Everything Dr. Reuben Doesn't Know About Sex

Even if You're Among the ever-dwindling few who have not read Dr. David (Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex but Were Afraid to Ask and Any Woman Can! Love and Sexual Fulfillment for the Single, Widowed, Divorced... and Married") Reuben, you've undoubtedly seen him. Seldom has a member of the medical profession been so visible as has Dr. Reuben. Even before his first book became a best seller, he was hitting the talk shows. Overnight, he became America's number-one sex maven, renowned as the man who, fearlessly, singlehandedly and wittily, had taken sex to the dry cleaner's and hung it up for all to see on television.

He's practically a "regular" on The Tonight Show. Fred de Cordova, the show's producer, tells why: "He's--uh--explicit, without being--uh--explicit...I mean, pornographic." But there's more to it than that, much more. As he springs forth onto The Tonight Show stage, Reuben is not only a perfect guest but a mother's dream. Boyish but dignified in his nice blue suit, he's lean, he wears glasses, he's courteous beyond belief, he's cheery and friendly (but never intimate). He says masturbation without flinching. Best of all, even when he talks about sex, he is sublimely unsexy. He is, in fact, downright ministerial, though not stuffily so. Rather, he is like one of those ministers in shirt sleeves who get right down there with the ordinary people. But somehow, you never forget he's the minister. Or the bishop.

"I guess Dr. Reuben is in charge of our national sex life," joked Mery Griffin one night on his show. But you could tell he was awed by the doctor's presence. Reuben began his number on that particular evening as he usually does, brightly, efficiently, working in the title of his book as soon as decently possible, treating the other guests (including Deborah Kerr and her husband, Peter Viertel) with the kind of almost overdone courtesy the great bestow upon the lowly. And suddenly something became apparent: He was calling all of them by their first names and they were all calling him Dr. Reuben.

Johnny Carson, too, speaks to Reuben in tones of hushed reverence. And Reuben is the benevolent king. "Of course, you're right about that, Johnny," he says reassuringly before going on to give the Real Answer.

But it is one thing to confer "right" on a talk-show emcee, which is like patting a loyal subject on the head, and another to pay homage to a colleague. Both in his books and on TV, Reuben usually fails to give credit for or to acknowledge the research of anyone else in his league. In fact, not only does he frequently misuse the research of others, he has clearly done no formal research of his own. But does anybody care? Here is the clean, cheery, dimpled little fellow who, if you turned the sound off, you might think were giving a talk on ornithology, not screwing. To hear him carry on about what a fine thing jerking off is, you'd think it were a new kind of self-improvement--something to do in your spare time, like stamp collecting. Once on The Tonight Show, the doctor was discussing masturbatory guilt and David Steinberg said, "The reason I feel guilty about it is I'm so bad at it!" Everybody broke up, of course. And maybe that's because nowadays, people are hung up about sex, not only because they think it's dirty but also because they feel so pressured to do it right. It's as if, in a kind of pathetic attempt to move away from the puritanical ethic of having a bad time, they'd bypassed having a good time and, instead, moved into having a "right" time. So, very likely, what has given Reuben the green light to sell his wares on TV is not only his pithy charm but also his emphasis on self-improvement. And Reuben's ministerial pose has given shows like The Tonight Show an almost public-service ring. So what do they care if it isn't only sex he's selling but sex courtesy of Reuben? What do they care if he plugs his book a lot? Besides, in addition to selling self-improvement sex, Reuben makes snappy little jokes; he even did a number on The Flip Wilson Show last year.

But, you may ask, why the sarcasm? Isn't Reuben getting sex talked about on TV? Aren't people buying his book who might not otherwise read or learn about sex? They certainly are, and that's precisely the trouble. Reuben, for all his winning ways, turns out to be like a messenger who brings news of a party--only he's got the wrong address and the wrong date. Look at these notations made by several distinguished sex researchers in the margins of the paperback edition of E. Y. A. W. T. K. A. S. B. W. A. T. A. (numbers refer to the page in the book):

5 Hogwash.

6 Pushes comparisons. Poor psychology.

7 Whose statistics?

8 Medically unsound.

9 Hogwash. Absolutely no info, available.

13 Wow! Old concept of premature ejaculation.

24 This guy is dangerous.

30 Not anatomically sound.

42 He can't even steal effectively.

43 Wrong.

45 This is pure fantasy. Junk.

48 Wrong.

64 Wish this were true. Absolutely no such statistics available.

65 Doesn't happen.

84 This is medical fantasy.

At last count, there were about 100 errors of one kind or another in Everything. With the exception of medical journals, few of these errors were noted in reviews of the book, which, of course, were mostly written by laymen. For example, the Life review--a rave--which really got the book going, concentrated almost solely on Reuben's captivating style and never questioned the information.

The errors, it turns out, range from mere exaggerations and bogus facts (e.g., "About 70 to 80 percent of Americans engage in simultaneous cunnilingus and fellatio." "That's interesting," said one sex researcher. "There are no statistics on the subject. How does he know?") to faulty information of a much more serious--even dangerous--nature (e.g., his now-famous suggestion that ladies use Coca-Cola for what he calls "the best douche available." "Such a procedure," writes Dr. John Money of Johns Hopkins University, "might lead to salpingitis, peritonitis or even gas embolism, causing death.").

Reuben's second superseller, Any Woman Can, is laced with another kind of fallacy. Whereas the errors in Everything are of a factual nature, Any Woman presents a more slippery kind of inaccuracy. His second boom is, simply, psychologically and sociologically unsound. "This book contains the most misleading advice I've ever seen," says Dr. William Simon, Chicago sociologist and former research associate of the Institute for Sex Research at Indiana University.

The errors in Everything begin in the first sentence: "As a psychiatrist...." Well, it turns out that Reuben is a psychiatrist only because he says he is. In California, anyone with an M. D. can legally hang a PSYCHIATRIST shingle on his door. According to published reports, Reuben trained as a clinical research associate in the Harvard Medical School's Department of Psychiatry and did work in neuropsychiatry in the Air Force. If true, these scant credentials would hardly qualify him as an adequately trained psychiatrist. It turns out, however, that both Harvard and the Air Force deny that Reuben has even this limited amount of training. Moreover, he is not listed by the American Psychiatric Association nor the A.M.A. catalog of specialists, nor by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, nor, for that matter, by the San Diego Psychiatric Society, where he lives and practices. Nor has he been published by any professional journal.

"Overall," says Dr. Money, "we judge his knowledge of anatomy and physiology to be less than rudimentary, his knowledge of psychiatry to be superficial, his knowledge of social psychology to be nonexistent and his scholarship unforgivably sloppy."

Probably one of the most constant and telling factors in Reuben's work is his almost total omission of sources. In a book meant for public consumption, it is sensible not to overload the pages with reference notes. But, surely, back-of-the-book notes would not have interfered with the doctor's prose. Furthermore, no statement of sources does not mean no use of sources. Reuben frequently avails himself of the material found by others --particularly by Masters and Johnson, to whom he gives not even passing credit. Worse, he misquotes much of their work and, worse yet, when he does allude to the pair of sex researchers, he refers to them as "experts in sex, who...solemnly receive dozens of forlorn couples who...must swallow their pride and submit to a series of copulation lessons....No grades are given but presumably there is a final exam."

Compare this with Nat Lehrman's description in Masters and Johnson Explained of what actually goes on: "The couple is encouraged to talk about their mistakes during the practice sessions --laughingly, if possible. This is to emphasize the fact that there are no grades given for 'good' performance, nor failing marks for 'poor' ones....Not only does the foundation never demand performance, but it actually forbids intercourse during the initial days of therapy."

Everything is packed with misinterpretations of anatomical facts, according to the findings of Masters and Johnson.

Reuben: "After the penis is...within the vagina...the woman can...by using muscle groups...stroke the penis from tip to base."

Masters and Johnson research indicates that this is essentially impossible for most women.

Reuben on masturbation: "Gentle stroking of the pubic area...initiates erection of the clitoris."

Masters and Johnson findings: "The clitoris does not erect under direct or indirect forms of stimulation. This is a well-established fable usually used in pornography."

Reuben: "All sexual feeling begins and ends in the clitoris."

Although it is now common knowledge that the clitoris is more sensitive than the vagina in the female, it is not correct that all sexual feeling begins and ends there.

Reuben's data on the female orgasm is particularly out of sync with Masters and Johnson's findings.

Reuben: "Erection of the nipples always follows orgasm in the female....It is an accurate mammary lie detector for those who insist on the truth."

Masters and Johnson: "Erection of the nipples does not always occur after orgasm. Women with inverted nipples, for instance, rarely have nipple erection, and innumerable women have erection of the nipples without orgasm."

Reuben: "If carefully observed, as they have been during laboratory studies of sex, every woman who has an orgasm during breast self-stimulation is also doing a little thigh rubbing."

Yet, according to the people who were in the Masters and Johnson laboratory, "those individuals achieved orgasm by stimulation of the breast alone."

Reuben: "Since the precise moment of orgasm usually brings on a lapse of consciousness, neither man nor woman is able to enjoy the orgasm of their partner."

Although sex research shouldn't be required to tell us so, it does, indeed, confirm that most men and women do not lose consciousness during orgasm.

Reuben: " 'Enjoying' sex without orgasm is about as satisfying as 'enjoying' a nice dinner without being able to swallow it."

There is no doubt that many women can and do enjoy sex without reaching orgasm. All Reuben would have to do is interview some. Which brings up another point. He not only misuses the research of others but, except for his soap-operatic interviewees, he has clearly done no formal research of his own.

Everything abounds with bold medical errors. "Cancer of the penis occurs only among uncircumcised men," he says, which is not true. Or, "Regular and frequent intercourse for the first six weeks after hymenotomy is essential to obliterate the remnants of the hymen and allow the vagina to heal satisfactorily."

"Gross nonsense," says a New York gynecologist.

Reuben has a great deal of fun describing an instance in which the male penis is "caught" in the vagina--"I felt like I was caught in a bear trap!" exclaims his patient, "Gene."

Such stories sporadically appeared in medical literature in the 18th and 19th centuries, "but on examination, virtually all the references turn out to be secondhand. Nobody has actually observed this phenomenon," says one sexologist. "There hasn't been any modern report of penis captivis."

Reuben's statement that there is always bleeding when the hymen breaks is untrue. "Innumerable women have gone through initial coital experience," says Dr. Masters, "without overt evidence of bleeding."

So it becomes increasingly clear that one reason for Reuben's omission of sources is that there often aren't any. And when there are sources, perhaps he does not cite them because in doing so, he might seem less like an inventor than like a messenger. And messengers don't get on The Tonight Show.

Sex researchers generally agree that Reuben is at his ignorant and irresponsible best in his chapters on prostitution and homosexuality. Dr. Judd Marmor, UCLA psychiatry professor and member of the National Institute of Mental Health Task Force on Homosexuality, commented on the latter: "This is really offensive. Reuben is contemptuous, derogating, snide. He shows all of the petty prejudices of an ignorant layman. He is badly informed; his knowledge of homosexuals is largely anecdotal. He tries to cover up his ignorance with glibness. There is a shocking failure to make distinctions between types of homosexuals. [Reuben gives the impression that most homosexuals wear dresses, or want to.] He obviously has no knowledge whatsoever of the majority of homosexuals." Dr. Money agrees: "Dr. Reuben's knowledge of homosexuality is not only naïve but astonishingly limited. He repeats old shibboleths about homosexuality, including the one that it is a 'disease' which can be cured only with psychoanalysis. In the face of contrary evidence, he falsely asserts that all male homosexual prostitutes play both introceptive (insertee) and extroceptive (inserter) roles; that homosexuals, as a class, are more promiscuous than heterosexuals; and that their sex life is unsatisfying."

Reuben: "Homosexuality has dozens of variations but they all have this in common: The primary interest is the penis, not the person," and "Homosexuals live together. Yes. Happily? Hardly." Hogwash.

On prostitution, here is Reuben versus Dr. Bruce Jackson, New York State University professor and author, who has studied and interviewed scores of prostitutes in connection with a forthcoming book on the underworld:

Reuben: "The activity men most often seek from professional prostitutes is fellatio."

Jackson: "I wouldn't say so, since it costs more."

Reuben: "The next most popular activity with the gents is cunnilingus."

Jackson: "I don't believe that. Most just fuck." (continued on page 130)

Dr. Reuben (continued from page 126)

Reuben: "The average callgirl turns about 15 to 20 tricks a night."

Jackson: "How could she? She has to have time to take a shower, move around. A more likely average is one to four."

Reuben: "One or even two abortions a year are not unusual for the average prostitute."

Jackson: "Hasn't he heard of the pill?"

Reuben: "All prostitutes have at least one thing in common--they hate men."

Jackson: "Many do, but not all. Also, they differentiate between men and 'tricks.' "

Reuben: "The majority of prostitutes are female homosexuals."

Jackson: "I have never seen anything to support this. It's part of the folklore of square sociologists. This is, at best, oversimplification."

Reuben: "Few prostitutes achieve orgasm, even in the privacy of their own bedrooms."

Jackson: "I don't know of any data to support this. Besides, how many other women have orgasms and how frequently?"

Jackson's main objection to Reuben, similar to Marmor's, is that Reuben is unaware of or ignores the fact that there is an enormous range in types and behavior of prostitutes.

Clearly, not everything is wrong with Everything. When it's not too cute, it's frequently funny. And, unproved or not, uncredited or not, some of his items are true and/or interesting. Masters and Johnson and others may have done all the work, but lay writers they are not. Reuben's information is screwed up, but an error-studded book does not necessarily mean an unenjoyable book--particularly if the errors go unrecognized by the reader. So if one is ignorant, which most people are on matters sexual, Everything can be (as Doc Reuben might say) a ball.

Compared with it, Any Woman Can, tome number two, is just dreary and cheap how-to-do-it girl talk. "It" turns out to be a laid-and-married package deal (in reverse order), with Reuben the omnipresent agent. He is not the first to try his hand at the how-to-do-it-girls business--although he may be the first person actually in the medical profession. Aside from everything else that's wrong with this book, Reuben, says Cosmopolitan editor Helen Gurley Brown, "is approximately ten years out of date." There are small items--like the idea that living with a man before marriage has "absolutely no value in predicting the final outcome of a man-woman relationship." Or his description of marriage: "There is also breakfast to make every morning, dinner to cook every night, and the laundry in between."

More important, Reuben's entire premise is out of date. It is (a) that we live in a world where "guilt has fought sex to an almost complete standstill...the human sexual urge has...been blighted" and (b) that unmarried women are "sexually marooned." The so-called sexual revolution has not, by any means, solved all of these problems, but it, plus the women's movement, plus the changing values of the young, has surely accounted for some change. Reuben never alludes to any of this. It's as if he were so overwhelmed with his role as sex messiah that he has stopped seeing the very world from which he wants to save everyone. "With the...information in the following chapters," he announces in his introduction to Any Woman Can, "with determination and with the tiniest bit of luck, every woman who is sexually marooned can find her way back to civilization." (What is the point of going there, one wonders, if everyone is so guilty and repressed?)

You can see how the question-and-answer format of both books suits perfectly the role that Reuben has chosen for himself. His poor dumb patients with names like Sheri, Rhonda, Eileen, Dorothy, Trudy, Denise, Rosemary, Beth, Luanne ask questions such as "How can a girl protect herself?" "Is alcoholism a serious problem?" or my favorites, "Men are not the same as macaroni?" and "Isn't that dirty?" and the case histories unfold like testimonials to the unfailing success of the Reuben treatment. The doctor emerges as a kind of Answer Man/Savior. Take peppy Joyce (they are all relentlessly peppy, even when they are miserable). After a session with the doc ("But who said that sex was unclean?" he asks/informs her, along with a lot of other hot news), she is finally "cured." "There is nothing I enjoy more than having sex and selling real estate, in that order," exults Joyce on her final visit. "Now I'm going to bring them together. Next week I'm marrying a most talented man in both fields--my boss!"

Incidentally, according to Reuben, peppy Joyce and her friends are all real, live patients. Eleanor Rawson, Reuben's editor at McKay, once let it slip that even she questioned the authenticity of the case histories. So does Dr. Simon: "I'm willing to bet," he says, "that every case is fraudulent. Patients just don't talk that way." A further clue is that they all talk in the same Mary Worthy way. Also, there are so many of them. And one by one, they go into the doctor's office, Sad, and come out, in reducing-machine fashion, Happy. But Reuben, says Mrs. Rawson, stands firm. There is no law, of course, against making up cases to prove a point. Many writers do. But, generally, (a) they do it less, (b) they do it better and (c) those who do it are usually writers, not doctors, and they call their work fiction. The question-and-answer case-history device does, certainly, make Reuben's books more readable. Beyond that, it reinforces the doctor's role--that of the all-knowing, genial but superior being. Pragmatically speaking, such a role is a splendid choice. Isn't everyone, after all, looking for answers? Isn't there something intrinsically comforting, reassuring, even loving about an answer per se? And aren't most people inclined to trust the answers of a young, nice-looking, assured M. D.?

But never mind Reuben's self-appointed sainthood, his phony cases, his myths, his clichés--the worst thing about him is still his thoroughly rotten advice. Take Dr. Reuben's Own Rape Tip: The idea is, if a lady is about to be raped, she should wait until the attacker exposes himself, then take his testicles in hand, "smash them as hard as she can with her right fist--once or twice--he will lose all interest in sex." The only catch is, one of the reasons he might lose interest in sex is that he will have developed a new interest--murder. Another chapter reads like an instruction kit on how to be a good tease. "Promise him anything," counsels the doctor, "but deliver it the night after the wedding."

Dr. Reuben's Own Rape Tip, by the way, is surpassed only by Dr. Reuben's Own Milk Tip: According to him, the "ultimate weapon" in getting a man is--milk!

"On every occasion...she must provide him with milk...on a date, after he brings her home, she can invite him in for hot chocolate or coffee with cream [italics his]. It's even better if she floats whipped cream on top of either drink."

But it's not enough to serve the milk. The girl who's really a winner is the one who makes it: "The most effective ice cream is that made with [a girl's] own hands..." Remember, "Mother made all her milk herself--or at least baby thought so." And the clincher: "A man who totally rejects milk is a questionable prospect for marriage." And there is more about literal hand feeding as the way to have a man "eating out of her hand."

Perhaps the most insidiously harmful chapter in Any Woman is the one that tells a girl "what to watch out for in a man." It's the you-can't-be-too-careful pitch. If a man is at his best after a couple of drinks, watch out, he's probably an alcoholic. If he eats funny, he's probably bad in bed. Other items on a list of what to avoid in men: "Center parts, bad teeth, frequent pursing of lips, worn-out shoes, pants with zippers that don't close all the way, rubbing hands together, dyed hair in a man (concluded on page 192) Dr. Reuben (continued from page 130) under 40." But at the beginning of the chapter, Reuben cautions against "negative emotional attitudes...which can seriously interfere with selecting the best possible man." No psychiatrist or professional in the field of human relations with minimal brains or integrity would ever give such overgeneralized, cheap, invalid and psychologically dangerous a-girl-would-do-this-or-that kind of advice.

Not only are the lists of cautions stupid (surely there are women happily married to men with center parts--or who are sloppy eaters. Maybe they have center parts and are sloppy eaters, too) but, if seriously read, such warnings encourage women who may be overcautious already to be more cautious yet. In many cases, such cautious behavior is the very reason those women are alone. Says psychologist Wardell Pomeroy (a co-author of the Kinsey reports): "This kind of thinking erects barriers between people--just what any psychiatrist works to destroy." And from Simon: "Like all simple-minded books, this one assumes that all males and females are alike and want the same things. Only then can you have such sure 'guidelines.' "

Certainly, one positive turn in the area of human behavior has been our growing awareness of and tolerance for differences between people. These days, almost every insightful book or article on the subject points to a greater need--and greater opportunity--to choose among a variety of life styles. On one level, that is precisely what the women's movement is about: more choice--to be and do what really suits women best as individuals. That can mean having a family or being an executive or both or neither. Women have come to this point in this and other areas (even in fashion, there is no longer a "right" way to dress) only because of their increased sense of human variability. Out-and-out old formula types are less dangerous than they used to be, because they're recognized for what they are. But the David Reubens are something else again. These are the old formula types masquerading as new. This is the big liberal come-on. Reuben's attitude toward women (there is no mention in either book of any kind of liberation movement, of course) is typical. First the come-on: "These days no girl ever has to get married unless she wants to," he says. But following this is the case history of poor Abby, the (God help her) career girl in her 30s, "slightly overweight...her expensive gray-tweed skirt and red turtleneck...the impression she gave was one of intelligence, poise and success." But! She goes out on a dinner date and the headwaiter says there's a business call for "Mr. Abby." End of story. Sob. She never saw her date again.

Of course, the broad-minded doctor is all for women's working if they want to, but "A woman has to be able to drop her job at any time and then pick it up a month or a year later." "Practical nursing, substitute teaching or temporary office assignments give most of the advantages," allows Reuben, "without encroaching on a woman's regular [italics added] life."

Why the false lead? Simple. Like a politician, he doesn't want to lose votes (in his case, readers). The way not to lose votes is not to come right out and take a position that might be controversial. Much better to start off this way, then turn that way. Then you get everybody.

In an issue of McCall's, where, until recently, he had a question-and-answer column, Reuben wrote on women's lib. ("We all felt that Dr. Reuben was--uh--beginning to repeat himself," says editor Don McKinney. "When the column expanded to subjects other than sex, it turned out his opinions weren't any better than anyone else's--and probably not as good.") Anyway, the first question went: "Is the liberation of women today really necessary?" "Yes, without question," wrote Reuben. "In spite of all their material gains, American women are still the innocent victims of relentless discrimination." From this lofty Betty Friedanism, he edged, almost imperceptibly, into a position to the right of Norman Mailer: "There is a higher calling for women...the task only a woman can do [italics added]--creating, developing and educating new human beings." (The doctor's position on women, by the way, is thoroughly consistent with his personal life. When I interviewed her a couple of years ago for Look, Barbara Reuben let it be known that she typed her husband's first book, not because he forced her to do it but because "he didn't want to deny me the privilege." She was also, at that time, at the Plaza hotel in New York, busy washing her husband's shirts, because the hotel didn't do a good enough job.)

Reuben is right when he describes the need for the kind of book he thinks he has written. "Despite all the frank, 'for adults only' films and books today," he writes, "most people still are abysmally ignorant about sex," and "one problem among others is to make an individual aware of the capabilities and potentials of his sexual organs so he can utilize them to their fullest capacity."

Needless to say, if people are ignorant and unaware of their sexual capacities, and many certainly are, it is largely the result of fear and guilt, which, in turn, come from inadequate and/or faulty information. (As we have said, nowadays, there are two kinds of guilt--while half the world is guilty about doing it, the other half is guilty about not doing it right.) Dr. Mary Calderone, executive director of Siecus, puts it very simply: "Sex information is an antidote to fear and guilt. The most important single fact about solid sex information is that it tends to be incredibly reassuring. But then it has to be correct information."

But what if the information is not correct? Or what if the information appears to be solid but is not? Incorrect data does not mean danger in all things. But in sex information, it does. There is not only the kind of physical danger that might arise from someone's harkening to the advice of an "expert" who suggests a possibly deadly douche. It is also the psychological danger that might arise if, for example, a woman with nonerect nipples harkened to the fiction that erect nipples are the test of a true orgasm. And, for another example, what of Reuben's concept of homosexuality? "Positively harmful," says Dr. Money. "He sounds cruel...and chastising to the young teenaged homosexual who might read his book in the hopes of finding help....I have also had experience with the parents of such a young person...who were frantic and panic-stricken because of the misinformation Dr. Reuben, the great best-seller expert, had given them."

What Reuben has done, in other words, is to reaffirm myths, add some new ones, confirm prejudices; instead of stressing information that is positive and reassuring (as he says), he presents data designed to increase the old anxieties about sex. Moreover, having plunged into an area where there is little enough research, he has misused what exists; and because he does not mention or use sources, it is difficult for anyone but an expert to find him out.

On top of this, he is a brilliant self-merchandiser. His television personality is sterling. He knows when to act sober (to gain audience respect) and when to joke (when people begin to get uncomfortable with the subject). "The flippant sex joke," explains Dr. Money, "relieves people's tensions and permits them to continue listening--or reading--and feel morally justified in doing so." There's nothing wrong with a little humor, but there is plenty wrong when humor is used as a replacement for good advice.

So, thanks to the media, which hunger for titillation, and thanks to an unsuspecting public, which hungers for information, and thanks to a publisher and an author who hunger for success, Dr. David Reuben has made it.

If he were a car, Ralph Nader might have stepped in long ago.