Original subtitles

Jada is on the line. Hi Jada.

- Hi. - Hello, you got a question?

Yes, my boyfriend has a foot fetish,

which I'm okay with.

Mhm.

It's just that it's went a little extreme now.

He wants me to put, like, my toe around his anus

and actually insert my toe, try to insert it.

And I'm very uncomfortable with that situation.

Yeah.

What about taking a latex glove?

You know, a latex glove?

Uh-huh.

And fill it with, um...

what can we put in it?

Sand or something so that it keeps its shape.

Oatmeal, there you go, or rice.

You know, take a latex glove,

fill it with rice.

Tie the top off tight,

and then pretend that that's a toe.

Okay.

That's desperation.

Okay. - I appreciate it, Sue.

Well, I'm sorry. - Thank you, all right.

Oh, it's all right.

Have I got an imagination.

Oh, and there's more to come, believe me.

I'm Sue Johanson.

I am retired now,

living in the lap of luxury.

The kind of work I did was a little bit controversial.

Our old friend, sexpert Sue Johanson.

Mrs. Johanson. - Sue Johanson.

How did you start?

I'm a registered nurse.

And then I started a birth control clinic for teenagers

in the health room of a high school-

Okay.

And went crazy.

But I realized that those kids were havin' more sex than I was-

Uh-huh.

And got kind of PO'd, so.

Right.

I decided that I wanted to teach sex.

You may not always have an orgasm,

but guarantee you will always have a laugh.

Roll up the rim to width.

My niche was radio.

Hi, Stacey.

Television.

Hi, Amy.

And personal appearances.

Horny is a beautiful thing!

I just didn't know anybody else anywhere

doing what she was doing.

Got a question?

Yeah, I came up with the idea of putting body glitter

on my boyfriend's testicles.

Mhm.

And I was wondering if there was any reason

why that would be a bad idea.

I get really turned on by watching men and women urinate.

Am I weird? - No.

It was like, I thought it was the best thing

I'd ever heard in my life, you know what I mean?

I just remember being so curious

about this little old white woman talking about sex.

Talk to each other.

That's the most important thing.

I think Sue was revolutionary.

Sounds like a good start.

Okay. It's a good start and a great finish.

Hey guys, relax.

One size fits all, not too worry-

She just wanted to break the taboo of sex.

So much for that.

How it that this one person, my mom's age,

was the only one telling us this stuff?

What were you expecting, Martha Stewart?

Thank you, yeah, roll cameras.

Okay, Sue interview, part one.

Good here? - Yep.

Sue interview, common marker.

All right.

Okay.

Are you ready?

Good to go.

If you were to think back,

what was your most favourite memory?

Hmm.

Ahh, do I have favourite memories?

Oh yes.

I'm Sue Johanson and this show is "Talk Sex."

The Hot Stuff Bag is just a-bulging and a-jumping tonight.

Great, okay, let's-

Randy Gulliver,

he was a genius on the control board.

Dwayne, do you have a drumroll by chance?

He was the guy in your earpiece when you were on-

He was in my earpiece.

That's 'cause the microphone's in your hand.

Oh, there's the microphone!

And he would say some of the funniest things.

It's a must.

He'd say, "What the are you doing?"

Perfect.

I like the little pink thing at the bottom.

Whatever the hell that is.

Julie Smith, she organized it all.

Oh yeah.

Oh, get that thing away from me.

My name is Julie Smith,

and I was the executive producer and co-producer on

"Talk Sex with Sue Johanson"

and the "Sunday Night Sex Show."

Okay, let's move on.

We're going to talk to Paula.

Hi, Paula.

Hi. - Hi!

The "Sunday Night Sex Show" was a live call-in program

where viewers got to ask Sue Johanson questions

about sex and sexuality.

Last week we were in the 69 position,

and he accidentally poked me in my eye with his penis.

I remember the first show.

I don't think I've ever been more terrified

in my entire life.

I had never done live television before.

What are we doing now?

Just behind-the-scenes stuff, so doing rehearsal or-

Okay. Well, yeah, okay.

Well, we can do that.

Sue's comfortable anywhere, okay.

Watermelon!

We're off to rehearsal.

I will behave myself. Break a leg.

I was absolutely determined.

I better be good or I better shut up and get outta here.

So green's good except for the monitor.

I was convinced that there would be no calls.

Nobody will phone.

We all were fairly terrified.

Ten, nine, eight seven.

Coming to blue.

Roll blue. - Three, two, one.

Up on it.

This is the "Sunday Night Sex Show,"

and I'm Sue Johanson.

But the "Sunday Night Sex Show"

is a Canadian first.

And it's your opportunity to give me a call,

if you have a question

or a concern about sex.

Can I get your name, please?

Okay Howard, what's your question?

Okay, let me put you on hold, Melissa.

"Sunday Night Sex Show," can I get your name, please?

And we have Marlena from Lethbridge calling in

right off the mark.

Hi, Marlena. - Hi.

Hi, how are you? - Good.

I think the idea is going public like this

is, uh, easier than they think.

I'm not embarrassed. I'm not uptight.

I'm not, um, scared of it.

I'm pregnant right now

and I plan on breastfeeding my child after I have it.

And I was just wondering, my boyfriend really likes

to suck on my breasts during love-making.

And I was just wondering, he's lactose intolerant

and I was just wondering if my breast milk could hurt him?

Well, he'll certainly have to start taking Lactaid,

won't he?!

I guess so.

I mean, she hit the airwaves gangbusters

with this information,

and nobody had seen anything like this before.

And the whole of Canada was just like, whoa,

what's going on?

Who is this person?

Well, what are we talking about, a cock ring?

Right.

Oh, a cock ring, they come in different sizes.

Is that right?

Yeah, you go to a sex store,

and they usually come in a package

and there's usually three.

Somebody's stolen my other one.

I have very vivid memories of the-of the

"Sunday Night Sex Show."

Here was this call-in show

featuring the most unassuming person

that was leading the show,

talking about

stuff that you just couldn't find anywhere else.

Yeah, okay, it doesn't look like that though.

Mine's all Steele.

Okay, then yours is a dildo.

Okay, a dildo then.

Does it have batteries?

I have a vision of her sitting at that desk,

holding some body part that was made of silicone.

I remember her giving a hand-job to a cucumber

and, uh, and showing you how to hold it for a blow.

I was like, wow, this is wild.

Let your fingers do the walking.

I never looked at a cucumber the same.

The most common questions we get in today's world,

like it or not folks,

is all about anal sex.

Nobody talked openly about this,

especially an older mature woman that,

you know, looked like she may have never had sex.

But, you know, that's no disrespect to you, Sue.

You know, the next time you're gonna have bum sex,

use something that's got a string on it or something

that you can retrieve.

Sue Johanson's age

was absolutely one of the best things

she had going for her.

She was like your grandma,

with kind of hair stickin' on end.

Wait, you got a hair on it. - Okay.

I was older.

I was never seen as a sex kitten.

I had the gift of the gab.

You will have a key word so that when she says this word,

you know that's it, it's over,

it's finished, it's done with.

A yapper, that's what I was, a yapper.

And the key word must be something like sky or canoe.

She was not intimidating at all.

People felt that they could speak to her

about their most intimate subjects,

and she was not gonna judge them,

and she was not gonna make fun of them..

Thank you very much. - Good luck.

I enjoy your show.

Thank you.

During sex?

The calls are fantastic,

and they give me so much insight

into what people are doing and what they wanna know about.

And where their imagination is taking them.

I also have the most wonderful crew.

Sorry, yeah.

My name is Sana Young

and I was the makeup artist on the show.

And how long did you work on the show?

The entire duration, from start to finish,

first show to the last show.

I was offered to come in on Sunday nights

for, I think it was $50?

I think that's what it started out as.

It was a tiny little studio.

We would cover the set up with our set pieces

for Sunday night and then strike it afterwards.

Talk Sex, can I have your name please?

Mark, what's your question?

I wonder what they thought of me when I came in,

'cause they'd already been doing the show

for a few years by that time.

And I think I probably was just like,

so embarrassed and shy.

I don't even think I looked anybody in the eye

that first day at all.

It took me a while to loosen up, really. Yeah.

And how did you?

How did I loosen up?

Um, very slowly.

And to help me,

we have Priya and Germain.

We're here in the hall of the studio

and they are going to provide a free home demonstration.

Ooh, this is a great position.

This is probably one of the most pleasurable ones.

Did you know of Sue

before you started working on the show?

I did.

In fact, Sue came to my grade school when I was,

I feel like I was nine,

and she was the first person to talk to me about sex.

Talk Sex, can I get your name please?

We're all from different backgrounds,

different ages, different careers.

But we all found common ground on that show.

Sorry.

It was fun. It was collegial.

We were always interested to know

what kind of sourdough Sue was gonna bring.

People had their favorites.

I had them trained. They had me trained.

The trust level was there, that was the thing I think.

Okay, so you are wondering,

what does an old lady like me know about sex toys?

Plenty.

Once the show got caught some momentum,

manufacturers of sex toys and like sex products

would send her like a box.

So, like, she was getting boxes shipped to her

on a regular basis.

My crew thought the design was kinda sexy

because the buttons look like female genitalia.

She'd call someone into the boardroom and be like,

"Could you try this for me? I think you'd like this."

You look like Garfield.

He had eyes like that.

Folks at the sex, oh-

sex store will tell you that the Impulse Spellbound Vibrator

is one of their best sellers.

And my testers were impressed.

Yes, we definitely tested the sex toys.

We were, uh, asked at random to sort of try different things,

I guess based, you know, on our,

what our potential, uh, enjoyment level was gonna be.

I gave this to one of our crew.

They are the unofficial Sex Toy Testing Council of Canada.

And he loved it.

There was many sex toys that came home with me.

There was so much sex toys, it was crazy.

I mean, but you know, the good, the bad,

and the ugly, right?

There's one I have to show you,

which I kept in my basement still.

It's, um, a really wild contraption.

I don't know what it's for.

Ah, there is a dildo so I think I know what it's for but um...

It's called the Fantasy Glide

and you don't bounce up and down

with the dildo in your vagina or your anus,

just like you'd think you would, uh-uh.

Instead, you simply press up and down on the handle.

Often manufacturers would send us

these really expensive,

completely crazy sex toys, you know?

And she would just sort of say, you know, it's not worth it.

You know, Sue knows how to pinch a penny.

The dollar store diva is back.

Now, all of this stuff came from a dollar store

and my fertile, vivid imagination.

No vibrator handy?

Well, tell all your friends to call you

and then put your cell on vibration.

And then you put it in a plastic bag

and slide it into the crotch of your panties.

Ooh, purr.

But I found these garish clip-on earrings at a garage sale

and so I tried them out as nipple clips

and they didn't hurt me,

so I decided we would try them out on Germain.

I loved the attention.

Yeah, it was really fun to show off.

And I was at an age where, you know,

I was-I was younger, you know?

I had a slightly different body than what I have now.

And I just wanted to show off. - This's what everybody needs.

Here is a tool belt.

He doesn't come with the tool belt.

Sorry about that.

Yes, I remember the tool belt with like,

there were vibrators in some of the slots.

Of course you can have your G-spot stimulator.

I think, were there handcuffs, too?

If I remember correct, maybe not.

Oh, we've got a butt plug stimulator here,

with the remote control yet.

I mean, I thought of everything, absolutely everything.

She would pull the different sex toys

out of the tool belt.

And the construction worker gimmick like,

it, uh, it definitely made me more comfortable

with getting dressed up in the bedroom and-and doing things

because people are turned on by many, many different things.

Ya never know, when the lights are out,

you're gonna go-

wink-wink, nudge-nudge, have fun.

There's such a vast definition of what pleasure is for people.

And what really makes us feel sexual,

feel turned on is so individual,

it is like a fingerprint.

When you use the vibrator all by yourself,

you can do what you want, when you want,

how you want it.

You can stop, you can start, you can add more lube.

You don't have to think about your partner.

You know, where's he at?

Is he tired or is she tired or are they pooped out,

or have they lost interest or,

am I ever gonna reach orgasm?

And you put so much pressure on yourself.

When you're by yourself, you don't do that.

I love the fact that Sue was starting those conversations

and pushing the narrative that this matters.

For a long time the messaging that I received

is that your pleasure happens in between

what works best for the man.

So what you've gotta do now is figure out, okay,

what do I do with my vibrator that works so well?

And then you share that information with your partner.

What stands out to me about listening to Sue was,

in a culture where we have so many issues around consent,

so many issues around sexual assault,

uh, I think to emphasize pleasure is something radical.

It's important for me to focus on pleasure in my workshops

because I find that is the thing

that people are missing the most.

Okay, welcome everybody!

Thank you so much for being here today.

Of course you know that you are here

for the sophisticated hand job!

But I really like to emphasize that it is extremely important

that you are not just focusing on your partner's pleasure,

but also having a good time for yourself.

I really feel like when it comes to the practicality

of having pleasurable sex,

we don't learn about that.

And I just found when I started having sex

I really noticed that I didn't feel confident

with certain things

and certainly handling a penis was like,

really high on that list.

I think people are fed an image as well of sexuality

that it should be pleasurable

but they're not given the tools to get there for themselves.

So I'm going to now hand out some dildos,

the moment everybody's been waiting for! Woo-hoo!

Fantastic.

There is a lot of challenges that come up

for, um, women taking that class

because they compare themselves to pornography.

And they also sometimes have partners

who are trying to achieve

what they've found stimulating in porn.

There's still choices, and they're all the same.

My problem is

I can't seem to go down deep enough for him.

Okay.

And I was wondering how to do that,

you know, or go deeper to pleasure him more.

A blowjob in-in porn is not realistic.

So if you think you're gonna take that whole thing

in your mouth,

you're gonna throw up.

That's not fun.

As a guy, we're so fixated on size.

The message I got from porn was,

that guy's got a penis bigger than nine of my penises.

Having a small penis is not a detriment.

It really isn't.

Here I am with my average wiener,

so I never expected a girl to react like that.

And when they did, I was like,

what's wrong with you?

What I want everyone to know about filmed sexual content,

um, that's for entertainment purposes,

is that it is a paid professional performance

of a fantasy scenario.

One of the really confusing things I think

and the myth of porn is that there's a simultaneous orgasm,

that it comes through humping.

That's really just what we see.

It's just a lot of humping!

And there doesn't seem to be a focus on sensuality.

There's a kind of, uh, negation of sex toys,

as if the sex toy represented, um,

a misfire of masculinity.

Since the time we've been together

she has not had an orgasm without external stimulation

via a vibrator or an enhancement gel of some kind.

And we wanna try to get away from that.

Why?

Mother Nature designed us so that females reach orgasm

with clitoral stimulation,

and our clitoris really doesn't care where that comes from.

It really doesn't matter.

So if it works, go for it.

Yes, ma'am.

My hands are getting a workout.

Yeah, I was just gonna say.

I was just gonna say, yeah.

Like, it sounds like this is the main event

and it's all for him, right?

But what if I wanna have a good time,

you know, like? - Yeah!

Get him going and then we could, you know, like-

Yeah, absolutely!

Take that idea sort of out of the mind of like,

you know, that I'm here because like,

you know, I started something with this person

and now like I kind of owe them an orgasm.

It is about always, like, a co-created experience.

Pleasure is the thing that makes sex

really worthwhile to people.

Um, and so I feel like that's something that

I really learned from Sue because that's how she was.

If you are not enjoying yourself then what's the point?

I agree.

- You know, you might as well kind of walk out the door.

Let's move on.

And we've got Nicole on the line.

Hi, Nicole?

Hi Sue, I watch the show all the time.

I love you, Sue.

Oh, thank you.

Even though we're slightly off the wall?

Well, that's why I watch you.

But I'm a lesbian and my girlfriend and I,

we just introduced anal beads into our relationship.

Yeah?

And we wanna know, when's the best time

to actually take them out?

When's the best time to take them out?

Like, um, uh, when do you insert them?

Before sex.

Oh, before sex, okay.

No, yeah, you'd take them out afterwards,

when you're finished, wouldn't you?

Well, sometimes she'll take them out when I climax.

Sometimes it's like, she'll just take them out

but we don't know when's the best time to take it out.

You know what?

I don't think there is any right time or wrong time.

It's whenever it feels good for you.

That was Sue.

So I am curious,

what were your overall impressions?

I loved her energy and how she answered questions so easily.

They were kind of like flowy,

like with the people's personalities,

how they would answer and I found it just more,

kind of a conversation more than just like a doctor's visit.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

How she'll explain it, yeah.

And they're like, when should I take it?

And then she's like, what do you mean?

Like you just... whenever, and it was like, oh, okay.

Like, some, yeah.

I love that whole segment because Sue's just like,

oh, you have a question about anal beads?

Yeah, here are mine.

I think Sue was popular because she was honest.

She was straightforward.

She was non-judgmental.

She met people where they were at.

It was just havin' a conversation.

Yeah, she just made everyone feel comfortable.

Yeah, no matter how weird

or like embarrassing of a question it was.

She was just like, yeah, all right, you know,

this is you, this is your life,

this is your thing.

Let's talk about it.

She's fantastic, yeah.

I didn't know anything about sex when I was young,

but you got a distinct feeling

by the absence of the conversation,

it was a no-no.

On the way home we stopped and parked

and then things seemed to happen,

'till we nearly...

Suddenly I realized what we were about to do.

I asked Jeff to take me home.

It was something you just don't do.

Don't even think about it.

An unplanned teenage pregnancy

was totally unacceptable.

You'll have to work out your own best way

to make emotions work for you and not against you.

I was born in Toronto in 1930.

My birth mother passed when I was 10 years of age.

My father, he was not on the scene too much.

He was having a few problems with alcohol.

Mom was raised by her mother's sister.

And her mother's sister didn't really like Sue.

So basically, Mom didn't have

a really loving, nurturing environment,

um, and I think that that must have been hard for her.

Did you feel listened to when you were younger?

Or did you feel- - Oh, no.

Yeah. - No, no.

So you didn't have a voice when you were younger?

Oh, no, no, no. Wouldn't dare.

Wouldn't dare, no.

I trained for nursing in a hospital,

St. Boniface Hospital in Winnipeg,

under the Grey Nuns.

And they were very uncomfortable ladies

who never talked about sex.

It was a nun-run institution, where they, you know,

two or three years and you were ready to wear the cap

and, um, and the white strict outfit,

which, uh, my mom was so defiant about.

She always would put her cap a little askew,

or she'd hike her dress up a little too high,

because she just was a bit of a clown.

Oh, yes.

In those days the other girls wore garter belts

with snaps on their nylons.

And I rolled them up, nylons up to the knees.

I was pretty liberal, let's put it that way.

Look at that.

Oh, yes.

Yeah, there we were.

Graduate we did.

She did, Hazel Carnegie did.

I did.

There was that aura of being a nurse.

You know, for a good time, call a nurse.

Um, so I decided to enjoy it.

I would be 25, I'd just finished nursing.

I met the man that I was going to marry.

And I knew the evening I met him

that I was going to marry him.

Ejnor was very good-looking,

well-spoken,

quieter,

less forceful than I was.

You could probably say I ruled.

It was a good marriage, with wonderful kids.

They arrived rather quickly, about 10 months apart.

My husband kind of regarded me as a walking ovary,

looking for a place to happen.

She taught me how to sew.

She taught me how to knit.

She taught me how to make sourdough.

She taught me how to bake.

Did she teach me anything about sex and sexuality?

I would say absolutely not.

I couldn't hear about sex from my mom.

But my friends, they'd come over

and they would find out that Sue was a nurse,

and they didn't think twice about just asking her

things that were on their mind

or questions that they had about stuff.

I think Sue was motivated because she had children.

And she was a nurse,

and at that time I think her kids had questions

and she really didn't know how to answer these questions.

So she started learning

about how to talk to kids about sex.

The Grey Nuns were not exactly great teachers

about human sexuality.

So I had to go back and learn that at university.

She was taking courses down at Ann Arbor, Michigan,

and she attended OISE to further her education.

And she did a hell of a lot of reading.

Her bookcase was just bursting with, you know,

Signs and Symptoms".

I think the big kicker was my sister came home

with a friend from high school,

who was at a very young age,

14, 15, 16, somewhere in there,

who believed that they were pregnant.

And of course in those days in Canada,

we couldn't talk about birth control.

Abortion was illegal,

and it was very traumatic for her.

And I just realized,

I do not want kids going through this ever again.

It was devastating.

She'd had an abortion and terminated the pregnancy.

That bothered me terribly.

And that was it.

I think that was like bee in bonnet

and Mom went, oh, wait,

we need some place for teenagers to go

so that they don't get pregnant in the first place.

The clinic was unique, uh, in Canada, really,

to be in a high school, Don Mills Collegiate,

and it was geared for adolescents.

I mean, teenage sex was a taboo

and nobody would talk about it.

And kids were at risk in their environments.

Hi. - Hi, come on in.

The teenage pregnancy rate in the '70s was very high.

They're out. - Your folks?

Uh huh. - Oh.

And when are they coming back?

Oh, they said late.

My sister and I both started working there

being receptionists.

The most common thing that kids would come in for

was usually birth control.

They were nervous about getting pregnant.

I'm not even on the pill.

I know a lot of other girls are, but I just don't know.

Well...

Oh yeah, we had kids lined up out the hall.

And they were telling mom

that they were going to basketball practice

and library and, oh, all the rest of it.

Oh, the clinic went crazy.

She was like a counselor,

and people were so comfortable talking to Sue, oh my gosh.

I never said, "You should."

That word was verboten.

You didn't use that word at all.

It was always, you could do this

and this might happen,

but, yeah, on the other hand, you could do that

and it, then the other thing might happen.

Let me tell ya, she's so old

she hasn't done it in thirty years!

As soon as the birth control clinic was open,

then Mom started teaching in like schools in the area.

I figure I've got about 15 seconds

to establish credibility,

to prove to you that I know what I'm talking about.

Sue Johanson came to my school

and it was amazing how quickly we all felt comfortable,

and it felt like normal and cool to just be like,

I have questions.

Make sure if you're going to be involved in sexual activity,

you get a method that's gonna work.

'Cause one in five teenagers gets pregnant

the first time she does it.

Just make sure you are not amongst those statistics.

She made it fun

and different from health class or something like that,

where you have to learn it and then write a test on it.

But here it was something that you could just listen to

and think about.

She's really gonna make people realize

that it's something that you have to think about.

My mom doesn't really discuss it.

She doesn't?

No, she doesn't like to...

she doesn't really like to talk about that stuff.

Sex was nowhere on my radar at that point,

partly because I never was exposed to sex in my household.

We didn't talk about it.

And she came in and she said,

"I know some of you might or already be having sex,"

and I was shocked.

I was thinking, who's having sex?

And I realized, okay,

get your head out of the sand, Carlyle.

Some of these people are already having sex,

even if it's just with themselves, right?

She just kind of normalized it for me in particular,

and made it seem as though it was something

that we needed to learn about,

just as we needed to learn about healthy food and exercise

and how our different parts of our bodies work,

that sex was just one of those parts of our body.

Females are not even told

how to identify when they are sexually aroused.

Guys know when they're sexually aroused.

There's no question, they've got this indicator!

There was this moment we were all like,

oh, we've all been sort of quietly to ourselves

been thinking about these things

and wondering about these things

and-and we all felt like, oh, it must just be me,

because no one's talking about it.

And she just opened it up and it was like, oh!

A lot of us are curious about these things.

A lot of us are thinking about these things.

And then you didn't feel weird or isolated

or like there was something wrong with you.

I got fed up with parents who were saying

parents should be the sex educators

for their own children.

And then they were heading, you know,

anywhere but talking about sex.

It's a question of what message

about how sexuality is meant to be expressed,

and how good it is and how important it is,

and how you're not supposed to waste your treasure.

That's what matters.

Sue Johanson?

Well, of course I have a problem

with wasting your treasure,

because that puts a whole different image

on the whole thing.

If Mom had any pushback,

it was from people who were anti-abortion.

I was non-critical.

Hey, I don't like abortion,

but there are times when it's necessary,

like it or not, Susie.

Um, put up and shut up.

I hated to be seen as somebody

who was promoting abortion.

'Cause I wasn't promoting abortion.

I was trying to prevent it.

Mom was a huge supporter of abortion clinics

and Morgentaler and the work that he did in Montreal.

We didn't promote that and we didn't provide it

but she wanted kids to be educated

so they never even got to that place in the first place.

Literally for centuries,

we have lived in a culture and in societies

that have told us to be afraid of sex,

that, uh, sex and sexuality are bad,

that they need to be, you know,

very heavily controlled and managed,

and that we shouldn't talk about it.

And so it just seems scary.

The problem with sex education

is that it doesn't really cover sex.

It covers reproductive biology,

how to make a baby, how to avoid making a baby.

You can cover that in 45 minutes.

The sperm meets the egg in this tube.

Then the fertilized egg becomes attached to the uterus wall,

and the cells multiply and grow into a baby.

Yeah, but how's it get there?

You know, not just the sperm and egg stuff.

I mean, well, what really happens?

Oh, what you wanna know about is sexual intercourse.

Well, that happens like this.

Here.

I always compare sex ed, as we have it,

uh, to driver's ed where they just teach you

how the internal combustion engine works,

but they don't teach you how to steer or brake

or what the red sign at the end of the block, uh, means.

And if that was our driver's ed,

the first time you got behind the wheels of a car

you would kill somebody.

When a man and woman want to make love

or have intercourse,

the man's penis becomes erect

so that it can more easily enter the vagina.

I think I would've been in the fifth grade,

and there was one or two lessons, um,

that were taught by my elementary school teacher.

This is what the male body looks like.

This is what the female body looks like.

This is how you put them together to make a baby.

And let's move on to English class.

I mean, definitely there was nothing about sexuality.

The fertilized egg now continues on its way to the uterus.

And most people's sexual interests

do fall outside of reproductive biology.

What trips people up is, what do I want?

How do I ask for it?

How do you negotiate consensual sexual activity?

How do you?

How do you get laid?

We fear that if we let younger people know it feels good,

they'll go out and do it, it'll give them permission.

Like, well, look,

we don't need to give young people permission,

puberty and Mother Nature

do a really good job of, at a certain point,

a person will become interested

in some aspect of this adult stuff

and will seek information.

So something I'm curious about with you is,

where do people your age go or, you know,

who do they turn to

when they wanna learn about sex and sexuality?

It's like people you know who

they've had some experience so you'll talk to them,

so whether it be friends or other people,

but also like the internet, to be honest.

It's-it's mainly the internet.

Okay, and are you, like, are you Googling?

Are you going on social media?

How do you search for the information?

I think it's like once you hear a word you don't know about,

like then you're like, what is that?

And you'll look it up and then you're like, oh!

And then you go like, oh, okay, cool.

And then like eventually you'll hear another word

and do the same thing

until you're basically all knowledged-up, you know.

Okay, that's really cool.

Does anybody have specific sites or specific sources

that you go to online?

There's this one girl on TikTok,

I don't know exactly what her name is,

but she's got quite a few followers and she's verified

and I go to her for a lot of information

and tips and stuff, so.

- Nice. - Yeah.

Wait, is she the one who has, like, the boyfriend?

Yes! Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay, person with the boyfriend.

I will find her.

For teens, I think it can be really hard

to go to a parent and say,

"Okay, I heard about this like sexual position."

I don't wanna ask my mom that question.

I don't wanna ask my teacher that question,

'cause I'm gonna have to show up the next day

and then be like, we had this conversation.

But it's like, oh, okay, the sex talking lady is coming.

I'll ask her.

She'll tell me, she won't be weird about it

and then she'll go away.

If I sort of boil most of the questions I get

down to their essence,

98% of the time what they're asking me is,

am I normal? Am I okay?

And pretty much 100% of the time my answer is yes.

Okay.

These are all fantastic questions.

What do you think is the best way

for you to get your message across?

Radio. Yeah.

Everybody has a radio.

The radio show came along as a result of an interview,

on the radio, on Q107,

Toronto's best rock with Jane Hawtin.

When I first started Q107, I was a newscaster.

And then, um,

they decided to create a show called "Barometer,"

which was a public affairs program.

I think I read in the paper about her getting into trouble

at Don Mills Collegiate because she was giving out condoms.

Oh, she sounds perfect for Barometer.

They're doin' it in the living room,

the dining room, the kitchen,

the bathroom, the car, the canoe, wherever.

We had her on several times because she was always great.

She was so straightforward and no nonsense,

but she also had a great sense of humour.

So we really had fun working together.

And so, when you find a great personality,

they should have their own show.

Welcome to the Sunday Night Sex Show

on the rock radio network.

Now here's your host, Sue Johanson.

We have Scott on the line.

Hi, Scott.

Hi, Sue.

Hi, you got a question? - Yes.

The first night on the Sunday Night Sex Show,

she had talked about anal sex

and how to have anal sex safely.

Who likes rough anal sex, you or your partner?

Ha. A little bit of both but mostly me.

Would you be honest enough to say to your partner,

"Ouch, whoa, that hurts"?

Oh yeah.

The next morning,

the program director came into my office

and he was absolutely apoplectic.

He said, "You have to tell her

"that she can't talk about anal sex anymore,

or-or the show's gonna get pulled."

And he tried to make me do it and I was, I wouldn't do it.

So, and so the end of the conversation I remember

was just something like, "Well, fine,

"we'll just see what happens next week,

"but she better not talk about anal sex."

And of course, she did.

I worry about it. I worry about it.

It's up to you, it's your rectum, not mine.

I used to listen to her on radio all the time

as a pizza driver.

It was a couple of hours.

I wouldn't miss a segment.

Driving home from the cottage on Sunday nights,

we'd listen to her stuck in traffic.

How do you feel you would perform in bed with two females?

Well, I personally think I'm pretty good.

I was a young teenage boy

and I had my boombox beside the bed

and I had this really dope Hitachi boombox.

And I would listen to the radio before I go to bed.

Sunday nights would be "Sunday Night Funnies."

And then you'd flip it over to "Sex with Sue."

Carnivores, their ejaculate is bitter

and sour and strong.

Yeah, that's why I'm so prolific with my sexual knowledge.

You know the candy Pop Rocks?

- Yeah. - Yeah?

Okay, is it safe to use when you're having oral sex?

And then it became like the thing you would talk about

the next day, did you guys listen to "Sex with Sue"

last night?

Did you hear about that one guy

who had a blah, blah, blah, blah, blah?

And you're like, yeah, yeah, yeah!

It was like, I thought it was the best thing

I'd ever heard in my life, you know what I mean?

Yes, a few weeks ago

me and my boyfriend were having, you know, intercourse,

and a very weird noise came out of my vagina.

It sounded kind of like a farting noise.

- Yeah. - So embarrassing.

Sue was on,

it was mostly in my bedroom

or in my headphones, if I was listening to a Walkman

with a radio player on it.

I picked up this prostitute

and I noticed that I have these cold sores

on the inside of my lips.

It definitely felt like a secret.

Okay, can you tell me first of all,

how are you feeling right now?

I mean, I realize that you're telling,

you've got no friends that you can talk to,

and there's just this great big gap in your life.

Am I right? - Right.

They can't find anybody else

that they can really open up to,

who will not put them down.

Radio is the greatest medium of all

because radio avoids

one of the great tragedies of the human condition,

which is we judge by what we see.

When you remove the visuals from it and you just listen,

you actually can get some truth.

My boyfriend and I,

we've been having troubles lately.

Yeah?

Well, actually, it's just me with the troubles.

I can't ejaculate anymore.

I should probably be clear that there were lots of people

who didn't like what Sue was doing,

who didn't like that blunt talk,

oh, who thought it went too far.

Ah, because it was too out there.

No one pulled advertising or-or anything like that.

We were exploring and we were willing to talk about it.

Our job is to present information.

It was also the time.

it was going to be really important

for people to be able to have sex safely.

If a woman is HIV-positive-

Yes.

And the guy is HIV-negative-

Yes.

If she was to orally stimulate his penis,

would he contract that?

One of the really important things to consider

when you talk about Sue's impact,

certainly on a certain generation,

is that when we were coming of age sexually,

in my age group, AIDS was hitting.

There is no test that can identify AIDS.

They know the disease is sexually transmitted,

particularly by homosexuals,

and that its symptom is a rare form of pneumonia

caused by a virus that kills immunity to illnesses.

Well, I came out in 1980.

So I came out before HIV/AIDS, just before,

and then watched as suddenly all my friends were dying.

The way that AIDS completely devastated my community,

it almost cannot be put into words.

It was so frightening and so mysterious.

The AIDS epidemic was really raging,

and it was barely being talked about in the news.

It was barely being spoken about

other than the "gay plague."

We're asking why potential blood donors

are not being required without exception

to fill out extensive questionnaires

under penalty of perjury

detailing their health and sexual proclivities.

'85, '86 was a terrifying time to be gay.

You had prominent, not fringe,

prominent mainstream Republicans talking about

having gay people, HIV-positive gay people,

tattooed on their asses

so that their sex partners would know.

And it didn't feel hyperbolic.

It felt like these were policies and proposals

that were being seriously floated.

Uh, and it was a scary time.

God is not mocked or fooled or deceived whatsoever,

a man or a woman soweth

that shall that person also reap.

We do reap it in our flesh when we violate the laws of God.

Oh yes.

Boy oh boy, that's a tough one.

That was heartbreaking

because I had a lot of friends who were gay,

uh, and that bothered me a great deal.

But they obviously felt that it was a sin.

And that's a shame.

It's believed there will be

6 to 7,000 cases of the disease in this province by 1990,

and medical treatment for those patients alone

is expected to run into the hundreds of millions of dollars.

My mother was a nurse.

She'd come home from the hospital

and try to describe what was happening to these young kids.

And they were being treated in hazmat suits.

They were essentially in quarantine.

And there was a lot of fear because no one knew what it was.

I've asked HHS to add the AIDS virus

to the list of contagious diseases

for which immigrants and aliens

seeking permanent residence in the United States

can be denied entry.

Then you hear about it reaching people you may know.

Because of, um,

the HIV virus that I have attained, uh,

I will have to retire from the Lakers.

He apparently was practicing unsafe heterosexual sex

at the time that he was infected.

And as we've been trying to tell the general public for so long,

this can happen and it does happen.

What HIV did was force a conversation

about the sex people were actually having,

as opposed to a conversation about the sex

we all publicly agreed to pretend everyone was having.

And so, that gave rise to incredible movements

within the BDSM community,

within all of these fetish communities that were thriving

because people were figuring out other ways to connect

and be close and have sex that felt dangerous

but wasn't actually dangerous.

The tiny silver lining of the AIDS epidemic

was that it required public speaking

about sex behaviour, absent morality.

If you do this, you can get sick.

If you do this, you'll not get sick.

And it was like, yes.

And that conversation about sex

wasn't led by the federal government,

wasn't led by local health boards.

That conversation was led by scrappy, community-based,

brand new HIV/AIDS education organizations.

I'd like to see major targeted campaigns

put on by our city government.

I'd like to ask Dr. Tuckson why

eight years into this epidemic

there is still not a major education campaign in the city.

When we really, really, really needed healthy,

progressive sex education,

the church and the government abandoned us.

Not only did they abandon us, they endangered us.

They sent us into this world where sex now equaled death

and the only person that we started to hear this from

was a Sunday night radio show?

That was really, really valuable.

You got a nice family doctor that you like?

Yeah, I do.

All right.

Make an appointment and-and also in the meantime,

until you get there, don't have intercourse.

If someone with HIV uses a dildo

and then you go and use it behind them,

would you catch it, HIV or AIDS?

Never go from rectum to vagina.

It became life and death,

not just for knowing how to have safe sex,

but also how to have a good sexual life.

Sex is such a huge responsibility

and I think that's a factor that a lot of people think about

before they-before they have sex.

If you're in a sexual relationship now,

in like 1992,

and you don't know that you have to have

some kind of protection if you don't wanna get an STD,

or if you don't wanna contract HIV, you know,

then you're not being exposed to the right things.

And we didn't do a good job

of giving you good sex education.

So my job this evening is to fill in some of the gaps

in your sex education in school,

some of the controversial issues

that they would not talk about in school.

The big event was having Sue Johanson speak,

you know, the first week of university, um,

and, uh, they just used to roar.

They would cheer when she walked out on stage,

which is so cool.

Sue, Sue, Sue, Sue!

Are you ready to have "Sex with Sue"?

She's one of the best things happening for youth today,

I guess, that's for sure.

She's answered a lot of questions that I've had.

Six thousand kids sitting out on a grassy hill

on a beautiful September evening,

listening to me talk about sex.

You gotta talk about it and you can't talk about it

if ya don't know what you're talking about.

So that's what we're gonna do tonight.

This was a big breakthrough

for you to be able to find your voice.

Yes, yes. - Really.

And to find that it worked.

I was standing out on stage, uh, talkin' dirty

and everybody listened.

cha,

she'll answer your questions fair and square.

She's down to earth, she's gonna tell it true.

Talkin' sex, talkin' sex, talkin' sex with Sue.

Yep, we're talking sex on Rogers Toronto Cable 10.

Give us a call if you've got a question.

Once we did the radio show,

we just quietly moved into television.

We have Mary on the line.

Hi, Mary.

Hi, Amy.

I started on Rogers, yeah, every Thursday night.

Hi, Sven.

Allan. - Hi, Sue.

Hi, you're there.

Good, you got a question?

So in radio people fall in love

with those voices, their personalities.

They feel like they're their friends.

And once they're on television,

it takes a lot to break through that.

We are still emphasizing the importance of condoms.

I absolutely know that she broke that wall

to be able to connect directly through people, um,

on television.

And so it goes on,

talking sex, learning about sex.

I'd known about the show.

I would go to Canada

and I would catch the show on Sunday nights.

Did you talk to your boyfriend about biting your testicle?

Yeah, Tyler likes to do that.

I think you've gotta make it very, very clear,

you do that again big guy, and you're out the door.

I just thought it was amazing.

I was in a hotel room going,

you can do this on Canadian television?

Oh my god,

you can't do this in America.

No, we're gonna rehearse "Talk Sex" first.

The people of America,

they wanted to call Sue themselves.

They had their own questions.

So, we approached Oxygen

about doing a live call-in for their audience.

And they said, oh yes, definitely.

Welcome! I'm Sue Johanson

and this is "Talk Sex."

I'm hot to trot,

so let's get those phone lines just a-burning.

Here's our first caller, her name is Michelle.

Hi, Michelle.

Hey, Sue!

Hello you, how are ya?

I'm doing great. How are you?

I'm fine.

You got a question for me?

Once the Americans picked her up

and she was on Oprah's network,

it was like, ooh, oh my god, Sue.

We had like, Oprah's assistants coming down

and like, it changed, you know?

It's like, now you couldn't smell like weed

comin' up the stairs kind of thing.

When I got American channels

that featured the show and paid,

then yeah, that was-that was nice.

So we did two shows back to back.

Uh, the first show was the Sunday Night Sex Show to Canada.

And then Sue literally was getting unhooked from her IFB

and running across to the other set,

and then going live to an American audience.

Now, can you take turns?

Every Sunday tens of thousands of people called.

We could hear the phone ringing

as soon as we arrived at six o'clock.

"Talk Sex," can I get your name please?

But we had no idea

when we started doing "Talk Sex with Sue Johanson"

for an American audience,

how ill-educated they were.

Is it okay to use a Ziploc bag

in replace of a condom with lubricant?

No!

Is it normal for children

around the age of 13 to masturbate?

Honey...

The questions from the American callers

just seemed like they needed to know more.

It seemed like they were just further back

in their sexual development.

And it-it felt good knowing that we were on the kind of show

that people looked up to for that kind of advice.

Hello, you're there, good.

You got a question?

Yes, Dr. Sue, how are you?

I'm a big fan.

Okay, I need to be clarify about one thing.

I'm not a doctor.

And I just don't want- Oh, I'm sorry.

No, no, I'm not offended,

but I just don't want anybody to think

I'm pretending to be something I'm not.

I've been called Dr. Sue,

and I always had to correct people

and say I am not a doctor

'cause I did not want anybody to think

I was riding in on somebody's shirt tail.

Welcome to The Dr. Ruth Show, with Dr. Ruth Westheimer,

coming to you from New York City.

Sue and Dr. Ruth were very different

because they weren't talking about the same thing.

- I'm 18. - Yes.

And I'm a virgin.

But Dr. Ruth, of course, was about the psychology of sex,

where Sue was, you know, nuts and bolts.

Lynn, listen to me very carefully.

It is really very important for somebody like you

to say to yourself that you have decided to remain a virgin

until the night after the wedding ceremony

and stick to it.

Do a lot of kissing.

Do you like to kiss?

And the best way is for you, in doggy position?

Do you know what I mean, doggy position?

Yeah, they're both old ladies, but she wasn't the same.

That just goes to say,

they needed Sue even more than Canadians needed her.

We're here to talk about how good sex can be

in the context of marriage.

You see, you're designed to have sex with one person,

your husband or your wife.

My sex ed was very religious-based.

So when I was growing up there was this idea

that sex was both this beautiful thing that God created

but also totally off limits.

You were not allowed to do it.

God knew that from the very beginning.

And he had a plan

that sex was to be protected within marriage.

Monogamy, what does that mean?

Just having one partner.

Only having sex with one person in marriage,

in a monogamous relationship for life.

What if I wanna have sex before I get married?

Well, I guess you just have to be prepared to die.

And so, that really kind of set the tone for me

about what sex was

and, like, how evil and off limits it was to me.

Um, there were no conversations about masturbation.

There were no conversations about sexual pleasure.

Gentle touching, stroking, oral sex.

And then I saw Sue Johanson on television

and she had like on her desk or whatever,

like, all of these different dildos

in different shapes and colours.

And she was instructing, like, different ways of penetration

or different speeds of penetration.

And I remember just being like,

first, I was just like,

oh my god, I'm going to hell.

Like, I can't watch this stuff.

But also I was like,

I'm so fascinated.

Tell me more.

What is the best way to have rectal sex?

'Cause it hurts me so bad when we have to do it.

Okay.

We have a sex toy tonight that might make it easier for you.

We had issues with the American show,

because when we first started,

sodomy and even oral sex was illegal in most of the states.

Uh, and I mean, to this day

it's illegal to have a vibrator in Alabama.

This one's small, dirt cheap,

and it works beautifully.

But Sue Johanson was never afraid to talk about anything.

Did Oxygen give you a list of words

you couldn't talk about?

Oxygen did not give us a list of things

we could or could not talk about.

But when the Janet Jackson Nipplegate happened,

all of a sudden the FCC clamped down big time.

And then we were given a huge list of words

that we could not use in the show.

Do you remember any of the words you couldn't say?

Well, I could say them.

Good thing my mother's not no longer on this earth.

The words we're not supposed to say.

Oh, the words we can't say.

See? - Mm-hmm.

The words that we can't say.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Penis is not on there.

Is on there?

Oh yeah, it's up there.

Okay.

But like cock was one of the things.

And of course, Sue took offense to that

because a cock ring is a cock ring,

and that there's no other term for it.

And so the network was like, "Well, you can't say that."

And Sue said, "But there's no other word for it."

"Oh, you know, a penile enhancer."

She said, "No, that's not what it's called."

And she would dig her little feet in and was stubborn

when it came to things that she knew was correct.

Because she was on such a mission

to do and to provide this information,

she didn't care what people really thought.

I don't wanna swear too much

but she couldn't give a rat's ass.

Oh, a cock ring.

Cock ring. Cock ring.

Radical cock,

the be all and end all to a maiden's prayer.

I didn't give a damn.

I walked in and I owned this place

and-and, you know, I can do this.

I was first introduced to Sue Johanson,

I would say,

the early 2000s, probably like 2002-ish,

um, on the Oxygen Network.

It was a time before social media.

We had dial-up.

It was a big deal for me to see this

because I was just enamored.

Like, I was just thinking,

there's nobody talking this way.

Now, when your husband gets out of jail

he is going to be as horny as they come.

He's gonna kick the door down.

And so, you know, uh, you just better say,

whoa, whoa, whoa, big guy, I need time.

I need a little time.

You've just done time.

I need time.

I was just addicted.

I was addicted to the-the-the frankness,

the honesty.

They're called vaginal farts

and it's something we can do,

they can't do.

What was great about Sue's show and Sue

was she was very serious,

but the things that were coming out of her mouth

were so in conflict with her appearance,

with her age,

you know, her matronly air,

that it was inherently comic.

You can use zucchini.

You can use cucumbers.

You can use candles.

All right.

Uh, you can, uh, use almost any long, slender toy.

But honey, why don't you just live dangerously

and buy a vibrator?

Her comfort around that tension and contrast

allowed her audience to relax and then enjoy

and then take it in.

So you slide this over your penis.

You swing and sway your way across the bedroom.

How could she resist?

I mean, come on.

She was just doing a public service

and for the rest of us it was just like magic.

We are watching magic right now

because nowhere else are you ever gonna see

a woman in her seventies pull out a dildo,

get her hands in position-

And then you grip it with your hand

and you coordinate head-hand movements.

And start showing you how to give a blowjob.

I think the thing that always got me

was how animated Mom was.

So what's the sense of a great big penis?

Me woman!

I'm bringin' in an airplane, 747.

Now, this toy is great.

Pulling stuff out of her bag.

It's called the Flex-A-Pleasure.

Got one! There's a butt plug.

And he just tucks his penis inside the opening.

Great clitoral stimulation.

Using her hands and everything was like

all about circling and fingers.

And being a clown.

That works real good.

I think it's pretty obvious by now

that I have a slightly warped sense of humour.

But I do believe that sex should be pleasurable

and yes, it should be fun too.

If you can't laugh at it, you should not be doing it.

Well, Sue Johanson really nails it.

If you can get them to laugh,

they will relax.

And when they relax, they can let in the information.

Um, and it's really important to help you to relax.

You have to relax to have good sex.

You know, my takeaway from Sue

is that sex can definitely be an expression of love,

but it can also just be absolutely hilarious.

We have no control over our bodies.

Sometimes things just happen.

And now Teri's calling in.

Hi, Teri?

Yeah, I was just wondering,

I know what a queef is,

but I don't know what causes them or how to prevent them.

What causes what?

Like a vaginal fart.

Oh, queefing!

Queefing, oh, okay.

Vaginal farts.

You know, vaginal farts are more fun.

Honestly, that's one thing that we can do

that guys can't do,

And ours don't smell.

Why would you want to?

Oh no, it's wonderful fun.

Think of it now.

You're having intercourse, okay.

Penis thrusting in vagina, right?

The air's gotta go somewhere.

It's packin' air in there.

So you're having vigorous, great sex.

Oh boy.

And all of a sudden she goes-

And you're so embarrassed.

Oh no, oh, I promise it won't happen again.

Oh, I am so ashamed.

And then you continue,

you have more vigorous sex.

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

Yes, yes, yes, oh yes, oh yes.

I think talking about sex in entertainment is the best way

to find an even playing field for everyone.

You know what, if you take a deep breath

you can blow him right across the room.

No, just laugh.

And every time you laugh, you'll fart.

They're called vaginal farts.

Have fun. Laugh about it.

It's the funniest thing,

if every time he thrusts in you go-

When you talk about sex on stage, um,

you're making people feel more comfortable

about possibly some of the things

that they consider in their own head

as weird fetishes that they may have.

My husband has this thing

about wanting to watch another man have sex with me.

Oh.

And I'm feeling like he may be, you know, gay.

Mm-mm, no, no, no, no, no.

Uh, Tina, that's a fantasy.

He wants to use it as a turn-on for himself.

You know, I've talked about how I love women's feet

and, uh, you see, you see some guys go, oh.

I get messages after the show be like,

guys will DM me and be like,

"Hey man, thanks for talking about that.

"I feel better about it."

I'm like, there you go, buddy.

It's just, it's hilarious.

Just laugh, just laugh.

I think entertainment is everything

when it comes to sex education.

Sex is fun, it's interesting,

it's cool,

and the way that you talk about it should mirror that.

It should be entertaining.

When you're having sex, you should be entertained.

Like, we're not at the place in society

where we need you to procreate for us.

So, like, please don't have sex for any other reason

other than it's fun.

So when we're talking about it,

we should have that same energy.

Yes, give it up for Miss Delta Work!

Sue knew she was an entertainer

and she was an entertainer from the beginning.

She loved an audience and she loved hamming it up.

Oh, it's a dirty job but somebody's gotta do it.

So every once in a while, we just take time

and clean our collection of sex toys.

And there you go, clean as a whistle.

You could just see that, you know,

if she could get a reaction from somebody,

she was in her element.

And you know what, it was massively successful.

Well, it's very nice to meet you.

I have seen your show, uh, several times,

and, uh, and I like it.

And I think what you're doin' is-is fantastic.

Thank you. - Now, first of all,

is your name Sue or Sue Jo?

Someone told me it's now Sue Jo.

In the United States it's Sue Jo.

Sue Jo.

Because my real name is Sue Johanson.

Okay, but- - So they shortened it down

to Sue Jo. - Like JLo.

Mm-hmm, oh yeah, me and JLo.

No. - Yeah.

And we're off.

When I was recognized in New York City,

that's when it suddenly struck me.

Whoa, wait a minute!

What's going on here?

To get in a limo and be driven there

and put up in a hotel and flown back

and security and all that, it was like,

oh my god, here we go.

Hi, Sue.

Hi, how are you? - How are you?

Fine. You got lights out?

Oh yeah, we're always-

Everybody in Canada and the US would know her and say,

"Hi, Sue, I love your show!"

Oh, I've seen you on TV. - Oh.

And that's when I kind of went, wow,

she really is famous.

Infamous would probably be the word.

I must admit, it was nice.

You have many, many fans here in Brazil, you know?

You are a celebrity.

That is wonderful.

I'd love to come down someday and celebrate with you.

She had no airs about her,

so it's not like she was sitting there thinking I'm a star.

I'm gonna be, like, the sex therapist to the world.

It never changed who she was on set

or how she behaved on set.

She didn't one day appear with a fur stole around her neck

or a different attitude,

she was always Sue.

Oh, George. - Different?

You make me twitch just thinking about it,

and that ain't horny.

I could see my mom come alive,

whether the camera was on her,

or as soon as she stepped out on stage,

or as soon as she walked out in front of a

television audience or whatever,

all of a sudden she just, she came alive.

This is called The Accommodator.

And it's worn over the chin.

The fame was nice.

Recognition on the street, yes.

Kids knowing who you were, yes.

Knowing that you were doing a good job, yes.

Yep, there's no question, it's an ego trip.

There's, I can't deny it.

So you're like-you're like a perverted MacGyver, right?

That's pretty much-

Is flirting in a chat room the same as cheating?

We'll look at the changes, both good and the bad,

that technology is making in our sex lives

and our relationships.

Later on, calls about internet porn,

online dating, you know,

that sort of thing became more common.

I readily admit

that I know very little about this topic,

but luckily we have some experts here who do.

Dan, you're in the front lines

with your column, "Savage Love."

What is your sense of the topic?

Uh, my sense is that a lot of people have

a false impression of the impact of technology

on our sex lives.

If you ask people, you know,

has it been positive or negative,

most of us have the impression that it's been negative.

Technology, the internet,

internet porn, chat sites,

cheating facilitated by websites designed to facilitate that,

you hear about that all the time on shows like yours

'cause people call in with their problems,

and in columns like mine.

But people who don't have problems with it

don't speak up, don't complain.

In the early '90s,

before the internet came along,

I got a lot more questions that were basically how-to.

What's a butt plug?

Uh, how do I fist?

Um, how do I perform this sex act or that one safely?

And now everything has its own Wiki page.

Butt plugs and fist have their own Wiki pages.

So the how-to is on the internet,

and it's a lot more extensive

than the how-to could be in 1,200 words in a print column.

Kegel exercises, have you ever tried them?

No. What is that?

Okay, I want you to go on my website

and, um, scroll through, scroll through,

and there's all sorts of information there.

People have a question they,

and there it is.

You Google it and it's there before your very eyes,

unless you wanna pursue it in other ways.

So many people can be free to explore

and discover who they are,

how they identify and what they like.

You know, so if you are someone who has a foot fetish,

before the internet

you might not really be able to explore that.

And now there's a whole community

that you can speak with.

I think of all the people with really niche sexual interests.

Like the example that everyone always gives

are the furries.

Like these people, until the internet came along,

were very isolated and didn't have a sense of community

because it's a rare sexual interest,

so it's very thinly spread.

And the internet created a community

that made people feel connected.

There's so much more available to everybody,

especially if they have a particular interest

in a particular area of sex.

Ah, yeah, you don't have to do a phone-in show so much.

Hm.

I hate the word virginity and this is exactly why.

Content warning!

Younger people that are coming up through a digital age,

where they have that access

and they have platforms to speak,

they're-they're able to offer their voice

in-in much more impactful ways than ever before.

The word virginity implies one very specific kind of sex.

And here's the deal,

we're not all having that kind of sex.

There's a lot of different kinds of sex

and they're all really cool.

The word virginity also implies

that you don't really have much of a choice in the matter.

When it happens, it happens and there's nothing you can do.

Well, let me just clear the air.

You did not lose your virginity if you didn't want to

because, you know,

virginity is like a social construct anyway.

Sue was and is a woman on television talking about sex

and that is exactly what I want to do.

I want to create a show,

albeit a little bit differently than what Sue did,

but I want to create a show

that's, uh, putting sex education out there

in an entertaining way, to keep people,

to keep people entertained and to educate at the same time.

Okay, so then give me an alternative to virginity

you say and I answer.

Sexual debut!

Coined, or at least I heard it from UCLA sexperts,

I think it's a fantastic alternative

to the word virginity.

With a sexual debut,

you get to decide what it looks like,

how it happened,

when it happened,

and exactly what it means to you,

no expectations.

So we can all reclaim the word virginity

and replace it with sexual debut

because it's obviously way better.

If you have any fun sexual debut,

put 'em in the comments and as always,

stay safe!

So do you feel like you, in a way,

have been replaced by, you know, the digital-

Yes. - Computer age?

Yes, yes. - Yeah.

The sex lady is-is gone.

Thank you so much.

Good luck. - I love your show.

I really do. - Thank you very much.

Thank you. - I love your show.

Oh, thank you!

Oh my god and you're really great.

Thank you so much!

Oh, you're welcome, Vera.

Oh god, buh-bye.

Bye-bye.

That's a hard one.

Oh! No, she-she's gone,

there's no question about it

and she-she lived well

and did well and enjoyed it.

But she's finished.

Sue retired, I think,

because she realized she couldn't keep up with the times.

The speed of technology, of the internet,

the direction sex was going in,

um, sexual preference, sexual...

how you identified yourself sexually,

diversity, um,

and, uh, all the options that were out there,

she could not keep the education up

and I think there were times when she may have felt like,

oh, I think I may have given, not incorrect information

but not as up to date.

Last week our show received several emails

from folks who felt that I implied

that bisexuals could not commit to a relationship.

I'm very sorry,

that was not what I meant and that was misunderstanding.

So, please accept my apologies.

She'd been really, really busy for so, so long.

Here she was doing one and then two live shows.

She was going to so many universities and colleges

all over.

Yeah, but usually I say bodacious tatas.

I mean, she used to come into the meetings

and she would've been in Red Deer

and then she would've driven somewhere else

to do another speaking engagement.

I have never had a question about a fallopian tube.

She's not a fragile flower that has to be taken care of.

She would just say, oh no, that's okay, fine.

I'll fly into Calgary and I'll rent a car

and I'll just drive five hours,

you know, and then drive five hours back.

I was going flat out,

so, you know, you don't get any more exposure

than radio and television and personal appearances.

You don't get it.

You know, she was a workhorse, man.

The driving and the teaching, she started to get tired.

And who wouldn't?

Who can keep up with Sue?

I don't have particular memories about that last show.

I do remember just feeling really sad.

Crying, all we did was cry.

We honestly didn't believe this would be the end.

We'd done the show for a long, long time

and there was a sense of gearing down,

people getting tired.

Yeah, it was 10, 11 years,

you know, thirty Sundays out of the year.

You only have 52 Sundays

so more than half the Sundays we were all together

and then, poof.

I think it was wise of Sue to stop when she did.

And we were just all sad

that we weren't going to be together.

I wore black for tonight's show 'cause I'm in mourning.

This is Susie's swan song for "Talk Sex."

There'll be a great big hole in my heart.

I loved doing this show,

and it hurts leaving my loving crew.

We've been together for 14 years in total,

so we're kind of joined at the hip.

It's, um, been a loving family.

Thanks to all of you for all your skills,

devotion to making "Talk Sex" a hit.

And the fat lady is not singing,

but she is signing off television.

I'll close with the same condom quickie

that we ended the first show with

174 episodes ago.

Sorry.

Sex will be sweeter if you wrap your peter.

And as the lights go down for the last time,

it's goodbye to all with thanks and love.

She was a mom to me but then I think in the end,

she became a mom to everybody.

Yeah.

So I think Sue was very aware

that what she did was making a difference.

Sue taught me what was possible

when it comes to sex and sexuality.

Let's end this before the police get here.

Sue Johanson, everybody. We'll take a break.

Sue has made a career

out of being very frank and very direct.

Sue Johanson, everybody.

I wanna say thanks to Sue, not only for blazing a trail

that I have followed as a sex educator,

but also for the ways that she has made my sex life better.

She's made me feel better and more accepting

about who I am as a person.

It's your life. It's your body.

It's your sexuality.

You decide.

You know, I'm a public facing sex educator,

like what does that even mean?

You're like, that's a job?

And that was the one person you could point to,

to say, yeah, kinda like Sue Johanson.

You got it?

- Mm-hmm. - Okay.

Do we need another Sue Johanson

to represent everybody who wants to learn about sex?

I don't think so.

You know, I think-I think it needs to be myriad voices

all contributing to the conversation.

I think there is danger in this era if you go to one voice,

but back then, that's how we listened.

Back then, that's how we consumed.

Michael Jordan,

Oprah, right,

Joe Strummer,

"Sex with Sue."

Oh yes, it opened the door.

Oh yes, it did.

It made it okay to talk about sex,

to talk about all sorts of stuff.

And nobody bats an eyelash anymore.

And I wasn't young.

I wasn't beautiful.

I didn't have bodacious tatas.

I was just a mother with a load of information.

Oh yes, I'm very proud of what I...

I pushed the line

as far and as fast as I could

and I got away with it.

I just wanted to say that I love your show.

Oh, thank you.

My husband Ben and I

watch it every Sunday just before, you know.

And he said that you look very lovely tonight.

He's got good taste.

When does a male's penis stop growing?

On the average of about 16 years of age.

Well, I heard that it,

until age 21.

Maybe you're right.

Keep on hopin', honey.

My wife and I attended a New Year's Eve party

and somebody actually smoked a cigarette

through their vagina.

Is that actually dangerous for the person who did it?

Ah, you get nicotine stains on your labia.

I have a slight heart condition

and I wondered if orgasms

could cause heart attacks.

No, no.

What a wonderful way to die though if you-

Well this is what I thought too.

Stop and think about it.

If you're going to go quickly and fast

do it while you're having an orgasm

because orgasms are heavenly anyhow.