As a Jewish child during World War II, she was sent from Germany to Switzerland on the Kindertransport to escape the fate of her parents who died in the Holocaust. But her character was relentlessly cheerful. pointed “The Talmud says that lessons taught with humor are more memorable.” That humor made her a cultural presence, appearing frequently on late-night talk shows from the days of Johnny Carson to Jimmy Kimmel. Her voice and her image as an old-woman sex therapist were easily caricatured, but audiences mostly laughed with her, not at her.
Behind its lighthearted personality lies an important cultural heritage, part of the continuum of American history. The 1960s was a time of sexual liberation that divided older and younger generations. In the 1970s, pornography began to emerge from the shadows. During the Watergate era, the name Deep Throat was still a dirty joke. Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein According to an anonymous sourcebut the name’s reference to pornographic films was also a sign of the film’s rise to mainstream attention. Building on the changes of those earlier decades, in the ’80s Dr Ruth made sex very light-hearted, sexual problems something to simply discuss and find solutions for. That stance made sense to a generation that grew up sexually liberated, and it was also an antidote to the cultural conservatism that soared during the Reagan era. Though not part of her pop culture image, she has always been a champion of birth control and women’s reproductive health, and especially advocated for safe sex during the AIDS epidemic. One of her dozens of books was 1992’s “Dr Ruth’s Guide to Safer Sex,” a title not as catchy as 1995’s “Sex for Dummies,” and you can see why her serious side was often underplayed.
Last year, while promoting a Hulu documentary about her life, she was as cheeky and passionate as ever, offering some common-sense advice to millennials who complain about being too busy or stressed out to have sex: “Don’t be stupid. Make time for sex,” she said. USA Today“Here are some super fun, FREE activities to do.” No one could say it better, or with such lasting impact.
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