Why need I volumes, if one word suffice? – Ralph Waldo Emerson
Usually when I report on a number of short news stories in a column, I have some sort of commentary on them; these stories, however, largely speak for themselves so I present them with only minimal comment.
Well, At Least They’re Consistent
Florida is well-known for its legislative and judicial excesses, but back in the Social Purity Era its legislators apparently decided that fornication should be illegal whether money changed hands or not. The law has rarely been enforced, but a legislator now wants to get rid of it and other outdated laws; as you might expect, none of his colleagues are interested. From the August 31st Sun-Sentinel:
…”Cohabitation” of unmarried people is currently a second-degree misdemeanor, punishable by $500 or up to 60 days in jail. The same penalty applies to cheating husbands and wives — though only to opposite-sex couples. The laws have been on the books since the late 1800s, but are rarely enforced. In 2006, though, a Jacksonville woman did take advantage of the law and have her husband arrested for cheating, according to a news report. (It’s not clear how the case came out.) Now, Rep. Ritch Workman, R-Melbourne, is on a mission to repeal the statutes penalizing adultery and cohabitation, as well as other laws he finds outdated, like a requirement that all bicycle riders keep one hand on the handle bars. He filed…the bill last week — it’s HB 4021 — though he hasn’t returned phone calls about it for the past two days.
Nobody else much wants to talk about it either. Asked how Gov. Rick Scott felt about the measure, spokeswoman Amy Graham replied simply, “This isn’t an issue the governor is focused on.” The bill has no Senate counterpart. And given the almost-certain opposition of social conservatives who lobby hard on “family values” issues, it’ll face tough sledding in an election year. Consider the response of State Rep. Dennis Baxley, R-Ocala, who previously headed the Florida chapter of the Christian Coalition: “I’m not ready to give up on monogamy and a cultural statement that marriage still matters,” he said.
I guess Workman hasn’t yet learned that most politicians never want to limit the number of ways they can harass, threaten and persecute people.
Somehow, I Doubt He Thought This Through
Posted September 1st on The Smoking Gun:
A Kansas man who called police yesterday to claim that he was robbed by two female escorts hired via an online service later admitted that he just “wanted a refund” from the women. Ahmed Hasnain, 26, was arrested on a misdemeanor charge in connection with the bizarre incident at a Motel 6 in Wichita, according to a Wichita Police Department report. Hasnain…told cops that he had expected only one hooker to show up and “didn’t like that there were two women.” After paying the pair $160, Hasnain decided that he wanted his money back…So…[he] called 911 at around 5 AM to lodge his complaint. Based on his own statements, Hasnain was charged with patronizing a prostitute. Perhaps he will consider calling the Better Business Bureau the next time he wants to register a consumer complaint.
And perhaps in the future he’ll also reserve 911 for real emergencies, like McDonald’s running out of Chicken McNuggets.
The British Policy on Sex Rays
In the United States, teachers who are discovered to have done sex work in the past are removed from the classroom lest their bodies emit invisible “sex rays” which might contaminate the tender little asexual innocents who discover them by watching porn. In England, sex-ray phobia is just as prevalent, but apparently bureaucratic inertia protects sex-working teachers despite their being officially condemned. According to a BBC story from September 1st:
Benedict Garrett, 31…was found guilty of unacceptable professional conduct but left free to continue teaching. A disciplinary hearing was told pupils at Beal High School in Ilford had seen him in a trailer for a porn film. Mr Garrett said: “What is wrong about it? I can’t see anything…I don’t think I’ve done anything that goes against my values and I worked incredibly hard as a teacher. What a teacher chooses to do in their life outside that work is up to them.”
…Mr Garrett…whose [stage name] is Johnny Anglais, said he had no plans to return to teaching…He admitted it “might be slightly embarrassing” if students had seen his porn films, but “no more than me starring as a monkey in the school musical”. He said students should not have seen his pornography work, as it was intended for over-18s, but added: “It’s perfectly natural. Get over it.” He added he did not see himself as a role model, asking: “If teachers are role models, why do we tolerate teachers who smoke, when smoking is linked to thousands of deaths? Do we look at teachers who are fat and say you shouldn’t be teaching? Obesity is linked to thousands of deaths,” he added. “However, I’ve heard from students who have told me they believe I’m a role model because I’m standing up for what I’ve believe in.”
Norman Wells, from the Family Education Trust, which campaigns against pornography and supports policies which promote marriage, said: “Benedict Garrett is being naive if he imagines that performing as a stripper and appearing in porn films is compatible with teaching responsible attitudes towards sex and relationships as a teacher of personal, social and health education. The vast majority of parents would be uncomfortable, to say the least, to have their children taught by someone involved in the sleazy world of the sex industry.”
Presumably, the sleazy world of politics is OK with Mr. Wells. Maybe Melissa Petro and Tera Myers should move to the U.K.
Michael Weinstein Isn’t Happy About This
More news about the porn performer mentioned in my column of September 1st, from the Huffington Post of two days later:
An adult film performer who tested positive for HIV and caused the porn industry to shut down production as a precaution has been retested and…does not have the virus…production can now resume, said Free Speech Coalition executive director Diane Duke. “The industry will be abundantly cautious as we try to nail down the reasons for what now appears to have been a false positive result on a previous test,” Duke said. The actor, who was in Florida, had been slated to work on a shoot for Mofos.com, but production was halted last week when the test came back positive for HIV. Duke declined to release the performer’s name, age or gender, citing the person’s right to medical privacy. She also declined to say how her group learned of the case…which…was found at an out-of-state clinic that does not report to California health officials, Duke said.
The porn industry was similarly shuttered in late 2010, after porn actor Derrick Burts was diagnosed as HIV-positive. His case was confirmed, and he has since left the industry to become an advocate for the use of condoms in pornography. The Free Speech Coalition is working on a database to track sexually transmitted disease testing among porn actors, a task formerly handled by the Adult Industry Medical Healthcare Foundation before it closed in December 2010. Known as AIM, the San Fernando Valley clinic had catered to porn stars since it opened in 1998. It was forced to close because of inadequate licensing.
The last line is incorrect; the clinic was actually forced to shut down by an illegal “cease and desist” order from the Los Angeles Department of Public Health, as reported in my column of March 7th.
One Year Ago Today
“All Shapes and Sizes” discusses the huge morphological variety of human genitalia, and addresses (among other things) the oft-asked question, “what is the average penis size, really?”
We need more politicians of whatever party like Ritch Workman and less like Dennis Baxley. I hope everyone besides me and the author, Maggie, noticed that both are technically speaking part of the same party, the Republicans, alegedly the conservative party. You could find Democrats, the liberal party, who would also have such divisions for example Democratic Senator from Nevada, Harry Reid, who wants to outlaw prostitution in Nevada, the only place in the USA prostitution is legal is in a few brothels in a few counties in the state of Nevada. It sounds like Baxley and Reid should go bowling together. LOL!!!
When will these fools ever learn that too many laws make more people into criminals then ever need to be? When will these fools learn that just because something may be immoral does not mean it should be illegal like St. Augustine of Hippo and St. Thomas Aquinas said and in particular what these two eminent Christian theologians said about prostitution? The same could be said about adultry in that it should not be a crime, but it should be a valid reason for any spouse, man or woman, to be able to get the children, child support and the home if the other spouse has been the only one proven adulterous with no other extenuating circumstances as it once was prior to 1965 A.D. for divorces in the USA.
Maggie is right that it is about control and not protection of the population. It is about this and other issues too as I’ve said before. When will people learn to tell the government, it’s none of your business and leave me and everyone else even people or ideas I don’t like alone, and to be wary of the government even when one thinks the law is absolutely necessary and constitutional? When will people learn what is truly constitutional and to not try and stretch the Constitution?
“When will these fools ever learn that too many laws make more people into criminals then ever need to be?”
That’s kind of the point, Doc — to make us all “potential criminals” instead of citizens, so we’re constantly scurrying around scared of the (for profit!) prison industrial complex and not asserting our rights. A scared populace is a controlled populace.
As the late, great Laura Nyro once sung, “You’ve got to fight for your freedom — sometimes every day.”
If we’re not vigilant about who were elect and what we allow to be passed as laws, we get our freedoms eroded little by little. Also remember police departments get more money from the gov’t when they need to make more arrests via their expensive creepy SWAT teams. Fewer laws mean fewer jobs.
Hey, there’s a new twist on an old slogan: “Laws mean work for all!”
Yes, it means more government jobs, but less private sector jobs. Without the private sector, the public sector will collapse. Only the private sector can make a better economy. I agree that only private citizens can safeguard their freedoms and Machiavelli noted that a republic can only have its freedoms for its citizens gradually reduced in order to take away all individual persons’ freedoms. I hope people enjoy the coming dictatorship. I worked for the government as a U. S. Soldier and am a Veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and all I have to say is don’t trust the government just like U.S. Marine Corps. General and Republican Senate nominee in the 1930’s, Smedley Butler who gave the “WAR IS A RACKET” speech and present day Ron Paul, Republican Presidential Candidate, and former U.S. Air Force physician who dealt with the burn victims of the Vietnam War at a hospital at Fort Sam Houston, San Antonio, Texas, USA. Even U.S. Army General and later President Eisenhower warned us about a military industrial complex.
I forgot to add a few things with my response above. Smedley Butler also is a recipient of thehighest military medal,the Medal of Honor, twice.which is almost impossible to do and even more difficult to live to tell the tale. Police are largely run like military organizations. I like the police, and consider them the thin blue line against genuine crime like murder, rape etc., but I’m also very wary of them. Most police like most military will do whatever they can legally get away with, what they are ordered to do, and what they are paid for. I say this as a former Soldier and Veteran of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Police and military life tends to be like a family in many ways, but also highly dysfunctional family. It can make otherwise good people do horrible things as well as experience horrible things and the emotional toll is too often too high for at least some people. Everyone who becomes a police officer or a military person pays a high price for this lifestyle, vocation and job.. All too often the rotten people rise to the top ranks in either the police or military too. Again, i have tremendous sympathy for police and military people, but I have no illusions about them and this is why I am wary of them.
“AHF: Follow the Money” video on Youtube.
MIchael Weinstein of AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF) is a man with an agenda, and it’s got nothing to do with public health. Michael Weinstein opposes government funding of research to cure AIDS; instead, Weinstein wants those billions of government dollars to be diverted toward treatment and prevention services, the kind that he and his organization provides. Michael Weinstein and AHF even sued Pfizer over Viagra, alleging it encouraged risky sexual behavior, but Weinstein filed suit only after Pfizer turned down his multi-million dollar funding request. And what do AIDS activists say about Weinstein and AHF? the AIDS Treatment Activists Coalition has called AHF’s efforts “half-hearted” and “self-promoting” “AHF has a history of bargaining for its own interests to the exclusion of those in the community as a whole.” AHF’s campaigns “are always self-serving.” – Paul Dalton of Project Inform, Philadelphia Inquirer, August 29, 2008. “Petty” and “small-minded” – AIDS activist Michael Barr, Bay Area Reporter, January 25, 2007. Analysts have called his campaigns “demeaning”, “disturbing”, “patronizing” – Bay Area Reporter. “Ridiculous”, “extortion” – former San Francisco AIDS policy adviser Jeff Sheehy, Bay Area Reporter, January 25, 2007. Weinstein is an opportunist who shamelessly exploits the misfortunes of others. When news hit that a single adult industry performer had tested positive for HIV, Weinstein revealed his plan to make the world a better place by demanding that adult performers be required by law to wear condoms. And which AHF supporter provided the picket signs for AHF’s protests outside the Hustler Hollywood store? LifeStyles Condoms. Want to know the key to Weinstein’s real agenda? Follow the money. Michael Weinstein sure does.
I am not surprised.
Ah, thanks for this, Marla! I’m glad to know I’m not the only one outside the porn industry who sees Weinstein for what he is, and I’m especially glad that many AIDS activists do.
You’re welcome, Maggie.
Well, that’s how these things hang around, isn’t it? Don’t want to send the wrong message, don’t want to condone something bad.
If we let sex-ed consist of anything other than {stamps foot} NO!!!!! we’ll be condoning teen sex!!
If we even lessen the penalties for first-time non-violent drug possession crimes, we’ll be condoning drug use!!
If we get rid of fines for adultery, we’ll be condoning adultery!!
And, of course, if we don’t lock up hookers, clients, madams, pimps, phone operators, and boyfriends, we’ll be condoning prostitution!!
How about condoning a little freedom?
One of the sociology professors at my alma mater (a Catholic university) is known to be a male model (Black Hawk Hancock), including underwear. No objections. I don’t know of any female professors who openly do the same or something even more nude. However, considering the number of sex workers I personally know who were or who are at that school as students, I’m assuming more of the faculty are doing some sort of erotic labor.
Aspasial- that is just so wrong on every level, leaving the name and profession of one of your professors – damn learn a tad bit of couth person!
Excuse me? You might want to ask some questions before you assume anything about the situation. For example, the fact that his modeling site names both his position and the universities where he teaches. Next time you want to address me, use some caution.