I'm not the first and certainly won't be the last person to write about the importance of male penis size, but hey, dick talk be making it rain all sorts of page views up in this server. Plus, in the wake of last year's size scandal at Subway, it seemed as good a time as any.

The media places pretty exacting standards of physical beauty on men (unlike their female counterparts), and according to my penis, it’s recently reached a tipping point come to a head.

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Penis size is something that I’ve been concerned about pretty much ever since my dad took me to use a public restroom, which I immediately mistook for an Italian salumeria.

Be it in a movie for comedic effect, or an illustration in a science book, every depiction I saw of a penis always seemed to be larger than mine. The advent of streaming internet porn didn’t help (NSFW or places where snake-charming videos are frowned upon). I began seriously questioning whether or not my penis was up to snuffaluffagus, and how much that would matter to women.

According to a study I conducted with the girl half-awake on the pillow next to me, size doesn’t matter a whole lot. But anytime a female I’ve been intimate with has said as much, it’s provided me with little reassurance. It’s hard to believe that many of these women wouldn’t lie – if not to spare my feelings, then perhaps to falsify a sense of satisfaction with me as a partner. Many women will go on to make the appendage that my penis appears to be the same size as most of the penisia they’ve encountered, some even that it’s the largest. That’s when things start getting really dubious. I’ve seen my share of cock, both flacid and otherwise, and I can say unequivocally mine is NOT the largest one I’ve encountered. So it actually tends to make matters worse when a girl goes out of her way in bed to say things like my “cock is so big” or "your dick is like a two-liter of Diet Squirt filled with water and dry-ice turned into an 8th grade bottle rocket science experiment." I mean who's going to believe a girl actually found an empty bottle of Diet Squirt anywhere? I want honesty in my relationships.

So once again Google becomes my best worst friend, where I can read studies like this one that asserts that a larger-than-average penis is in fact preferable to many women. And while it's true that for every study showing this or that one can find another claiming evidence completely to the contrary, I have yet to see any studies published that demonstrate women prefer a below-average sized penis.

For this next part, I actually had to go out and buy a measuring tape. According to stuff I read on wikipedia at some point or another, my penis falls within the range of “average”, measuring 5.25″ from the shaft (28.5″ from the butthole). Other studies suggest that I’m below average, with the high mean reaching as much as 6.3″ in length. For comparison, I made this visual approximation of the varying states of my self-esteem throughout writing this article:

As a man (with a penis) I can tell you that penis size does matter to me. And there’s three main reasons why:

1) Her Pleasure As discussed above, it does seem there is certainly some pleasure women derive from the actual size of the penis’s length and girth. While my length is 5.25″, my girth is 5.1″, putting me at the high-end of that average, and effectively meaning I have a cube for a penis. But the more penis there is, the more surface area there is to stimulate a woman on the inside (ignore the clitoris, it doesn’t do anything). If that wasn’t true, then the producers of the Ouch! That’s My Cervix! might want to consider a new niche porn line.

There’s also some aesthetic value here. I think everyone – men included – agree that a bigger dick “looks” better. There’s more to see and therefore more to understand what’s going on. It’s precisely why they have larger dicks in porn – you can tell who’s in what hole while still managing to fit a wide-angle lens underneath some dude’s taint. And I think aesthetic value is worth something. As crappy as it is to say, there are some labias that I find more aesthetically appealing than others, and it would be remiss of me not to admit that.

The bottom line is that most men want to feel like they’re physically satisfying a woman. And while I recognize that penis size isn’t everything, I think it’s worthwhile to note that it is one of many assets that we as men can provide. I’ve talked with many men who’ve all said they’d rather surgically remove an inch of their finger than lose an inch of their penis’ length. I do think that perhaps what I lack in penis size has encouraged me to hone my aptitude in other areas such as cunnilingus, verbal communication, and lying about owning a Porsche. As men we compensate: what Mozart lacked on the cricket field he made up for by learning how to properly tinkle some keys, but it'd be nice to bring it all to the table.

2) Dick-Swinging with the Boys I've always said that women care more about what other women are wearing than men do. It's pretty impossible for me to tell if you're wearing the most expensive shoes, let alone to name more than one female show brand (Chinos?).

Well that’s kind of what it’s like for dick size with men. Anytime I see an event like the World Naked Bike Ride (NSFW-ish), it always seems to be less about the cause and more about a bunch of people who want to show off their junk. I lived in the UC Berkeley Co-ops, and for every naked event I attended (of which there were plenty at Berkeley), I was always surrounded by guys with HUGE dicks. It makes sense - it's like going to the beach and being surprised that everyone with their shirt off has a better body than the guys over at the Game Developers Conference. But it really gets my goat that the whole nine yards standard is being waved around to the rest of the world.

But rather than encouraging these guys to sheathe their swords, I think the little guys should be more welcomed in showing what they got. One area I think women have an "advantage" in the bedroom is with breast size. I’m not suggesting there’s not massive amounts of pressure on women to be well-endowed, but I do think a degree of pressure is relieved when it’s more or less all out there from the onset. If I had to tell you my dick size right at the beginning of a date, I think the rest of the date would actually be relatively pressure free. And if there was any actual halfway-decent penis enlargement surgery, I know a lot more men would consider it.

Louis C.K.: Hilarious Get More: Watch More Stand-Up.

So men, particularly those of low to average size, next time you’re in the locker room – drop trou and gallivant about. And see where your next date takes you when in the first five minutes you mention “Eric Barry told me to mention that penis size is ______".

3) The Logistics Here’s perhaps my biggest gripe with penis size. I can’t do what I wantwith it. That spoonie-effing thing? Can’t do it. Girl’s hands on cock while also in her mouth? Can’t do it. Slipping out during doggy-style or when she's on top? Yep. I’ve even had condoms slip off several times (who wants to go on a rescue mission? Also, who uses condoms?). So there’s a point where the inconvenience, the limiting of sexual positions, and the physical shortage of space actually impinge on my own ability to get the most out of sex.

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In the end, you have to work with what you've been given. Granted, I've never had performance complaints in the bedroom, but that moment when the pants come down will always be wrought with fear for me. I'm just thankful that never happens until both parties are many beers in, when the brain starts to loose it's accuracy with depth-perception. ---- For more on penis size listen to my interview with "Small Penis Party" creator Ant Smith.

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I Don't Have A Big Penis, And Why Size Matters To Me