The Mostly Unfabulous Homepage of Ethan Green

While there are many conceptions of ideal beauty and physical perfection, no one vision of attractiveness is more valid than any other. Accepted standards of beauty within a culture change over time. This book is a record of my recent work that probes the parameters of women's physical appeal, the sources of their sexual appeal.

My first book was an in-depth exploration of one facet of sexual experience. I was surprised at the number of women who, like myself, were fascinated with the world of fetishism and S/M. For this project I wanted to do a book for and about women that examines a broader range of erotic expression.

Of course, I am a woman and so I ask, why do women like to look at other women? Men have traditionally been the main consumers of explicit sexual images. But females looking at softly sexy pictures of women may actually comprise a larger market. Fashion magazines exploit this apparent fact. The impulse is more than women simply seeking to research the competition. But is it appreciate, lust, or bisexuality?

In Western culture, female sexuality is society's sexuality. Sexual desire is expressed principally through depictions of seductive or aroused women. Men's cravings are a given. Women's desire must be cultivated and nurtured, hence it has great value, and greater power as a symbol of desire itself.

From early in life, women's privacy around others of their own genders is more encouraged than men's. For us, bathing and elimination always happen in private booths. Our bodies must be more covered up. Our genitals themselves are less revealed. Perhaps this reduced level of access to intimate information about the real-life appearance of others fosters greater fascination with those of our own sex.

At the same time a greater degree of physical intimacy among girls and women is accepted. Young women may hold hands when they walk together, dance together, even practice kissing without raising any suspicions about their sexual preference.

So men and women, both gay and straight, are likely to be drawn to images of women. Women as ultra vixens in all the regalia of femininity: lipstick, heels, and finery. Women acting out extreme expressions of their erotic cravings. Women masquerading as men. Women of all types.

Going beyond S/M chic, the chapter "Sadean Women" portrays sexually confident, strong women who are not confined to the accepted sex roles set by society. These are women who no longer feel compelled to choose between the roles of madonna and whore, a dilemma that has plagued women for generations.

"Ritual Love" includes scenes that disclose the roots of sublimated desires. I maintain that many of women's preoccupations -- with food, fashion, motherhood and child beauty pageants, for example -- have a sexual basis.

"Obscure Objects of Desire" features portrayals of sexual attachment to body parts or objects. While it is commonly assumed that only men have sexual fetishes, in my view femininity is intrinsically fetishistic. Glamorous accessories like high heels, gloves, fans, and masks are really sex toys. As control of image-making and access to media ceases to be male-dominated, products and representations that frankly acknowledge women's fetishistic urges will inevitably become even more pervasive.

Gender play is the theme of the chapter "Divine Androgyne." These are women who experiment with masculinity by dressing as the opposite sex or simply affecting a macho demeanor. During the Middle Ages the Catholic Church canonized scores of female saints who had lived their entire adult lives as men. Many had changed their gender to access the religious training afforded only to priests.

"Ecstatic Theater" is a chapter of enactments of erotic scenarios. Here are women who are capable of acknowledging their innermost desires and letting them take form. Using costumes and props, they act out story lines that they long to experience and often subconsciously fear, such as being dominant or submissive in a sexual relationship.

The women in this book range in age from nineteen to forty-three. They are mothers, wives, girlfriends, gay, straight, and bi. They are tall, short thin, fat, Black, White, Asian and Hispanic. Some represent the return of the playgirl philosophy, some believe in Girl Power, some revive Princess Diana. Some have adopted pop-star styles from Madonna to Riot Grrrls to the Spice Girls. All of them manipulate their own images, to exhibit their appetites, revealing myriad forms of desire.

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