In the New York Times THE ETHICIST piece “My Daughter Is Having Sex with Her Best Friend. Must I Tell Her Mom?” (March 22, 2022), a mother needed advice, because her mid-teen daughter was having girl-on-girl sex during sleepovers with her best friend.
Here's part of the question submitted to THE ETHICIST:
My daughter is in a newly romantic relationship with her best friend, who is also female. Both are in their midteens. My daughter recently confided in me that they have had sex. She insists, however, that I am not allowed to tell the friend’s mother, because the mother wouldn’t let them have sleepovers or hang out as much. My ex-husband is the one who hosts the sleepovers, and he looks the other way when they are in the bedroom, reasoning that (or so my daughter tells me), “It’s OK because there are no penises involved.” [...] Are my ex-husband’s actions egregious? Name Withheld
The mother’s question reminded me of Ariel Levy’s Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture (Free Press\Simon & Schuster, 2005). Levy related in the book that on the thirtieth anniversary of Nancy Friday’s “international bestselling collection” My Secret Garden: Women’s Sexual Fantasies (Trident Press, 1973), a panel discussion titled “Sex and What Women Want Now” was held at the 92nd Street YMHA in Manhattan. The panel discussion, which included Candace Bushnell - the author of Sex and the City, was moderated by Norman Pearlstein, Friday’s husband and the editor-in-chief of Time Inc. Levy related that during the panel, Friday opined that as long as a [young] woman reaches orgasm, it doesn’t matter whom she thinks about while masturbating or during sex. Friday asked the panel discussion attendees,
“Doesn’t everyone here agree that it doesn’t really matter? If it takes you where you want to go, if it helps you reach orgasm, does it matter who you’re thinking about?”
In My Secret Garden, a variety of fantasies were shared, which began when most of the fantasizers were between the ages of 7 and 11. For example, Alexandra fantasized about having an affair with her high school teacher. She stated emphatically: "[...] I'm sure it would not be a fantasy if I gave him a little encouragement." And Stephanie fantasized about very young girls being raped "by a mad professor". In Stephanie’s fantasy, the professor decided whom he was going to rape by examining "their sexual apparatus". However, in addition to their fantasies, some women shared what they brought to life during schoolgirl sleepovers.
Clarissa recalled that she and her friend were caught masturbating with candles - when they were 12. Marina shared that she began to be aware of men at the age of 9 or 10 and thought about them while she masturbated; however, Marina only had "a vague idea of what lovemaking was" until she met her friend, a 10-year-old Mediterranean girl. Marina and the Mediterranean used to sit at opposite ends of the bathtub and pour warm water from a Russian silver teapot over their clitorises while caressing their bodies "with infallible, instinctive verve." Celia confessed that when she was about 8, she used to bully her: "[...] friend into playing games where we had to pretend to take off our clothes and the 'wicked man' would make us walk in the street [...]" In addition, Celia said that when she was 10, she wanted to be a stripper and that she had "intimate contact" with her girlfriend. And when Alison was 14, she had an "[...] unusual relationship with a close girlfriend". In the unusual relationship, Alison's girlfriend would dress Alison in a sexy bikini made of chiffon scarves. Then Alison's girlfriend pretended that she was a "rowdy seaman" before she “raped” Allison.
Since reading that THE ETHICIST piece and My Secret Garden, while doing research for a second edition and a new book, I’ve come across a number of actresses, singers, and influencers, whom, just like the women in My Secret Garden, have shared their schoolgirl sleepover sexual exploits via Youtube podcasts, memoirs, (non-fiction) books, and even via a Netflix comedy special.
Becca Moore
Becca Moore is a podcaster and influencer with over one million followers on TikTok. On the “My First Time (with a woman)” episode of her Becca Moore podcast (YouTube, August 27, 2024), Becca shared that during middle school sleepovers, she and her friends would “sit in a circle and all make out with each other.” Becca,
“Like, honestly, in middle school we used to, like, sit in a circle and all make out with each other. And no boys would be around. I don't really know why we were doing that, but I did love those sleepovers. That was fun.”
By high school, Becca was still making out with girls during sleepovers, but schoolboys attended the sleepovers too. Becca,
“And then when I got to high school, we would have sleepovers and make out, like, play spin the bottle, but boys would be there. And it was kind of, like, a little bit, I will say, the high school one, was a little bit performative.”
“I think that we were not really, like, turned on. We were only doing it because boys were watching, and I think we thought that it was hot for them to watch - at least from my perspective. I think, I was more so thinking about the boys than the girls.”
Thus, at least for Becca, making out with other high school girls during sleepovers wasn’t (only) for pleasure, it was additionally done to provide entertainment for the schoolboys.
Miley Cyrus
Miley Cyrus, the Grammy award-winning singer and actress, shared with Alex Cooper on the Call Her Daddy podcast “Miley Cyrus-Call Her Daddy Interview” (YouTube, August 13, 2020) that when she was a pre-teen, she had a girl-on-girl orgy, which Cooper referred to as “amazing”.
Miley, "Yeah, when I was like 11 or 12 [...] I got most of my girlfriends to hook up with me."
Alex, "That is such an amazing [thing]. That's amazing!"
Miley, "The first time I ever hooked up with anyone was with a girl. Two of them."
Alex, "And did you go past first base?"
Miley, "Yeah! Oh yeah!"
Alex, "Miley's like, 'Of course. Oh my God. Absolutely.'"
Since Miley admitted that she went “past first base” during sleepovers, we can confidently infer that Miley’s hookups were more involved than Becca’s ( i.e., Miley and her girlfriends did more than kiss during sleepovers).
Jessica Simpson
Jessica Simpson, the singer, actress, and fashion designer, wrote in her memoir, Open Book (Dey Street Books\ HarperCollins, 2020), that when she was between the ages of 6 and 12, she and a family friend would have girl-on-girl sex during sleepovers. Jessica wrote that, like Miley Cyrus, her family friend would initiate sex. For example, during the night, foreplay consisted of tickling Jessica’s back. Eventually, they started having sex during the daytime while using a closet for privacy. Jessica’s friend would even watch Jessica shower. Jessica wrote:
It would start with tickling my back [...] Eventually, it wasn't just at nighttime. She would get me to go into a closet with her, or just find a way to linger until we were alone. It got to the point that she would sneak into the bathroom to watch me shower.
In an interview with People “Jessica Simpson on Confronting Her Abuser: 'It Was Extremely Painful and Still Is'” (January 29, 2020), Jessica clarified that even though her family friend initiated the sex, Jessica admitted that she “allowed it to happen”; thus, Jessica felt “very shameful”, because she was complicit. Jessica confessed to People,
“I allowed it to happen, so I felt that I was as much of the abuser as the abused. So I was very shameful during that time, from 6 to 12 years old.”
Curiously, Jessca is the only celebrity slash influencer who expressed shame about her girl-on-girl sleepover activities and considered it to be sexual abuse. But just as curiously, out of all the words in her 416-page memoir, Jessca used the schoolgirl sleepover sex imagery to promote the book.
Julia Fox
Julia Fox, the actress (Uncut Gems, 2019 [A24]) and model, related in her memoir, Down the Drain (Simon & Schuster, 2023), that in 2001, when she was an 11-year-old 6th grader at East Side Middle School in Manhattan, she and Ella, whom Julia described as a straight A student with “beautiful thick auburn hair and big green eyes”, would “roll joints with a filter, ‘like the French’” and they would kiss “like the French too.” As an excuse to kiss, Julia and Ella played spin the bottle and seven minutes in heaven. Julia wrote:
We play[ed] games like spin the bottle and seven minutes in heaven [i.e., in the closet kissing], and then we pretend[ed] like it didn’t happen.
Unlike Jessica Simpson, Julia and Ella didn’t appear to be ashamed of their pre-teen sexual exploits; however, Julia wrote that Ella insisted that their girl-on-girl kissing was “practice for the real deal”. In other words, Ella assured Julia that they were not middle school lesbians or bisexual. Consequently, Julia wrote that she sensed that Ella simply enjoyed kissing girls.
Eventually, Julia befriended Rose - a rich classmate. “Penthouse on Fifth Avenue rich.” Julia loved sneaking into Rose’s penthouse after hours, where the schoolgirls would: “[...] sit cross-legged, facing each other on her floor, and pass each other love poems.” Sometimes Julia and Rose would: “[...] massage each other with oils”, “dribble hot wax over each other’s bodies’ or, like Marina and the Mediterranean girl in My Secret Garden, Julia and Rose would take “baths together”. While the schoolgirls bathed, Julia wrote that she couldn't stop staring at Rose's “enormous double-D breasts, covered in thick purple stretch marks.”
When Rose was grounded, Julian befriended Alice, whom “lost a bunch of weight using diet pills [...] [and] started tanning and wearing makeup.” Julia and Alice had a crush on Tommy, whom invited them to his house for a sleepover via AIM: “My mom is out of town, you guys should come over!” After a “few beers”, Tommy handed Julia and Alice a pair of boxers, and they squeezed into Tommy’s “tiny twin bed”, where, after Julia put Tommy’s penis into her mouth, he immediately ejaculated all over her hair. Consequently, Julia was “half thrilled, [and] half horrified.” Julia:
I quietly slide under the blanket until I’m face-to-face with IT. Wow, it’s beautiful. I put my hands around it and grip it tightly with my sweaty palms. I move my hands up and down, his body twitching at my every move. I stick my tongue out and taste the tip, as if sampling an ice cream cone. It doesn’t taste bad! I put my mouth over it, and before I can even start sucking, he ejaculates all over my hair. I shoot up from under the covers and run to the bathroom. I begin scrubbing the gelatinous goop out of my hair, half thrilled, half horrified.
Days later, Julia graduated from middle school; however, before she started elementary school, she lost her virginity to 23-year-old Giovanni - in the middle of the street in Italy. But that story is for another post.
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