What should a parent answer if their child asks what a vibrator is, or what the word orgasm guarantee actually means?
Several people in Fredericia have asked themselves that question, where a bus advertisement from the webshop Sinful has been driving around on the city buses over the summer with a motif of three vibrators accompanied by the text “100 percent orgasm guarantee”.
Also read: Poll: May city buses advertise sex toys? ( https://www.dr.dk/nyheder/indland/afstemning-maa-bybussen-reklamere-sexlegetoej )
The advertisement was taken down again after it was criticized by several in the city, who felt that it was both inappropriate and that it was wrong that children in the city were exposed to it.
Today, the poster with the floating vibrators in Fredericia has been replaced with another Sinful motif. So now several of the buses in Fredericia are driving around with this advertisement. (Photo: © Asta Holst Bach/DR)
But it doesn’t have to be that complicated to have the conversation about vibrators and orgasms with your child, says Katrine Zeuthen, PhD in clinical child psychology and privately practicing psychoanalyst.
- I would start by asking the child: what do you think? Like, first find out what it actually is the child is asking about.
- And then the child can come up with an explanation that is fairly innocent. Often children are satisfied with a very simple explanation. You can also say that it is something that is nice for adults to use.
It is important that the adult tries to stay at the child’s level in such a conversation, she says.
- It is a collision between the adult’s sexuality and the adult’s knowledge of what, for example, a vibrator’s function is, and a child’s curious question into the adult world, which for the child is enigmatic and inaccessible, but also exciting.
What do people in Fredericia think about Sinful’s vibrator advertisement? For several of those DR News met at the bus station, it was precisely children’s reactions to the advertisement that mattered:
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Political correctness and modesty are taking up more space
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When the vibrator advertisement offends some people, part of the explanation may be that we have become significantly more prudish. That is according to Sune Bang, who is a communications consultant and branding expert.
- It is a movement that has been going on for ten to twenty years, which has changed our behavior.
According to Sune Bang, it is an “Americanization”.
It is not a problem that children see an advertisement for a vibrator, says Katrine Zeuthen, PhD in clinical child psychology and psychoanalyst. (Photo: © Klara Løkke)
- When we watch an American film on some streaming service, there are often these warnings, and some of the most severe warnings are about sex. Because it really is something that divides the population in the USA.
- Even though we see ourselves as being very free-thinking in Denmark, we also see that movement coming into our country.
According to Sune Bang, this means that sex is increasingly being perceived as private and taboo.
- We have previously really patted ourselves on the back that we are free, with bare breasts and nudity as a natural part. But today, political correctness and modesty take up more space.
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Psychologist: Talk about the vibrator advertisement, but don’t go into details
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> I would refrain from beginning to go into details and very thoroughly
> explain what such a vibrator’s function is
> Katrine Zeuthen, PhD in clinical child psychology
Katrine Zeuthen sees no problem with Sinful advertising their vibrator in the public space, or children seeing the advertisement.
- There is such easy access to an incredible amount of sexualized material also in advertisements, which is more covert and hidden. This advertisement is completely real.
The problem arises if adults either do not want to talk to the child about the advertisement or answer far too detailed, she says.
- I would refrain from going into details and very thoroughly explaining what such a vibrator’s function is.
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