Penis Monologues

All this talk about the Vagina Monologues has had me thinking: what if they had Penis Monologues? What would they say...what would they wear? Ribbed or Cherry?

Instead of "my short skirt" it could be "my short dick," about a man who was scared to get intimate with women because his member fell an inch or two shy of the 5.5 inch average. The "if you love vaginas, you have to love hair" skit could be edited to "if you love penises, you have to love balls" about the stigma that surrounds sweaty testicles.

Men could talk about their unexpected visitors. "I got up one morning with a strange lump in my pajama bottoms. It made my ritual morning piss kinda hard. Ended up throwing myself horizontally across the toilet seat so I wouldn't pee all over the wall. When it was still there 20 minutes later I tried thinking about baseball, and then got really desperate and thought of the lunch ladies naked. But it was still there, so I had to use force: half a role of masking tape securing it to my right leg. You know, my mom never figured out why we ran through tape so fast..."

Then of course there would be stories about the pressures that men face sexually. "Hey...at least girls can fake it. Me, I don't have the option of pretending. I can't claim I'm sexually aroused when a chick is staring at the limp noodle between my legs. The nights when it just isn't gonna happen, I can't pretend I got off. Actually, come to think of it, I tried that once. Felt real bad for this girl who had been going down on me for a half hour and nothing was happening. So I told her that I had cum, but that I had this family condition where I just didn't ejaculate. Yeah, never got in her pants again..."

Certainly there are enough emotionally disturbing situations that arise on account of penises to fill a similar two-hour play. But if they had penis monologues, would men want to go? Would men feel comfortable sitting in an auditorium filled with other men hearing about the tribulations of having a three inch penis, pre-maturely ejaculating, morning wood and erectile dysfunction...or would this scene be too homoerotic for men to feel comfortable?

Yet, more importantly than the question of if men would go, is would women go, should women go? I mean, I know that I'd pay five bucks to see the penis monologues. I would go because as a straight woman I recognize penises are organs that (assuming I have enough game) I will be interacting with for the rest of my life. Because sexual intercourse is something that men and women do together, discussions of the penis relate to women, and in the same way discussions of the vagina relate to men. But despite this seeming obvious observation, many men seemed to react to the idea of attending the Vagina Monologues with fear, disinterest, and disgust.

They seemed to fear that they wouldn't be able to relate to the Vagina Monologues because they don't have one. In a school where, according to the Office of Undergraduate Admissions, 35-40 percent of the junior class is willing to go abroad for an entire semester and learn about another culture, I find it ironic that such a low percentage of Tufts men are willing to spend two hours in an auditorium learning about vaginas. So maybe the monologues don't mirror your life experiences, but you know, neither do James Bond films, and you watch those anyway.

I think there's a misconception that the Vagina Monologues are about 500 women cramming into an auditorium vowing to ditch dicks for vibrators. That there's some hypnotizing vagina pendulum, and all those in attendance leave brainwashed and screaming castration. But this is entirely not the case.

The Vagina Monologues recognize the problems that women encounter with their genitalia. At no point does it blame men for the difficulties of puberty, for women's confusion regarding their own bodies, or chastise all men for the violent acts of few. It does not deny or trivialize the experiences and traumas of having a penis, or to say that women's problems are more important.

It's not just a play for pissed-off girls. It's for everyone who has a vagina, has touched or penetrated a vagina, or was born out of one. Because sex is something that we engage in together, if you're a heterosexual man, you have to take an interest in vaginas. They're half the equation of your sex life, and without them, quite frankly, you're left jacking off.



Please note that the parts of the Vagina monologues I am addressing in this article are mainly the sexual aspects. The play deals with an entire host of issues not all of which are sexual.