NOTES AND QUERIES ON SEX


I thought I'd pass on to you these fascinating snippets of information from the Guardian "Notes and Queries" web page. If you can think of any better answers, you can send them in and win a prize!

How effective is sex as a form of exercise?

The more you put in, the more you get out. According to The Mackeson Book of Averages, the sexual act burns up 200 calories on average, compared to 400 for a vigorous game of squash.

— Will Maudling, London NW3.

Why is the most common form of heterosexual coupling called the missionary position?

I may be wrong, but isn't the missionary position the one recommended by lay preachers?

— Philip Oliver, Burton upon Trent, Staffs.

This appears to be so-called not because it was used by missionaries (although that was probably the case) but because it was the position missionaries are supposed to have advocated for the 'lesser races' they were preaching to. There seem to be two reasons for this preference. The face-to-face position was thought more 'civilised' than other 'animalistic' ones and, secondly, it literally put the man on top. In this way the position embodied two key aspects of the nineteenth century middle-class view of the world. The evidence of sex positions in the past suggests that it was by no means the most preferred and perhaps not the most common. Presumably the missionaries encountered a situation where it was not so common otherwise they would not have had to advocate it. The rise of the missionary position, therefore, seems to be related to the intensificiation of a male dominated, imperialist, class society. But contemporary sex surveys also suggest that both men and women often get more pleasure from alternative positions. Readers sympathetic towards the Labour Party's current abandoment of class politics might like to consider the significance this has for their own lives. Not only are revolutionary positions more politically correct, they are also likely to be more fun.

— Mike Haynes, Telford Socialist Workers Party, Telford, Shropshire.

I am fairly certain that Mike Haynes of the Socialist Workers Party has, unsurprisingly, adopted the wrong position over missionaries. The 'missionary position' was not advocated by them but was their conventional mode and observed as such by inquisitive Trobriand Islanders in the depth of the Polynesian night – and eventually reported to Malinovski et al. (qv). One matter is, however, illuminated by Haynes: the reluctance of SWP members to look one another in the eye.

— R. A. Leeson, Broxbourne, Herts.