The Couple Who Shagged in an MRI Machine for Science | Hacker News Reader

The Couple Who Shagged in an MRI Machine for Science

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>“In many ways I think we’re going backwards,” Ida says. “I grew up in a time when sex wasn’t a big deal, and we’d always go bathing naked and people seemed more open minded. Now, people just seem to be getting more and more conservative.”

An observation I've made too. I don't think it's an accident that this was done in the Netherlands given that in central and Northern Europe in particular there was always a healthy and open attitude towards nudity and sexuality and a "Freikörperkultur"

I noticed this with the decline of mixed saunas and changing rooms in public baths and I don't know if it's an Americanisation of culture but people seem to become increasingly neurotic about sexuality and people's bodies.

Totally agree, but it's even happening in America, too. My pet hypothesis is that the Internet has made it so pretty much the primary or only way some people are exposed to nudity is in highly sexualized (and unrealistic) scenarios.

For example, when I was a kid/youth, everyone just changed and showered in the locker room. Nudity wasn't "flaunted", but it was just a natural consequence of, well, changing clothes. As I got older, I noticed that most of the younger generation (I'm Gen X, so basically talking about Millennials) would do the "under the towel caterpillar shuffle" to change. This always struck me as completely bizarre: the caterpillar shuffle was something you did when you needed to change your bathing suit outside, in public, not in a men-only locker room. Honestly, it struck me as kind of sad.

> This always struck me as completely bizarre: the caterpillar shuffle was something you did when you needed to change your bathing suit outside, in public, not in a men-only locker room.

Alternate theory: I wonder if this has anything to do with society acknowledging that homosexuals exist. Twenty years ago, most straight people probably wouldn’t think about that.

Once you realize, why would it matter if you’re in a single-sex environment or not?

Straight guy here: I never think about that. Now that I am, I still don't care. Anecdata, and maybe I'm just not the brightest or something, but I really doubt that "the gays will ogle me" is the kind of culture-forming collective epiphany that would bend this practice.

(aside: I really appreciate alternate theories (and you posting yours), and I don't want this to come off as overly dismissive; in this case I just don't agree)

> but I really doubt that "the gays will ogle me" is the kind of culture-forming collective epiphany that would bend this practice.

So why would people care if there were women there? Is it different?

I’ll go a step further and say I think the entire concept of a single-sex changing room may be outdated.

Frankly, my main concern would be that women would see me as "predatory", for lack of a better term. Put a different way, I would be uncomfortable with the idea that I would make them uncomfortable in some way. I guess in some way, not assuming someone's sexual preference (that is, adhering to what is statistically very probable) allows everyone in the situation to save face in accordance with politeness theory [0]. Maybe this isn't entirely logical, but it doesn't seem too far off to me.

This is one example of a situation that would explain the incongruence; I'm sure there are others from different perspectives.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politeness_theory

I'm not sure it is entirely logical, but certainly somewhat logical in the context of nudity being something forbidden.

>Frankly, my main concern would be that women would see me as "predatory", for lack of a better term.

That was outdated too during the sexual revolution (when people would get naked far more casually, including at concerts and nature, and few would bat an eye), but somehow came back to fashion as the boomer generation grow older...

> So why would people care if there were women there? Is it different?

Yes, it's way different, obviously!

> I’ll go a step further and say I think the entire concept of a single-sex changing room may be outdated.

You're definitely in the minority there. Having been a 13 year old boy myself, and knowing how 13 year old boys behave, there's no way in hell I'd allow a room full of them to be in a room with my 13 year old daughter naked.

>Yes, it's way different, obviously!

Obviously if one is from a puritan culture and that's all they know.

Hasn't been as obvious in nordic countries, Germany, etc.

As a man, I don't have problems changing around women. From anecdotal experience, I think women generally feel more strongly about this. There are surely some women who don't care and men who care.

This would remove a safe space for (mostly) women and (some) men who don't feel comfortable with this.

Same as allowing transgenders to change with the gender they identify with.

> This would remove a safe space for (mostly) women and (some) men who don't feel comfortable with this.

And what of the LGBT people who don't feel comfortable?

Anecdotally, I remember two separate gay classmates in high school telling me that locker rooms made them feel super uncomfortable, once they began to discover their sexuality. Both were girls, for whatever that's worth.

Relatedly, I'm also sympathetic to straight cisgender people who are uncomfortable seeing the opposite sex's genitalia in their single-sex changing rooms.

Getting rid of these gender divisions might be the only way to put everyone on a level playing field. Either you're comfortable with everyone seeing, or you're not. If you're not, use a towel.

And I'll go another step farther--I don't normally do things that involves changing rooms in the first place. However, the times I have been naked around someone who isn't an intimate partner has more often been mixed-gender than single-gender.

I haven't done it enough for it to not feel a little weird going against the cultural conditioning, but it didn't bother me beyond that.

Not assuming everyone is straight seems like a generational thing. However you feel in co-ed change rooms should mirror your feelings in single sex change rooms. Men and women may/may not check you out.

Shouldn't the issue rather be the reverse? How you feel in single-sex changing rooms should be how we all get to feel also in co-ed rooms. There is no shame in Scandinavia to be together in a sauna with any age or gender - you don't flaunt what you got, but you also don't need to hide it unnecessarily. This was the norm in most places, certainly all around the USSR and famously you find that most (or maybe by now just 'many') beaches allow nudism while the west has some too it's clearly less.

Definitely a large part of this is that the prudish American ways have spread in Europe through (mainstream/Hollywood) films and series. Violence is normalised, while the body and sexuality are shamed and hidden and in that process made taboo and erotic. If you watch some non-UK European movies you really see this very visually, e.g. French movies are all about emotions, German movies are all about mystery and social issues, or e.g. Estonian movies are exploring character. All European films will have some nudity built in, but it's rarely 'sexual' and more just to show that the characters have intimacy/a private moment.

Yes, going to Japan and experiencing their public onsen was unusual for an American like me — to be nude among strangers. To be sure the place I went it was gender divided, but still strange for an American.

Yah, Hollywood. Married couples sleeping in separate single beds. Kisses without tongues. Bras made of cast-iron.

Seems naive to me to assume that a generation or so ago straight men had no clue that gay men existed ... among them!

While it may be in the open now, societally, I assume straight men always knew there were gay men everywhere. For all of human history.

>Seems naive to me to assume that a generation or so ago straight men had no clue that gay men existed ... among them!

The parent is maybe 20-something and thinks of 2000 as some distant past filled with savages?

Straight men knew gay men existed among them (including in locker rooms) since the time of Socrates...

That would never occur to me — a homosexual will look at me lustily.

I feel men change clothes in private because women don't want to see them. And women prefer men not see them change clothes so they too change in private. So you separate the genders. Weird, I know.

66-year-old straight male here.

I went to a boy's boarding school, a few females, male changing rooms, I'd say about 10% of the boys were gay or curious. We showered toigether; there were no cubicles. I wasn't ever ashamed to be seen naked.

No woman I've been with (not very many) has ever seemed ashamed to be seen naked; but interestingly, I think, they have seemed to prefer to dress and undress out of sight. I'm not like that at all; I'd walk down the street naked, were it not for the risk of exposing an unexpected erection. Most girls are shyer than me, for what I think are obvious reasons.

I think there's no place for body-shame; I think it's sexy as hell when a girl enjoys you gazing at her naked body. I'm no work of art, but I love being consumed visually, too.

I grew up with single sex changing rooms being the norm pre internet, and hated it. It had nothing to do with homosexuality or internet, and everything to do with bullying and human's worst instincts.

I was healthy and normal and straight and it still affected me.

The only thing worse than dealing with bullying or the typical relational aggression in social groups is dealing with it when you're literally completely physically exposed.

I hate it and was happy with the trend toward privacy. Society isn't compassionate enough to deal with nudity.

>Totally agree, but it's even happening in America, too.

Happening in America? It was (and still is) imported from America, from the puritan US media and movie influence on European (and perhaps global) audiences...

I'm sure it's cyclic. It's not clear that America has always been prudish - think back to the swinging 60s and "free love".

I think it's more a construct of the ongoing societal flip between Elizabethan and Victorian morals. I had a teacher years ago who opined that generations swing one way, and then the other - within the context of their societies.

Agreed, the Netherlands in particular seems to be become more and more conservative. I miss the more open culture of the 80s/90s.

I don't see this as much in the other countries I've lived. I lived in Ireland for 12 years and saw that marriage being accepted in a referendum, which I've never thought possible when I first moved there.

I guess the headstart that the Netherlands had, led to a stagnation somehow.

Not just the Netherlands. Populism, law & order, back to the land "tradition" are all on the rise worldwide.

There's a disillusionment ... due to what is of course the great question. It's pretty clear that the gridlock in politics (Obama, Change, Hope -> Trump; early 2000s EU extension -> Brexit), the good old social inequality and so on has something to do with it.

Also, likely the balance of mood shifted. (Less people are optimistic about the future than used to be, plus these disillusioned people have become more vocal and bitter, and very susceptible to populist dictator-wannabes' agitation. Whereas the new generation that would counterbalance this is so inoculated against earnestness online, that they wholesale reject any participation in whatever their elders do online. Yet at the same time they are of course trapped in the Insta/TikTok world.)

I would say people's attitude is much less conservative these days.

Sex out of wedlock, attitude to drugs, display of violence, government taxation and regulation, freedom restrictions - they are all a magnitude more than in the past.

What changed is that previous examples of innocent nudity are sexualised, probably because of our highly sexualised culture.

Probably harder to acknowledge but also immigration from cultures less comfortable with sex/nudity and more conservative in general.

Excerpts from different parts of the piece:

“I realised I was the only woman in the room,” she recalls, and describes a pang of exasperation. “It was like, of course I’m the only woman in a study about women’s bodies!”

And at that moment Pek knew they’d achieved something more significant than an arts project; they’d re-written around 500 years of anatomical assumptions.

It's actually really interesting stuff.

I found the article provocative, but annnoyingly flat. There's just one 2D image from the MRI scan; an MRI "image" is a 3D image that you can pan, tilt, scroll and colourise, and so on. That 2D B+W image look like something from the sixties - you hardlyu need an MRI scanner to make a picture like that.

I don't think too many people will comment on this, but it's really quite cool and I wish it wasn't so taboo. Especially considering how illuminating these kinds of first stories are. I wonder if the article will inspire new genres of porn.

You might be interested in the tv show https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masters_of_Sex

I wanted to watch it, but I never got around to it. Thanks for the reminder. I was watching sex sent me to the er which was pretty cool, it reminded me of dark matters. At the same time it turned my hulu recommendations to trash. Say la vie.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Matters:_Twisted_But_Tr...

Interesting it says that all other participants in later studies needed viagra, and they were the only ones who did not. They apparently were so happy with one another, they needed no special tools to get the job done while in a room with a lot of noise and other people, perhaps. MRIs are noisy things, and I find their comments interesting.

I'd venture that the ability to get it up in an MRI or having researchers watch the act has little to do with how happy people are in a relationship

Right - I just assumed they were more comfortable with people watching than the others.

They were acrobats, which probably helped. I'm surprised this article didn't mention that tidbit.

> Only one couple was able to have sex without Viagra. The authors wrote: "The reason might be that they were the only participants in the real sense: involved in the research right from the beginning because of their scientific curiosity, knowledge of the body, and artistic commitment.

> "And as amateur street acrobats they are trained and used to performing under stress."

Have you ever been in an MRI machine?

The racket is almost deafening, and the scan lasts 20 minutes. It's very cramped; I'm kinda astonished they could get two people into the machine at the same time. I can't imagine having a shag inside one. I guess you'd have to be really horny.

When I take the mri, it feels like the roof is 6” from my face. Maybe they had a more novel coupling than boring old missionary. Or maybe they weren’t fully down the tube???

Two things, both mentioned in the article:

The normal sliding tray you lie on was removed--they had to crawl in but they had the whole ring available. And they did it spoon fashion.

It doesn’t look like they are spooning in the picture given that the bladder of the female is against the belly of the male

There was a bit on those experiments in Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex by Mary Roach. She has a good way of writing that's both funny and informative.

Yup. She can make anything interesting.

I'm curious: do Americans know what shagging is?

Only because I've watched Austin Powers

The man is claiming there was magnetism shrinkage.

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