The Munchkin of the Bedroom

By John Leo

Wanda: It's 10 o'clock, Ralph. Do you want the news or the Ruth Westheimer show?

Ralph: One vote here for prurience, my sweet. Who wants to watch death- dealing hurricanes when you can switch to radio and hear Debbie from Manitoba describing her low clitoral sensitivity? How can soccer riots compare with Rosalie of Omaha asking Dr. Ruth which porno films to flash on the ceiling while locked in the clumsy embrace of Husband Bob, the rapid-fire mortician?

Wanda: No need to be so sarcastic, Ralph. Ruth is good at what she does. I take it you don't like her.

Ralph: Far from it, light of my life. She's my favorite sex munchkin. Who else would tackle the tough question of whether a devout Catholic like Bruce from Dubuque shows disrespect for his church by doing it dressed as a nun? These are the very issues they duck all the time on Face the Nation and Meet the Press.

Wanda: Try to subside, dearest. Dr. Ruth must be doing something right. Sexually Speaking, her radio call-in show, has been on the air for five years. It went nationwide last September, reaching hundreds of thousands of listeners over some 60 stations. Good Sex, her six-nightsa-week cable TV show with guest stars, is just as big a hit. Every night about 3,000 callers try to get through. She's got a book out, Dr. Ruth's Guide to Good Sex, with three more in the works. She's a great success.

Ralph: And no wonder, my pet. Chicken soup and voyeurism are a dynamic combination. You could spend a decade peering into the neighbors' bedroom windows and not get half the kick of a Westheimer show. You sit mesmerized as Ruth soothingly points out, "Normalcy is hard to define," and "There is no one right size for the penis." You get to look down on all the bumpkins who call in wondering whether Ben-Gay makes them sterile. In fact, everything's such a mess out there, it makes your own sex life seem pretty good. Ours is superb, by the way. Best of all, my beloved one, when you listen to Dr. Ruth, you feel a surge of therapeutic uplift that many of us find to be missing from your average porno film. So you don't have to feel slimy at all when you hear what Yvonne of Tucson does with the Cool Whip. What more can you ask from a talk show?

Wanda: I'm surprised you don't have a bit more sympathy for her, Ralph. Actually, she's rather conservative. She doesn't think married people should fool around. She says people should keep the rules of their religion and should feel guilty when they do rotten things. That's enough to set her apart from a good many people in the sex-advice business. She doesn't even think people should have sex on the first date.

Ralph: A sexual conservative who dispenses soft-core porn will never go broke in America, dearest.

Wanda: Give her a little credit, Ralph. She's funny, and she has a knack for relaxing all those troubled people out there. She told one couple to go to a motel to refresh their sex life. The woman called back later to report that nothing had happened, and Ruth said, "Well, at least you had a good night's sleep." Her advice is sensible. She tells people to be romantic and realistic too -- sexual appetite waxes and wanes even in the best relationships. Believe it or not, she also advises people to be careful about sharing details of their sex lives. She talks about one man who admitted to an encounter group that he was turned on whenever he saw a cow. The group was bound by secrecy, but when the poor fellow got to his office, his secretary and everyone else began calling out "Moo! Moo!"

Ralph: If everybody were as reticent as she seems to advise, she would have no show, dearest. Thanks to the good Dr. Ruth, thousands of otherwise normal people are happy to go on the air to discuss the configuration of their spouses' private parts. Next thing you know, we will all be using one another's toothbrushes, Wanda.

Wanda: We live in a sexually frank age, Ralph. She's using that frankness to help people.

Ralph: A cynic might say she is using a marketable shtik, Wanda. Your dowager aunt can be counted on to ask about the children, but Ruth -- looking so tiny, wholesome and middle-aged -- leans forward sweetly and asks you what setting you use on your five-speed vibrator. It's a brilliant effect, a variation on about 40 familiar dirty jokes. It wouldn't work at all if she were a normal size, or if she looked and sounded sexy. Apart from two or three of those sharp comments per show, she has the wit to play the straight man. She knows people tune in for the lurid tales from the provinces and not just to hear her say, "Have you tried masturbation?" or "Why don't you do it in the kitchen?"

Wanda: Somehow, Ralph, I get the impression that no program on sex could ever meet your standards.

Ralph: I've got it, Wanda! Why don't I just take over the Westheimer show and give it some class? I'll call it Ask Dr. Ralph or Orgasmically Speaking, something upscale and tony like that. Horny housewives and bored cabbies can tune in as I deftly field anguished queries from Marvin of Hackensack, whose penis apparently swivels too much to the left, and Elsie of Batavia, who cannot achieve the Big O unless there's a chimp in the room. Naturally, I would take the high ground, quelling all this genital turmoil by declaring everyone normal, including the chimp, and instructing all listeners to "Go for it!" -- with contraceptives, of course. I would then startle my rapt audience by revealing that sex is nothing to be ashamed of, and in fact may even be a natural part of life. Then, as a finale, I would beam at my audience, looking sweet while talking dirty. What do you think, my partner in bed as well as life?

Wanda: I think it's time to go to bed, Ralph.

Ralph: Right, dearest. You get the lights. I'll get the projector.