Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Archive for June, 2011

In Their Own Words

Posted in Miscellaneous, Perception, Philosophy, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 10, 2011| 50 Comments »

The act which men commonly perform on prostituted women is penis-in-vagina sexual intercourse.  There is nothing “natural” about that act.  –  Sheila Jeffreys

The first part of the report I excerpted in yesterday’s column discusses Sheila Jeffreys, Australia’s best-known anti-prostitution fanatic.  Because prostitution is legal in Australia, Jeffreys is widely recognized as the emotionally disturbed lunatic she is and the report presents her as such:

In her book, The Idea of Prostitution, she argued that…clients of sex workers (or in her terminology ‘prostituted women’) are more accurately described as ‘batterers’, ‘rapists’, and ‘prostitution abusers’.  In the same book, Jeffreys made the quite startling claim that:  “The act which men commonly perform on prostituted women is penis-in-vagina sexual intercourse.  There is nothing ‘natural’ about that act”.  This is consistent with, “her firm belief that men maintain power over women by the act of sexual intercourse, and that heterosexuality is therefore bad for women”.  In 1979, she stated that feminists who sleep with men are enemy collaborationists and to her sexuality is the basis of oppression of women by men.  Consistent with this belief, Jeffreys has described marriage as a form of prostitution, whereby women guarantee men sex in return for subsistence.  Even in today’s society, in which women are better educated and hold professional employment, Jeffreys contends that, “the right of men to women’s bodies for sexual use has not gone but remains an assumption at the basis of heterosexual relationships”.  In essence, Jeffreys regards every married woman as a prostitute.  In 1973, Jeffreys decided to abandon both her heterosexuality and femininity.  She has said: “I gave up beauty practices, supported by the strength of thousands of heterosexual and lesbian women around me who were also rejecting them.  I stopped dying my hair…and cut it short.  I stopped wearing make-up.  I stopped wearing high heels and, eventually, gave up skirts.  I stopped shaving my armpits and legs”…Jeffreys has also argued that western beauty practices such as makeup, high heels, and cosmetic surgery, are harmful cultural practices…

Most American politicians undoubtedly recognize the extremist insanity of American neofeminists, but because they are politically useful they are allowed to speak before legislatures and other government organs and everyone in those assemblies pretends that the poisonous filth they spew is something other than the hateful product of diseased minds.  But since the Australian government has no need for Jeffreys or her ilk, she is presented as she actually is and damned by her own words.  Today’s column follows in that same vein; I’ve assembled a few quotes from other neofeminists in order to show the true colors of those who oppose women’s right to sex work (both in prostitution and porn).

The best example of the way American politicians conveniently ignore the fanaticism, appalling misandry and sheer ugliness of prohibitionists is Donna M. Hughes, architect of recriminalization in Rhode Island and bridge between soi-disant conservatives and radical feminists.  In a number of articles and speeches Hughes has displayed a shocking level of racism (especially toward Asians and Germans) and prejudice against women who are sexual, even referring to respected sex educator Megan J. Andelloux in these words:  “Then a tattooed woman, calling herself a “sexologist and sex educator,” spoke against the [criminalization] bill. She is also a reporter for a prostitutes’ magazine called $pread.  (I couldn’t make this stuff up!)”  But bigotry is actually the least of Hughes’ faults; she is inordinately fond of scare quotes (using them even for such common words as “good”, “bad” and “it”), enamored of weird, cumbersome passive-voice constructions such as “information about finding women in prostitution,” and so obsessed with the word “pimp” that she often emits strange phrases like “woman pimp” or “pimp agency”.  But IMHO the strangest of her oddities is her bizarre tendency to describe mundane ideas and actions using portentous language so as to make them sound sinister:

Men write about “good” and “bad” experiences buying women in prostitution.  They have “good” experiences when women comply with everything the men want them to do, focus all their attention on the men, and pretend they like the men and enjoy the sex acts (sometimes known as a GFE – “GirlFriend Experience”)…Men have “bad” experiences when women will not do everything they want, or are disinterested, perfunctory, and try to minimize the physical contact with them.

In other words, a customer paying for a service is satisfied when the service provider is friendly, competent and responsive to his preferences, and dissatisfied when the service provider is rude and performs badly.  I somehow doubt Miss Hughes would consider a rude mechanic who ignored her complaints and failed to fix her car to be a “good” mechanic, yet this paragraph implies that the buyer of a service has no right to expect to get what he paid for.

Here are a few other choice and representative quotes revealing the true mindset of some of the women who want to control other women’s bodies and minds:

Julie Burchill

When the sex war is won prostitutes should be shot as collaborators for their terrible betrayal of all women.

Nikki Craft

Pornography, most often, dehumanizes women.  It reduces us to fetishized objects and provides a blueprint and support network for men who commit acts of sexual terrorism.

(Though this quote is fairly typical neofeminist anti-porn rhetoric, it is notable in that Craft has a long history of using her First Amendment right to free speech to speak out against the First Amendment).

Gail Dines

The man “makes hate” to the woman, as each sex act is designed to deliver the maximum amount of degradation.  Whether it be aggressive fellatio or violent sodomy, the goal of porn sex is to illustrate how much power he has over her.  Yet the women are still portrayed as enjoying these scenes.  Images like these are commonplace on the internet and shape the way men think about sex, relationships and intimacy.

Andrea Dworkin

Heterosexual intercourse is the pure, formalized expression of contempt for women’s bodies.

Marriage as an institution developed from rape as a practice.

One can know everything and still be unable to accept the fact that sex and murder are fused in the male consciousness, so that the one without the imminent possibly of the other is unthinkable and impossible.

Romance is rape embellished with meaningful looks.

Under patriarchy, no woman is safe to live her life, or to love, or to mother children. Under patriarchy, every woman is a victim, past, present, and future. Under patriarchy, every woman’s daughter is a victim, past, present, and future. Under patriarchy, every woman’s son is her potential betrayer and also the inevitable rapist or exploiter of another woman.

(Yet, Dworkin apologists now insist that “she never hated men.”)

Melissa Farley

It is not possible to protect the health of someone whose “job” means that they will get raped on average once a week.

Just as we know that violent men from all social classes batter women, so we also know that the difference between pimps who terrorize women on the street and pimps in business suits who terrorize women in gentlemen’s clubs is a difference in class only, not a difference in woman hating.

Women who ‘choose’ prostitution are sexually abused as kids at much higher rates than other women…Other ways that they ‘choose prostitution’ include poor or no education and no job that pays the rent.  Prostitution is a choice based on lack of survival options.

(The first quote is from an argument against harm reduction policies such as condom distribution, the second from a tirade against strippers and the third from a denial that women like me [or most other sex worker advocates] actually exist).

Sheila Jeffreys

When a woman reaches orgasm with a man she is only collaborating with the patriarchal system, eroticizing her own oppression…

Catharine MacKinnon

Empirically, all pornography is made under conditions of inequality based on sex, overwhelmingly by poor, desperate, homeless, pimped women who were sexually abused as children.

Men who are in prison for rape…were put in jail for something very little different from what most men do most of the time and call it sex.  The only difference is they got caught.

Kate Millet

Prostitution, when unmotivated by economic need, might well be defined as a species of psychological addiction, built on self-hatred through repetitions of the act of sale by which a whore is defined.

Robin Morgan

I claim that rape exists any time sexual intercourse occurs when it has not been initiated by the woman, out of her own genuine affection and desire.

I feel that ‘man-hating’ is an honorable and viable political act, that the oppressed have a right to class-hatred against the class that is oppressing them.

Pornography is the theory, and rape the practice.

Read Full Post »

Down Under

Posted in Current Events, Perception, Philosophy, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 9, 2011| 37 Comments »

Do you come from a land down under?
Where women glow and men plunder?
Can’t you hear, can’t you hear the thunder?
You better run, you better take cover.  –  Ron Strykert & Colin James Hay

Perhaps it’s due to their geographical isolation, the reversal of the seasons, or their exposure to the Aurora Australis or some esoteric exhalation from the Antarctic regions or South Pacific.  Or maybe it’s something in the food down there, or a frontier environment which fostered individualism without the congenital tumor of Puritanism which still afflicts America.  But whatever the reason, it seems as though the people of Australia and New Zealand are a lot more practical and sensible than the rest of the English-speaking world about a lot of things, including sex work.  As we’ve discussed before, New Zealand decriminalized prostitution entirely in 2003, and though our trade is only legalized in Australia most of the laws aren’t nearly as arbitrary and onerous as those of most legalization regimes.  On May 12th the Prostitution Licensing Authority of the State of Queensland released an analysis of the Swedish Model, essentially dismissing it as a load of politically-motivated codswallop unsubstantiated by facts.  The report is a joy to read; its arguments are lucid and its viewpoint so well-informed that I honestly had to keep reminding myself that it was a government report rather than a tract released by a sex worker rights organization!  Here are a few highlights:

Gunilla Ekberg, Co-Executive Director, Coalition Against Trafficking in Women and former Special Advisor to the Swedish Government…has previously said that:  “My whole life has been about ending male violence against women”.  That Ekberg could [make this] claim…indicates a peculiar zealotry.  Her extremist, one-dimensional views are evident from this statement, describing clients of sex workers as sexual predators and rapists:  “In prostitution, men use women’s and girls’ bodies, vaginas, anuses, mouths for their sexual pleasures and as vessels of ejaculation, over and over and over again.  Prostitution is not sexual liberation; it is humiliation, it is torture, it is rape, it is sexual exploitation and should be named as such.  Consequently, males who use women and girls in prostitution are sexual predators and rapists.”  All sex workers are seen through the prism of passive victimhood and the proponents of the Swedish model deny that any person could ever freely choose to work in the sex industry.  Ekberg argues that…the dominant position of men in society means that for women freedom of choice is illusory because it is not possible to choose from equal alternatives…Laws which in any way give legitimacy to the sex industry by legalising or decriminalising prostitution are decried as legitimating violence and abuse of women by males and entrenching patriarchy…

After a section describing the British flirtation with Swedish-style laws and a profile of Australian anti-prostitution crusader Sheila Jeffreys (which is so good I’m saving it for tomorrow), there is a discussion on “a woman’s right to choose what she does with her body, who she wants to have sex with, and the form that sex will take,” concluding with these paragraphs:

The problem with the radical feminist perspective of sex work is that it is inherently simplistic and relies on stereotypes.  So that sex workers are all from marginalised and impoverished backgrounds, are poorly educated, drug addicted, have been abused as a child, are homeless, have been trafficked or coerced, and generally have no other choice but to prostitute themselves.  This not only appeals to, but reinforces, commonly held community prejudices about sex workers.  This is clear from…Swedish Government publication[s]…[which] ignore…that there are women (and men) in sex work from a wide variety of backgrounds who have consciously chosen to enter the sex industry after considering a range of options, and who have diverse motivations for selling sex.  High earnings (without requiring formal qualifications) in combination with flexible working hours are generally cited as the predominant reasons for sex work…The Selling Sex in Queensland 2003 report found that about one in four sex worker respondents had completed a university degree.  Similarly, the June 2009, Working in Victorian Brothels report found that, “sex worker respondents to this study revealed high levels of training”.  This would tend to indicate that these individuals were involved in sex work not because of lack of education and other skills, not as a result of not having any alternative employment options but because they had chosen to sell sex…This certainly does not support the claim of Ekberg that, “99% of the women in prostitution are certainly not willing to be there”.

There are undoubtedly individuals who are selling sex who are unhappy and would rather not be doing it but the same could be said of any occupation.  To some extent, freedom of choice is an illusory concept.  If we were truly free, how many of us would be in our current jobs?  An annual survey of United States job satisfaction found that only 45 per cent of respondents were happy with their jobs in 2009, down from 49 per cent in the previous year.  This means that more than one in two workers are unhappy in their job.  Why do they turn up to work each day, however reluctantly, even though they have no job satisfaction?  Because they have a standard of living to maintain, mouths to feed, and a mortgage or rent and bills to pay.  Because despite the drudgery, monotony and unpleasantness of dragging themselves to work each day, the consequences of not working are too awful to contemplate.  Why should it be any different for sex workers?

…the inherently condescending and paternalistic (although maternalistic would be more apt) nature of the Swedish model…tells all women selling sex that they are victims and that they need saving, even if they do not realise or are incapable of realising it.  It tells them that there is no way that they could possibly have chosen to be a sex worker or in the terminology of radical feminists, a ‘prostituted woman’.  The Swedish law fundamentally infantilises women and tells them that they are incapable of making rational choices.  It is the state telling those women, we do not actually care what you think, because we know best.  In this regard, it is instructive that sex workers or sex worker organisations were not even consulted on the Swedish law.  It would be hard to think of any other area of policy where the major stakeholders, those most affected by the law, were not even consulted.  Rather than being supportive of women, some sex workers and commentators have argued that it is oppressive…

I promise, I had nothing to do with writing this report!  The reason it sounds so much like what I write on the subject is that it’s the truth; two intelligent authors who respect the rights of individuals to self-determination, both looking at the same set of clear facts with open minds, are bound to make similar observations.  The next section is an analysis of the claims made about the Swedish model; it draws upon work by Petra Östergren, Laura Agustín, Nick Davies and others to reach the same conclusions as Dodillet and Östergren did in the paper I quoted in my column of May 22nd.  And here’s its conclusion:

The available evidence does not match the widely heralded rhetoric of the success of the Swedish model in practically eliminating prostitution.  Even the best that the Swedish Government’s own Skarhed Report can conclude is that prostitution has not increased in Sweden.  Hardly a ringing endorsement.  There is some evidence that the prohibition on the purchase of sexual services has driven the sex industry underground and sex workers feel less secure and consider themselves at greater risk of violence.  The law does not protect sex workers who have been left worse off as a result.  Trafficking is conflated with prostitution, so that all migrant women engaging in prostitution must be victims of trafficking and exploitation.  One of the worst effects has been to marginalise an already stigmatised group in society.  Sex workers have described how they feel like second rate citizens and they are infantilised by being told they could not possibly have freely chosen to enter the sex industry.  They are not prostitutes, and certainly not sex workers, but prostituted women.  They are told that they are disempowered victims of male violence and exploitation, even if they are incapable of comprehending that themselves because of a false consciousness syndrome.  Their own views and experiences are discounted.  They are deprived of their autonomy and agency as individuals.  This is incompatible with the principles of a liberal democracy.  Conversely, a harm minimisation model respects the right of adults to freely choose to enter the sex industry but puts in place measures to better protect the health, safety and welfare of sex workers and clients.

As I’ve said before, it’s really reassuring to know that at least some people who are not themselves sex workers get it.

Read Full Post »

Because We Say So

Posted in Current Events, Perception, Philosophy, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 8, 2011| 29 Comments »

Will the advancing waves obey me, Bishop, if I make the sign?”
Said the Bishop, bowing lowly, “Land and sea, my lord, are thine.”
Canute turned towards the ocean–“Back!” he said, “thou foaming brine.
From the sacred shore I stand on, I command thee to retreat;
Venture not, thou stormy rebel, to approach thy master’s seat:
Ocean, be thou still!  I bid thee come not nearer to my feet!”
But the sullen ocean answered with a louder, deeper roar,
And the rapid waves drew nearer, falling sounding on the shore;
Back the Keeper and the Bishop, back the king and courtiers bore.  –  William Makepeace Thackeray, “King Canute”

Lawheads are probably the single greatest obstacle to human freedom on the planet; it is impossible to estimate how much suffering and oppression come of the ludicrous notion that a government has the power to legislate reality.  Modern lawmakers, unfortunately, are craftier than King Canute; they avoid demonstrating their impotence by attempting to command the moon and tides, and instead concentrate on forcing others to pretend that their pretenses are real by defining behaviors they wish to suppress as crimes and “social ills”.  Using violence and force to compel others to give up their preferred lifestyle can then be labeled “rehabilitation”, and enslaving priestesses in sweatshops can be represented as “helping” them.  The following appeared on May 11th on the website God Discussion.com:

Despite the fact that the tradition of Deuki temple prostitution was formally abolished in Nepal with the 1990 constitution which declared human trafficking and exploitation illegal, many women are still living in temples in the provinces of Western Nepal as Deuki Temple prostitutes.  In the Nepalese Deuki tradition, common in western Nepal, a young girl, usually from a poor family, would be sold to a rich family by her parents.  The rich family would then offer her to the gods to serve as a temple prostitute in exchange for the blessings and favor of the gods.  Alternatively, a poor family might simply leave its daughter in the temple as gift to the gods and pray that the gods reward them with good fortune.  Once a girl is so offered she is abandoned to her own means.

Deukis are expected to support themselves by providing sacred sex services to male visitors to the temple.  According to a longstanding western Nepalese tradition, sex with a Deuki was spiritually cleansing and offered the man opportunity of remission of his sins.  NGOs have been providing assistance to Deuki prostitutes in Nepal to start a new life, and provide education for their fatherless children.  The NGOs have been working on self-employment programs in skill development centers set up for the Deukis.  But a new report shows that the efforts at rehabilitating the Deukis in Nepal have not been entirely successful.  A local NGO estimates the number of Deukis yet unreached by rehabilitation efforts in western Nepal at about 2000.  The report states that the younger Deukis have benefited more from the program than older ones and that the greater proportion of women still living as Deuki prostitutes are older ones unable to acquire new skills and benefit from the self-employment and skill acquisition programs.

Dutta Ram Badu, manager of Swaraj Samajhikk Sanstha, one of the NGOs helping the Deukis says, “The young women have changed their lives for the better by taking advantage of the various trainings, but the government has not shown interest in the older women.”  Some have suggested that the older Deukis could be helped by setting up homes for them where they may form self-help communities with cottage industries in such vocations as needle work.  Child labor and prostitution remains a major social ill in Nepal and most of the human trafficking is across [the] Nepalese border into India.

It would be difficult to invent a better example of lawhead propaganda than this one.  The stink of racist paternalism pervades the article from the very first sentence:  an ancient religious tradition dating back into prehistory is defined as “human trafficking and exploitation”, and the author appears surprised that it did not obediently vanish upon being “formally abolished”; I am irresistibly reminded of the pundits who predicted that the 18th Amendment would magically remove the desire for liquor from the minds of Americans.  Then in the second paragraph we are told that “rehabilitating” (brainwashing) the priestesses into factory and sweatshop workers “has not been entirely successful” (in other words, it hasn’t been at all successful).  One of the “rescuers” who is “helping” the Deukis to “change their lives for the better” by becoming wage-slaves believes the only reason the older ones don’t “take advantage of training” is that the government has not “shown interest in” them (i.e., it hasn’t forcibly thrown them out of the temples as the “rescuers” desire).

Am I defending the practice of selling children to temples?  No, of course not, but just because I’m opposed to agricultural slavery and sweatshops doesn’t mean I think farms and factories should be banned.  The Nepalese law throws the baby out with the bathwater; it would have been a simple matter to outlaw slavery, require Deukis to be of the local age of consent and to enter the temple voluntarily, and then to provide “rehabilitation” to those who wished to leave.  But no, as is typical of governments the world over Nepal instead prefers to define problems into existence and then attempt to “solve” them by brute force.

When I want to break an egg I do so on the side of a bowl, then discard the shell; if I need the yolk separated I crack the egg into a separator, then gently shift it around until the white drains into a bowl and the unbroken yolk is left behind.  But if a government wishes to break an egg it does so with a sledgehammer, then has to laboriously pick all the bits of shell out of the egg, clean up the splattered mess on the walls and counters, frequently replace bowls shattered by accident and repeatedly sterilize the sledgehammer.  And since it’s impossible to keep a yolk intact in the process, all recipes involving separated whites or yolks must be banned and meringues, macaroons, waffles and angel food cake must be labeled “contraband”.  But lest citizens consider this tyranny, a modern regime then demonstrates its immense compassion by forcing those who create or enjoy such treats into “rehabilitation” by telling them that raw vegetables are much better…and proving the point by giving them nothing else to eat.

Read Full Post »

Full of Themselves

Posted in Miscellaneous, Perception, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on June 7, 2011| 81 Comments »

Unless we include a job as part of every citizen’s right to autonomy and personal fulfillment, women will continue to be vulnerable to someone else’s idea of what “need” is.  –  Gloria Steinem

I always find it fascinating when women in professions which are only barely different from prostitution (such as stripping or domination) or historically connected to prostitution (such as acting and massage) get all holier-than-thou, proclaiming themselves “better” than we are or even attacking us as “criminals” or “degenerates” or whatever.  Some of them even become actively involved in prohibition, in an obvious attempt to distance themselves from us and pretend that their jobs are not remotely similar.  Recently, A.K. Smith called to my attention this example from the June issue of Massage Today; though I can completely sympathize with any profession wanting to prevent credential fraud, the author’s wounded, self-righteous tone reveals this as a mere cloak for an anti-whore philippic.

For decades, the massage profession has battled the stereotype that it is a front for prostitution.  While the occasional bad apple can still be found in the bunch, the profession has made significant strides in recent years to combat this false belief.  Hospitals and health care centers nationwide have begun to embrace massage as a compliment to their traditional medical practices and most states have established licensing criteria for professionals who have the proper education and skills to become legitimate practitioners.

Right, and in civilized countries nursing homes have begun to embrace prostitution as a means of satisfying the needs of their patients for sex and companionship, and many of those countries have licensing criteria for prostitutes as well.  So by the author’s own logic, that makes our profession every bit as “legitimate” as hers.  I might also point out that if our profession were decriminalized, nobody would need to use hers or any other as a “front”.

Nevertheless, criminals have continued to sully the profession’s good name and in California an investigation by the state’s certification board has uncovered their latest tactic:  phony massage school transcripts.  Amazingly, prior to the investigation by California Massage Therapy Council (CAMTC), it was legal to sell a fake transcript in the state.  Transcripts – along with criminal history records – are key credentials in the state’s massage therapist certification system that allows therapists to practice legally.  The investigation began when the CAMTC discovered patterns in which certain “schools” seemed to have large numbers of graduating student[s] with prostitution arrest records.  Armed [with] this and information from other sources, the CAMTC brought in an undercover investigator who would discover that these “graduates,” mostly women of South Asian and South American descent, were part of a vast network of human traffickers profiting from prostitution.

Since it’s no longer fashionable to attack whores as criminals merely for being whores, the author dresses them up as “human traffickers” instead.  And not just plain old garden variety “traffickers” either, oh no!  They were “part of a vast network”! You saw it here first, readers; the California Massage Therapy Council did what the FBI couldn’t:  uncover PROOF of a “vast network” of traffickers!  Maybe we should put the CAMTC in charge of federal criminal investigations, since they’re so good at it.

The undercover investigator found that human traffickers were selling phony massage school transcripts so prostitutes could pose as legitimate therapists and work or operate massage parlors that are nothing more than fronts…”Police departments who work with us, gave us every prostitution arrest along with the name of the schools they claimed they had gone to,” said the investigator.  Information was also obtained from the National Certification Board for Therapeutic Massage and Bodywork, as well as states like Texas that maintain close records of prostitution arrests.

The horror!  The horror!  We’ve gotta keep them dirty whores out of every other profession…oops, I mean rescue them from human trafficking by preventing their holding down other jobs in the future…oops, I mean rescue them from enslavement by keeping them out of trained jobs so they can only work the most menial…hmmmm…what do I mean?

At a visit to one of these “schools,” the investigator was taken to the back to meet with the Assistant School Director.  “This one in particular looked nothing like a school.  It was an ordinary house.  Not to be stereotyping, but she looked like a madam with very provocative clothing and makeup.  I told her I was interested in (buying a transcript) and she said ‘yes, no problem’ and asked me to come back in a few days with a check,” said the investigator.  “Some operated that way, at others, I was in and out with a transcript in two hours”…The investigator told Massage Today that in one waiting room, there were “many young women of Asian descent dressed provocatively.”  The investigator also said several of the bogus schools that came under scrutiny were also clearly houses of prostitution.  “At this one place, it was pretty obvious they were conducting prostitution on the premises.  The men who ran the place were lecherous and disgusting and had no qualms about commenting on my appearance,” the investigator said.  “In one of the schools, I was in an office with a sliding door to the exterior.  Men kept coming in that way saying they were there for massage appointments, but they looked and acted like johns,” the investigator said…

My jaw literally dropped on reading this section; I’m picturing the writer as a 90-year-old schoolmarm clutching her pearls.  The pervasive racism of the entire article, the obsession with the women’s clothing, the use of tortured phraseology (“conducting prostitution on the premises”), the incredible subjectivity of the “investigator’s” statements (“the men…were lecherous and disgusting”) and the asinine 19th century stereotypes (how does she know what a so-called “john” looks or acts like?  Personal experience perhaps?) would make me think this whole article was a bad joke if it hadn’t been published in an actual trade publication; I honestly had to check to make sure I wasn’t reading The Onion.  But what do I know about prostitution?  I obviously can’t be a “real” madam, because I’m not Asian or South American and don’t wear “very provocative clothing and makeup.”

Read Full Post »

The Versatile Blogger Award

Posted in Biography, Favorites, Miscellaneous, tagged , , , on June 6, 2011| 32 Comments »

This means so much more to me this time, I don’t know why.  I think the first time I hardly felt it because it was all too new.  But I want to ‘thank you’ to you.  I haven’t had an orthodox career.  And I’ve wanted more than anything to have your respect.  The first time I didn’t feel it.  But this time I feel it.  And I can’t deny the fact that you like me…right now…you like me.  Thank you.  –  Sally Field, Academy Award acceptance speech (1984)

Last Friday, May 27th, I was informed by The Naked Listener that he had nominated me for the Versatile Blogger Award (or “Versy” for short).  Now, for a woman generally regarded as bright I can be rather slow on the uptake when it comes to pop-cultural stuff; as I’ve mentioned previously I’m actually fairly new to the whole blog thing (reading or writing), so I had never heard of the Versy before and assumed it was a regular award-award that people had to vote on; I therefore waited for further news but did not presume that I would have much chance at winning because IMHO I’m not all that versatile.  But after his next email to me the wheels started to turn a bit and I realized that for this informal “award” the nomination was equal to a win, provided one fulfills the rules of acceptance, which are as follows:

Official Rules of the Award

1) Thank the award-giver(s) and link back to them in your post.
2) Tell your readers seven (7) things about yourself.
3) Give this award to up to fifteen (15) recently discovered bloggers.
4) Contact those bloggers and let them in on the exciting news.

I knew I’d have no trouble with three of those; it was the third one which gave me pause because I’m actually quite soft-hearted when it comes to my friends and I didn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings by excluding him!  So I thought about it for a few days and decided that I would add two criteria of my own:  the recipients should be truly versatile, i.e. post on more than one topic (or at least a broad range of stuff within that topic) and should be relatively new to blogging (established no earlier than 2010).  Since as I see it the “award” is really a way of calling others’ attention to bloggers, I feel those who need it most aren’t well-established and popular blogs but rather ones which IMHO don’t get enough attention.

So, first of all, a big “Thank You!” to The Naked Listener, who is a regular reader and commenter here since at least early December; you may not only be interested in his blog, but in his other 15 nominations (he cheated a teensy bit) as well.  To my protest that I wasn’t all that versatile a blogger he responded that I deserved it “for being as versatile as anyone could ever be talking about whores and the law.”  I reckon I can’t really deny that!

Seven Things About Maggie McNeill

I’m pretty open with saying things about myself in this blog, so I decided to tell you a few things that A) I don’t recall mentioning before, which B) aren’t likely to come up in posts in the near future.

1)  I don’t actually have a favorite color; I have various favorites for various things, and sometimes even those change.  The only color I never wear is yellow, because it makes my skin seem sallow and results in people asking me “are you feeling well?”  I change my nail polish color every three weeks; purple during Carnival, red near Valentine’s Day, green for the vernal equinox, pastels for the rest of the spring, sapphire blue at the beginning of July, metallics for the rest of the summer, earth-tones in autumn, black at Halloween and the shiniest red I can find for Yuletide.

2)  My favorite recording artists are The Beatles, Blondie, Heart, Meat Loaf, Joe Satriani and Vangelis; I’m also rather partial to Rush and Blue Oyster Cult, and there are lots of others I like enough to own several CDs of.  My favorite composers are Bach and Beethoven.

3)  I don’t care much for broadcast media; I stopped watching network television about 1980, public and independent television in the mid-‘90s, and cable about ten years ago.  And I haven’t listened to the radio since the early ‘90s.  But I have a really huge collection (600+) of music CDs, and a even bigger one (1500+) of DVDs.  My secret:  I never, ever, ever pay full price; at least 80% of my discs are used, and I burned at least 10% of my collection to disc myself.

4)  I don’t know how many books I have, but it’s a lot.  Definitely more than the DVDs, and that’s not even counting the cookbooks or the comics.

5)  Unless I’m working outside I prefer skirts to pants, and my favorite clothes are these wonderful embroidered rayon dresses which come from India.  They come in every color imaginable and a large variety of styles, and are very figure-flattering.  When I must wear jeans, I try to get them in colors rather than plain old blue, though that’s much harder nowadays than it used to be (in the ‘80s and ‘90s I could find green, white, purple, pink or magenta with no problem at all).  I like spandex but can’t stand polyester, and I won’t wear a nightgown unless it’s made of either silk or nylon.

6)  I love to cook and bake, and I make EVERYTHING from scratch except phyllo (the premade stuff is actually cheaper and better) and a couple of quick-fixes to be used in dire emergencies.  Oh, and it’s just as cheap to buy cheese already grated as it is to buy the blocks and grate it oneself.  My favorite appliance is my Kitchen Aid stand mixer, which is IMHO a girl’s best friend.

7)  I need three pillows to sleep; two for my head and the third to go sort of between my tits to keep me from rolling from my side onto my stomach (which since my boob job is far too uncomfortable).  I can’t sleep on my back at all.

My Nominees for the Next Award (in alphabetical order)

I’m only choosing ten because all the others I might have picked are either not really blogs per se or else they’re older and more established than I’m allowing.

1)  A.K. Smith Books (sex work, but versatile topics)
2)  Brandy’s Bedroom (the only hooker-blogger I know who is nearly as prolific as I am)
3)  Econjeff (practically the definition of “versatile”)
4)  FreedomWonk (“Public policy through the lens of liberty…and other stuff”)
5)  I Hadn’t Meant to Tell You This… (ruminations on all sorts of things!)
6)  Isle of Hemingway (sex work, politics, economics and more)
7)  Little Revolutions (“capricious spells of neurotic obsession on various subjects”)
8)  Sex Hysteria (far more versatile than its name would suggest, and this award is a shameless attempt to get Dave to start updating it again)
9)  Sincerely, Kelly James (sex work, civil liberties, politics, philosophy…)
10) Strippr (mostly about stripping, but with a lot of attention to other sex work as well)

If your blog doesn’t appear here or in my links and you think it’s one I might be interested in, send me a link!  As you’ve probably noticed, I often call attention to other blogs I feel might interest my readers.

Read Full Post »

Perquisites

Posted in Perception, Philosophy, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on June 5, 2011| 25 Comments »

She was a Phantom of delight
When first she gleamed upon my sight;
A lovely Apparition sent
To be a moment’s ornament.  –  William Wordsworth

Sometimes there’s a major cultural gap between whores and amateurs; either we say or write things that most amateurs seem completely unable to comprehend, or else they make a big deal about something which seems to us much ado about nothing.  The particular story which made me think about this was this one published on the BBC News website on May 20th, which came to my attention via EconJeff on the 24th:

[Munich Re, the world’s biggest re-insurer,] held a party [in 2007] for salesmen where they were rewarded with the services of prostitutes…The gathering was held at a thermal baths in the Hungarian capital Budapest as a reward to particularly successful salesmen.  There were about 100 guests and 20 prostitutes were hired…[the women wore] colour-coded arm-bands designating their availability, and…had their arms stamped after each service rendered…guests were able to take the women to four-poster beds at the spa “and do whatever they liked”…”The women wore red and yellow wrist bands.  One lot were hostesses, the others would fulfil your every wish.  There were also women with white wrist bands.  They were reserved for board members and the very best sales reps.”  A spokesman for Ergo [a division of Munich Re] told the BBC that the party had happened, but said it was not the usual way of rewarding their employees…”We’ve taken all the right steps to prevent it happening again,” he said.  “It was a mistake but we are very sure that it was a unique event.  The new people of the sales organisation introduced a very personal commitment that these things should not happen again.”

I’m trying very hard to grasp how a sales reward party held four years ago can be considered news in any way.  Companies do this sort of thing all the time as an incentive to salespeople:  top producers are flown to some resort, put up in luxury, feted and sometimes showered with gifts and personal services such as massages or (in the case of saleswomen) makeovers.  Since prostitution is legal both in Germany and Hungary, what’s the problem?  Obviously nobody complained because if he had this would’ve been current non-news in 2007 instead of old non-news in 2011.  Did some radical feminists get upset or something, or was the party held without the board’s permission?  Did the randy Germans rack up too high a tab, or did the tax men reject the cost as an allowable business expense?  Because if it’s the latter, and you agree with the disallowance, maybe you’d better sit down because you’re not going to like what you read next:  this happens on a much smaller scale all over the world, all the time.

One of the perks of many executive or sales jobs is a company expense account; the employee is allowed considerable leeway in spending at restaurants, clubs and other entertainment venues because it is recognized that a little wining and dining goes a long way toward winning customers (and that includes politicians being wooed by lobbyists).  In other words, a few hundred dollars worth of food and entertainment can result in many thousands or even millions in business.  And though prudish accountants might balk at payouts to strip clubs and call girls, they don’t have to know; the racy names of many adult entertainment companies are just DBAs, and the actual names on their business licenses are either neutral (mine was a set of initials) or sound like those of other hospitality industry companies.

Most of the time the girls don’t even directly realize they’re being employed as bribes, but if you are an escort who’s ever been hired by one man for another (outside of bachelor-party arrangements or dads initiating sons) you have served in this capacity, even if the guy who hired you referred to the gift’s recipient as his “friend”.  And if you work in a state or national capital, a good percentage of those “friends” were either politicians or bureaucrats.  Since I’m reasonably quick on the uptake I generally recognized these situations for what they were, but I remember one instance where I didn’t have to guess because the gentleman who hired me spelled it out:  he was the regional sales representative for a large vendor of snack foods, and I was the bribe for the buyer of a large retail grocery chain to switch from his current supplier to that which employed my client.  Considering how much money was riding on the deal I couldn’t help but feel incredibly flattered, and I suspect that was exactly what my wily client intended by telling me; the self-confidence boost raised my charisma by several notches over its already-high level, and I had the buyer eating out of my hand as soon as I walked through the door.

But it’s not only high-level employees who get their companies to hire whores for them; even lower-level employees who travel for their jobs can usually manage it even without expense accounts, thanks to the magic of per diem allowances.  For those unfamiliar with the term, a per diem is a set amount of money for which employees are reimbursed when travelling on business.  Some companies insist on receipts for everything and pay only what the employee actually spends, but others prefer to avoid wasting their accountants’ time with such minutiae and  therefore simply pay the full per diem due that employee.  A man who prefers fine women to fine food can therefore easily hire an escort and be reimbursed by his company, through the simple expedient of eating much more cheaply than his per diem allows and applying the surplus toward his other appetites.  If you’re a corporate accountant and have never considered that your travelling employees might do this, I suggest you look at it philosophically:  How can it be right for the company to pay for the satisfaction of one physical need but wrong to pay for another?  You’re spending the same amount of money in either case, and a happy, relaxed employee will almost certainly do a better job.

Read Full Post »

June Updates (Part Three)

Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, Philosophy, The Dark Side, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 4, 2011| 49 Comments »

We recipients of the boon of liberty have always been ready, when faced with discomfort, to discard any and all first principles of liberty, and, further, to indict those who do not freely join with us in happily arrogating those principles.  –  David Mamet

Four short articles on subjects we’ve visited before.

How Old is Oldest? (March 12th)

Satoshi Kanazawa is no stranger to controversy, but if he had realized the firestorm his May 15th Scientific Fundamentalist column would touch off he might’ve picked a different subject.  The column attempts to explain why interviewers for a large, long-term government study called “Add Health”, who were asked to rate their interviewees’ physical attractiveness, tended to rate black women as less attractive than other women, yet did not rate black men as less attractive than other men.  The controversy has been described in many, many articles, but though this May 17th report from Huffington Post is less inflammatory than most it still makes the same basic error all the others do:  representing the offending opinion as Kanazawa’s own, when in fact he clearly stated in the article that it was the interviewers who rated the women.  Kanazawa was attacked as “racist” and the controversy has resulted in the end of his association with Psychology Today and may even have imperiled his academic position, yet nobody seems interested in recognizing that he didn’t make up the data, he only analyzed it.

Now, Kanazawa’s analysis may, as one of his colleagues at Psychology Today argues, be incorrect; I’m not good enough with statistics to follow the rebuttal.  And Kanazawa certainly could have been much more careful with his phraseology; whenever I approach an emotionally-laden topic I choose my words very carefully indeed so my meaning is unmistakably clear.  But I’m the Princess of Paranoia and 99.9% of the human race words its essays with far less caution than I employ in the composition of my grocery list.  What’s worse, most people read others’ writing even less carefully, with the result that most readers saw the words “black women less attractive”, jumped up screaming “racism!” and instantly began spreading outrage.  I can certainly understand why black women would be upset about the article, but the attacks on Kanazawa constitute a classic case of killing the messenger.  In a free country we have the right to be mistaken or offensive, and if scientists are to be censored or even lose their jobs for being wrong or pissing people off, you can kiss scientific progress in the Western world goodbye.

Backwards Into the Future (March 30th)

Colorado “authorities” are apparently so certain of the vast profits they’re going to reap from robbing sex workers’ clients, that they’re spending money they don’t yet have to harass other sex workers:

Colorado Springs authorities…assign[ed] seven detectives to spend $700 at a strip club as part of a [March 5th] liquor compliance audit and prostitution sting…[which] found alcohol violations but no prostitution…Lt. John Godsey…says the $700 came from money seized in other undercover investigations.  Godsey says $100 per…[man] trying to blend in seems about right…An attorney for the club says the owners voluntarily surrendered the club’s liquor license.  The club is now all nude and doesn’t serve liquor.

Readers from civilizations more advanced than Colorado may not understand that last line; in some American states dancers in clubs where liquor is served can only go topless, and clubs which allow fully-nude dancing can’t serve liquor.  Presumably, states with such laws believe that exceeding a certain “sin density” in a confined area will cause a degradation of the space-time continuum, or something.  In any case, here’s yet another example of armed hooligans being paid to indulge their perversions (in this case trying to trick strippers into crossing one of the arbitrary lines which will excuse their being abducted and humiliated) on company time and at the taxpayers’ expense.

Subtle Pimping (April 8th)

It’s official; Kristin Davis is now the third member of The Honest Courtesan’s Hall of Shame along with Karen Sypher and Capri Anderson.  Regular readers will recall that this dishonor is reserved for those whores who have most disgraced our profession by their incredibly disgusting behavior.  I first took notice when Davis claimed only 5% of whores were professional and nominated her when she claimed that 80% of escorts are coerced, but these egregious violations of sisterhood had not yet been crowned by a blatant violation of professional ethics until May 19th, when she revealed or claimed (the veracity of the statement doesn’t matter) that disgraced IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn was once a client of hers:

Kristin Davis said she provided young women for the IMF chief in 2006…and that one complained about his “aggressive” behaviour.  “He was a client of my agency…When men abuse women I’m no longer going to protect their identities”.  Mr. Strauss-Kahn…has been charged with sexually attacking a 32-year-old hotel maid at the Manhattan Sofitel…He denies the claims and is being held in Riker’s Island prison.  Miss Davis…said Mr. Strauss-Kahn…wanted an ‘All-American girl’, with a fresh face, from the mid-West,” she said.  “A girl in January 2006 complained he was rough and angry, and said she didn’t want to see him again”.  In September 2006…[another girl] reported that “he was rough”, said Miss Davis, adding:  “She told me not to send any new girls to him”…

Davis’ excuse for the ethical violation is pure bullshit; if she truly cared about other women’s safety she wouldn’t be attempting to build her reputation at our expense by promoting bogus statistics which politicians could use to justify further criminalization of our profession.  She knows very well that just because a client is rough with a working girl does not mean he’s going to commit rape; if anything, rough consensual encounters may satisfy his urge to overpower women.  That’s not to say I approve of such behavior; if I had several girls complain about a client I wouldn’t send anyone else to him, either.  But that still doesn’t constitute evidence of rape any more than reading a book about explosives means that a person is guilty of a bombing.  Kristin Davis doesn’t care about “men abusing women”; her behavior has made it abundantly clear that she cares only about herself and will say whatever will get her the most attention, whether it’s true or not and no matter whom it hurts.

The Eye of the Beholder (May 11th)

Individual liberties are not subject to restriction merely because they offend others; unless a third party is actually injured no government has the right to ban consensual adult behavior, even if that behavior upsets or disgusts most people.  Back in December there was a perfect example when Columbia University professor David Epstein was charged with incest for a three-year relationship with his adult daughter, and recently another father-daughter couple appeared on a TV talk show (as reported in Jezebel on May 17th):

Recently The Steve Wilkos Show…aired a…story about a father and his 18-year-old daughter who had been estranged during the girl’s childhood but reconnected through MySpace when the daughter, Britney, became an adult.  They struck up a romantic relationship…The footage—which features Britney and her father, Morgan, in a deep French kiss…is disturbing to say the least, but apparently it gets worse…Wilkos mentions that the couple “provided proof” that they were in a sexual relationship, which one source tells us was “video documentation” and that the “dad had filmed it”…

I don’t mind telling you that I find this creepy, icky, weird and sad on a number of levels and that I’m 95% sure that the woman will regret it at some point in the future, but I could say the same thing about doing cocaine or obsessive levels of body piercing.  In the days before reliable birth control and genetic testing incest laws had the valid rationale of preventing inbreeding, but with the advent of those resources (and the descent of eugenics into disfavor) such arguments have lost their former impact.  So should we really ban sexual relationships just because others find them skeevy?  If you think so, tell that to your friends who support same-sex marriage.  Being a free adult means having the “right to be wrong,” to make decisions others find questionable or even distressing and which may even result in considerable harm to oneself.  Still not convinced?  Take a look at the debate in the comment thread after that article and see how you feel about statements like “Do you actually believe that just because a woman says ‘okay’ to have sex, that everything’s okay?”  The arguments against tolerance – that adult women cannot be trusted to make their own sexual decisions, that in a “bad” relationship it’s always the man who is wrong, that there can be a crime without a victim – are the same ones used to rationalize criminalization of sex work and a host of other things.  Tolerating others’ unpleasant or even self-destructive behavior is the price we pay for others tolerating ours.

Read Full Post »

June Updates (Part Two)

Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Philosophy, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 3, 2011| 11 Comments »

I repeat … that all power is a trust; that we are accountable for its exercise; that from the people and for the people all springs, and all must exist.  –  Benjamin Disraeli

More updates to old stories; this time they’re all about alleged abuse of power.

License to Rape (November 16th)

As Dave Krueger asked in his May 16th guest blog on The Agitator, “Why is it called crime when other people do it, but “misconduct” when a cop does it?”  Rapes, assaults and even murders committed by cops are habitually downplayed, excused or even ignored as in this report on the rampant abuse in the San Diego police department from the May 16th Atlantic:

In San Diego, ten police officers are currently accused of serious misconduct in unrelated cases that include allegations of rape, stalking, drunk driving, domestic abuse, and sexual assault.  One of the officers has been charged with sexually assaulting five women while he was on duty.  Another is alleged to have told a woman that she’d be arrested unless she agreed to have sex with him.

The most interesting take on the rash of misconduct comes from the Voice of San Diego, where a sharp enterprise story chronicles the rise and fall of a departmental anti-corruption unit…[which] police chief [Bill Landsdowne] doesn’t have any plans to bring…back…Elsewhere in the story, I noticed this:  “Mayor Jerry Sanders…described the rash of incidents as an embarrassment and echoed Lansdowne’s assertion that it was correlated to stress among officers.”  Rape, stalking and sexual assault caused by stress?  It’s hard to have faith in city leaders after that explanation, but here’s hoping that they reconsider and bring back proactive anti-corruption measures – and that other police departments follow suit.

Just imagine if anyone but a cop tried to use “stress” as an excuse for rape; he’d probably be penalized for insulting the judge’s intelligence.  But when the rapist is a cop, officials not only believe him, they actually invent the excuse for him.

Acting and Activism (January 8th)

Trafficking “expert” Mira Sorvino is at it again, this time promoting Sacramento, California as the “leading destination for sex traffickers”, a title I’ve also heard claimed in the past few months by New York, Dallas, Miami, Portland, Atlanta and the entire state of Ohio, to name just a few.  The writer seems to believe that the Academy Award doubles as an advanced degree in criminology, sociology or both:

Human trafficking is a serious crime that can be found in the Sacramento area and requires not just law enforcement but also community participation to combat, panelists said Tuesday at a Congressional field briefing that included Academy Award-winning actress Mira Sorvino.  US Rep. Dan Lungren (R-Gold River) hosted the hearing at Rancho Cordova City Hall to highlight the fact that Sacramento’s convergence of interstate highways and large immigrant population has made it a leading destination for sex traffickers.  In 2006, Sacramento was named the city with the second highest rate of child prostitution in the US, according to FBI statistics…Human trafficking is a hidden crime, officials said, and accurate statistics for communities including Carmichael, Elk Grove, Fair Oaks and Rosemont are difficult to calculate.  “I did not know Sacramento was a boomtown for this issue,” said Sorvino, whose film credits include Mighty Aphrodite and Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion.  “This is a crime that represents the worst evil there is, that doesn’t spare children.”

It pretty much degenerates from there into the usual collection of politicians mouthing canned outrage, with a statement from a prohibitionist group and the mention of an undocumented horror story.  One politician even claimed that “Sacramento is leading the nation in getting at child sex trafficking,” which I guess makes sense since they claim to be the top destination for it (though I think those other cities might argue the point since they all seem to covet the dubious distinction).  Yet somehow Mira, that font of prostitution wisdom (deriving, no doubt, from playing a hooker in Mighty Aphrodite), didn’t know that Sacramento was having a trafficking boom, probably because they just made it up in order to attract federal and NGO funds to the area to boost its sagging economy, one of the worst in the state.

One last thing:  Anybody else notice the vaguely racist implications of  the claim that Sacramento’s “large immigrant population has made it a leading destination for sex traffickers”?  I guess those dirty immigrant perverts are all using their food stamps and the wages from the jobs they stole from real Americans to “buy children for sex” as Mira’s friend Demi puts it.

He Said, She Said (March 4th)

Sooner or later guys are going to start realizing that playing BDSM games with women they don’t know very well is like trusting a stranger with the keys to one’s house.  In the current climate of “sex abuse” hysteria, any man who does stuff like this without a signed contract, or who exceeds the parameters of that contract, is a bloody fool.  The following is edited from a May 19th AP report:

Single mothers, former drug addicts and other beaten down young women who came to wealthy businessman Henry Allen Fitzsimmons for a chance to climb out of their financial hole knew his help came with a catch.  In exchange for an allowance, a place to live and promise of a college education, they agreed to be spanked if they broke his rules.  At least six of the women say he his corporal punishment went too far, including one who says he sexually assaulted her, and the 54-year-old Virginia Beach restaurant owner faces felony charges.  “These women are victims.  They’re single moms.  They need their bills paid,” prosecutor Tom Murphy said at a court hearing Thursday.  “It’s bizarre, there’s no doubt.”  Fitzsimmons’ attorney claims his slight, white-haired client is the victim, taken advantage of by women half his age who knew what they were getting into and filed charges only after a falling out.  “He’s not a danger,” Fitzsimmons’ attorney, Moody “Sonny” Stallings Jr., told the AP.  “Strange, but he’s not a danger to anybody.”

A judge on Thursday allowed a grand jury to decide whether to indict Fitzsimmons on two felony abduction charges and three felony object sexual penetration charges filed against him.  Six other assault and sexual battery charges were dropped because prosecutors acknowledged the women had agreed to the spankings.  For months, Fitzsimmons gave each of the women $200 weekly, promised to pay for their college tuition, treated them to lavish nights on the town and even bought one a car as part of his so-called Spencer Scholarship Plan.  They were spanked if they violated rules, such as failing to call Fitzsimmons or drinking alcohol…None of the women filed charges until Fitzsimmons in April accused one of them of stealing money and fired her from his restaurant, the oceanside Envy Bar and Grill, where many of them worked.  A week later, six women began filing charges.  On Thursday, that former employee’s complaint was dropped, along with those of two other women whose only complaints were that they had been spanked.  “Who’s the victim here?” Stalling asked in court.  “They were taking the money and all of a sudden when the mother gets fired they all run down to the police station and want to file charges…They’re trying to say he preys on these women…These aren’t 15-years-olds.  These are all adults and they’re getting the money from this old guy.”

So why aren’t these women being charged with prostitution?  Is there one reader over the age of 14 who fails to see these relationships as sexual?  Fitzsimmons paid a whole harem of whores $200/week plus tuition and expensive treats to play a BDSM game with him, and then (depending on who you believe) he either got slightly more sexual or else they decided to kill the fabled goose and collect the gold from his carcass.  Bimbos who play with fire and then cry to Nanny when they get their fingers burned only perpetuate the notion that women are too stupid, weak and gullible to be allowed control over our own sex lives.

Read Full Post »

June Updates (Part One)

Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, Philosophy, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 2, 2011| 12 Comments »

Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the Government’s purposes are beneficent.  Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil minded rulers.  The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal well meaning but without understanding.  –  Louis D. Brandeis

Our monthly collection of short articles hearkening back to previous columns.

The Camel’s Nose (October 2nd)

Al Franken may not know much about intellectual freedom, but…

Back in October I told you about the “Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act,” (COICA), a proposed law which would have allowed the government to censor wide swaths of the internet; less than two months later I reported that the Senate Judiciary Committee (including “internet freedom champion” Al Franken) had unanimously voted to allow the bill to move one step closer to becoming law.  Fortunately, as this January 18th article from CNET reports, Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon single-handedly kept the bill from the Senate floor; unfortunately, according to this May 12th article from the same source, the bill’s sponsor has reintroduced it under a new name:

Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) today introduced a revised version of a controversial bill that would give the Department of Justice and individuals new powers to enforce copyright and trademark law against “rogue” and “pirate” Web sites that offer unlicensed copies of protected content or which sell illegal knock-offs of brand-name goods.  The new bill was long expected. A late draft leaked out last week.  The proposed law, “Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property” or Protect IP, includes several revisions to a draft introduced last year, known then as “Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act,” or COICA.  The drafters of Protect IP have tried to respond to some of the most severe criticisms of COICA, which was seen as dangerously vague on its definition of the kinds of Web sites that, under the proposal…Registries and other Internet infrastructure providers were especially concerned with provisions that could have required any provider of domain name look-up services to comply with court orders to block access to the underlying IP address of a condemned domain name…

But critics have already condemned the new version, noting that it not only failed to remove some of the most dangerous features of COICA, but has also added expansive provisions that the earlier draft didn’t include.  TechDirt‘s Mike Masnick, for example, notes that the narrower definition of an “Internet site dedicated to infringing activities” in Protect IP is still both broad and vague.  And the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s Abigail Phillips wrote…that “Despite some salient differences…in the new version, we are no less dismayed by this most recent incarnation than we were with last year’s draft”…Like COICA, Protect IP expands the web of enforcement techniques by requiring advertising networks and financial transaction providers to cut ties to domains found to violate the law.  But the new version now adds search engines and others to the list of providers who can be conscripted into complying with court orders.  Protect IP would require “information location tools” to “take technically feasible and reasonable measures, as expeditiously as possible,” to remove or disable access to the site associated with a condemned domain, including blocking hypertext links to the site…Perhaps most worrisome of all, Protect IP adds a provision that allows copyright and trademark holders to sue the owner/operator of a domain directly.  Again, the provision applies only to nondomestically-registered domains, but it allows the private party, like the government, to sue the domain name itself if the registrant does not have a U.S. address.  That’s important because in all cases, once a suit is initiated, the plaintiff can ask the court to issue an injunction or restraining order effectively shutting the site down…Thus, with minimal court proceedings and perhaps without any opportunity for the defendant to respond or participate, the draft law would enable the Department of Justice or a private party to effectively shut down a nondomestic Web site, putting the burden on the owner/operator to prove that the site is not “dedicated to infringing activities” as defined in the law…

The “guilty until proven innocent” mechanism of the law, not to mention its “breaking an egg with a sledgehammer” philosophy, are all too familiar to whores; perhaps I should’ve filed this under “Welcome To Our World” instead.

No Other Option (October 17th)

On May 18th Svenska Dagbladet carried this article about German “sex assistants”, whores who minister specifically to the elderly and disabled.  Since few of my readers read Swedish (I certainly can’t!) and some may lack access to translation software, I’ll paraphrase the entire article herein.  IMHO the most interesting thing about the article is its positive, accepting tone despite the fact that it was published in a Swedish newspaper, which I think you’ll agree tends to support my May 22nd statements about the true opinion of the Swedish public on the subject of sex work.

In Sweden, Catharina König would be guilty of prostitution, but in Germany she receives calls from health professionals and desperate parents.  “When people ask what I do, I usually say that I work with people with disabilities, and add that it’s sensual and erotic work.  And then they look at me with big eyes,” she laughs.  Five years ago (at the age of 47) she became unemployed, then stumbled across an article on “sex assistants”, people who help the disabled or elderly people to experience sex.  “I felt that it could be something for me, but I didn’t know if I could pull it off.  In my head, I had images of drooling and disfigured people,” she says.

Catharina König went to the Institute for Autonomy for the Disabled, a college which trains sex assistants.  Her clients are mostly elderly men in retirement homes or younger disabled men.  Sometimes, she says, they just want to see a female body, or caress it; sometimes they need help getting an orgasm.  And often they just want to lie in bed holding someone.  Many of her calls come from nursing home staff; they see that the elderly or disabled are suffering, depressed or aggressive but cannot help them.  In the case of younger people who live at home, it’s usually the mother who calls.  “Recently I was at home with a 40-year-old man who had never been with a woman, Catharina said; “At first he was terrified.  But then it became so soft and nice.”

One of Catharina König’s regulars is 58-year-old Peter, who has a spastic paralysis of the limbs.  “I am not an Adonis whom women turn to look at, but like most other men I yearn for a woman and her body,” says Peter, who wished to remain anonymous.  “In principle, I think that one should not pay for sex, but the disabled have so many disadvantages in society I claim my right to do so.”  When asked what he thought about the fact that in Sweden he would be labeled a criminal, Peter said he considers that an insulting idea.

Christina König agrees.  “Sure I’m a sex worker; I sell sexual services.  But it’s so much more than that; I’m trying to give people the feeling that they are beautiful.  It’s wrong to try to punish that.  Besides, in Germany prostitution is permitted since January 2002; the law considers the buying and selling of sexual services to be a commercial transaction, provided they are done voluntarily.  Brothels are permissible, and prostitutes pay taxes and the same charges as other self-employed people.”

Today there are many brothels which advertise that they are accessible to the disabled; their amenities include ramps for wheelchairs and staff who understand and can help.  The Association for Sexual Services, a German sex worker organization, estimates that half of the country’s nursing homes for the elderly or disabled allow prostitutes to visit their residents.  Many prostitutes have discovered this as a niche; most are a little older and have life experience, says Marion Detlef, a social worker at Hydra (an organization which provides services to sex workers in Berlin).  Detlef said that there is good cooperation with the old people’s homes, and more recently with nursing homes for the disabled as well.  “It’s still a big taboo for many people.  But even in church-based institutions, there is a growing understanding that all people have sexual needs.  As it says in the Bible, ‘Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.’”

What a sensible, enlightened view!  And what a contrast from the monstrous, asinine official attitudes toward sex work we see in nearly every story coming out of the U.S. these days.

Read Full Post »

Mind Reading

Posted in Current Events, Perception, Philosophy, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on June 1, 2011| 44 Comments »

Distinctions drawn by the mind are not necessarily equivalent to distinctions in reality.  –  Thomas Aquinas

Why do so many modern people imagine themselves to be mind readers?  It used to be that we understood that telepathy, if it exists at all, is a rare talent; scientists have tried to measure it and writers of science fiction have used it as a plot device, but nobody has yet succeeded in conclusively proving its existence.  And because the wiser leaders of the past understood this, they developed laws which basically said that when the individual or the state accuses someone of wrongdoing, the accuser must present proof rather than guesses; claims of preternatural knowledge of the thoughts of others have been disallowed in Western courts of law since at least the 18th century.  But in the past few decades, that’s all changed; the rise of identity politics and pop psychology has convinced the chronically paranoid, the hopelessly narcissistic and the borderline megalomaniacal that they have the ability to know what’s going on in the heads of others with the same level of certainty as that provided by scientific or documentary evidence.  And though at one time courts, journalists and most other educated people would have scoffed at such claims, that is no longer true.

As I mentioned in my review of Silverglate’s Three Felonies a Day, federal prosecutors in the United States no longer bother to provide evidence of mens rea (criminal intent); the very fact that the prohibited actions (whatever they might be) were performed is considered proof that the accused intentionally broke the law.  Those accused of crimes used to be referred to by police and reporters as “suspects” (thus indicating the presumption of innocence); nowadays they’re called by the ugly word “perps”, short for “perpetrators” (thus indicating the presumption of guilt).  “Sexual harassment” laws and codes require courts to analyze the hidden mental states behind otherwise-innocuous acts, and “hate crime” laws officially grant prosecutors the power to read the minds of those accused of violent crimes in order to punish them above and beyond the penalty determined by their objective actions, for the “crime” of having a normal (if ugly) human emotion.  Nor are officials the only ones who claim telepathic powers; those who embrace victimhood are always quick to point the finger and shout “racism!” or “sexism!” or “homophobia!” at those who say things they don’t want to hear, even if those things happen to be true.  Even in today’s climate of intellectual repression the truth has not yet been banned, so those who wish to suppress that truth seek to criminalize the motivation instead, and claim to be empowered with the ability to discern that motivation with crystal clarity.

Of course, this is nothing new for whores; we’re long-used to police accusing us of crimes without any proof whatsoever, though in the past they at least troubled themselves to lie or to pretend that ordinary objects and actions constitute “evidence”.  But now the Utah legislature aims to free police of the inconvenience of having to make things up by criminalizing “acting sexy”, as detailed in this May 20th AP story:

Two escort services have filed a federal lawsuit to halt a Utah solicitation law they fear could lead to the arrest of strippers or escorts who are simply acting sexy.  Utah defines solicitation as a person agreeing to sex in exchange for money.  A new law that went into effect this month broadened the definition to include any person who indicates through lewd acts, such as exposing or touching themselves, that they intend to exchange sex for money…Andrew McCullough, an attorney representing the escort services…said the law is so broad that it could allow police to arrest licensed employees of sexually oriented businesses, such as escort services or strip club dancers, for doing their job.  The expanded law includes language that makes a person exposing their genitals or touching themselves sexually an indication that they are offering sex.  Those acts are legal in Utah for private strippers.  “Most girls who touch their breasts are not telling you they’re open for sex,” the attorney said.  McCullough said the law is “virtually identical” to one struck down by a federal judge as unconstitutional in 1988.  The Utah law could be used by police to hassle businesses protected by the First Amendment, McCullough said.  For example, he said a semi-nude dancer at a strip club could be arrested for “suggestively thrusting.”  [Salt Lake City Police Chief Chris] Burbank said officers would not target anyone who is not a prostitute…

As if it’s not bad enough that normal female behavior is criminalized (technically I’d be in danger just walking down the street in Utah, since I’ve been told numerous times that almost everything I do is sexy), the discretion as to what constitutes “sexy” is left entirely up to the cop.  But the police chief promises that not a single one of the paragons of virtue under his command will ever, ever charge women with breaking this law even if they do…unless of course, those women are prostitutes.  But wait, doesn’t the law define any woman who acts that way as a prostitute?  Shhh, go back to sleep; you weren’t supposed to notice that.  What Chief Burbank actually means is that this law won’t be used alone, but rather only after a cop determines that a woman is a prostitute through use of his Super Psychic Mind Probe power; the law is just to provide a convenient excuse in court since mind-reading isn’t technically recognized under Utah law.

But as so often happens with these prohibitionist stories, the reporter saves the best for last:  “The intent is to target prostitutes, especially underage ones who are forced into the sex trade and trained to evade arrest, [law sponsor Jennifer] Seelig said.  The arrest would be the first step in helping them get off the streets.”  How can the state justify literally forcing girls into prison cells as somehow “better” than other unidentified parties allegedly “forcing” them into the sex trade, especially when the act of trying to evade arrest would seem to indicate that the “victims” prefer the latter to the former?  Why, because deep down they really want the state’s “help”, that’s why.  And how does Seelig know this?  By reading their minds, of course.

Read Full Post »

« Newer Posts