Important trailblazer

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(Bild: AFP/Chris Delmas)

Sex therapist Ruth Westheimer is dead. The psychologist known as "Dr. Ruth" died on Friday evening (local time) at the age of 96 and in the presence of her children Miriam and Joel, as spokesman Pierre Lehu confirmed to the German press agency dpa.

Westheimer is considered an important pioneer for an open approach to sex and partnership issues, particularly in the USA. She was born Karola Ruth Siegel in 1928 in Wiesenfeld near Frankfurt into a Jewish family and was taken to Switzerland on a Kindertransport at the age of ten, shortly before the outbreak of the Second World War. She escaped the Holocaust, but never saw her parents or her beloved grandmother again. Her parents were murdered by the National Socialists in the Auschwitz concentration camp.

Fought underground for a free Israel
After the war, while still a teenager, Ruth moved to Palestine, trained as a sniper and fought underground for a free Israel. She is seriously injured by a grenade. She then began studying at the Sorbonne in Paris. A check from the German government for 5,000 marks (2,556.46 euros) as compensation for the suffering she had endured enabled her to move to the USA in 1956. There she continued her studies, married Manfred Westheimer and had two children. She became a US citizen in 1965.

Has written numerous books
Westheimer's career began in the early 1980s with the radio show "Sexually Speaking", in which she answered questions from listeners. The success was soon so great that further radio and television programs followed. Together with speaker Pierre Lehu, Westheimer also published several books, including "Sex für Dummies" and "Silver Sex - Wie sie ihre Liebe lustvoll genießen".

Her characteristic giggle and open approach to sex tips won her many fans. She spoke uninhibitedly about topics such as ejaculation and masturbation, so that hundreds of thousands anonymously sought advice from the motherly expert. "Her name and the distinct sound of her voice are inextricably linked to sex," the New York Times once wrote.

Many international followers
The German-American had many international followers and was also awarded the German Federal Cross of Merit in 2019. "The questions are the same everywhere," she once told the German Press Agency. Every country boasts that it has the better lovers. But she could by no means recognize the best in the world.

According to Westheimer, who has written more than 30 sex guides, the image of a supposedly puritanical America compared to a sexually much freer Europe is also pure "nonsense".