Zoom Dick Follies
As the Coronapocalypse continues to kill, maim and bankrupt multitudes, there’s a new affliction in the land of the free-to-be-foolish, and its name is Zoom Dick.
Forget blue balls, erectile dysfunction, premature ejaculation, Priapism, Peeping Tomfoolery, Peewee’s peepee, Weiner briefs, and liar-liar pants on fire. Zoom Dick is America’s #1 penis problem, at least (on that fateful date of 10/19/20) according to Twitter.
Just in case you were looking at porn or pics of cute Pomeranians instead of the gossip we call news, allow me the honor of spilling it: Esteemed best-selling author, Emmy-winning New Yorker staff writer and CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin was caught with his pants down, literally, masturbating, as so many of us do these days and every day—except most of us don’t do it on a New Yorker staff Zoom call, which is what Mr. Toobin was doin’.
I don’t think too many of us wank on work calls, but then again, I don’t know. Maybe lots of folks are savvy enough to turn off their cameras when they’re bopping the bishop or polishing the pearl as the team talks strategy.
Toobin—a man who has crafted for himself a very successful career out of writing and talking about other people behaving badly, i.e., O.J., Trump, Elliot Spitzer, Roger Stone—was not so savvy.
The work call in question involved “election simulation,” which some have teased that Toobin misheard as “erection stimulation.” Hey, it’s an honest mistake—call it Toobin Confusion—or a lawsuit-stimulating case of brazen sexual harassment, depending on your point of view.
This election simulation is said to have involved several New Yorker luminaries roleplaying. See, right there, it sounds a little kinky, but no, it wasn’t sexual roleplay; it was political roleplay. For example, bestselling Dark Money author Jane Mayer (who happens to be a member of my class at Yale, which makes me feel even more spookily tied into this ridiculous story), was roleplaying “establishment Republicans,” Jelani Cobb was taking the part of “establishment Democrats” and Toobin the legal analyst was roleplaying “the Courts.”
Everything was moving along in typically erudite, businesslike fashion, and at a certain point, when all the party-affiliated roleplayers went into their respective “break rooms” to conspire, Toobin, being The Court and ostensibly unaffiliated, took a real break and seemed to go on another video call.
My guess is this “other” call was with a virtual lover (married over 35 years, Toobin is a well-documented philanderer), perhaps a saucy dominatrix commanding him to fap for her, or maybe he was just watching porn.
When everyone returned to the main screen after their break, lo and behold, there was Toobin’s camera lowered to a bird’s eye view of his crotch and what could be called, in keeping with the roleplay, “packing the Court.”
The distinguished roleplayers later reported that they could see Toobin touching said package, but apparently no one piped up to say, “Whoa Jeffrey, your briefs! Not your legal briefs, your underwear! Put that subpoena—I mean your penis—back in your pants!”
Why didn’t they say something? Were they too shocked? So outraged they couldn’t speak? Virtually transfixed by the wanking wonderworm? Already thinking of jokes they could crack about it later?
Thus, Courts roleplayer Toobin choked his courtly chicken, seemingly oblivious, though who knows what he really knew, since it wasn’t his face on camera, just that now-notorious Zoom Dick. At a certain point (when he was “finished”?), the Toobster reportedly left the call for a moment (gotta wash up!), then called back in, all covered up and ready to play the Court, acting as if nothing injudicious happened.
Maybe he really didn’t know what happened. It’s a spooky time of year, after all. Witches, bitches and bugs fly through the Coronapocalypse, as Rudy Ghouliani unzips his fly, Mike Pence’s hair attracts flies, while the very air they fly through is laced with lethal poison, all of us flying headlong into a very scary election, continuing climate catastrophe and Goddess knows what else. Almost everyone but Kim Kardashian is feeling pretty stressed.
Some people’s response to stress and pressure is to escape into self-pleasure, which is great—but (do we really have to say this?) not during a work call. That is, unless you’re ready and willing to take a principled stand and say, “Take this snotty New Yorker job and shove it where the sun don’t shine. I’m a free masturbating man and I am not ashamed!”
Of course, that proclamation would certainly get the guy fired, not just suspended. But at least, I’d say Toobin’s got balls… in addition to Zoom Dick.
Maybe then, with a little courage, humility and a really good sense of humor, he could reinvent himself as a celebrated commentator, though now with a specialty in sexual peccadillos earned by personal experience and professional sacrifice.
But no, Toobin did not show Wanker Pride; he wailed like a big blubbering baby in his abject mea culpa, “I made an embarrassingly stupid mistake, believing I was off-camera… I apologize to my wife, family, friends and co-workers…. I believed I was not visible on Zoom… I thought no one on the Zoom call could see me. I thought I had muted the Zoom video.”
How many ways can you say “I’m an ignorant, excuse-making, Luddite asshole…” with Zoom dick?
Yes, it’s quite possible that while on break from the New Yorker call, Toobin figured he could squeeze in a quickie with the Domme in another window or catch a snippet of porn on his phone, not realizing his New Yorker cam was still on. Got to put a sock on that thing, Jeff—no, the other thing…
However, another distinct possibility is that Jeffrey Toobin is a risk, danger and dopamine-craving exhibitionist who flirted with the rather common, very potent fantasy of getting caught in the act.
If that’s the case, it’s likely that he almost exposed himself various times over these last nine months of Coronapocalyptic Zoom calls, keeping Willy just out of the work cam’s view while playing on the other cam, edging his excitement like a daredevil doing exhilarating, death-defying, pushing-your-luck stunts.
But luck like that has a way of running out, and then this one time—oops! There it was, clear as a pickle (or a summer squash?) on the work cam: Zoom Dick! Whoa, how’d that happen? Did he even see it? Beware: the cock that shocks may be your own.
At that point, the exciting scary sex fantasy of getting caught quickly devolved into grim reality.
Execution was swift, no trial necessary in the court of public opinion. Shortly after the call, Toobin was suspended by the New Yorker, he took a leave of absence from CNN, and Twitter exploded into an orgy of mockery, or as they say in the fetish world, public disgrace.
Zoom Dick is one thing, and Zoom Dick mockery is another. Hey, it’s more fun to laugh at some naughty fool’s erection than worry about this scary election. Folks on all sides, politically speaking, just adore humiliating the elite white male and, in a way, this one asked for it.
Many of my exhibitionistic sex therapy clients love the idea of showing the world their beloved joysticks, with or without consent. They dream of exposing themselves in parking lots, locker rooms, trains, planes, while driving, at the MILF-next-door’s window sill, emerging from showers at opportune moments, leaving their bedroom doors open so unsuspecting family members or housekeepers will walk in on them mid-stroke, on balconies, and yes, on Zoom calls.
Most just fantasize about such brazen displays, but some actually do it. Many just long to be seen, but most are also aroused by the risk. The ultimate fetish of privilege is risk. Regular people face serious risk every day, but wealthy, successful individuals tend to be so sheltered in their somewhat boring, unchallenged bubble of privilege, they often crave the erotic thrill of risk, the more danger involved, the better. As a sex therapist, I try to help my risk-compulsive clients to enjoy their scary sex fantasies in the movie theaters of their minds (they’re always open, even in lockdown), but practice impulse control in real life.
Because in reality—unless you’re at a bonoboësque nudist swinger resort (which, sadly, is increasingly rare these days)—you’ve got to keep it in your pants. In a way, it’s kind of sad that there are so few places in our increasingly Puritanical society where the average penis can comfortably and consensually be out and about, like Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden before the Fall.
It’s even more disturbing that We the People—worked up into a veritable Sex Panic—are more collectively outraged by public exhibitionism than by peaceful citizens getting gassed, clobbered and killed by police.
But that’s the so-called civilization we live in.
In our genital-shunning society, nonconsensual genital exposure is invasive, belligerent, shocking, sometimes even traumatic for those forced to see such a thing (thinking of you, Jane!). So, for their own good and the good of their coworkers, exhibitionists need to put the brakes on their natural physical openness. Most can manage this with a little discipline and awareness or just because they are considerate of others. Toobin doesn’t appear to be blessed with these attributes.
I even find myself agreeing with the odious O.J. Simpson (who has a longstanding beef with The People Vs. O.J. author) when he says “Damn, Jeffrey Toobin. At least Peewee Herman was in an X-rated movie theater.”
I love Peewee Herman. Back in 1991 when Peewee got busted for masturbating in an adult theater, I felt it was so unfair, I masturbated in solidarity with Peewee right on the air—and I was on real radio back then.
But no, I’m not masturbating in solidarity with Jeffrey Toobin. Though I often agree with his liberal “perspectives,” he ain’t no Peewee Herman.
Though in Toobin’s defense, X-rated movie theaters have been closed for years, and certainly aren’t open in the Coronapocalypse which has so many folks going crazy, committing crimes far worse than Zoom Dick.
Unsurprisingly, persons of the male gender appear to have more sympathy for Toobin’s plight than most of my fellow females. After the news broke, #MeToobin became a jokey hashtag which upset the #MeToo’ers who claim that Toobin’s Zoom Dick “sexualized the workplace.” What that means depends on your dopamine levels.
What about Zoom Clit? Is that as bad as Zoom Dick? Women masturbate too, of course, and many are eroticized by risk and danger. Though ladies are known to accidentally(?) broadcast trips to the loo, I haven’t heard about anyone buffin’ the muffin on a work call… yet.
Speaking of the “fairer sex,” Toobin’s long-suffering wife, Amy McIntosh, has not weighed in, thus far, on her husband’s dick being out and about. They met at Harvard, and I guess they didn’t have Crimson Sex Week, like we had Sex Week at Yale, or they’d have learned to put his Dick in a Box, as the Justin Timberlake song so slyly suggests.
Toobin’s no virgin to sexual peccadillos. Apparently, he cheated on Amy more than a few times, he has a love child (with fellow lawyer Casey Greenfield) he at first denied, and he’s been accused of harassing at least one woman, whispering an invitation to anal pleasure into her ear at a party, then following her from that party to her hotel room door, where she claimed he said, “you know you really want it.”
Ugh… Exhibitionists love to imagine that the women they desire *really* want whatever they’ve got, but just won’t admit it. Frankly, I find this “approach” more infuriating than a million Zoom Dicks (though sometimes one leads to the other). This male fantasy of repressed female desire waiting to burst forth—if only it is tapped with the *right* annoying seduction technique—is critical to many exhibitionists who hope-against-hope that the revelation of their precious penis to an unsuspecting stranger, nonconsensual acquaintance or utterly disinterested family member will be a delight to behold.
At this point, many fellow pundits opine that Toobin should take the route of many disgraced celebrities, declare himself a “sex addict” and seek treatment from an expensive, resort-like facility specializing in sex addiction.
I agree that Toobin would benefit from some good sex therapy, like a lot of people—maybe you. But I wouldn’t call Toobin—or you—a sex addict. Many aggrieved spouses find satisfaction in accusing others of suffering from “sex addiction”—the equivalent of “sin” in modern secular parlance—and some of those so-accused actually get off on being labelled a “sex addict,” like being called a “pervert” or “sicko,” as an aspect of public disgrace or private humiliation.
However, as a serious designation, “sex addiction” just doesn’t work, which is why, despite heavy lobbying from impassioned sex addiction counselors, the Psychiatric DSM-5 (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) doesn’t include it.
Toobin may be an over-privileged spoiled brat going through a midlife crisis, with lousy impulse control, compulsive exhibitionist tendencies, scary sex fantasies, job burn-out, a sexless marriage, a death wish, self-destructive depression, Coronapocalyptic craziness and more; the possibilities are extensive. But sex is not an addiction like alcohol or opioids.
Sex is the essence of life (that’s actually the name of a Sex in the Pews podcast I just did), but too often we pretend we don’t need sex, that it’s not important, we’ll handle it tomorrow, we’ll vanquish those naughty desires by sheer force of will, or maybe it’s our partner’s need for sex that we don’t want to deal with—and we have every right not to deal with it—but then… Zoom Dick happens.
At least, Jeffrey Toobin can thank Rudy Ghouliani (who never needs a Halloween costume) for momentarily taking the heat off of him by putting his own creepy claw down his pants just after procuring the phone number of a comely young lady in the new Borat movie. Has this been “Men Touching Their Dicks in Public” week?
Maybe it’s just that men touch their dicks a lot. Not all men, not all the time, but a lot of men touch their dicks a lot of the time. I know this as I live with one and talk regularly with a lot of others about their deepest sexual thoughts and most private erotic activities.
Speaking of privacy, little by little, we’re losing it. Much of what we used to think of as “private” is now public. In the Coronapocalypse, we try to maintain physical distance—unless we’re at a Trump Rally—but with all our cyber communications, “social distancing” is a complete misnomer.
When we Zoom together, we’re not “social-distancing”; we’re socializing. Visually speaking, we can be very close, much closer than we might be at an in-person meeting. We have yet to wrap our heads around this way of being together. Certainly not the little head, the Zoom dickhead.
Some tips: Look down… check around during your next Zoom business call, make sure your package is in your pants. Check that it hasn’t fallen out or creeped up above your waistband or found its way out of your fly, especially after your bathroom break. If you must pull out your plonker, for whatever reason, cover your camera, unless you’re making porn!
Hmm… Was Jeffrey Toobin making porn? Not on purpose, of course, but if any of the offended parties, took an evidentiary screen shot of Toobin’s Zoom Dick, we the People would like to see it. Toobin could launch a successful OnlyFans account at this point, though he’s probably not gutsy enough. Jane, if you’re reading this, remember how we bonded over bonobos at the reunion? I have no idea how you felt about Jeffrey’s indecent exposure, but if you got the screenshot, toss a bone(r) to a fellow Old Blue!
Which reminds me, we’re still waiting to see Jeff Bezos’ dick pic. Enquiring minds want to know.
I realize many people don’t want to see this at all, so preface the pic—Toobin or Bezos, but please, not Rudy Ghouliani—with a trigger warning like, “Trick or Treat!”
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