At SFSI during training of sex crisis counselors, the “first base”, “second base” model for sexuality is referred to as the “baseball diamond model”. It stands for both the euphemisms xkcd explains above for “scoring” with a sex partner (the stages of penis-vagina intercourse goal achievement) — and also for the limited sex acts typically perceived as “normal” sex. Which, as we say, is great if all you want to do is run around in circles. This explanation is going to have to go into the next round of training, for sure.
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For those that are insatiably curious and incredibly nerdy – but a bit lazy…
The binary code base is [as you might guess] in ascii: “base 2″
:D
uh, actually, the xkcd doesn’t refer to penis-vagina contact or gender at all in the baseball diamond diagram, and in the conversation above, both the boy and the girl talk about performing the acts on some unnamed “her.” bonus: it doesn’t define home base, but it does refer to both oral and anal sex. so, i don’t see how this is heteronormative…
2yk — no no, perhaps I didn’t make it clear enough that we use the baseball diamond model as the ‘jumping off’ point for opening the discussion of heteronormative sex at SFSI; I in *no* way meant to indicate that xkcd was making a narrow statement about sex and gender. obviously I love xkcd, and while much of xkcd is het-focused I love that their comics apply to pretty much everyone most of the time. this is a great example. if anything, it’s slightly furry focused. furrynormative? on the flipside, there’s no S in LGBT, so I think it’ll be a while until we see an F.
wups, need more coffee.