Hi everyone, welcome back to Doing It, the Sex and Relationships podcast where sex has

never been so nerdy with me, your host Hannah Witten.

In this week's episode, I'm joined by Ella Dawson.

Ella is a sex and culture critic who digs into topics we usually avoid

in polite company from our dehumanising culture of casual sex to how shame keeps us silent about

our mental health and sexual health. Her short fiction has been published in six erotica collections

and she is currently working on her first romance

novel. Ella first gained a platform due to her opening up and candid sharing about being

herpes positive and has been using her audience to educate and fight the stigma around herpes

ever since. I was really keen to speak to Ella because we

haven't covered STIs on the podcast enough and never really spoken about herpes at all.

Herpes is one of the most stigmatized STIs and Ella is really doing such amazing work to break

the stigma. So when she was enthusiastically suggested by one of my

patrons to be a podcast guest, I knew I had to check her out and see what all the fuss was about.

Our chat did not disappoint. I learned so much talking to Ella from just how common her piece

is to how the stigma is actually relatively

recent from the 70s and 80s and Time magazine's infamous herpes cover.

We also talk about how sex positive sex education can try and steer away from fearmongering

and talk about STIs in a way that doesn't exacerbate STI stigma,

rather than the message that I certainly received that they were the end of the world.

We also spoke about how talking to sexual partners about your herpes and STI status

can create greater intimacy and vulnerability leading to

...