I am just wondering what other people's thoughts are on this. In most of our cultures, the ass is a dirty thing not to be touched. After all, that's where your shit comes out of and shit is unclean according to popular opinion, fear of disease/bacteria etc. There is also the (I think completely baseless) association between anal activities and the gay community. Then there is religious pressures and so on. Because of these reasons, I think that most people are brought up with built-in psychological barriers stopping them from even attempting to play with their ass. Especially heterosexual men. Then there is what I said in another thread very recently - that people who are adventurous enough to give it a go will often quit after the first time or two, becuase they didn't enjoy it that first time. When I first started I had no idea what I was doing. It was extremely small stuff, very tame. I didn't even go for the prostate massage or any kind of stretching. I would just put the blunt end of a pencil or whatever in. I didn't particularly physically enjoy the feelings of course, probably because they were so mild and non-descript, but it was in the back of my head somewhere that "some people enjoy this stuff, so maybe I can too once I know what to do...". So in a way I had to push past the initial neutral/negative experiences to learn how to make it feel good, which I eventually did. I guess there is a parrellel with other things. For example most girl's first experiences with sex aren't very positive. And for example, if you talk about japanese food many people will just say "That's raw fish isn't it? YUCK!" Without having tried it. I am just wondering - how many people try, and how many of those try once or twice then give it up because they didn't enjoy it initially? If in our culture, the negative associations were brought down and raw facts were left to think about rationally and in the open without stigma, how many more people would try and be into anal play? My thoughts are that a large majority of people would at least try it and most of these could learn to enjoy themselves. It's well accepted that the anus is linked with the genitals and has a secondary sexual association. I believe people should embrace this.