How Dr. Ruth changed gender in the United States forever

Starting in the 1980s, television sex therapist Dr. Ruth Westheimer ushered in a new era in the United States with her pragmatic openness and positive attitude toward sexuality and became a cultural icon.

Dr. Ruth, the sex therapist from television, was more than just a celebrity. She died on July 12 at the age of 96the obituaries called her a cultural icon for good reason. Even people who have only a vague or no idea who Ruth Westheimer was live today in a social world that she helped to shape. The Netflix drama series Sex education classes Without them, there might not be anything. And probably not Showtime’s Couples Therapy – or the many commercials for erectile dysfunction treatments that are so common on US television today.

Beginning in 1980, Dr. Ruth’s popular radio and television shows – in which she offered frank, humorous and detailed sexual advice – promoted the idea that sex was a healthy aspect of life and that conversations about sex should be open. She came at just the right cultural moment and was just the right wholesome, grandmotherly figure to convey this message. Her candor marked a turning point in the acceptance of what is now called sex positivity.

From a 15-minute radio show called “Sexually Speaking” to a long series of television series, including “Good Sex! With Dr. Ruth Westheimer,” she gave blunt advice when no one else would, on everything from losing virginity to achieving orgasms and living out fantasies. “If you want to believe there’s an entire football team in bed with you, that’s fine,” she said. said in 1985. For a country with a deep-rooted, lingering cultural sense of puritanism, she was a breath of fresh air. She had credentials to back up her advice: She’d worked at Planned Parenthood, earned a doctorate in education, and done postdoctoral work on human sexuality. But viewers didn’t know any of this, nor did they particularly care. Her bubbly personality and down-to-earth approach made her an unexpected star.

With her typical candor, she was often quoted as saying that her career would not have worked if she had been tall and sexy. Her key to acceptance by the general public was her reassuring grandmother role. When she began her television career, she was already middle-aged, a petite woman (140 cm) with a perky voice. “I was not a young woman sitting on television in a short skirt and showing cleavage,” she said. said“I was already 50. I have an accent.”

As a Jewish child, she was sent on a Kindertransport from Germany to Switzerland during World War II to escape the fate of her parents, who perished in the Holocaust. But she was a relentlessly cheerful personality. She pointed “It says in the Talmud that a lesson taught with humor is a lesson you retain.” That humor made her a frequent guest on late-night talk shows, from Johnny Carson’s era to Jimmy Kimmel’s, and bolstered her cultural presence. Her voice and image as a little old sex therapist were easily caricatured, but viewers mostly laughed with her, not at her.

Behind this cheerful personality lies a rich cultural heritage that is part of a continuum of US history. The 1960s were about sexual liberation, dividing older and younger generations. In the 1970s, pornography began to emerge from the shadows. The name Deep Throat was in the Watergate era, when Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein named her anonymous source, thebut the reference to the porn film of the same name was also a sign of the film’s visibility in the eyes of the general public. Building on the changes of those earlier decades, Dr. Ruth made sex seem downright cheerful in the ’80s, and sexual problems simply something to talk about and find solutions to. This attitude was relatable to a generation that grew up sexually liberated, and it was also an antidote to the cultural conservatism that arose during the Reagan years. Although it is not part of her pop culture image, she was always an advocate of contraception and women’s reproductive health, and an advocate of safe sex, especially at the height of the AIDS epidemic. One of her dozens of books was Dr. Ruth’s Guide to Safe Sex in 1992, albeit with a title not quite as catchy as 1995’s Sex for Dummies. So you can understand why her serious side was often underestimated.

In 2019, while promoting a Hulu documentary about her life, she was still unabashedly and enthusiastically giving common-sense advice, this time to millennials who complained about being too busy or stressed to have sex. “Don’t be stupid. Make sure you have time for sex,” she said USA today. “Here’s an activity that’s so much fun and free.” No one has ever said it better or with more lasting impact.