Mark Fennell

So a lot of that focuses in on the effects of masturbation for men, but I think one of the reasons I really want to talk to you is that history of masturbation for women, which is kind of where a lot of these objects have come into the story.

The female orgasm, how is it talked about in that period?

Well, it's also just like this, that idea still permeates the world.

Like there's, I think there was an American politician, even a few years ago that invoked a version of that.

Yeah?

That's it.

Which is basically a filtered version of the same thing, that idea that stretches back.

Well, let's talk about that because I think a lot of people listening to this will probably have connected the idea of hysteria, right?

Which is kind of very well known, but has a lot of misconceptions around it.

So I guess walk us through what the concept was and whether or not it, what's real about it and what's not.

No.

So what do you reckon it was then?

What was it made up?

So the popular idea that's kind of permeated culture is in sort of the 19th century, British women were going to these doctors who were like initially giving kind of pelvic finger massages and then eventually kind of creating mechanical devices.

Is any part of that true?

So that really breaks that whole idea apart, doesn't it?

So the hysteria myth just refuses to die.

And it's one of the most enduring misconceptions we have about women in the Victorian era, which raises a question.

If that's not true, like when do vibrators actually start being used for female pleasure?

Well, the best we can say is that if you fast forward to New York in the 1970s, you meet a woman named Betty Dodson.