Pioneering sex expert Dr. Ruth Westheimer dies at 96 : NPR

Internationally acclaimed intercourse therapist Dr. Ruth Westheimer, who tore down taboos along with her open, nonjudgmental and good-humored public conversations about human intimacy, has died. She was 96 years previous.

Based on her longtime publicist Pierre Lehu, Westheimer died peacefully on Friday at her residence in New York Metropolis. The reason for dying was not publicly shared.

Westheimer grew to become a family identify within the early Eighties when she was in her 50s, for her frank method to discussing intercourse on her widespread late-night radio present, Sexually Talking.

She continued her work on TV with The Dr. Ruth Present, which by 1985 attracted 2 million viewers every week. She additionally shared her data in dozens of books together with Dr. Ruth’s Information to Good Intercourse and Intercourse for Dummies, on the internet and within the classroom. She taught at Yale, Princeton and Columbia Universities in addition to Hunter Faculty.

Westheimer was a proponent of secure intercourse who normalized the usage of phrases like “penis,” “vagina” and “condom,” at a time when few dared use these phrases in public settings.

She was additionally an outspoken supporter of homosexual and abortion rights, catching fireplace from conservatives in the course of the Reagan period for her stance.

Anti-feminist chief Phyllis Schlafly criticized Westheimer, together with Gloria Steinem, Anita Hill, Madonna, Ellen DeGeneres and others for selling “provocative intercourse chatter” and “rampant immorality” in her 1999 essay “The Risks of Intercourse Schooling.”

Catholic firebrand the Rev. Edwin O’Brien was additionally a Westheimer detractor, labeling the intercourse therapist’s work as upsetting and morally compromised.

Along with her German-tinged English (The Wall Road Journal as soon as described Westheimer’s voice as “a cross between Henry Kissinger and Minnie Mouse”) and diminutive stature (she was nicely underneath 5 toes in top) Westheimer approached her work with gusto and a way of enjoyable. She targeted on reminding individuals that there’s nothing to be ashamed of relating to discussing intercourse. Her cheeky catchphrase was “Get Some!”

“I definitely consider within the want for sexuality schooling, I do consider that it needs to be taught based mostly on scientifically validated information, and it needs to be taught with some type of humor,” she instructed NPR in 2007.

Westheimer’s world success and joie de vivre belied a tough previous.

She was born into an orthodox Jewish household as Karola Ruth Siegel in Frankfurt, Germany, in 1928. Her mom was a housekeeper and father a salesman. At 10, her mother and father despatched their solely youngster to Switzerland to flee Kristallnacht, a wave of antisemitic violence perpetrated by the Nazis. Westheimer believed her mother and father have been murdered at Auschwitz, since she by no means noticed them once more.

She would hold these early tragedies underneath wraps for many of her profession, solely talking brazenly about her previous in 2019 with the discharge of the Hulu documentary Ask Dr. Ruth.

“I’ve modified my thoughts with this movie,” she stated in an interview with NPR on the time of the film’s launch.

After the battle ended, she immigrated to Palestine, which was underneath British management on the time. There she skilled as a scout and sniper for Haganah, the Jewish militia. She sustained a critical damage throughout a mortar assault.

Westheimer moved to Paris two years later, and studied psychology on the Sorbonne, earlier than immigrating to america in 1956.

In New York, she labored as a maid whereas finding out for her grasp’s diploma in sociology on the New College and went on to earn a Doctorate of Schooling from Columbia College’s Trainer’s Faculty.

It was her post-Ph.D. job at Deliberate Parenthood in Harlem educating girls intercourse schooling that led her to review sexuality in a deeper means.

Past her work as a intercourse therapist, Westheimer grew to become a cultural icon. She appeared on late evening TV discuss reveals, co-starred within the 1985 film comedy One Girl Or Two alongside Gérard Depardieu, appeared on the duvet of Individuals journal, sang on Tom Chapin’s This Fairly Planet album, and hosted Playboy movies. She was additionally the main focus of the one-woman play, Changing into Dr. Ruth, and the board recreation, Dr. Ruth’s Sport of Good Intercourse.

Many public figures took to social media to precise their unhappiness at Westheimer’s dying.

“Dr. Ruth Westheimer led a rare life,” wrote New York Gov. Kathy Hochul on X, remembering Westheimer’s position as New York’s first-ever Ambassador to Loneliness. “We labored collectively to highlight a psychological well being disaster impacting our seniors. She was courageous, humorous, candid and sensible.”

“Unhappy information,” wrote Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden, additionally on X. “Lately the @librarycongress acquired her papers and we’re hoping this assortment will assist researchers and lift consciousness to the problems her listeners have been fighting.”

Westheimer was married thrice. It was her third marriage, at age 32 to fellow Holocaust survivor Manfred “Fred” Westheimer, that caught. Their life collectively lasted 36 years, till her husband’s dying in 1997.

Westheimer is survived by two kids and 4 grandchildren.