Movim • ‘Making the scarlet letter into my career’: my life as a sex writer

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‘Making the scarlet letter into my career’: my life as a sex writer

news.movim.eu / TheGuardian • 30 April 2026

I thought my mother was ashamed of my taboo profession. Then I realized our experiences were more similar than I thought

My first viral personal essay was titled: “In Defense of Casual Sex”.

It was 2008. I was 24, living in San Francisco, and working at the online magazine Salon. I was responding to a series of books about hookup culture, including one warning young women that they were ruining themselves for love and marriage by sleeping around.