Have any questions or comments related to class or otherwise? If so, fire away.
More Damn You, Auto Corrects!
in Humour Etc.
Another selection:
The strangest things people have traded for sex.
in Sex Work, Humour Etc.
From Find Law's blog:
You've heard of the sex trade, but probably not like this: You may be surprised by the variety of strange things people have tried to trade for sex.
We're not just talking about prostitutes, either. Indecent proposals by some everyday folks -- even a judge and a former "Sheriff of the Year" -- made our Top 5 list of strange things traded for sex.
Here's our Top 5, in no particular order:
1. McDonald's Chicken McNuggets
The Golden Arches regularly touts its nuggets, made from 100% breast meat. That may be one reason Khadijah Baseer, 31, allegedly staked out a McDonald's parking lot in Burbank, Calif., to offer sex acts in exchange for McNuggets. But when customers refused to bite at her offer, police arrived and arrested her.
2. McDonald's Double Cheeseburgers
The Cheeseburglar would be shaking his head at this one: Christine Baker, 47, allegedly agreed to have sex with an undercover Florida cop in exchange for two double cheeseburgers off the McDonald's dollar menu. The cop bought the burgers, but Baker allegedly also asked for a tip in cash. She must've grimaced when police busted her for prostitution.
3. Phillies tickets
A Pennsylvania woman allegedly tried to score tickets to a Phillies-Yankees World Series game in 2009 in exchange for sex -- with a man who turned out to be an undercover cop. Courts eventually cleared Susan Finkelstein, 45, of all prostitution-related charges. But not before her strange approach to securing World Series tickets got her fired from her job.
4. Methamphetamine
A former "Sheriff of the Year" in Colorado was busted for allegedly trying to trade methamphetamine for sex. Ex-Sheriff Patrick J. Sullivan, 68, was caught on tape trying to make the deal happen, and was also charged with manufacturing and selling the drug. He was booked, ironically, into a jail that bears his name.
5. Justice
Pennsylvania Judge Ross Cioppa, 70, was accused of demanding sexual favors from female defendants in exchange for favorable outcomes in court. Cioppa allegedly tried this twice, in two separate cases, before being charged with bribery, indecent assault, and official oppression -- definitely one of the stranger things we've seen allegedly being traded for sex.
Grandmas watch Kim Kardashian sex tape.
The new male ideal?
in Attitudes, Body Image
From CNN:
Drew Manning thought he had the body of the ideal man: 6 feet 2 inches of tanned musculature, sculpted arms and washboard abs that narrowed to a firm, 34-inch waist.
His perfectly chiseled body was hairless due to regular "manscaping." People assumed he worked out three hours a day, seven days a week, but the 31-year-old personal trainer said nutrition was really the key to his dream body. As for working out, he indulged in his favorite activity for only about 45 minutes a day, four to five days a week.
Then, Manning's once impressive muscles softened to pounds of bloated fat -- on purpose.
Manning, a personal trainer, decided to gain nearly 70 pounds so he could better understand how his clients feel. He then planned to lose the weight to show that no matter the numbers they faced, others could get fit, too. He called it his "Fit 2 Fat 2 Fit" campaign, and documented it on a blog, and a book that debuts in June.
He expected some physical discomfort, but the emotional struggle -- and judgment from others -- surprised him. As he loaded sugary cereals and soft drinks from his cart at the local grocery store one day, he caught three women staring at him, then sliding their eyes to the food he was buying.
"'I'm doing this as an experiment! I used to be a fit guy, not the fat guy,'" Manning wanted to turn around and explain. "I'm a lot more self-conscious now. There was a total lack of confidence in the way I felt in public because I wasn't the fit guy anymore."
[...]
"As women gain more financial power in society, men are expected to bring more to the table," Addis said. "In addition to being financially successful, they need to be well-groomed, in good shape, emotionally skilled in relationships and the emphasis on looking good is just part of the bigger package -- the stakes have been raised."
Some psychologists and trend watchers said the male muscle obsession only grew during the last few years. As the economy struggled, men were sent looking for aspects of their lives they could define and control. Body image is, at times, the only thing.
"Men can't control how much money they make or their employment situation, but they can control how they look. It can create this obsessiveness," said Sarah Toland, senior health editor for Men's Journal.
Read the rest here.
Dirty Magazines by Heather Bradley.
in Attitudes, Pornography
Menstruation cuteness.
in Menstruation
Thursday mail - April 19.
Have any questions or comments related to class or otherwise? If so, fire away.
More labia anxiety.
From Jezebel:
Your Vagina Isn’t Just Too Big, Too Floppy, and Too Hairy—It’s Also Too Brown
Good news, ladies! Society has discovered another new thing that's wrong with you, which means another opportunity for you to make yourself more attractive for your man. Score! Turns out, the color of your vagina is gross and everyone hates it. So bleach that motherfucker. Bleach it right now!
In this commercial for an Indian product called Clean and Dry Intimate Wash, a (very light-skinned) couple sits down for what would have been a peaceful cup of morning coffee—if the woman's disgusting brown vagina hadn't ruined everything! The dude can't even bring himself look at her. He can't look at his coffee either, because it only reminds him of his wife's dripping, coffee-brown hole! Fortunately, the quick-thinking woman takes a shower, scrubbing her swarthy snatch with Clean and Dry Intimate Wash ("Freshness + Fairness"). And poof! Her vadge comes out blinding white like a downy baby lamb (and NOT THE GROSS BLACK KIND) and her husband—whose penis, I can only assume, is literally a light saber—is all, "Hey, lady! Cancel them divorce papers and LET'S BONE."
Needless to say, certain citizens are troubled by this product—which, in addition to just being fucking insane, brings up painful issues about the hierarchy of skin tone within the Indian community. As if it isn't bad enough that darker-skinned people are encouraged to stay out of the sun and invest in skin-bleaching products like Fair & Lovely, and that white actresses are being imported to play Indian people in Bollywood movies, now everyone has to be insecure about the fact that their vaginas happen to be the color that vaginas are??? Splendid! God, I was just saying the other day that my misogyny didn't have enough racism in it.
Read the rest of the article, including a comment from one of the ad execs, here.
And the ad:
* As a side note, I'm surprised that Jezebel, which fundamentally is a women's feminist online magazine, is calling vulva, vagina.
Movie: Zombie Ass.
in Humour Etc.
Need a study break (kind of NSFW)?
Pure sexiness, 1980s porn-style.
Busted for praying nude.
in Humour Etc.
From United Press International:
Philadelphia family of four were taken into custody after allegedly stripping naked and praying in a parking lot at Upper Darby High School, authorities say.
Police Superintendent Michael Chitwood said Sarah Butler, 44, and her children, Joanne Butler, 23, Bessie Butler, 22, and 14-year-old son were arrested about 1 p.m. Friday after being found inside a parked van on the school grounds, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported.
Chitwood said the family had arrived at the school about 3 hours earlier to have her biological child released from school, the Delaware County Daily Times reported.
"Because she has no parental rights, school officials would not release the child and said she couldn't take the child out of school," Chitwood said. "They started singing religious songs and lay prone on the sidewalk at the entrance to the building."
When school security ordered them to leave, they returned to the van and took off all their clothes, the Daily Times said.
"They disrobed between parked cars and were running around chanting prayers to Jesus," Chitwood said. "They were running around the lot for 5 to 10 minutes. When police got there, they were in a van and locked their arms in defiant protest. They were chanting 'Jesus is Lord.'"
The three adults were to be charged with defiant trespass, disorderly conduct and open lewdness, with the mother also expected to be charged with corruption of a minor, the Inquirer said. The teenager was placed with Children and Youth Services.
School Principal Chris Dormer called it a "rather bizarre incident" in an announcement made on the school's Web site, the Daily Times reported.
The history of breast implants.
From the BBC:
It is 50 years since the first breast enlargement using silicone implants. Today it rates as the second-most popular form of cosmetic surgery worldwide, undergone by 1.5 million women in 2010.
It was spring 1962 when Timmie Jean Lindsey, a mother-of-six lay down on the operating table at Jefferson Davis hospital in Houston, Texas.
Over the next two hours, she went from a B to a C cup, in an operation that made history.
"I thought they came out just perfect… They felt soft and just like real breasts," says Lindsey now aged 80.
"I don't think I got the full results of them until I went out in public and men on the street would whistle at me."
Though the operation boosted her self-confidence - and she enjoyed the extra attention - she had never planned to have a breast augmentation.
Lindsey had been to hospital to get a tattoo removed from her breasts, and it was then that doctors asked if she would consider volunteering for this first-of-its-kind operation.
"I was more concerned about getting my ears pinned back... My ears stood out like Dumbo! And they said 'Oh we'll do that too.'" So a deal was struck.
The surgeons were two ambitious pioneers, Frank Gerow and Thomas Cronin.
It was Gerow who had first come up with the plan for a new kind of breast implant.
"Frank Gerow squeezed a plastic blood bag and remarked how much it felt like a woman's breast," says Teresa Riordan, author of Inventing Beauty: A History of the Innovations that have Made Us Beautiful.
"And he had this 'Aha!' moment, where he first conceived of the silicone breast implant."
[...]
Where are breast implants most popular?
Read the rest here.
It Gets Bigger.
They Shoot Pornstars, Don't They?
in Pornography
Susannah Breslin is a very successful journalist who has published piles of work on the sex work industry. She's also put together several interesting projects which I'll be posting about next week.
One her best known pieces is an exposé on the Southern California porn industry. She doesn't candy coat what she sees - she reports the real deal, and it isn't always pretty. As a matter of fact, some of her accounts are disturbing (trigger for sexual violence!). The piece is long, but very much worth reading.
Here's the opening:
At a certain point during the week that I spend in Los Angeles, interviewing adult performers, visiting adult movie sets, and talking to those who live in the San Fernando Valley and work in the adult movie industry about the recession and how the current state of the economy is affecting their livelihood, I find myself in a nondescript apartment on the outskirts of the Valley, the residence of a man who requested I not reveal his identity.
It’s a quiet, warm afternoon. Outside, a woman whose hair has been dyed the color of cherry Kool-Aid is smoking a cigarette on a narrow balcony overlooking a half-empty parking lot. In the living room, the man and I are sitting on a dingy beige sectional sofa, watching an adult movie playing on a laptop.
The movie set into which we are peering is your garden variety, run-of-the-mill porno fare: tan sofa, white walls, hideous curtains. In all likelihood, this is one more cheap hotel room located somewhere in the greater Los Angeles territory that has come to be known, colloquially, as Porn Valley.
At the center of the screen, a young woman is perched on the edge of the couch, alone. As the camera closes in on her, she smiles tentatively and crosses her arms protectively.
Her look is that of a 21st century Bettie Page. She has long, dark hair with short bangs and bright blue eyes rimmed with heavy black eyeliner. She wears a cropped black top with a plunging v-neck, a baby pink plaid miniskirt (not unlike the one worn by Britney Spears in the schoolgirl-themed music video for “… Baby One More Time”), and white high heels—otherwise known as “stripper shoes.”
“OK, so what are we going to do?” a man standing off-camera asks in a voice that sounds as if it has been digitally altered. “Should I just beat the shit out of her?”
Read the rest of it here.
Thursday mail - April 12.
Have any questions or comments related to class or otherwise? If so, fire away.
Polygamy in Netherlands.
Passed along by Andrew (thanks!).
This is from 2005 - I assume that there have been more of these types of marriages since.
From the Brussels Journal:
First Trio "Married" in The Netherlands
The Netherlands and Belgium were the first countries to give full marriage rights to homosexuals. In the United States some politicians propose “civil unions” that give homosexual couples the full benefits and responsibilities of marriage. These civil unions differ from marriage only in name.
Meanwhile in the Netherlands polygamy has been legalised in all but name. Last Friday the first civil union of three partners was registered. Victor de Bruijn (46) from Roosendaal “married” both Bianca (31) and Mirjam (35) in a ceremony before a notary who duly registered their civil union.
“I love both Bianca and Mirjam, so I am marrying them both,” Victor said. He had previously been married to Bianca. Two and a half years ago they met Mirjam Geven through an internet chatbox. Eight weeks later Mirjam deserted her husband and came to live with Victor and Bianca. After Mirjam’s divorce the threesome decided to marry.
Victor: “A marriage between three persons is not possible in the Netherlands, but a civil union is. We went to the notary in our marriage costume and exchanged rings. We consider this to be just an ordinary marriage.”
Asked by journalists to tell the secret of their peculiar relationship, Victor explained that there is no jealousy between them. “But this is because Mirjam and Bianca are bisexual. I think that with two heterosexual women it would be more difficult.” Victor stressed, however, that he is “a one hundred per cent heterosexual” and that a fourth person will not be allowed into the “marriage.” They want to take their marriage obligations seriously: “to be honest and open with each other and not philander.”
Documentary: The Ballad of Genesis and Lady Jaye.
in Gender, Relationships
From the documentary description:
[...]
But that's just the preamble to the story. Defying artistic boundaries, Genesis has re-defined his art as a challenge to the limits of biology. In 2000, Genesis began a series of sex reassignment surgeries in order to more closely resemble his love, Lady Jaye (née Jacqueline Breyer), who remained his wife and artistic partner for nearly 15 years. It was the ultimate act of devotion, and Genesis's most risky, ambitious, and subversive performance to date: he became a she in a triumphant act of artistic self-expression. Genesis called this project "Creating the Pandrogyne", an attempt to deconstruct two individual identities through the creation of an indivisible third.
[...]
The homepage for the film is here.
Thursday mail - April 5.
Have any questions or comments related to class or otherwise? If so, fire away.
Snatchly.
Last week I posted about Tumblr users who collect and post porn on their Tumblr pages. This is, apparently, the next new thing (NSFW, and for academic purposes only!).
From MSN:
Snatchly is the Pinterest of porn
Pinterest is aimed mostly at women. You "pin" items to another user's pinboard, thus creating a community based on sharing pictures of your wedding and videos of your dog. It's become so ubiquitous, even Michelle Obama has an account. Snatchly (totally NSFW and not pictured, so search on your own), on the other hand, is like most of the rest of the Internet, a place where men swap and share porn. On Snatchly, you "snatch" (get it?) content (porn) and post it to your page. It's a site where you can "personalize your porn," and hey, it conveniently links to all the best smut-related video sites. Snatch away.