Vaginas are awfully complicated. All flaps and folds and levers and sweet spots—some angular, some puffy, some yummy, some not, some stricken of hair, others swimming in it—no two alike. They’re amazing, vaginas. And when it comes to orgasmic heights, unlike their male counterparts, they’re not all slap and cuddle, either. No, there’s more to it. Scientists in the Netherlands, for instance, recently discovered, while performing brain scans during sexy times, that when vaginas reach orgasm, the minds attached to them achieve an almost trance-like state.
    Laura Martinez, an 18-year-old rapper based in Santa Ana, CA, is well familiar with this trance-like state. And while, when enjoying this particular past time, she may not be able to dig her heels into her bedspread, arch her back into the headboard, or pitch her arms to the heavens in exalt, she can damn well feel the vibrato between her legs. Thus, “My Vagina Ain’t Handicapped,” Martinez’ single, released via YouTube with infamous filmmaker Ryen McPherson (Bumfights), which unabashedly and humorously puts forward a few facts, a number of which extend beyond the title to the lyrics: “I’m just a thug ass nigga / that’s pretty simple ‘n plain / I can’t even move my frickin’ knees / but still I kick it all day.”
    Martinez joins a photo team in Culver City, Los Angeles, for a bit of glamour-making. She’s flanked by her nurse, a cutie pie who seems as charmed by the dramatics of fashion folk as Martinez, and her mother, who speaks only Spanish, and watches the proceedings with a calm that suggests she’s brought her rapping, sexually-liberating, wheelchair-spinning daughter to photo shoots for lifestyle magazines an uncountable amount of times. It’s pretty awesome. After a bit of song and dance, Martinez answers a few questions pertaining to her being here. When asked what she likes about the internet, the conduit for her expression, she says, “It’s freeing. If you choose not to be seen, no one can judge you about how you look. They only judge you about what you post, or what you put out there.”
    It’s inspiringly puzzling. Because here’s this girl, out to let the world know she’s got a set that can warm and tingle as much as anyone, yet she clearly doesn’t look the part. Sex, and beauty, and the thrill of climax—like certain pages of this magazine arguably suggest, remember—are about the standardization of unachievable ideals. Sex, as far as the public is concerned, isn’t for everyone—it’s for the select few who deserve it. And yet, some of the people featured herein are probably too bloody concerned with themselves to unhinge enough to orgasm. Rather silly.  
    What isn’t regulated by these imposed aesthetics, or this unrealistic physicality, is music, and Martinez shares on its distinct autonomy from other forms of expression. “Music is fun,” she says, “I can’t paint or draw, but I can do this. You don’t have to jump around, or do anything physical to do music—everything is open to the sky. You can develop the lyrics, and feel the lyrics, and do anything to make the music feel better. I like saying how you feel and not worrying what people are going to think—giving people a shock by saying things I probably shouldn’t say.”
     Laura Martinez represents a generation of individuals whose voices were once not heard. Or does she? While we’d love to let “My Vagina Ain’t Handicapped” stand as some warm and fuzzy moment for the disenfranchised, it’s actually much cooler than that. Because Martinez is too provocative to represent just any generation of individuals, she’s too cutting-edge. To whit: “But baby if you’re worried yet you’re still down for sex / You can’t impregnate me through the tube around my neck!”
    With such a keen sensibility for the way of things, Martinez is eyeing up her future beyond music. “I don’t exactly plan on making a career out of music,” she says, “but it’s been fun. I’m going to school for psychology. It would be nice to work with different types of people. It seems like the psychological side of music—how people react to different types of music and melody—might better their world.” With people like Laura Martinez in our world, it seems as if we’re already rolling on our way to betterment.