Monogamy is a theory without a practice, argues Armand DiMele alongside biologist Roberta Mariotti. They unpack genetic, sexual, and social monogamy, explore why no species is truly monogamous, and discuss polyamory and the emotional baggage no relationship structure can dissolve.
Do men and women harbor genuine hatred toward each other, or is it fear wearing hatred’s mask? Armand DiMele traces misogyny and misandry through evolutionary biology, phobia research, and caller stories, arguing that what looks like contempt between the sexes is often unacknowledged fear of the other’s power.
Passion, technique, and emotional honesty are all part of good sex, argues Dr. Judy Kuriansky, a veteran sex therapist and protege of Masters and Johnson. She and Armand DiMele, joined by Stephanie D’Ambra, LCSW, debate Schnarch’s raw-desire model against Kuriansky’s view that intimacy is a skill built through practice, gestalt techniques, and her three A’s: acceptance, acknowledgment, and appreciation.
Emotions did not arrive randomly but were shaped by evolution, starting with mate selection in lush early environments. Armand DiMele and co-host Roberta trace how song and dance triggered the first feelings of love, expanded the human brain, and gave way to speech, testosterone, and the emotional complexity we carry today.
Drawing on Dr. Loren Brizantine’s research, Armand DiMele and co-researcher Lauren Sykes walk through the biological roots of women’s emotional sensitivity, hormonal cycles, maternal bonding, perimenopause, and how these forces shape behavior across a woman’s entire lifespan. Callers share vivid personal stories.
Diana Winstead spent a year as a shaved-head, robed Buddhist nun in Burma, meditating in near-total silence. Armand DiMele draws out what she learned about sexuality, surrender, and selfhood by removing almost everything modern life is built on, and what happened when she returned.
Sexual fantasy is a creative workaround for deep psychological inhibition. Dr. Michael Bader, author of “Male Sexuality,” joins Armand to explain how childhood guilt, the fear of hurting others, and the loss of selfhood quietly kill desire, and why “healthy ruthlessness” is actually essential to arousal.
Our closest genetic relative isn’t the violent, male-dominated chimpanzee but the bonobo, a peaceable ape in which females run the group and sex defuses conflict. Armand DiMele and co-host Roberta Maria Atti draw out what this means for human assumptions about aggression, gender, and our own nature.
Mary Roach, author of Bonk, joins Armand and co-host Stephanie D’Ambra, LCSW to trace the surprisingly awkward history of sex science, from Leonardo’s coition figures to MRI studies of intercourse. They cover orgasm as a nervous system reflex, the upsuck theory, and how couples still struggle to talk about desire.
