What is the deal with cock rings? What are they supposed to do?
By Dr. Carol Queen • Aug 19th, 2009 • Category: Blog, Carol QueenDr. Carol Queen, Ph.D replies to questions from our social network.
Question: OK, seriously. what’s the deal with cock rings? what is it supposed to do?
A cock ring does three or four things.
One, it dresses up your (or someone else’s) cock. Especially those involved ones with straps and things (which can also serve as a form of bondage, depending on how they’re used). Some guys use a ring just as a kind of fluffing tool — it makes even a soft cock partially full and makes it look bigger in a jockstrap, tight pants, etc. — so that even if the ring isn’t visible, it still adds to the visual appeal.
Two, it can serve as a means of clitoral stimulation during intercourse, depending on which ring you choose: the ones with little vibrators or soft bumps built onto them are designed specifically to do this.
Three, it can add to the wearer’s sensation — because a correctly-worn ring enhances engorgement, which enhances sensation. (How to correctly wear it? See below.)
And four, because a correctly-worn ring enhances engorgement, it can also add to the penis’s fullness and rigidity and to the duration of the erection. Before the days of Viagra and its kin, cock rings were the strategy of choice for many men who were concerned about a flagging or too-soft erection, or who wanted to experiment with staying harder longer.
A cock ring which is intended to have the above effects of engorgement, firmness, duration, and sensation needs to be worn as tightly as is comfortable; a loose ring won’t do these things. It is generally worn below the testicles against to body, so that when it’s on, the cock and balls are all part of the package. Put another way, it isn’t worn on the shaft alone – unless it’s the vibrating style, which is not designed to affect engorgement. In this case, the penis serves as a handy vibrator-carrying tool, and a dildo would function the same way with such a cock ring on it.
Cautions: If it hurts, it’s on too tightly (or is pinching the skin or snagging a pubic hair). Don’t wear it, especially at first, for a long time. Remember the language in the Viagra commercials about the need for medical treatment for an erection that lasts too long? Much as porno attempts to convince you otherwise, an erection is not designed to be maintained for hours on end. Guys who’ve learned to use cock rings well often loosen them and tighten them again if they want to wear them for longer than a half-hour or so — for this reason, the kind with several snaps is probably the most popular and time-honored, because it allows you to adjust tightness this way. Stretchy rubber rings can be good, too, especially the larger neoprene kind that aren’t too narrow. Metal rings are the most challenging to use; if a man can’t get out of a metal ring when he’s ready to lose his erection, it’s an emergency situation. Do you even want to know what they’ll do to get a stuck metal cock ring off? (This might be a good place to use that devil emoticon, because many people will NOT want to know the details of this often medically-necessary procedure. On the bright side, if the fire department comes, those guys [including the female ones] are often very sexy.)
–CQ
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Dr. Carol Queen >> Carol Queen is a writer, speaker, educator and activist with a doctorate in sexology. First as an organizer in the lesbian/gay community, where she helped found one of the first gay youth groups in the United States, and later in the emerging international bisexual community, as a sex worker and a practitioner of alternative sexualities, she typically teaches and writes from her own experience and that of her communities even as she references academic thought on these subjects. See her website: www.carolqueen.com.
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