Enough! or Too much! – William Blake
As I said in my column of December 9th, there always seems to be an explosion of interesting news articles at the end of the year, and here are seven more updates. After today, I’m officially done with this sort of thing until January!
Recognition (August 19th, 2010)
In this early post I discussed the awkwardness which results when an escort discovers that she knows a client in real life, but none of the examples I gave can compare with this UPI story from December 3rd:
…Titus Ncube of Bulawayo [Zimbabwe] said he called for a prostitute to come to the hotel room in which he was staying while having marital problems and was shocked when his 20-year-old daughter arrived…Ncube said he collapsed to [the] floor upon recognizing his daughter, who quickly fled, crying. “I am sorry for what I did,” Ncube said. “I spoke to my wife and daughter. I apologized for my actions as I just wanted my family back. My daughter has stopped doing what she was doing and is going back to school next year. My marital problems are not over, but we have a counselor who is helping us to get over this most difficult period”…
R.I.P Bob Guccione (October 26th, 2010)
In this article I pointed out that men’s magazine publishers have “to be given credit for pushing the envelope and helping to advance the cause of sexual liberty in the US by bringing both porn and frank discussion of sexual topics (including prostitution) into the mainstream.” Now a new book by Mike Edison explores the history of American men’s magazines in depth so as to prove that assertion, and the author promotes it with “How Sex Magazines Made The World A Better Place” in the December 7th Huffington Post.
Good Fantasy, Bad Reality (October 27th, 2010)
From the Jackson, Mississippi Clarion-Ledger of December 12th:
A truck driver claims his prostitute fiancee suffocated as they celebrated their engagement with a meth and bondage sex party. Then he drove from California to Mississippi with the corpse in the cab…and set fire to the truck – with himself and the body inside. Mark Andrew Rice pleaded guilty to arson and desecrating a corpse and was sentenced Monday to six years in prison…[with] two years…suspended for time served.
Rice, 49…met [Natasha] Carpenter at a truck stop in Texas. He fell in love after several encounters…and [gave] her an engagement ring…[on] Sept. 15, 2009. As part of their celebration in Barstow, Calif., Carpenter agreed to let him bind…and…gag…her…When he found her dead, Rice panicked and bought “all the meth his dealer had” and drove to…[Mississippi, where he] planned to say goodbye to his family and kill himself…[but they] took a gun away from him so he climbed into the rig and set it ablaze. Deputies eventually pulled him from the burning truck…Hancock County authorities believe he would’ve been charged with manslaughter or worse had she died in Mississippi…Prosecutors in San Bernardino County, Calif..said there was “insufficient evidence to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.”
It’s really quite a sad story, since he seems to have genuinely loved her; I’m guessing the methamphetamine increased her metabolism so that she suffocated more quickly than he allowed for.
Barbie (December 5th, 2010)
In this column I pointed out that “People with a lot of free time and more math skills than sense have published complicated calculations showing that at 1/6 scale, Barbie would be 5’9” tall, with measurements of 36”-18”-33” and a weight of 110#”
and that “The campaign to suppress or neuter Barbie derives from the same repressions and insecurities as the campaign to ban porn and abolish prostitution…” And just as neofeminists aren’t too scrupulous about getting their facts right with regard to porn or prostitution, so they aren’t in their Barbie-attacks either:
Galia Slayen…[told NBC’s “Today” show that] she first created [a 6’ tall] Barbie-like figure — with a 39-inch bust, 18-inch waist and 33-inch hips…for the first National Eating Disorders Awareness week in 2007 while she was [an anorexic] high school student in Portland [Oregon]…”I’m not blaming Barbie [for my illness] — she’s one small factor, an environmental factor,” Slayen said. “I’m blond and blue-eyed and I figured that was what I was supposed to look like. She was my idol. It impacted the way I looked at myself.”
The grotesquely distorted microcephalic figure in the picture (which, as you will note, bears little resemblance to a real Barbie doll) is a perfect symbolic representation of the grotesquely distorted “prostitute” caricatures described by people like Melissa Farley, except that Slayen’s distortion of the math isn’t nearly as severe as that practiced by Farley et al.
Welcome To Our World (January 20th, 2011)
It’s funny how efforts to suppress consensual activities always end up looking a lot alike, as in this December 5th story from the Associated Press:
…Lithuania’s capital [Vilnius] recently introduced a ban on panhandling that not only punishes those who beg but those who give, with fines of up to 2,000 litas ($770). Outraged rights groups say the ban spells misery for the needy in one of Europe’s poorest countries, as winter kicks in and economic turmoil spreads across the continent…”Begging is a human right,” said Linas Kukuraitis, director of the Lithuanian chapter of Catholic charity group Caritas. “It was there long before cities emerged. There have always been those who begged and those who helped them.”
But Vilnius Mayor Arturas Zuokas says the ban will help beggars to find more sustainable ways to make a living. “Giving money to people on the street is wrong,” Zuokas said. “By doing this we doom them to stay there forever”…police…are not issuing fines just yet. Instead they are handing out cards to beggars with addresses and phone numbers of charities and homeless shelters. Stricter enforcement is expected to begin in January. The mayor himself rode his bicycle…looking for violators of the ban. Zuokas made a splash on YouTube earlier this year by riding an armored personnel carrier over a luxury car as a publicity stunt for his crackdown on illegal parking…He said there are plenty of homeless shelters for the poor in Vilnius, “but they stay on the streets because it is a kind of business.”
…Some Asian countries have laws targeting both beggars and almsgivers but European…laws typically focus only on [beggars] and aren’t always strictly enforced. However, police in Ireland cracked down on panhandlers this year…[and] Austria’s Styria province…introduced a begging ban in February. None of them punish almsgivers. By contrast, Norway, one of the world’s richest countries, abolished a more than 100-year-old vagrancy law in 2005, making it legal to beg in the streets. It’s also legal in Sweden, Germany, Spain and Portugal…
Note that Sweden and Norway officially believe that beggars have more right to self-determination and making a living in a way that suits them than women do.
Elephant in the Parlor (October 23rd, 2011)
A politician being caught with a prostitute isn’t really news, but for the prostitute to expose the politician is. This one’s from the December 6th Huffington Post:
The…married mayor [of Medford, New Jersey], accused on a website two months ago of having sex with a prostitute at a California hotel, [has] resigned…The anonymous allegation against…Chris Myers…included a photo of…him in his underwear…[The accuser] claimed to be a prostitute…[whom] Myers contacted…through a male escort website…Myers paid him $500 but didn’t fulfill promises of a car and other gifts…[and that] the broken promise was the reason he was taking his story public. The website was [soon] taken down…[and though] Myers…refused to comment on the allegations [he] didn’t deny them…His resignation letter…did not mention the scandal…
Saint Death (November 1st, 2011)
The December 10th Miami Herald featured this article on persecution of Umbanda, another syncretism of Christianity with African and Indian beliefs. The crusade is largely driven by Pentecostal Christians who…wait for it…want to “save” believers from their choices:
…many Brazilians…view Umbanda…as…witchcraft…In many parts of the country, [it] was outlawed until the 1950s, and in the following three decades believers were supposed to register with the police…Brazil’s…1989 constitution enshrined [religious] freedom…but…followers say official disdain and intense prejudice still put their lives and shrines at risk…[they] report on average 100…physical or verbal attacks a year…in…Rio de Janeiro alone…Cases…have increased along with the…power of Pentecostal religions…”There is always a discourse of ‘taking them from the hands of the devil'”…[theologian Fernando] Altemeyer said…Such tensions have come into relief in Sao Goncalo, where Mayor Aparecida Panniset, an outspoken Pentecostal, has been accused of failing to protect Umbanda sites, or even destroying them. In October, she ignored pleas by religious tolerance activists to stop the demolition of the house where the first Umbanda rituals were held in 1908. She also turned down requests to meet the activists…then moved ahead with efforts to raze another traditional Umbanda house…
One Year Ago Today
“The Swedish Pimpocracy” shows how the government of Sweden exploits women to “implement a plain old-fashioned tyranny while hiding under the cloak of ‘enlightenment’.”
Every time some politician (usually a “family-values” republican) gets exposed as having been caught with a hooker (often gay) or in some sex shop, I’m really not surprised. I’m waiting for the day when old Frothy Mix (Santorum) gets caught snorting coke off a rent boy’s ass. But really, what sort of stupid, non-professional believes in promises of gifts later?
Here in the upper Midwest, we’ve had a solid couple of months of political candidates trooping around Iowa (Legal gay marriage) talking about how much they hate the homos. About how queers should be denied rights, “registered”, saved from their sin. You know what? It sounds exactly like what I hear from the whore-rescuers.
We have a bumper crop of people who are just not comfortable with sex, especially anything beyond tightly controlled sex for reproduction. And they hate all recreational sex, be it gay or paid.
I feel very fortunate that I’m happy with sex with men or women, and having been in the business, have had opportunities to do things many people never get. I’m sorry for those who miss out on that. When working, I used to see so many guys who said “My wife won’t do this or that, or I’m too embarrassed to ask her”. I was happy to help them have those experiences.
And those driven by fear react by striking out in hate, be it to queers or whores. It’s sad for all involved. People with an inability to embrace their inner queer or pervert cause so much damage.
To fully “come out” as what I call a “wild woman” and a bisexual Christian has been amazing to me! From the time I started having sex only friendships, I resolved to 1 day be “fully out” about it and started the work towards that goal. Unfortunately, there’s a lot of ###*** out there about both of these groups and I’ve resolved to keep speaking out against it. I hope to meet other bisexual and/or gay Christians 1 day in person. I’ve “met” a few online and it’s been a revelation. I’d rather be dead than go back to hiding from nearly everyone in my life these 2 things.
Do you all see my lady there? She’s got guts. I’m proud of her, and I’m going to jump her as soon as we both have time and neither of us has a cold.
[achoo!]
Thanks! YOU deserve a lot of credit for helping me with “coming out”! I feel it’s OK for me to brag a little on all this because I committed myself to fully coming out 1 day and have made that goal. From what I’ve seen online, the gay/bisexual Christians need more support and more education is needed also. Those is this group have some things in common no matter how we handle it, i.e., some don’t act on their attraction (stay celibate) and others do act on it. Maybe there’s more support than I know about online (if so, wonderful!). But, I do know from looking at all that’s related to this online that more education is needed. You know that most of my family (and yours) have known for a while we have what we call an “arrangement”, but I’ve resolved to hold nothing back anymore if the subject of gays, etc., is brought up and also “arrangements” in general. I hope it’ll go well when the time comes (when I tell about the bi thing)! But, if it doesn’t and they think badly of me, etc. that doesn’t change my real worth and it won’t devastate me like it would have back when my self-esteem needed more work (and it DID…it was very battered from years of abuse). I’m hoping for the best.
Whether others take it well or not, you’re my lady, and I’m with you.
Hi Maggie. I was over here today
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Telling-Women-to-Smile-is-Sexist/243300992382631?sk=wall
And saw this article.
http://radicalhub.wordpress.com/2011/12/15/why-did-sasha-grey-exit-pornography/
A comment by a woman was as follows.
“Sammi Jones I guess I don’t see how porn can ever be viewed in a positive light towards women. To each their own and all but yeah.”
I suggested she come over here and ask you.
Also, if you read the article? I am amazed that these feminist writers openly disregard direct quotes from women in porn and then substitute their own words into the womans mouth and the other women fall for this. Its just an amazing thing that ANYONE can fall for such blatant lies.
So. Saha Grey leaves porn having made a BIG NOISE about how she was going to transform porn etc. She even did this thing with that guy Howard Stearn about free the Palestinians or something and Stearn was question exactly where her qualifications were. So what that big deal women come and go in porn all the time. Its the MEN who hang around forever. Ron Jeremy, eh? He was around WELL past his use by date.
So Pentecostals view Umbanda as witchcraft? I used to be a part-time wedding photographer in high school (for the chicks you know!) … and I did a gig at a Pentecostal church once. As I was packing up my gear to leave, I was the only one in the main section of the church and I heard, what sounded- to me like, a group of people ON FIRE in a side room. Well, I had to save these people so I went charging into that room and well – it was a group of about 20 people speaking in tongues and flailing around.
That looked to me a lot like “witchcraft”! Anyway – I don’t see how they can call anyone “strange”.
I also agree with Comixchik above on “family values” Republicans. Democrats really ping on Republicans for this but … I wonder why Anthony Weiner chose to lie about his “sexting” rather than just come out and tell everyone it was no one’s business? I don’t think it was the “sexting” that sank him – but the lying about it. Clinton seems to have done well, politically, with his “affairs” – until he tried to lie about one.
I think if the Republicans are stupid enough to nominate Mitt Romney – it’s going to be a deal in the general election. The Mormon Church will swing for the fence to get him elected and I surely hope the gay lobby pummels him hard on gay marriage and other rights for homosexuals.
The Mormon Church will swing for the fence to get him elected and I surely hope the gay lobby pummels him hard on gay marriage and other rights for homosexuals.
Ah, but that’s the point… allowing more people to sign contracts of their own choosing isn’t just good for homosexuals, it actually benefits everyone.
Government should stay out of marriage altogether, whether it is prohibiting certain types of marriages or forcing cohabiting couples into married status without their consent (common-law marriage).
I totally agree – I just think it’s funny that Romney is considered the “independent’s choice” … I don’t see it – not after the main stream media and the Obama campaign points out little cracks in his armor like gay marriage and really a lot of other things.
The next President will either save the nation or pilot the plane to the scene of the crash. To save it – he or she will have to do some bold and decisive things. I don’t see anything bold nor decisive in Mittens.
I’ll probably just hold my nose and vote for Obama – and then go home and stock canned goods. 🙂
I agree. Government should get out of the marriage business entirely, and that includes abolishing divorce court. Couples (or groups) should have to come up with their own contracts, with breaches and dissolutions handled under contract law in ordinary civil courts.
Great stuff in here. I agree with Comixchik , I am so glad i can relax and enjoy my sexuality.I will tell you as a former “Fundy” , it was just so much grief.
I’ve heard the if you give to the needy, you force them to remain needy argument before. Unfuck those making that argument. It’s just a way for people who don’t give to feel morally superior to those who do. You want to be stingy? Fine. You can’t afford to give without making yourself homeless? I get that. But don’t say that you don’t give to the poor out of concern for the poor. That’s like arresting prostitutes for their own good, or medicating children so they don’t get mixed up in drugs.
THANK YOU! YES! How about: give to the poor because it’s the right thing to do? That reason alone is wonderful. ###*** all this hair-splitting and endless agonizing over who gets what, why, when, etc., etc. It reminds me of the endless debate over the death penalty which hours of time are spent on but those who are in crisis because they have to deal with the death penalty DIRECTLY (because they had a family member who committed a crime, etc.) get NO time from these people endlessly debating. How about just deal with those who are in need instead of endless talking but NO DOING? Unfortunately, the you force them to stay needy argument is very popular and I really love it from those who have never been on unemployment, never needed Medicaid, never needed disability, etc. THANK YOU for speaking up!