To prove the point, Lauren Crow photographs women masturbating as part of her ongoing project The Little Death.
"In a patriarchal society, women are flooded with information on how to be and how to look in order to please others, namely men. In terms of female pleasure, we are rarely shown what it really looks like," Crow says on her website.
"We are afraid to talk about it and when it is shown, it is from the male gaze in media such as pornographic films, which in general are made by men for men.
"These films, unless you truly understand their production and falsity, give people the wrong idea of what it really is to see a woman in a state of pleasure."
Crow hope these images will encourage women to be less self-conscious when it comes to climaxing alone, and with a partner. The honest portraits may not conform to pornography's idea of sexy, but we think they're all the more beautiful for it.