Sunday Lunch
with ... Ian Kerner
By DEBRA PICKETT
SUN TIMES COLUMNIST
January 16, 2005
There is no polite, G-rated way to begin
an interview with Ian Kerner.
Kerner, the author of She Comes First:
The Thinking Man's Guide to Pleasuring a Woman (ReganBooks,
$22.95), is a sex therapist and self-described "spokesperson
for the premature ejaculators of America." When he is interviewed
on television, as he frequently is, talking about the big
male-female issues of the day, the major networks black out
the title of his book because of the, um, pun. But the joke's
on them because they still show the cover. And the book's
cover features a still life of fruit that is as sexually suggestive
as a still life of fruit can possibly be, even before anyone
puts a big, black "fashion don't"-style bar across the title.
Breaking the ice
If you are talking to Ian Kerner, you are
talking about sex, whether you really want to be or not. I
knew this going in, but, still, somehow, as we shook hands
and sat down in a quiet room just off the bar at the W Lakeshore
hotel, I was thinking there was going to be a way to soft-pedal
it.
Then the first question came out of my
mouth: "So, how does someone become a sex therapist, anyway?"
"Basically," he answers, "what happened
was that I was in a relationship and there were some sexual
issues and we went for sex therapy. For me, it was really
life-transforming. . . . And, when the dot-com thing ended
[Kerner, like every well-educated New York guy his age, was
an executive with an Internet company], I was really inspired
to take this up myself."
Well, super, I think to myself, that pretty
much breaks the ice. Are you going to follow up by asking
exactly what those sexual issues were?
Meanwhile, Kerner is calmly stirring the
coffee in his high-design cup, waiting for the next question.
I've read his book and he knows I've read
his book, which means he knows that I know that he was a chronic
premature ejaculator. I can't speak for him, but, personally,
I'd just as soon avoid chatting about that. At least before
dessert.
But talking about the book, which is basically
a how-to for a specific variety of oral sex, is not exactly
standard-issue lunch table conversation, either. Until this
moment, faced with a man who has published a diagram of the
18 parts (18!) of the clitoris, I never considered myself
a prude.
Right now, though, I find myself asking
incredibly lame questions about how a person qualifies as
a "sexologist." (It takes about 3-1/2 years of course work
and clinical practice.) There's only so much of that we can
pursue, though, before I stammer through a question about,
er, how the book might be tied in to his own experience, and
Kerner jumps in, "You mean going back to my issues with premature
ejaculation?" he asks, in the nicest, just-want-to-clarify
tone you can possibly imagine.
The next big thing
"Yeah," I say, trying not to notice the
painting hanging right above Kerner's head -- a reclining
woman who, in my imagination, has just participated in one
of the more complicated techniques described in Kerner's book,
like, say, the 1-2-skip-4.
Becoming an expert -- maybe an evangelist
-- in oral sex was Kerner's solution for his, um, issues.
And he is, he says, poised for premature ejaculation to become
the next big thing in male dysfunction. Soon, he says, there
will be a pill. And, inevitably, commercials for the pill.
Celebrity endorsements.
And all of that, Kerner says, represents
a giant missed opportunity.
"There are a lot of unhappy, dissatisfied
women out there," he says, looking at me in a way I try not
to take as meaningful.
And a magic pill, he explains, won't get
those women what they want -- not without some serious retraining
for their male partners. Which is, of course, where he fits
in.
"When people think of sex therapists," he
says, "they think of Dr. Ruth or [cable TV star] Sue Johanson
or, like, of those mid-life couples starting to swing that
you'd see on HBO's 'Real Sex.' I want to put a younger, fresher
face on sex therapy."
Kerner's book is written in a very guy-friendly
way, but it's hard to imagine many guys buying it, since they'd
have to admit they need a how-to book in the first place.
On the other hand, he says, "I get a lot of questions from
women wanting to know how they can give this book to their
guy without insulting him.
"You can tell him you got it free," he says,
and, again, I find myself wondering if this is a general suggestion
or if it is just meant for me, since I, um, did get the book
for free.
Sequel coming
Weirdly, though Kerner is incredibly open
in talking about sex, there are things I feel I can't ask
him. Like about his marriage and his young son and whether
-- I can't help but notice -- his being kind of a short, slightly
built guy has anything to do with his attitude about all of
this sex stuff.
There are some things, though -- stop looking
at how small his hands are! Stop it! -- that are just entirely
too politically incorrect. So we go back to talking about
his sex books.
The next one, titled He Comes Next,
is due out in summer and deals with, he explains, "the question
of whether a woman can have sex like a man does."
