Can dancing doctors on TikTok teach kids to have safe sex?
Condom + banana = sex education?
Old news. The newest form of sex ed penetrating the minds of pubescent teens all over the country involves top-chart hits, spry doctors or nurses on their lunch breaks and easy-to-learn viral dances — oh, and safe-sex tips.
Along with a rap sheet of national awards, Staci Tanouye, an OBGYN from North Florida, has over 20 videos of herself dancing in her office while advice about birth control and sexually transmitted infections flash across the phone screen in bright word bubbles. Her channel, @dr.staci.t, has 169,000 followers.
And she’s not the only one. Nurses and doctors have become a common sight on the For You page, the opening panel of highly watched videos for casual scrollers. Discussions about safe sex have taken a million forms over the last two decades. From the “My Body” books to nationally divisive campaigns to destigmatize sexual pleasure through progressive education policy, teaching America’s youth to be responsible in steamy situations has always been a push-on-a-pull-door effort.
Despite discourse in deciding what’s right, in 2017 birth rates fell 10% for women aged 15–17 years. And this trend is continued from a drastic drop of 64% between 1991 and 2015. We’ve come a long way from Reverend John Todd’s 1935 “Student’s Manual” which implored young men to resist the “secret vice” of masturbation with pure will. Once WWII hit, sexually transmitted diseases soared through troops like gun-powder laced Mausers and the federal government got involved. Earlier, in 1918, Congress passed The Chamberlain-Kahn Act, which pushed money toward educating soldiers about the dangers of STIs.
It wasn’t until the ’60s that the public started seeing sexual health as a public health matter — something that warranted federal involvement and action. The earliest film, “Damaged Goods,” targeted those soldiers and those seeking companionship from sex professionals like prostitutes. Films like these have changed drastically. Just this year, “Sex, Explained,” a Netflix original docuseries voiced by singer, songwriter Janelle Monáe, offers “straightforward, nonjudgmental explainers on a wide range of sex-related topics,” according to a review from The Daily Beast.
The film is supposed to fill the vacancy of sex education in schools, as some states, including Sweet Home Alabama, do not require sex education. Legislators have attempted to reverse this, but have not been successful. But, that doesn’t mean public interest isn’t there. The Alabama Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy (ACPTP) and the University of South Alabama surveyed 434 parents across the state to measure parents’ temperatures on sex education in public school, according to reporting from AL.com’s Starr Dunigan.
The survey found that 83% of Alabama parents wanted their kids to be taught sex education in school, 38% said their children were not taught sex education and 20% said they didn’t know if their children had been taught about sex. The current law still forces educators to say that homosexuality “is not a lifestyle acceptable to the general public and that homosexual conduct is a criminal offense under the laws of the state,” and 74% of those surveyed said it was “very important” to “talk about what sexual orientation means," with public school students.
Despite the numbers, educators in Alabama are commonly using the lesson of abstinence in sex education settings. There is no medical evidence that states that waiting till marriage will prevent the contraction of sexually transmitted infections or HIV, said Christina Clark Okarmus, executive director of ACPTP. There are 20 million new sexually transmitted infections in the United States each year, according to the United States Center for Disease Control, and 15-24 year-olds account for 50% of those even though they only make up 25% of the sexually experienced population.
In hindsight, it’s actually not a surprise that doctors, nurses and specifically OBGYNs are jumping on the TikTok bandwagon and putting themselves out there for the sake of sexual safety. Oregon’s Dr. Jennifer Lincoln, known by her very complicated handle @drjenniferlincoln, has over 261.5K likes on a video clearing up some common misconceptions and myths about OBGYN appointments. And the efforts are in the right place, especially since 41% of TikTok users are 16-24 years old — a common age bracket used in teen pregnancy statistics.
And the doctor’s smooth moves might just work, Okarmus said. “As the world changes, we have to meet young people where they are,” she said. “I think it could bring home the message, and I think it could also counter false information.”
In fact, Okarmus said the TikTok messages might be the only “positive” sex education lessons students are receiving in Alabama. Some videos have over 500 comments featuring follow-up questions like, “What does it mean when there’s a smell? Do I have something?” or “At what age should I start seeing [a gynecologist?]” or “What are the risk factors of IUDs?”
Okarmus said she wants to say these questions are a positive thing, but it confirms a consistent fear of hers: Students are still not getting the education they need and deserve, she said. “They are turning to anywhere that will give them that information," she said. The TikTok method of teaching sex education is the most creative campaign Okarmus said she’s seen in many years. Meanwhile, there has been a rise in text question-and-answer services for students needing advice in that area, as well as state-by-state changes in public education law.
Sexual education law tweaks in the Alabama have been proposed at least three times in recent history and have been killed each time. “It’s not gone through yet," she said. “We’ll see what happens this year."
Craig Revel Horwood on how he got into dancing and raunchy Strictly couples
I wanted a family... then I caught my wife in bed with another man: If you’re surprised to find Strictly’s Craig Revel Horwood was once married, wait till you hear the rest of his astonishing life story. (You couldn't make it up!)
Craig Revel Horwood didn’t want to be a judge on Strictly Come Dancing, the show that has made him a star. He didn’t even want to go to the audition. ‘I said to my manager, “I’m not interested. What is it? Celebrities dancing with professionals? It’s going to be pathetic. Awful. Car-crash television. I really don’t want to do that.’’’
The lifelong dancer was a highly acclaimed choreographer and director in the West End when the call came in 2004. ‘I never wanted to become famous. I became a choreographer so I could sit in the dark and not be recognised.’
Craig Revel Horwood is giving Event his frankest interview yet about his extraordinary life
That’s an extraordinary thing to hear from a man who is about to go on a nationwide tour with an all-singing, all-dancing show based on his own life, called All Balls And Glitter. As he gets ready to tell all on tour, Revel Horwood is giving Event his frankest interview yet about his extraordinary life: including why he traded sex with an older man for dance classes as a teenager in Australia, why a short-lived marriage to a woman in his 20s failed and the day his father tried to shoot his mum.
As for his reluctance to step into the limelight with Strictly in the first place, he says: ‘I felt forced to go to the audition in my lunch hour, so I was in a foul mood.’
They asked him to comment on a clip of two dancers. ‘I said, “Whoever is walking down the stairs is terrible, she can’t even walk, let alone dance. It is very lame, darling. The boy’s got the most bowed legs I have ever seen for a professional dancer...’’’
So he didn’t hold back! ‘They said, “Could you cut it down to three words?” I went, “Dull, dull, dull.” And they were the first three words that ever came out of my mouth on Strictly Come Dancing.’
The dancers he demolished were TV newsreader Natasha Kaplinsky and Brendan Cole, who went on to win the series. ‘So there you are: I know nothing!’
The live audience booed when he gave the same verdict during the first television episode and a star was born. ‘From the moment the boos started, I became Mr Nasty.’
Revel Horwood with current partner Jonathan Myring at their Hampshire home. 'It's nice for people to know I am human. I am not affected by the business, like a lot of people'
The other three original judges were Hot Gossip founder Arlene Phillips, movie choreographer Bruno Tonioli and ballroom expert Len Goodman. Goodman left a few years ago but recently blasted the show for being too raunchy these days. ‘I couldn’t disagree with him more,’ says Revel Horwood. ‘I think Len is living in the Dark Ages, or thinks that Strictly should be set in the Fifties. He became a dancer in order to pick up girls, you know. Now you can go on Tinder, but in Len’s day you had to go and have a dance with them. It wasn’t raunchy back then, but of course people had sex!’
He’s letting rip again. ‘You’ve got to be clear about this: Strictly dancing is sexy, whether you like it or not. What are you going to do, put no sex in the Rumba? They call it the dance of love but what would it be then? The dance of cold, wet fish?’
He held his tongue and said nothing when 189 people complained to the BBC when Strictly showed two men dancing as a couple for the first time, just before Christmas, but now he lacerates them. ‘Out of 13 million viewers, that’s not bad. Those people need to turn off. Don’t pay your TV licence, don’t watch the BBC if you can’t cope with two men dancing with each other. It’s ridiculous. Those 189 people should be named and shamed.’ That’s strong. Surely they have a right to complain if they want to, as licence-fee payers? ‘It’s totally homophobic.’
But these are rare flashes of anger. For the rest of the time, as we talk on the white sofas at his manor house in the Hampshire countryside, it’s pretty clear this tall, witty man is nothing like the poker-faced pantomime-villain we see on screen, demolishing egos. ‘When I am not judging people, I am not judgy.’
Neither is he orange or as artificial-looking as he seems under studio lights, in full make-up. There is a hint of Botox in the smooth, wide forehead and the hairline may have had some help, but Horwood is naturally handsome and looks young for 55. His famous catchphrases with their attention-seeking, drawn-out syllables – ‘Dis-ah-ster dah-ling!’ – are all about making the maximum impact on telly. ‘There’s no time to sugar-coat it. I’ve got 20 seconds to speak my mind.’
Some dancers get angry at his comments, some even cry. ‘I don’t care about the celebrities, oddly. I care about the dancing but I don’t care about their emotional state and I don’t care how they take the criticism, because that’s not my problem.’
Revel Horwood on his wedding day with wife Jane in 1990. 'I was both gay and straight, so being bisexual, it wasn’t a big issue for me or for her'
Viewers do care though and it can spill over into real life in alarming ways. ‘An old woman came up to me on the street and whacked me across the face. Then she said, “That’s because you said something really bad about my favourite celebrity. But please don’t change, I love it!” ’
Now he’s going on tour to dance, sing and reveal more of himself. ‘I am only really known as a two-dimensional character on television. Nobody knows I sing, so I will sing stuff from musicals I’ve done: Miss Saigon, Cats, Jesus Christ Superstar, La Cage Aux Folles. I’m going to explain what my life was like and is now.’
Revel Horwood was born in Ballarat, Australia. ‘My dad was in the Navy for 20 years so we moved around. I actually started school in this country, while he was training in Portsmouth. We went to Sydney and then back to Ballarat [in Victoria] when I was 13. Growing up there was not easy. It’s quite a macho society. They push cricket, football – all of those sports I don’t like.’
How did he get into dancing? ‘Everyone went through puberty before me but I was still a chubby kid with a pretty face. In PE they made me run round with my top off. After that I was called “Tits”. I was miserable and so a girl in the school orchestra called Amanda suggested I go to exercise classes with her. I thought they were Jane Fonda workouts but it was jazz ballet. I fell in love with it and decided I wanted to become a dancer.’
There was another good reason to chase that dream. ‘Dancing gave me a way to be free of my family life. My father was an alcoholic and he was quite abusive. He just screamed at us all the time. That upbringing made me drive harder to achieve something. Just to escape.’
It does sound horrendous. ‘My dad tried to kill my brother-in-law and my mother. He shot over their heads, that’s what he said, but the threat was still there. The police picked him up in his pyjamas and he went to prison. He was clean for four years after that, but then he started drinking again and it was all over. It took that for Mum to not have him back.’
His father died four years ago. Revel Horwood was in England and could not get back for the funeral but he took part by Skype. ‘I sang his favourite song, My Way, which I sing in the new show. That will be hard, but I have come to terms with it. I am pleased he no longer has to live that life.’
His own life was transformed by a man he will only call Mr X. Revel Horwood was 17 and working as a chef and dancing in drag clubs when they met. Mr X was 43. ‘It gave me opportunities I never would have had. So, it was a Sugar Daddy sort of thing. I knew exactly what I was doing.’
Mr X took him on a six-week world tour, including the opening of Cats on Broadway and paid for the teenager to go to dance college in Melbourne, in return for a sexual relationship. ‘The tabloids have called it prostitution but it really is no different to a younger woman marrying an older man then divorcing him for half the money. At least I wasn’t doing that.’
Going to college would have been impossible otherwise, he says. ‘My family couldn’t afford it. I thought, “OK, let’s take this opportunity.” It wasn’t horrific, you know?’
Revel Horwood worked as an exotic dancer in Paris and on tour with the drag legend Danny La Rue, but then joined the first touring cast of Cats. That took him to the West End. ‘I was doing Cats and Miss Saigon at the same time. The matinee of Cats then an evening of Saigon. It was only because they ran out of people to play Munkustrap [the narrator]. They were all off sick or injured, so the producers asked if could I do three weeks of alternating shows.’ Revel Horwood became the dance captain, leading the troupe in many different shows. ‘Then I hung my dancing shoes up forever, at the age of 30.’
As a choreographer and director he worked in opera and ballet as well as West End musicals and was nominated for two prestigious Olivier awards. ‘I am not just someone who holds paddles from one to ten on a Saturday. I am not a diva, otherwise I would not be working. Producers will not work with those types of people. They can’t stand it.’
If that’s a surprise, given his TV image, there’s an even bigger one hidden in his life story. Revel Horwood currently lives with a man, a horticulturalist called Jonathan Myring who is 22 years his junior, but at the beginning of the Nineties he married a woman.
‘Love works in mysterious ways, doesn’t it? I was 25. Jane was 30 and time was ticking. She wanted to have children and I thought, “Well, this is a really good opportunity.” I was both gay and straight, so being bisexual, it wasn’t a big issue for me or for her. We were two people who loved each other, coming together and wanting to have kids before it was too late. But then it ended in adultery…’
Revel Horwood, aged 18, centre, and his family (from left): sister Diane, dad Phil, brother Trent, sisters Melanie and Sue, and mum Beverley
On her part? ‘Yeah. It didn’t work out. That was after two-and-a-half years.’ Was that hard to take? ‘Yes, of course it is,’ he says, noticeably using the present tense.
Are they still in touch? ‘Yes, she runs my website. Ha! We go on holidays together. It’s amazing. Her and her family. She’s remarried and she’s got a son. She sort of got everything she wanted in the end.’
He sounds wistful. Could he have lived that family life? ‘Yes, of course I could. I had every intention of doing so, but when you find someone in bed with someone else and they say they are in love with them that does put a dampener on it.’
He then fell in love with a man, the interior designer Lloyd Rooney. ‘I stayed with him for 12 years. I hadn’t known that was possible: a long-term, gay relationship.’
Revel Horwood has talked about marrying his current partner, Jonathan, so have they thought about children? ‘I don’t have any plans yet. I would definitely adopt, because there are so many kids out there that need secure homes.’
There were rumours that he threatened to quit Strictly last summer, but he denies them. ‘I signed for two more series a year ago. So that’s nonsense.’ The issue was that BBC bosses forced him to apologise for a comment about previous winner Stacey Dooley, and her professional partner Kevin Clifton, who had become lovers. Offering tips to the dancers on the next series he said: ‘Of course, if you sleep with your dance partner that helps.’
The comment was never broadcast but Revel Horwood was still made to put out a statement saying it was ‘hurtful, cruel and incredibly disrespectful’. Was he cross about that? ‘No. Do you know how many apologies I’ve had to give out? Oh my God. I am constantly doing it.’
Do you know how many apologies I’ve had to give out? I’m constantly doing it
A little more pressing reveals there was no smoke without fire and he was actually ready to leave. ‘There is some truth in the fact I said that if the BBC told me what I had to say – if I was scripted in any way – and if I was told I couldn’t say something, then I would not want to do the job. But I said, “I will apologise, absolutely, if it has upset her.” I spoke to Stacey directly after that comment anyway. Plus they’d moved in together!’
Has he ever been tempted to date one of those gorgeous dancers himself? ‘No,’ he says firmly. ‘Only because it’s not my thing. I can’t imagine going out with a dancer. It would be just awful. They are all over the place. Emotionally, physically, everything.’
I wait for the ‘dah-ling’ that usually comes with that word, but this is Craig Revel Horwood very much off duty. ‘It’s nice for people to know I am human. I am not affected by the business, like a lot of people. There are a lot who are full of fear. Through that fear they become divas. They are generally the people who have less talent.’
If he’s half as charming on tour as he has been today it will be great. ‘Oh dah-ling,’ he says at last, puffing out his chest as if ready to perform. ‘We’ll have a ball!’
‘Craig Revel Horwood: The All Balls And Glitter Tour’ begins on May 22. socomedy.co.uk
In the world of LGBTQ exotic dancing, meet the Philly dancers performing for other women
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Miterrez “Mighty” Brown took a deep breath at the top of the stairs at the Gentlemen’s Gold Club in Armistead Gardens, a neighborhood just northeast of downtown Baltimore.
She wore a sheer black mesh shirt over pasties, loose jeans that barely clung to her hips, and a pair of black combat boots. “Focus” by H.E.R. blasted through the speakers as Brown, 27, pushed her locs over one shoulder and made her way down onto the stage, each of her movements measured and deliberate. She flashed a sultry smile at a woman sitting next to the stage. A disco ball spun slowly above her head.
But Brown, a former resident of Warrington, Pa., who works as an exotic dancer and identifies as gender-fluid and lesbian, does not consider herself your run-of-the-mill stripper.
Not only is she a “stud” — a woman with masculine ways — but Brown, who has since relocated to Washington D.C., chooses to work at events tailored exclusively to women, queer and straight alike. When she’s not performing, she broadcasts her dancing on Instagram to her largely female audience.
“I use the phrase ‘exotic dancer’ because I do something that you don’t normally see,” she said. “You don’t usually see a female dressed in male attire, advertising masculinity with a splash of femininity, saying, ‘I’m here to behave as a male and I’m here to do whatever I want.’”
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In the world of live adult entertainment for the LGBTQ community, events for queer women have traditionally flown under the radar. In recent years, major lesbian nights and bars have closed in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Boston. Philly has been without a lesbian bar since Sisters closed in 2013. Former Sisters general manager Denise Cohen opened Toasted Walnut in 2017, but has stayed away from labeling it a lesbian bar.
When Brown lived in the Philadelphia suburbs, she didn’t have many opportunities to perform here, and has remained affiliated with Lyfe Lounge, an LGBTQ strip club that rents space from the Gentlemen’s Gold Club. Before this, she danced with City of Doms, a group of New York City-based female “dom” dancers who were recently featured in a Vice documentary. City of Doms and Lyfe Lounge both host events in rented venues, which draw hundreds of women.
“We don’t really have a huge gay community,” Brown said of Philadelphia. “What we have is downtown and it’s mostly men.”
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Amber Hikes, the former executive director of Philadelphia’s Office of LGBT Affairs, said the high cost of renting venues is one reason why events for queer exotic dancers don’t have as great a presence here. She also allowed that there might not be strong demand for those events at the moment.
“It’s not that they don’t happen,” Hikes said. “But we have a problem with consistency in events. Folks will get really excited and create an event that does really well for six months, maybe a year, but then it’ll burn out. The situation will stay the same if no one tries to create an event that’s similar to what City of Doms does.”
As a kid in Woodbury, N.J., Brown would mimic Michael Jackson’s moves, but she began dancing seriously in high school, after her mom went to serve in Iraq for two years. Stuck with a guardian who was neglectful, she and her brother went without food, heat, or medicine when they got sick. She couldn’t even call her mother.
Dancing was a distraction from all that.
“I began uploading videos of me dancing — mostly goofy stuff, because I was still a minor at that time — onto YouTube," Brown said. "I used my fear of what was going on with my mom in Iraq and just redirected it in a healthier way.”
Brown’s videos became so popular — gaining more than 80,000 subscribers — that YouTube began paying her. When she turned 18, she pivoted to exotic dance.
When her mom returned from Iraq, Brown deleted her YouTube page. She began dancing again about a year later on social media platforms, and that’s when Brown told her mom and explained how it was a coping mechanism.
“I would never want my mom to find out that I was a dancer on someone else’s terms," she said. "It was like, ‘Look mom, I’m bad! And I’m good at being bad, but you can’t see all that stuff.’”
Brown’s dancing videos found a wider audience on Facebook and, later, Instagram Live. Eventually a follower directed her to City of Doms.
“All my life as a dancer, I just wanted to do dom dancing,” she said. “I just didn’t know it existed or what to search to get started."
City of Doms was created by Cameo Kyle, an event organizer who started hosting male entertainment shows in 2004. A decade later, he attended a show in New Jersey that featured a stud, which inspired him to invite one to perform at his next show.
“When I first started promoting the show, all the girls were like, ‘Ew! I don’t want to see that!’” said Kyle, who identifies as straight and cisgender. “I got a lot of flak. I was getting worried. But on the night of the show, when [the stud] performed, she captivated the straight girls and the curious women.”
After the show, a handful of guests asked him if it was possible to have a show with all studs. Kyle reached out to dancers he found on social media and eventually built a group with a loyal following. Today, City of Doms has roughly 14,000 followers on multiple Instagram accounts.
Amela “Body Hunter” Hunter of West Oak Lane began dancing with City of Doms last winter, after Kyle found her Instagram page, where she posted videos of herself working out. Since then, Hunter has picked up gigs at parties for queer women of color, including GUSH, a monthly gathering in New York that charges $5 for femmes and $75 for straight men.
“To me, it was pretty easy to decide to join,” Hunter said. “It seemed pretty easy and I didn’t have any nervousness. I love it, I have a great time, I go there for a job. I don’t go there for a party.”
Even though the group draws mostly lesbians, Hunter said that she hopes in the future to see more diversity in the audience. She’s been trying to invite her friends who identify as gay, bisexual, and transgender.
“It’s hard to reach out because they’re like, ‘Are you doing porn? Are these porn parties? Are these orgies?'” Hunter said. “You can see people opening up to it a little more and realizing that we’re not just go-go dancers, we’re strippers but only for the LGBTQ community. It makes it more special.”
In 2014, the group sold out its first show in the Bronx, where audience members were privy to performances by at least a dozen dancers. The entirely female audience showered their favorite dancers with dollar bills and participated in boisterous contests, like who gave the best lap dances. The dancers were a mix of studs and “femmes” — women who present as more traditionally feminine.
The dancers frequently travel for performances, and this past year, their shows, often rowdy and crowded, were held in D.C., Denver, and Chicago. Kyle also hosts a sellout cruise event each summer.
“There’s not a lot of spaces you can go where you can see women dancing for women,” Kyle said.
Dominique “Poetry” Brooks had toyed with the idea of an LGBTQ-focused strip club for a decade before founding Lyfe Lounge. Now, her vision was realized.
“I felt like they need their own safe space — a nice, beautiful one that they could be proud about," said Brooks, who identifies as polysexual and teaches pole fitness and dance. "Somewhere where they could do their own thing without anyone judging or harassing them.”
Last winter, Brown had a group of studs mocking her during one of her first performances at Lyfe Lounge. Her commitment to professionalism kept her dancing. But then Brooks went over to the hecklers and asked them to stop.
“I was so shocked and happy,” Brown said. It was an uncomfortable incident at City of Doms that led her to stop performing there. “She basically said to them, ‘Hey, we don’t do that at Lyfe Lounge.’ No one had protected me like that before.”
Spaces where members of the LGBTQ community can express themselves sexually while feeling supported and accepted are incredibly important, Brooks said. She’s hoping to eventually build Lyfe Lounge into a physical club with three floors, including one for gay men.
“I’m doing this out of love,” Brooks said. “Sometimes these shows can make us look like … this is some circus thing. But people in the LGBTQ community have fantasies as well, and they deserve to have fun and express them comfortably as well.”
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