Hitch Explains The Blow Job

Am I the only one who thinks it unseemly that the author of a scholarly work about Thomas Jefferson should also write an article about fellatio?

Be that as it may, Christopher Hitchens did just that. His article for Vanity Fair, is heavy on literary references, but contains one piece of etymological trivia that I'd always wondered about. Why do they call it a "blow job" when, as Chevy Chase once said, "you're not supposed to blow on it; that's just a figure of speech."

The crucial word "blowjob" doesn't come into the American idiom until the 1940s, when it was (a) part of the gay underworld and (b) possibly derived from the jazz scene and its oral instrumentation. But it has never lost its supposed Victorian origin, which was "below-job" (cognate, if you like, with the now archaic "going down").

Interesting. Of course, "sucking cock" is also a misnomer. If this were a more confessional blog, I might tell you the story of a certain fourteen year old's first encounter with a boy, wherein they both discovered the truth of that last statement, embarrassingly so for her, but painfully so for him.

Hitchens has a theory about why the blow job has become the quintessentially American sex act of late. It's not that Monica was so influential. It's really about the ADA, according to British transplant Hitch.

There is another thinkable reason why this ancient form of lovemaking lost its association with the dubious and the low and became an American handshake and ideal. The United States is par excellence the country of beautiful dentistry. As one who was stretched on the grim rack of British "National Health" practice, with its gray-and-yellow fangs, its steely-wire "braces," its dark and crumbly fillings, and its shriveled and bleeding gums, I can remember barely daring to smile when I first set foot in the New World. Whereas when any sweet American girl smiled at me, I was at once bewitched and slain by the warm, moist cave of her mouth, lined with faultless white teeth and immaculate pink gums and organized around a tenderly coiled yet innocent tongue. Good grief! What else was there to think about? In order to stay respectable here, I shall just say that it's not always so enticing when the young ladies of Albania (say) shoot you a cheeky grin that puts you in mind of Deliverance.

Hitch also mentions the movie Deep Throat, and it's importance to American cultural development.

[I]n 1972 . . . some amateurs pulled together $25,000 for a movie that eventually posted grosses of $600 million. Is this a great country or what? This film, with performances by Harry Reems and Linda Lovelace, was one of the tawdriest and most unsatisfying screen gems ever made, but it changed the world and the culture for good, or at any rate forever.

Having seen Deep Throat at a high school slumber party years ago, I can't say I understand Hitch's praise. It was a pretty sucky film, literally and figuratively. I don't remember much about it, except that me and my friends couldn't stop laughing, which means it was either really cheesy, or we were really stoned. I also remember wondering how Linda Lovelace did that. They must have used some kind of special effects, is all I can think, because what I saw was not physically possible.

As long as we're on the subject, I have a blow job related philosophical question. It's a non-rhetorical one for the comments section if you choose to weigh in. It seems there are two schools of thought regarding the power distribution within a duo a fellatio.

School one views the person doing the sucking as the one with all the power. Quite simply, this school argues that despite the apparent subservience of the fellator's posture, and the work:reward ratio involved, it is the sucker rather than the suckee who is in command. The argument is based on the fact that at any time, at the whim of the fellator, the fellatee might find himself in a World Of Hurt According To Garp. If you know what I mean.

The second school of thought on the power relationship issue vis-a-vis dicksucking, tends to scoff at the former school's "Garp" argument. This more inferential argument can be summarized thusly: Since fellators service a fellatee willingly and almost never cause harm, it can be surmised that the fellatee has power akin to a master-slave relationship. As one arrogant guy said to me during a discussion of this very issue, "A powerful king won't let anyone with a sword near him. But the most powerful king surrounds himself with swordsmen, because he knows nobody would dare hurt him."

Interesting point. But still I would come down on the side of the fellator as the one with all the power. Because she/he still gets to decide whether, when and for how long the job gets done.

And how well.

h/t to Blogger Ale.

Update: Essential reading: Oral Sex for Dummies, by JoanC: Part I and Part II. Even if you think you know the subject, I gaurantee you won't think so after reading Joan.