Originally published by Ladybud Magazine

I once lived with a couple of gay body builders. They used anger as foreplay, creating jealous scenarios of infidelity (which in reality they were ok with) and would prompt each other to throw fists. The fists would fly, mirrors would break and fifteen minutes later there was ass-slapping and moaning coming from the bedroom.

This was terrifying to me, I never knew if I was going to walk into a stray fist or just how escalated the fight would become, if I would need to call the police. To this day I am unsure if the anger was real or if it was just play, but it definitely felt real. My skin would crawl with anxiety and fear as soon as the voices would raise. Needless to say, I moved out.

Lately I have been thinking a lot about aggression, about anger. Sometimes anger is productive, many activists thrive on anger, anger for injustice fuels their passion for productive change. It motivates many of us to put ourselves second to justice, even if we may never see the future we are fighting so hard to change.

But some thrive on anger and controversy because it’s an addiction to them. An addiction as real as loading the meth pipe or slamming heroin in your vein. Addicts use a substance, in this case anger and vitriol, the way they would use a drug, as escapism– a way to set aside one’s own culpability. They use the anger and passion as fuel to make other people feel bad, which in turn makes them feel good.

But why is it we do this the most to the people we love, or those who love us unconditionally?

I have, at times, found myself falling into this trap, I get angry about things that are beyond my control and so instead find reasons to be angry at someone else, someone who doesn’t deserve it.

I hate you! Now fuck me!

Anger sex can be really, really good. No one holds back, all the rage and passion you may be holding about work or social relationships can be channelled physically, your partner becoming an effigy that absorbs all that emotion from you like a sponge.

When it’s over nothing matters anymore, you realize all that anger you were carrying was just a big distraction, an unfortunate one in the scheme of things like mind-blowing orgasms and a pint of strawberry gelato with a champagne chaser.

If only we realized we had a choice between crusades and cuddling, the world would be a much easier place to exist in.

I think my roommates couldn’t verbalize their feelings, so they would manufacture dramas to enact before turning the rage into passion and pounding it out of each other. They would reemerge a few hours later, pick up Taco Bell and watch cartoons on the couch together all night, affectionately nuzzling into each other’s chiseled pecs.

In my musings on anger and sex I have come to look at people I interact with a little differently.

For instance, I have recently had the unfortunate chance of luck to deal with one such person, one who thrives on drama, hatred and anger. Normally I would react by crawling into my shell and hiding, knowing there is nothing I can do or say to reason with a person on an anger-high, but still couldn’t help feeling empathy towards them.

And as much as I hate to use this phrase, I think they needed to get laid more. I know, I know, as a feminist I take offense to hearing those words too. Many a time I have gotten justifiably angry in the presence of men who would write it off as my raging menstrual hormones or a lack of dick. 99% of the time it is neither, the anger is generated out of vulnerability, self debasement and confusion.

But, some people really just need to get fucked. They need some ass-slapping therapeutic sex to work out the emotions they can’t seem to verbalize, the emotions their brains are mis-interpreting to anger and fear.

The anger and drama is really just a manifestation of the loss of control they feel, in the process of trying to take control they lose their mind. It’s ok to say you were wrong and start over and other people respect that. But all that anger with no release will never lead you to that conclusion.

The problem is, most of us live in our heads instead of our whole bodies. Our heads can be treacherous places with self-dug caves to nowhere and pits of acidic bubbling lava. People in hell always want ice water, and they will stop nowhere short of tearing apart your freezer until they get what they want.

Sex is a form of meditation, and we all know how bad it is when you are worrying about all the things you need to handle and all the people you need to take down. The only person you need to take down is yourself, and once you go down you take a load to the mouth and come back up with a whole new perspective. There, doesn’t that feel better?