Instinctively, I hedged. "It depends," I said.

I wanted to say that I loved it, found it completely fascinating, a trip to unknown territory that turned out to be paradise. But I also wanted to fit in. Dave and I both came from working-class towns and employed locker-room lexicons rich with romantic terms such as "chowing box" and "eating pussy." In that world, sex was considered an achievement, but facing the action was "unmanly, if not unsanitary," to borrow from Gay Talese's protagonist in "Thy Neighbor's Wife."

Still, after some prodding, I came clean. Dave did the same. In whispered tones typically reserved for drug deals and the PGA Tour, we shared our passion for diving in. Weeks later, half a dozen of us again discussed "snacking," a term we took from the back of a Triscuits box that read, "Let's Talk Snacking!" I suppose we thought the term more complimentary: Snackers do not "chow down" like ravenous wolves; they nibble delicately, savoring the cuisine. Plus, the term let us talk covertly at parties.

These days, however, few of us care to talk undercover. Most of us have become unabashed evangelists. And I'd like to think that we have persuaded several men to give it a shot. But much to my surprise, the toughest people to convert have been women, both friends and former bedmates. Some say they don't want to have to return the favor. Others claim that the act is too intimate, that it fosters an expectation of sexual intercourse. And most shocking of all, many women consider it gross.

I'm not sure which is more frustrating: those who refuse because they figure I'm not actually interested, or those who say no because they can't overcome outdated ideas of their own bodies.

Of course, men and male-dominated culture deserve some of the blame for both of these lame excuses. Predatory men have been around since David raped Bathsheba, and America's anti-cunnilingus attitude is as old as the country itself. From the Mayflower's ministers to the followers of 19th century scribe Krafft-Ebing, who termed the act abnormal and for perverts, the vagina has been portrayed as a cesspool, the act of snacking declared taboo. Today's culture hasn't done much better. "Chasing Amy," "Seinfeld" and "The Sopranos," among other productions, have all shown scenes highlighting the dangers of going down. And as women can attest, the oft-repeated message has kept a lot of men away. According to Sandor Gardos, a clinical sexologist who answers questions for several online medical sites, women are constantly coming forward to complain about vagina-phobic partners.

But at least as many men ask Gardos why their wives or girlfriends continually refuse a good licking. Gardos posits that many women have a poor sexual image, one that arises from a lack of education.

"It's surprising how many women have never looked at their genitals," he says. "It's sort of based on physiology: Men see their genitals every day -- they can't get away from looking at them. But for women, there is only so much that they can see. So there's this mysteriousness. And because of this, all kinds of negative stories evolve."

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