History of Orgasm: Part 4: Vibrator Technology

              I’m continuing my review and summary of Rachel P. Maines’ book, The Technology of Orgasm, for parts 1, 2, and 3 click here:
http://femgasmproject.blogspot.com/2014/11/history-of-technology-and-female-orgasm.html
http://femgasmproject.blogspot.com/2014/11/history-of-orgasm-part-2-hysteria.html
http://femgasmproject.blogspot.com/2014/11/history-of-orgasm-part-3-masturbation.html

This section, like the last one, was unfortunately rather disorganized and very repetitive- much of what was discussed in this section was discussed already in the first one. What’s so strange about this book, is that it’s a pretty short book for such a large topic, so you would think that each fact would only be said once in order to effectively use what little space she has, but instead it seems that the book could have been cut by about a third, and nothing substantive would have been lost. But there is some interesting information here about hydrotherapy, the beginnings of vibrator use by doctors, and the beginning of the use of vibrators in the home.

Hydrotherapy

Apparently an entire journal was devoted to the topic. 

     Bathing has always been associated with sensuality in Western culture, even dating as far back to the baths of Greece and Rome (72). Sick or not, throughout history, wealthy women especially visited “healing” mineral springs, and in the 1830s and 1840s hydrotherapy or “the water cure”, was a major medical fad (73). And of course, it’s use continued well into the second half of the nineteenth century (78). The “water cure”, a bit more aggressive than women simply laying in baths, involved pumping water into the vagina- apparently for any “female complaints”. (74). (I’ve discussed why responding to women’s  problems by “treating” the vagina is not exactly as wonderful as we might try to make it, in far harsher words, in other sections.) Apparently, most women did respond to hydrotherapy, according to Maines, with great enthusiasm, enjoying it immensely, which greatly confused doctors (74).  That women enjoyed these treatments even seemed to upset some doctors, who struggled for an explanation,  with some Freudians, even into the late 20^th century, suggesting that women orgasm from water simulation, because it allows them to pretend to be man, who is capable or urinating and ejaculating like a man (81). She notes that while masturbation with water was once common for women, and has been shown to especially pleasurable for many of us, studies in the 1990s showed that only 2% of women then used water at all, through shower heads or other means. It’s use has actually declined.

Vibrators

Moving out of the doctor's office and into the home. 

    Vibrators were first “medically” used (to treat “hysteria”), in 1878,  in Paris,  and most doctors were happy to switch over to them, due to their dislike of manual stimulation (68, 93). By 1900, dozens of models were available (93). They were, like hydrotherapy, used to treat all problems a women might have, much, I’m sure, to the detriment of many women whose problems stemmed from somewhere other than their vaginas, although Maines doesn’t discuss this (95). Doctors had a hard time, as discussed in previous sections, maintaining their reputation as professionals when it came to vibrators, as everyone from Freud to erotic movies to popular film, was discussing and depicting vibrators as inherently sexual, never mind that they were beginning to be sold to the average consumer (95, 100, 108). By 1908, they were on the shelves, although often with warnings to avoid “excessive use”, or “imprudence”, while at the same time, promoted as being “far superior to the human hand” (103). As we learned in previous sections, eventually this acknowledgement of women’s sexuality and the sexual nature of these “treatments”, stopped the use of the vibrator in medical offices. Soon enough, vibrators were seen as “self-treatment”, as ways for women to take their sexual pleasure into their own hands. (108).