I’ve always been puzzled by the US tendency to conflate healthy sexual desire with being “wrong.” Doubtless it’s the endless persistent repression that pervades US culture at every level. It’s too bad that in the USA sex is “nasty” and “dirty.” Why do US women scream things like “shit” when they are experiencing peak pleasure? Such a shame.

Conversely there’s a great erotic power in playing with words and ideas. When, years ago, my lover had just fucked another man she’d text me that she’d been “naughty” and that she deserved to be “punished.” But there was no underlying negativity in these games, no involuntary use of words with unpleasant connotations. Similarly we never used that US staple wherein the woman calls the man “baby.” As an English friend of mine once said to his American girlfriend, “I am a man, not a baby. And if I was a baby, you’d be my mother and frankly that notion does not excite me in the least.”

Using words to turbo-charge arousal is fun, but considering the best words to use makes all the difference.