So since Donald Trump first ran, that has changed the game, we now have populism running rampant where elections are so much about playing on people's emotions.

It doesn't matter if what anybody's saying is true or not, it's just how it makes people feel. Mix that in with the tech, you know, bros and the oligo power of folks like Bezos and um, Zuckerberg. And we've just got a recipe for disaster where, you know, there's controls on what information is available online and what gets boosted, what doesn't.

Obviously we know Twitter or X played a huge role in different major elections recently, um, and disproportionately promoting certain candidates and stuff. So I just think we're in a, we just, again, a really strange and unfortunate time. Um, in history when it comes to suppression of people's voices and imaginations.

[00:29:14] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Which is why I'm so grateful you're here to be able to speak to that voice and speak to that imagination. Right. Especially in the context. And so when you think about that, when you think about agency and career joy, where do you see us needing to move? What are some of the things that you vision out for that transformation?

[00:29:39] JJ: Yeah. Yeah. So I think what I, where I'm going with the whole sort of coming to terms with the fact that we do have now a, a, you know, a far left is we kind of have to get our house in order as progressives.

[00:29:55] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:29:56] JJ: Um, and really kind of root down. And I think we need to touch grass. I think we need to just sort of have some alignment on what.

Our goals should be, I think class politics needs to come back into the picture in a really serious way, realizing now that you know, that idea that there's a revolving door between business people and politicians that's always been there, realizing now that that's even more problematic because we do have, you know, someone like Elon Musk who's gonna be a trillionaire.

So developing class consciousness, developing more consciousness around racial politics, um, disability justice, gender justice, um, education is, I think, really, really key to all these pieces. And it becomes harder when, you know, there are bans happening in certain countries for folks not being able to use social media.

The conversation about, you know, in Australia, for instance, people under 16 aren't allowed to use social media anymore. I think that's probably a whole other conversation than ours today. But it does bring up, you know, interesting considerations around the fact that when certain groups can't access certain information, what does that do to those communities?

So queer and trans kids that are never exposed to anything queer and trans, because that's, they, you, they can only get that information online. Well, I'm sort of a living example of what that does, and it means that these kids don't find themselves until later in life and then they have to grieve like large chunks of their life.

Grieve things like, you know, sleeping with people that don't even fit their orientation. Being in relationships with people that don't even fit the orientation because, you know, like myself didn't have opportunity to actually be exposed to other ideas. Mm-hmm. Um, to find things more authentic. Mm-hmm. So I think there's a lot of work to do around solidarity building and consciousness raising.

To try to get us to a place where we can actually like envision something different. Because right now the powers that be are working so hard to make it impossible for us to dream something different.

[00:32:10] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:32:10] JJ: And conditions we're living in are just getting more and more oppressive, like with the cost of living going up, et cetera.

[00:32:18] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. It's often brings up in terms of our psychology, uh, trauma response. Right. When you see these bigger systems, right. It's very common. I'm curious for the listener, which ones, you know, which one and ones it can be multiple or starting to resonate as they listen to you talk about our collective experience.

Right. Is it the flight, the fight, the freeze, or the fun? And often it's a combo of all of 'em, right? But as they hear you really paint the landscape, I'm sure one of those is resonating with you, dear listener. As much as it's resonating with me, often freezing. 'cause I just feel overwhelmed of, wow, I can't change this.

You're right. You know, trillionaires the system. It's huge. Oh my gosh. Versus this other space of fight where I'm like, I need to make more content, more content, more content. You know, just, which could also be maybe running, you know, depending on you look at that. Right? And so it, it's. So natural to fall into that because what you're painting is the reality of the landscape and how big it is right now, and how much of it is outside of our control.

Right? Which is often overwhelming. And so usually I try to come back to this space of what can you do in your direct relationships, of course the activism work and all of that. And also there are, you know, people around you right now in your own community that are people you interface with and talk to, and how can we bring more direct action into those relationships.

I'm curious if you have anything that like, feels tangible for the listener who's starting to feel overwhelmed and that immense level of despair with this. Like how do you bring some, some tactile, tangible things to start with for them?

[00:33:58] JJ: Yeah. That's such a beautiful and important, you know, intervention in the conversation that we're having.

There's so much despair. We're watching literal genocides happen in front of our eyes. It's. It's a harrowing time to be alive. And yet I do think there's a lot of potential for pushing back even in really small ways. And so, you know, the first thing I go to is really just working on our, regulating our own nervous systems.

And it's something that I work on really intentionally. Um, and I have students, especially my gender studies classes, we talk about all this horrible shit. And then they go like, how do you, how do you have arguments with people about this? How do you maintain your composure? They're like, I'm having, you know, Christmas dinner with my father who's a Trump supporter.

Like, what do I do? And I'm like, the first thing you have to do is learn how to regulate your nervous system because you, and it's so much easier said than done. And it's such a lifelong process, especially for us trauma babies. Who I've been through a lot, but I really think the small work does add up. So working on regulating our nervous systems is so important, like individually and as a collective.

Mm-hmm. Definitely is my first thing that comes to mind.

[00:35:23] Dr. Nicole: Oh yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I feel the, you know, five years of a doctor in clinical psychology and not a single class on working with the body. Wild. Wild. Right. I'll be in a, a neuropsychology class and we're talking about adrenaline and cortisol, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and no one's like, Hey, so when your client's experiencing these things, this is what we should do.

No, it's like, can you point on the exam, like where that activates what it's like, gosh, like we're missing such a simple, key, crucial piece of this is that. Everything we experienced, dear listener, you're hearing this right now through your ears, it's through your body that you're synthesizing this information, this conversation that we're having, right?

And so everything that you experience in life is because you have. Body. Right? And so we know that when we get activated into our trauma responses, we've quite literally stepped into a different part of the brain. We're more in our amygdala, we're more in the older, more reptilian parts of our brain, right?

And we're not in our prefrontal cortex, which is where we make executive critical thinking decisions. And so when you get activated, right, we're quite literally in a different part of the brain. And so the first step, as you're pointing to, is to be able to work with the body, right? And. Like you're saying, that's so hard to do.

That's a muscle for most of us to survive in the certain, like current context. It is all thinking, thinking, thinking. Next thing, next thing, next thing. Survival. Survival. Survival. Right. In terms of how often do people just sit and be with their bodies? Right? It's. It's very uncommon these days. And so when you get activated and you're in that state, you don't really have that muscle lift of checking your body, right?

And so when I'm working with clients, we talk about how you need to start scanning your body and tuning into your body when you are calm and regulated. And then that awareness will translate to the moments where you're more activated. 'cause you're already in that pathway of scanning. Like, how am I feeling today?

Wow, okay, I've got this breath rate, I've got this. Great, right? Those are the skills you need. So that way when you are activated, you're with that parent at home for the holidays and you start to notice your chest is tightening, your voice is elevating, right? You have a bit more awareness to say, okay, I need to take that deep breath.

I need to go for the walk outside. I need to call one of my other queer badass friends who's gonna co-regulate with me on the phone right now because I'm losing my shit. Right. Like, whatever your go-to thing is, the more that we build that awareness in our calm state, the more it can also translate into the more activated states.

And we already have that muscle built of how to ground ourselves.

[00:38:10] JJ: Yeah. It can be so hard though when things are so overwhelming and you know, like the images we see online of graphic violence and and stuff on social media, it just can really, I think, take us out of our bodies. And then, you know, when things get quiet and we're not holding our phone or we're not in front of a screen, it's like things might not feel okay.

And so it's like, oh, I want a distraction. And I noticed that within myself, um, recently, and I'm going, wow, okay. You know, that obviously signals that I'm so overwhelmed with things. Um, and what can I do about that? Like. Is the emotion that's there that I'm so afraid of confronting. Like is it that threatening or like, can I actually, can I actually face it?

Can I sit with it so it can move? And so it can pass, right? Mm-hmm. But yeah, the time we're, the times we're living in, it's so heavy. It's so heavy. And that's partly, you know, why I research joy.

[00:39:09] Dr. Nicole: Yeah, right?

[00:39:10] JJ: Yeah, for real. Because we can stay stuck in that heaviness so much. You know, as somebody who studied psych, not myself, you, I, it, you know, you, you probably know, like sometimes we need to distract ourselves, right?

Like, and just shift from that, that feeling that we're having to switch into something different. Mm-hmm. And it's not just to ignore the feeling necessarily. It might be to return to it another time, but. I don't know about for other folks, but for me, I can definitely get a sense that I'm stuck in this like despairing mode, right?

With everything that's going on in the world. And you know, as a gender-based violence researcher, I think about the Andrew Tatu it all. I think about the Joe Rogans of the world. I think about like trad wipes. And I'm just like, God, I grew up in a society that felt like things were getting more progressive and liberating and what's happening.

And, and so I really find myself needing to become very aware of the states that I'm in. And honestly, like everyone, it's, it's easier said than done, but I do think that's a big part of how we push back right now against what's going on, is actually like taking care of ourselves in that way.

[00:40:26] Dr. Nicole: Absolutely.

Absolutely. So in line of that, for you, what are some of the ways that you take care of your body? We can start there, right? Since you dropped us into the body, one of my favorite topics. What are some of the ways that you take care of your body, find joy with your body?

[00:40:42] JJ: Yeah. Well, I mean that can be a racy question for sure, but, um, you know, I grew up as a competitive figure skater.

So I just from a very young age, I think my dad was, my dad was a hockey player, he put me on skates at like two years old. So from a really young age I was doing a lot of sports and especially skating and just moving my body a lot. So for me, moving my body brings me a lot of joy and I know that about myself.

So, you know, I escape to the mountains to go hiking as much as I can. I'm like constantly walking everywhere. I refuse to get a car so I can cycle and walk. Just moving my body really helps me. Find joy and feel connected to myself. Sometimes it's overwhelming to connect with my body and like I have to kind of check out and, and, you know, listen to a podcast on a walk and not really like, feel so connected.

But other times, you know, I'll be hiking and I'm like, I don't want, you know, any music, any, anything. I just wanna be with my own thoughts and all this kind of gets me to a place of greater joy.

[00:41:51] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:41:52] JJ: Yeah. And then of course there's like a more rapier side of, you know, for me being connected to my body also means being connected to the erotic self.

That doesn't necessarily mean sexual, like I'm drawing on Audrey Lorde. Yeah. Black feminist, uh, black lesbian feminist theorist Audrey Lorde, who talks about this idea of the erotic, and it's not necessarily sexual. It's this, it's basically our intuitive power that we all have. And she talks about it really in terms of women.

[00:42:21] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:42:22] JJ: Somebody who's trans, non-binary. Um, I think that it can really be expanded to, you know, gender diverse people and people more broadly maybe. Um, but there's this deep, intuitive power that we all have and we can listen to it or we can suppress, and the powers that be want us to suppress it. Um, so it can be sexual and it can be really powerful to be connected to that energy, um, in an intuitive way, not in a performative way, like just performing hegemonic or dominant sexual scripts.

I don't think that's sort of the way to go for me anyway. But, um. Just being in touch with my body in a really like, raw way.

[00:43:02] Dr. Nicole: Yeah.

[00:43:03] JJ: Um, that's what brings me a lot of joy and connection to myself.

[00:43:07] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:43:07] JJ: Um, and then just trying to connect with my erotic more broadly. Like not tamping down rage when I feel mad at what's happening in the world or I feel sad, you know, like letting that guide me mm-hmm.

And be a compass and not sort of letting the powers that be numb me out.

[00:43:24] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Right. Finding the spaces we're able to feel fully that full range. Right. The pleasure to the pain and everything in between, up, down, and otherwise. Right. Of the human experience. Mm-hmm. In terms of the somatic experience with our emotions and yeah.

That, that practice of being able to go on the hike without music and enjoy that experience. I can feel like a lot for people. And again, when we're in a society that is so. There's so much trauma going on, so much awareness of it too, right? That's a lot for our bodies to take in. And so like you're saying, like scrolling more and more and more.

Next thing, next thing, next thing. This is something that you see with a lot of trauma survivors, right? Is that when you're in survival mode, you keep going, going, going, going, going. And it's often not until you get into a more stable space that you actually feel the overwhelm of everything you were carrying.

'cause your body is really intelligent, right? Your body is going, Hey, it doesn't look like it's the right time to be thinking about this stuff next, right? I don't wanna sit and think about that. This isn't the time. And so when you get into more of a, a softer space where it is safer, it can start flooding back and feeling way intense, right?

So for someone who is constantly going, going, going, the idea of sitting with in silence. Everything bad that ever, you know happened can just flood straight back to your head. Right? And so the reality is there might be a bit of like titrating for folks too, where it's like, yeah, the idea of going for a hike and not listening to music and truly feeling it, my body and the birds and the sounds, that sounds beautiful, but it feels impossible, right?

Because of the speed at with which I live, right? It's that small steps, right? You don't have to meditate for an hour, right? What if we just take three deep breaths? I'm not even gonna say 30 seconds. 'cause that might feel like a lot for folks, right? So it's like, how can we work with people with where they're at to start these small practices that bring you joy, right?

And dear listener, I'm sure you already have many, right? There's, like you said, you pointed to a couple, right? For you of hiking, right? Being able to enjoy that. For me, I love taking a bubble bath, right? I love going biking, right? There are probably some more things in your life, dear listener, that you already go to that bring you joy and, and what would it mean to actually next time that you do those things, maybe check in to see how much you're scrolling.

Could you tune into your body and just notice what those activities are doing for you? Right? It's that small step towards that. And I do find that to be absolutely political. You think about things like, um, the Sunday scaries. Right. No one wants to tune into their body and how much they're afraid and tense and unhappy to go back to their work on Monday.

Right. If you're lucky to have a 40 hour Monday through Friday work week under this. Right. That's a privilege in and of itself. But there's a lot of people that, um, feel even that tenseness. Right. And I think the body is constantly speaking. The system is not working for us. The system is broken. Right. And so when you really sit with that, when you really feel that you're not numb to all of the atrocities every single day that come out on the news, that's a lot to feel.

That's a lot to feel.

[00:46:42] JJ: Yeah. It is. Yeah. It is a lot to feel. So I think we do have to be gentle with ourselves as much as we can be. And certainly, you know, I talk about these practices, but it really truly, I'm not trying to, you know, I. Make it seem like I've got it figured all out. Like seriously, it's such a journey.

[00:47:00] Dr. Nicole: No one does. No one does.

[00:47:01] JJ: It's such a journey. Yeah. To like sort out, yeah. To really sort out kind of what works for us. And honestly for me, like this is such a privileged thing to say, I recognize that I have had to limit my social media, you know, at times because I'm just like, I can't, I can't even take in some of the news.

And at first there was this one period where I stopped reading the news altogether. And like for the listeners, I'm one of the, I'm this type of a person who will literally read the news on my phone three times a day. Like, I just, I wanna be up to date with what's going on in the world and like, especially local politics.

Uh, so I can advocate if I need to or can esp, I'm like, you know, a platform as a public intellectual, as an academic. Um, but there was a period where I was just like, okay, I'm not gonna, and. I felt guilty about it at first, but having that breather allowed me to restore my nervous system so that I could come back.

And then I had a better idea of what my capacity was. And I do honestly think that a lot of this self-care type stuff, as I think what we're talking about, it has to do with returning to the joy and like figuring out a way that we can get back to feeling joyful. I didn't know about for other folks, but for me, feeling joy is just like the best feeling.

[00:48:27] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:48:28] JJ: It's the best feeling. It brings so much energy and beauty into my life. Yeah. But we can't tap into it always when we're so overwhelmed. So I really do think the first step is kind of figuring out how to actually be in our bodies. 'cause feelings are somatic. We can't feel joy unless we're actually in our bodies.

And not like cognitive joy, but like actual joy that restores us in our bodies. Like we have to be in touch. So I think this, I didn't actually think this would come up today, but it makes perfect sense that it is because finding joy is so much about actually getting in touch with ourselves.

[00:49:08] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm. Yeah.

The reality is you can't pick and choose which emotions you feel. Right. So there's so many people who will be like, pleasure, pleasure, pleasure, pleasure. It's like the more you feel the pleasure, the more you're gonna cry. You know that, right? Like, you know that's connected, right?

[00:49:28] JJ: I know,

[00:49:29] Dr. Nicole: right? Yeah. Yeah.

And so how

[00:49:31] JJ: I know. Yeah.

[00:49:33] Dr. Nicole: I, I mean, I'm, I'm here for it. Right. Fully embrace it. I've always joked on the podcast that I come hard and I cry hard. Right. And those are definitely connected. Right. I don't think you can, you can come as hard if you can't cry because it's about that release either way and fully, like, feeling the experience in your body.

And so, yeah. For, for you and your research with Joy, how have you seen that transform people's sex life and their eroticism for you? Hmm.

[00:50:04] JJ: Yeah. By, I'm sorry, I just can't get over that ice.

[00:50:08] Dr. Nicole: I cry hard and calm.

[00:50:11] JJ: Love that so much.

[00:50:13] Dr. Nicole: I know. I keep wanting to make some mer I'm like, I gotta put that on some merch somewhere is good.

I need that back. I need that tote personally.

[00:50:22] JJ: Yeah, it's, um, yeah, no, I, yeah. You should hook, hook me up. Yeah, totally. Totally. And like sometimes it's at the same time, you know, like these things are so intermingled, but, um. Yeah, I, I think, uh, so I can tell you a little bit about how I got to Joy in my research to make it sort of make more sense.

But, um, my thesis research was so depressing. Mm. And I spoke with undergrads, um, at the University of Toronto who were complex trauma survivors. So people who had experienced trauma in childhood that could be parental neglect, sexual victimization, um, witnessing violence, et cetera. And then who were re-victimized by violence later on as teens.

So these folks had been through a lot, and I was curious about their experiences with sexual consent because the new sex ed curriculum had come out in, um, the province of Ontario where Toronto is, and there was, uh, consent had been added for the first time in the curriculum. There was some protest about it.

So there was this one sign I, I can't get, it's like burned into my head. That was this guy holding this sign that said teaching consent. Did you get ours? And so it really assumes that like, youth don't, their consent doesn't matter and that it's parents should have choice in determining what they if Yeah.

If, if they even learn about consent in the first place. Which is absurd to me.

[00:51:48] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:51:49] JJ: But the definition of consent and how it was talked about in the curriculum was very black and white. It was just say yes and everything will be good and fun and or just say no and you'll be free from harm. And you know, uh, I was going like, what are the young trauma sur first of all, like, that's not how a lot of sex looks for folks.

But also, you know, for the trauma survivors in the classroom who may have had a lot of gray areas of experience, uh, sorry. Gray area experiences of consent. Or who, you know, maybe were victimized as kids, uh, sexually and who weren't able to say no. And, you know, they weren't, or they did say no and they weren't free.

You know what I mean? There's a lot of gray area there. Yes, yes. You know, so I was like, this is not a helpful way of framing consent. So I spoke to undergrad trauma survivors, and it was just like horrifying. It was so depressing. Their, their struggles with consent. They, they experienced dissociation from their bodies.

Like literally one participant described not being able to feel touch on their skin. Sure,

[00:52:53] Dr. Nicole: sure.

[00:52:54] JJ: While they were acting enthusiastic.

[00:52:56] Dr. Nicole: Mm.

[00:52:57] JJ: Like just really hor, just super depressing. Hypersexualization, um, or hypersexuality, pardon me. Substance use. Like acquiescent. Acquiescing or just kind of giving into what other people want, because that's kind of what parents maybe expected when they were young, et cetera.

So it was really depressing. But at the very end of the study, there was kind of this. Uh, silver lining that emerged, which was participants who were, uh, LGBTQ plus who had slept with cisgender straight men and slept with queer and trans people found that their experiences with queer and trans people were way more pleasurable, really accommodated what I termed their sexual access needs.

So anything that they needed to kind of support them in getting towards pleasure or, or sexual joy. And it had, there was such a deeper sense of consent, so I was like, what are queer trans communities doing differently and how can we learn from that for gender-based violence prevention? But the way that participants talked about, like these experiences with queer and trans people being so much more joyful was, I was so interested in that.

And I was also, that was the time when I was having my first, you know, long-term relationship with a woman. And I, I had this parallel where I was going. Wow. You know, I have had such more pleasurable sex with this partner than I ever had had with men. It's so unscripted.

[00:54:29] Dr. Nicole: Yeah.

[00:54:29] JJ: It's so authentic feeling.

Mm-hmm. It doesn't feel performative. I felt deeply embodied.

[00:54:37] Dr. Nicole: Yeah.

[00:54:37] JJ: And I was like, this is incredible. So then was born my queer sexual joy project because I needed to investigate this to find out what queer and trans communities were doing differently. Mm-hmm. And I think Joy is a radical force for social change potentially.

And like you said, we can't always access it. And there's a lot of other feelings that are there that we might have to reconcile with before we can even get to Joy. But I think especially queer joy and trans joy are things that are revolutionary.

[00:55:10] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[00:55:10] JJ: If we can tap into them and we can sort of spread that around and not the kind of queer joy, I just wanna.

Have a caveat here. Not the kind of queer joy that's, you know, splashed on a pride float for, um, a big bank. You know, that's not the kind of queer joy that I'm interested in. I'm interested in queer joy as a collective experience of resistance that believes in the wellbeing for everyone. Not just personal or individualistic understandings of joy.

Yeah. But I do think joy is contagious. I think it builds resilience, it strengthens communities. It disrupts systems that thrive on fear. Shame. So I don't think joy's just a feeling. I think it is a form of resistance and I can say, you know, a lot more about this 'cause it's something I'm super passionate about right now.

Yeah. But, uh. This is, that's sort of how I got to studying joy.

[00:56:05] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Love to hear that. Right. I think, uh, there's a lot of resonance in my journey as well, right From the clinical psychology side. I started with sexual trauma. I volunteered in that space, came to the field of psychology, knowing I wanted to work with sexual trauma.

Getting there and then realizing, but wait, what's the whole healing continuum? We can talk all day about trauma, but where do I take my clients next? Yeah. You know, and that part wasn't talked about at school, right? So I was like, oh, okay, well there's the work, you know, so I'm, I'm sure for you similarly, right?

Like, here's all these experiences, right? And here's the transformation is getting to the joy space. And so I can imagine, you know, with, with queerness, there's so many scripts that you're throwing out the window, right? We know the research on the orgasm gap and how much more lesbians orgasm than women who are with, you know?

Yeah. And heterosexual connections with cis men, right? Mm-hmm. And so I would love even more research if there's like, even more of an orgasm gap with like trans and I, I would love to know, I don't know if we have that yet. Um, but I, I know. Yeah. But we know we, we do with lesbians, right? So I can, I'm gonna make a guess that it probably continues onward.

Um, if I were to make a educated guess, um, because there's so many, um. Narratives that you're throwing out the window. I'll always remember for myself the, I mean, it wasn't the first time I had sex with, um, a woman in a dildo, but definitely in that process, I remember, you know, growing up, so Christian, I was taught that I'm going to give my body to my husband, right?

Mm-hmm. And so, and I've experienced my own sexual trauma. And so the paradigm of that, of often like giving, giving, giving. And so in ways that I, I struggled to say no. I struggled to even ask for a break in sex, even when it hurt in any of that. Um, so when I first started having queer sex and there was a dildo, it like shattered my mind because I realized, wow, this moment of penetration, I have my partner over here fucking me, but this is a, like a, a piece of silicone like.

I should be feeling the pleasure. This is for me, what is like, like what? Because you know so much of my penetrative life, I was like, oh, this is for the other person. I want them to feel good. I'm a good woman. I'm gonna do this. Right. So, yeah. Oh, it just shattered everything. And so I think, yeah, when you start having those queer experiences where you're like, wow, it's not about this.

It's not just p and v. What does it mean to completely go outside the box of pleasure? Right? You start to be so creative. There's so many possibilities, right? I couldn't even fathom for so long just receiving, let alone just topping someone, you know? But like most recent sexual encounter was me absolutely topping my.

Female partner before she left for a trip, right? I was like, Hey, you wanna orgasm before you go? Great. Happy to do that. So joyful. Let's go lay down. Lay down. You know, like, but those are things I couldn't even fathom, you know, because of all the scripts of of, of stuff. And so I think it, it really takes us into this space so that I think like, you know, if I'm talking about pleasure, talking about joy, both are about play, right?

I feel like that's the big key is like play, can we get to play? And play is something that incorporates, you know, so much release of scripts and expectations, right? And there's some play with, with strict rules and we love kink and b, DSM so beautiful, you know? Um, but ideally to get to that space where you just feel like there's more opportunity, more space to move your body and be in that sort of joy and pleasure.

[00:59:44] JJ: Yeah. And not really worrying. I mean, I know there's some research, I always come back to this piece of research, but. Outta the west coast of Canada showing that ger sex with men. Women are most often focused on the pleasure of the male partner as opposed to themselves. And that is exacerbated when folks are trauma survivors or sexual violence survivors.

So, you know, we know that there's a most straight folks, or, and also to broaden that folks who have sex with men who are, you know, identify as women when they're having sex with men, they're focused on the pleasure of men. And that makes me so sad. And also like. Kind of makes me feel sick. And I think that's because I have had my own experiences of like moving out of that space of sleeping with men to something so much more pleasurable and genuine feeling.

[01:00:41] Dr. Nicole: Yeah.

[01:00:41] JJ: And my sexual joy project really did find like most of the participants were actually queer and trans, or sorry, we're, um, trans and gender diverse. Mm-hmm. So while I don't have like a quantitative survey to, you know, compare to that lesbian and the orgasm gap in lesbian sexual satisfaction, I can say like anecdotally and through my qualitative research findings, interviews, focus groups aren't making that sort of thing, um, that folks absolutely said that they're having so much more pleasurable relationships and sex because they do have that element of play.

It's a greater sense of authenticity. It's a greater sense of care and ethic of care that's woven in there. And there's just like this safety, when I termed it, a container of safety where people can explore and play and really just, you know, be in their bodies and not be worried about being judged. And that's the thing I hear a lot from lesbian friends too.

This is my own experience that one of the major differences of sleeping with men is that like there isn't this fear about how you look necessarily. And like there certainly are, you know, lesbians or s folk aren't homogenous group and there is sexual violence that happens in these communities.

Absolutely. Um, so it's not to make it simple, but you know, a lot of that violence, we've seen some of the research coming out shows that it's actually usually a reproduction of like cis heteronormative. Ideologies that are being played out. So it's, you know, it's mask folks who aren't, uh, badera and Nord Meyer call it like a righteous masculinity, like mask.

Folks won't let go of this, like toxic masculinity. And so they're playing it out and reproducing violent structures, but it's not inherent to the queer, to queer communities. But anyway, that was a bit of a tangent. It's just to say that in my queer sexual joy project, I really saw that trans and gender diverse people were having immensely pleasurable sex lives because they were feeling a great sense of freedom to just be in their bodies and navigate towards pleasure in whatever form that looked like.

And it didn't look like blowjob, you know, p and v penetration, male orgasm sex done. That was not what it looked like. It was so many different things, and I think that's one of the reasons queer sex is so beautiful. It can be. Many, many, many different things that don't have to look like a script from porn, you know?

Yeah.

[01:03:21] Dr. Nicole: Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. And so the power of being able to talk to your other friends about what they're exploring is such a transformation, right? What were you doing the other night? Right? And to hear the ways that they're playing and, and if you're lucky to be in communities where you get to even watch that and see that that can absolutely transform what you know is possible, right?

Um, 'cause yeah, porn is definitely entertainment and not education, right? And there are definitely ways where you can find more queer porn, more ethical porn, but the reality is a lot of what we find is not give any sort of example of anything out of, like you're saying, than normative. Scripts, um, that often encourage a lot of violence and things that are non-consensual, right?

Mm-hmm. And so to be able to see that other space right, takes a, a big leap into a new world that often we don't even know is possible. Until you get into the communities and you're hearing other people speak about their sex lives and speak about what they're learning. And I find that to be, you know, we, we talk about sexual violence that will thrive in silence, right?

And so to get to a space of play, pleasure, joy, we have to be having open conversations. You know, I loved when the first time when I was in grad school, I had gone out with some of my friends and they had asked me, what are some of your fantasies right now? At the time, I was like, I wanna get outta grad school.

That's like the biggest erotic fantasy I have is like, I want out of this thing. Um, but I love that question because at the time I wasn't even thinking about that, right? I didn't have that muscle flex of joy and fantasies and pleasure. And so to start even flexing those muscles, dear listener, like, what are some of the fantasies?

And if you're really lucky to be in a community space where your friends then say, how do we help you make that happen? Right? How many hands do you need for that scene? Right? Who's on deck? Right? Like, so powerful to have those sorts of communities. We're able to truly create that fantasy. And, and, and that's such a flexing of the muscle to say, wow, I have this vision.

I would like to have this. Who's on board with me? How do we have the consent talks? How do we create that? And then doing the aftercare, I mean, that is a radical space that is so outside of the norms of the traditional things that so many people are often locked in that you're speaking to.

[01:05:39] JJ: Totally and all that stuff.

I found that my queer sexual joy project, and there was a lot of joy, especially non-monogamous communities and the kind of care that showed up there. There was also a beautiful thread of a tremendous amount of care for casual sexual, during casual sexual experiences. So people will have hookups, which are often looked at as these risky endeavors, and especially for women, like, you know, don't have casual sex, like you're gonna get assaulted.

And you know, that's so true when I'm hearing reports like anecdotally and through research that like women are having hookups and men are just like randomly choking them without consent and yeah. You know, um, with the rise of like violent porn and what have you. Wow. I just, I'm like viscerally so affected by that.

I've lost my train of thought because this is such a big thing right now, like the whole choking conversation and there's a lot of research coming out about it. It's like, it's, it's a lot, um, the, the whole choking discourse, but putting a pin in that, I think my queer sexual joy project really found that even in queer hookup contexts, there was so much care and like beauty that came outta that.

So I think, you know, I think questions that I'm asking are things like, what if the opposite of rape culture isn't just consent? What if it's actually joy?

[01:06:59] Dr. Nicole: Yeah, absolutely.

[01:07:00] JJ: Right? Yeah, because I think consent is like the floor. It's not the ceiling. And I don't think we can stop at consent or else we're missing this bigger vision where, you know, we need to think about cultures where sex and intimacy and community are like joyful and give life to us.

And I think that means doing stuff like you're talking about, of like chatting with friends, if that's available to us and learning what's possible, exploring different avenues. But we're in, in this culture that's very risk focused, very much like prevent harm. Avoid harm. That's in my field of gender-based violence, that's what it's focused on.

There's a lot of talk about preventing harm and risk, but there really isn't talk about how do we actually build pleasurable and caring and safe, beautiful sexual cultures. The thing is, I think queer and trans communities are already doing it. Oh yeah. Literally, like they're doing it, but they're, they're building these cultures, Uhhuh.

Mm-hmm. They have them. It's in existence, you know? Mm-hmm. And so I think there's a lot to learn from queer and trans communities that straight folks and folks who sleep with men can learn. To shift things. So that's kind of what I'm obsessed about right now is thinking about how we can spread word about this around.

[01:08:22] Dr. Nicole: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'm so glad that you're doing that research and speaking to that. It feels very much so, like the gap I found in clinical psych, right? So for you to find that gap and be like, why are we stopping the conversation here? This isn't the end point. This isn't how we're gonna end all of this violence.

We have to go to that next space. And even in the history of this podcast specifically, I, I definitely come from many conversations about spiritual trauma and many conversations about sexual trauma. And there's definitely a shift in the podcast where it starts to be like, Nope, we're talking about pleasure.

How do we get to pleasure? That is revolutionary. You know what I mean? And so, yeah. Absolutely. Like, you know, as a therapist, I'm so here for the trauma work. I'm so here for the healing 'cause that's the beginning. It's just not the end. And so I'm so glad that you're seeing that in the work that you're doing and also finding the spaces where queer and trans liberation is completely rewriting the scripts of the mainstream ways that sex and eroticism is played out, and finding new and exciting ways where that's bringing more joy and pleasure and life force to people, which is absolutely what we needed.

I wanna tie it like full circle to when we're dealing with all the bullshit of the society that we live in, we need joy. We need sources of joy to come back with resilience against these systems. Right? And so how can you form that? Yeah, I'm gonna have a great scene with my community, right? Like I'm gonna have some great scenes.

I'm gonna like release demons out of my body when I orgasm, right? And I'm gonna help them do the same, right? And so that sort of work is absolutely political because it gives us that life force to come back to that family who's voting for Trump. And we're having to take some deep breaths, but thank God I had a great scene the other weekend so that I feel good in my body.

I find that to be extremely political and self-care in the highest form And community care. Community care.

[01:10:30] JJ: Yeah, totally. So I hear you talking about. How liberation isn't just about what we resist, it's really about what we create and what we intentionally create. Whether that's a great scene or you know, great relationships with people in our community.

A great solo sex practice. Yeah. That's really like peeling off those layers of those sexual scripts that we were told growing up work. For a lot of us, it's working through religious trauma, like holy hell, there's a lot of that in the queer community. Yes. Um, but yeah, I just, I'm so fascinated by how communities, um, create joy in the face of oppression because it's so important.

I agree with you 1000000% that we have to do that. And I also think queer communities are often framed as just vulnerable or at risk, and it's like all of us are, you know, like mentally ill. All of us are living in poverty and it's like the reality is our communities do have higher levels of poverty and do have higher levels of mental health issues.

That's because we live in a profoundly homophobic and transphobic society.

[01:11:30] Dr. Nicole: Oh yeah.

[01:11:31] JJ: I think from my research and you know, just from our conversation, you can see that queer and trans communities are also innovators. You know, like they're building these practices of care and resistance, and I think the wider world can really learn from it.

[01:11:46] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[01:11:48] JJ: Yeah,

[01:11:49] Dr. Nicole: absolutely.

[01:11:50] JJ: Yeah.

[01:11:51] Dr. Nicole: Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. So much of the language that has been built right, comes from queer trans K-P-D-S-M, right? In terms of how to have these conversations, how to do it with safety, all of that, right? There's a lot of really important work that has been laid down for these foundations, for all of us, and there's so many ways in which.

That future, it's gonna take small steps, right? Wherever you are, dear listener, in that journey, I think it's small steps towards that embodiment of play and joy and, and pleasure, and trusting that if you find the people who are also having those values, that you will continue to grow with them, right?

Community is everything. You cannot do this alone. And when we think about some of the rates with, um, as you were speaking to with our communities, it's just interesting, right? Like when we, when we have a, say we have a plant and we put the plant in some really shitty soil and the plant starts to die, we look at that data and we say, look at this plant that's dying, right?

And we don't take, we, we, uh, the reality is we take a moment and we say, wow, the soil and the context for that plant is not great. And yet in the field of clinical psychology, which is the space that's putting out that research on depression, anxiety, all that shit, if you don't take some level of systemic awareness, which is where we started this conversation to understand that's why our community is hurting, not because our community is broken, but because the systems that we live in are broken.

Mm-hmm. You know, like, Ugh, God, it kills me. It kills me, because that's how we create these narratives. Oh, queer brown and queer, trans Brown. It's like, no, what's the soil that you're planting us in? This is a fucked up soil. And so I just

[01:13:51] JJ: mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. No, we live in a really fucked up world. And it's hard to be in our bodies like we've been talking about.

It's hard to think about cultivating joy sometimes because things are just so heavy. Yes. Um, but you know, like you said, community is everything. And yes, we, we've been given a raw deal with this society, but I do think queer joy shows us how to imagine and build something else. And the way we do that, I think is within ourselves, like accepting ourselves if we are, if you're listening and you're queer, like accepting yourself if you're queer, accepting yourself if you're trans, but also finding other people who share those values.

And then, you know, that alone for me was life changing. Oh yeah. Connecting with other queer and trans people. Like, it's just, it's given me so much life. It's given me so much. Rootedness. So it's funny that you brought up that concept of soil 'cause it really is this rootedness that I feel in the world and this strength from which to move.

Right? But I do think we need to, within our communities, like build um, keep thinking about relating to one another in different ways. Like not reproducing harms from the shitty world that we're living in, right? Not reproducing individualism and competitiveness and all those colonial things that, you know, tell us to want to dominate other people.

And for, you know, our lives to be about competitiveness and conquest. I think there's so much possibility if we can just develop different relationality with one another. And that's where I really land with my work. Um, it's how do I practice my values with other people I'm in community with? How do I show up and.

You know, just being in good community with other people, I think finding joy with like-minded people with similar values, that's a form of resistance.

[01:15:58] Dr. Nicole: Yes. Absolutely. Absolutely. And one that I can confidently say will shift your whole experience of reality. Mm-hmm. For the better. Right? When you find other people with those shared experiences, you feel seen, you feel understood.

And that is the intimacy we all need to have a healthy, thriving life is that deep connection. And I feel so privileged in the reality that the majority of my, my bubble that I live in is queer and polyamorous and radical and liberated and kinky, and it's badass and I love it. And sometimes then the alternative happens where I forget that this is not the world where I step back out and I might say something and not really remember that this is not the context of all people.

Granted I have my Mormon mother and family, so that is always a good reminder. Uh, but. But I felt so much community that like, you know, there's those moments where you step out and you're like, wow, okay, that water is very cold out there. Damn, okay. I really like my like warm little pool over here. You know?

Um, but I think that. In, in the revolution. It's, it's not about completely ostracizing the family member who votes for Trump. 'cause my mom did. And it's like, do I shut her out for that? Right? Yeah, I know I saw your face. Um, I didn't, right. I had a very clear conversation with her and I continue to have conversations with her and there's a certain level of space that I need to have to protect myself from some of the extremely hurtful comments she's made about how I live my life.

And so what, what I, what I think about with that is how can we find balance, right? Where it's not that we're cutting these people off unless we have to. Of course there's real violence and realities to that, so I wanna name that. But if we're able to have that. Space where we are able to still have slow meaningful conversations with those people because we can do more of that.

When you have a really secure bubble, I've got a really secure queer radical bubble, which gives me more resilience to do more political work and other relationships that are a bit more challenging. Right? And I'm not saying to just take direct harm, that is not what I'm saying. But the reality is there are some people in our lives that are in our periphery that we can have meaningful conversations with, that we can show up authentically with and have those deeper challenging conversations.

And then I like to trust in the ripples of those, right? The slow ripples of those over time. 'cause we're just a very small blip in the human existence, right? And so often we can't see how much is changing when we're just living in our day to day. But conversations like this, the conversations that you dear listener have after listening to this episode with your community afterwards, right?

That ripples out. To so many things that we'll never even know.

[01:18:44] JJ: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. That's such a beautiful way of putting it. I've also found a similar thing, and I've never thought of it as a bubble before, though. It's certainly protective in my community. Yeah.

[01:18:59] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[01:19:00] JJ: It's really about intimacy, I think, and the intimacy that we're taught growing up is kind of non-existent, I think, where it's very, it's not paired down, it's not more raw.

It's not really just being with other people authentically being, even with like the land, being with nature, you know, in this really kind of stripped back way that's not about performing, I don't think we're taught that growing up and to, again, back to that concept of the erotic from Andre Lorde, just like really connecting with ourselves to be able to.

Know who we are, the ways we wanna behave, our values, how we wanna be with other people, but when we can find people who are willing to listen to themselves, to connect with themselves, that even just thinking about that makes me feel joyful.

[01:19:52] Dr. Nicole: Yeah, absolutely. You're doing incredibly important work by bringing this into the conversation with your field.

[01:20:01] JJ: Thank you so much. It's been just so lovely talking to you today.

[01:20:07] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm. Such a joy. Such a joy. There's the word, right? Oh, I wanna ask you too, a few, I love this question that I've been exploring with folks, which is, if you were to connect back to your younger self, what words of wisdom advice would you share?

I know right from the perspective you sit at now.

[01:20:29] JJ: Uh, I know,

[01:20:32] Dr. Nicole: I know, right?

[01:20:33] JJ: So my inclination is to just go funny with this one because the truth is, there's one thing that I generally don't ex that I don't usually talk about, and that's being queer and trans. As a young kid, I was recently in this, doing this visiting Chairship at the University of Sydney in sexuality studies, and we had this two week intensive institute that I was helping facilitate.

It was all about schooling and queerness. And so every workshop, I'm just like thinking about how hard it was to be a kid who was queer and gender non-conforming. Um, and it's one of the most painful things for me. And like I've been through other, I've been through like other traumas, but there's something about this for me that really sticks.

So, um, and there's like more work that I'm, you know, will do in that space, but. So the first thing I think of and, and like the along the funny lines, is just to like tell my younger self, like, you're gay.

[01:21:36] Dr. Nicole: Yep.

[01:21:38] JJ: Like you're gay and you're gay. Um, it will, if you understand that it will make sense of things.

[01:21:45] Dr. Nicole: Save you a couple of years, a

[01:21:47] JJ: decade from year

[01:21:48] Dr. Nicole: two for me,

[01:21:48] JJ: only a few. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And it will, it will help you understand like why you see things differently, why you feel like you're on the outside, et cetera.

But if I am, if I, you know, move in a little bit, if I soften to towards that question, I would tell my younger self that you are perfectly good as you are and you should definitely listen to your instincts because are so fabulous. Don't think that you don't belong. You're different, your differences are actually your strengths.

Yeah. That's a hard question, Nicole.

[01:22:34] Dr. Nicole: Oh, didn't she love it? Oh, okay. Okay. Okay. What makes it hard for you?

[01:22:41] JJ: Oh, um, this sound, that sounds like a person who studied psychology.

[01:22:45] Dr. Nicole: Yeah. You love that therapist.

[01:22:47] JJ: Let's

[01:22:48] Dr. Nicole: tell me about how you feel.

[01:22:52] JJ: It's also a very queer thing. Like that's just, but no, it, it truly is just that it's a very emotional thing.

[01:23:00] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm. Yeah. What's it bringing up for you?

[01:23:02] JJ: What's it bringing up for me? Mm-hmm. Yeah. It's just, you know, I think when we grow up queer and or trans, we get messages that there is something wrong with us and that we're pathological.

And as much as I'd like to say, Hey, listen, I am this. Very accomplished professor with a doctorate, you know, from the University of Toronto. And I research what I want and I won awards and whatever. When it comes down to it, I still was a kid who felt like they didn't fit in in some ways. And, you know, for me, it wasn't that I was like, uh, you know, I was always fairly like, had friends and, and was popular in school, but there was a part of myself that I felt like was very hidden.

And that's, that's like quite damaging for a kid, you know, to feel like there's a part of yourself that doesn't make sense. Because it did make sense. There was just no one around me telling me that it, it did. And that's why I love being around queer elders. I love it. It's so nourishing. Mm-hmm. You know, and I, when I moved to Western Canada and left Toronto, I, that's one of the hardest things for me was leaving my queer elders and not being able to visit them and just share space with them, because it really reminded me that they've probably been through harder things from an earlier generation generations.

[01:24:42] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[01:24:42] JJ: And yet they persevered, and yet it's just a reminder of how everything is more than right. With being queer and trans.

[01:24:52] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

[01:24:54] JJ: Yeah.

[01:24:55] Dr. Nicole: Mm. Yeah. Your younger self who is beautiful and all the ways,

[01:25:02] JJ: yeah. Every kid should have that. And again, with the province I'm in right now in Alberta, there's many, many antique and anti-trans laws that were just passed and are going into effect right now.

So I worry for those kids. I'm working with some of those kids. I'm working with some trans high schoolers to push back against the, the policies and the laws. But, um, it's just a tough time, especially for queer and trans youth. I really feel for the younger generations right now. Yeah.

[01:25:32] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[01:25:32] JJ: Um, but I hope they find community.

I hope they find embodiment, right?

[01:25:37] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[01:25:38] JJ: And joy.

[01:25:39] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, the listeners that are here are getting to look into your life and your wisdom and your experience. So you get to be an example of what's possible, right? An example of the transformation and to stand tall and a doctorate.

Absolutely. I'm gonna give that up for everything. It is. Congratulations. Right. We need more. And I know it's something to check with the egos for myself as well too, right? But like in this political game. Oh my God. Use it. We need that. When we have all that other stuff that you're speaking to, we need more people with doctorates to say, Hey, listen, I have the credentials of the system.

Listen to me. Right? Yeah. And so I'm so grateful that you're doing that work, and I'm so grateful that you've come onto the show today to speak so vulnerably to your experience and everything that you've gone through.

[01:26:36] JJ: Thank you so much for having me. This has been a really beautiful and thought provoking conversation.

[01:26:42] Dr. Nicole: Oh, so good. So good. Well, as we come towards the end of our time here, I'm gonna take a deep breath with you. Okay.

And I appreciate your compliment. I'm not gonna let that run over. Thank you. Thank you. You know, I'm like, next thing, next thing. I'm like, Nope. Take that in with a deep breath. Thank you. I appreciate that. And so the last question that I ask every guest on the show is. What is one thing that you wish other people knew was more normal?

[01:27:17] JJ: Hmm. Wow. That is a really profound question. I think I wish people knew that it was normal to completely go your own way with sex and to not think, okay, I need to move my body this kind of way. I need to have my brain going so I perform a certain thing. I really wish people knew that it's okay to just be totally in the moment, to the point where you're letting your bodies' impulses take center stage and trusting.

And that can be a very terrifying thing because you can be so exposed to, well, what if I act weird? Or what if I do a weird sex thing? And it's like trusting your body and your intuition and your erotic power to know. What's gonna feel good. I think it also allows us to really tune into our partners as well and just be so present and there's like this synergistic moment I think that can happen when we let go of needing to do certain acts or certain movements or behaviors during sex.

I think one of the things that my queer and trans queer, uh, sorry, trans participants said in my queer sexual joy project, made sex so pleasurable was that it could be anything.

[01:28:43] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[01:28:44] JJ: It could be anything.

[01:28:45] Dr. Nicole: Mm-hmm.

[01:28:46] JJ: And that, that freedom was actually what was most pleasurable. So I really wish, especially straight cis and would listen and just let the fuck go.

Yeah.

[01:28:59] Dr. Nicole: They wanna be so good at sex, but they miss the whole thing, you know? It's like

[01:29:02] JJ: Exactly.

[01:29:04] Dr. Nicole: It's like you want it so bad, like, who? Like, hold on.

[01:29:08] JJ: Or you're like, obsessed with sex. You're compulsively wanting to have sex, but like. Maybe you'd be more satiated if you just like did it differently.

[01:29:18] Dr. Nicole: Right. And that's where the, uh, the pain of knowing that they're a product of the systems right, is deeply, you know, that they're suffering and that rigidity that they don't even see.

Right? And so then that's the pain of that, of knowing that at its core, right? And so that is heartbreaking. And so I, I am so grateful and it's, and it's hard 'cause also those are the people that. Enact the most violence 'cause they're so restricted that anyone outside of that is so deeply threatening that they quite literally attack the other.

[01:29:46] JJ: So yeah.

[01:29:48] Dr. Nicole: But yeah, within that, I'm so grateful that you said that, right? The freedom to really be able to explore anything with that. Right. And, and, and it reminds me so much of my dissertation with relationship anarchy, right? In terms of rewriting the narratives of how to relate, and sex being a huge part of that, right?

Like, what does it mean to really take off all of the scripts here? And you have this whole white canvas of ways that you can relate and play and be in your body. And eroticism, which at first is often very scary. You're like, where is my paint by numbers? Where is my relationship escalator, my intimacy escalator of kissing or touching, kissing, foreplay, which is a word that I hope to eradicate and penetration, you know, like eek.

But like, you know. The script, that's the paint by numbers. And so when you give someone a blank canvas, they're like, what? Do I do with this? Right? But when you first work through that, you find supportive people. You do your own play with yourself, right? My favorite invitation is to do some play in the mirror and really embrace that.

When you do those things right, you start to become really in tune with your creativity. And so you feel that ability to come to the blank canvas and throw whatever you want onto it and trust that, right? And so like any new path and skill way in life, it's gonna take practice. It's a new muscle. You start with very lightweights, and then you keep going, right?

It's a new skill. And so building those neuronal pathways is gonna take time, right? Mm-hmm. And so for the listener who's new to all of this, or even if you're way down the path and feel like all this is something you already know in your heart and soul, continue to take those steps deeper and deeper and deeper because the more you build those neuronal pathways of joy, of pleasure.

The easier it is to play both in and outside of the bedroom, the dungeon nature, wherever you like to get it on, right, it translate to all areas of your life for sure. And so I think you did such a great job today of inviting all of the listeners to really hold that nuance of the pain of our current world and the joy of it all, and did it in such a research backed way, and also spoke to your own vulnerability with these things.

And so I'm so grateful that you came onto the podcast today.

[01:32:09] JJ: Thank you so much for having me. Yeah. And yeah, I hope the listeners find something really generative out of this, and also, of course, joyful.

[01:32:17] Dr. Nicole: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I'm sure they did. And for all the people that wanna learn more about you, your work, your Queer Joy project, where can they find your content?

[01:32:32] JJ: Yeah, well the best place to find my work is@www.queerjoy.ca, and from there I am on some socials. So you can find links on my website to those.

[01:32:45] Dr. Nicole: Perfect. Well listener, I'll have all that linked in the show notes below, so you can just go check that out in the links. And again, thank you JJ, for coming outta this show today.

[01:32:56] JJ: I thank you for having me.

[01:32:58] Dr. Nicole: Dear listener, thank you so much for tuning in to Modern Anarchy. Thank you for sharing this episode with your friends, with your lovers, with your community. Truly, it means so much to me and I am so grateful that you are here. If you are wanting to release jealousy in your nonmonogamous dynamics and step into a compersion and pleasure filled connection, you can read my book, the Psychedelic Jealousy Guide.

For free on my website. There you'll also find so many other free resources, including worksheets on how to clearly communicate and set commitments and boundaries within your non-monogamous dynamics and other ways to practice clear communication about your sexual desires so that you can step into your most pleasure filled sex and relationships.

So head on over to modern Anarchy podcast.com to find all of those free resources, and I look forward to seeing you next week.