The Olympics are always a chance for hosts to do some moral cleansing, and drive away undesirables by brute force. – Scott Long
“The lawyer of a man convicted of building and promoting pornographic websites [in Iran] says a death sentence against his client has been converted to life imprisonment…blogger Saeed Malekpour will spend the rest of his life in jail…” There aren’t too many other countries barbaric enough to sentence a man to life in a cage for “dirty” pictures, but I can think of at least one other.
The Eye of the Beholder (June Updates)
Pay attention, sex worker activists:
The children of three women who were murdered by Robert Pickton have filed lawsuits against the police and the serial killer…They allege the Vancouver police and the RCMP failed to properly investigate reports of missing women and failed to warn women in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside that a serial killer was likely at work, despite having evidence implicating Pickton in the disappearance of sex workers as early as 1997 and 1998…
The suspicious deaths of two prostitutes…has sparked a major investigation…The bodies of Jill Lyons and Karen Nabors, who both worked as online escorts, were discovered in an apartment building in Vancouver. Ms Lyons, 45, was discovered dead in her own apartment on August 12…The body of Ms Nabors was discovered on August 25, also in her own apartment, and police…suggest…the 48-year-old was murdered…
Another ludicrous mini-panic from the clowns who brought you idosing, jenkem and vodka-soaked tampons:
“Parents, lock up your shower supplies”…is an actual quote from an announcement made…at a middle school just outside of Richmond, VA…of…a new practice called “shamboiling”…where shampoo is brought to a rapid boil and then the fumes are inhaled for a hallucinogenic effect…one thing is certain…shamboiling is catching on quickly and…is potentially deadly…The Sheriff’s department is urging parents to check their shampoos for [ammonium lauryl sulfate] and to take the necessary precautions to keep these chemicals away from children…
Here’s the debunking on Snopes.
Police have detained a Chinese-American…on suspicion of visiting a sex worker in Beijing as authorities crack down on bloggers. Charles Xue [AKA Xue Manzi], who has over 12 million followers on Sina Weibo…regularly reposts reform-minded content…Among those questioning the motive behind the arrest was the editor of the state-run Global Times newspaper. “Cannot rule out the possibility that authorities are arresting Xue Manzi…to give him a hard time,” Hu Xijin wrote…in a blog posting that later disappeared…
Yet another “sex trafficking” opportunist exposed:
The founder of…anti-human trafficking NGO Sisha, Steve Morrish, announced…he was stepping down from his position due to a raft of allegations accusing him of financial impropriety…Sisha’s alleged financial problems were revealed publicly…on August 8 in…the Cambodian blog Penhpal. The posting alleged that money donated to Sisha…“has instead been siphoned off to pay for the NGO’s operating expenses”…
Is this idiotic enough yet? Can we stop now?
A 10-year-old girl…identified as “Ashley,” was charged by police for aggravated sexual assault…[for] playing doctor…a neighbor saw the children and called the mother of a 4-year-old boy…[whom] Ashley was inappropriately touching…Ashley’s mother…was not allowed to sit-in on the 45-minute questioning of her daughter…
If this were intended to increase sex workers’ range of options, it’s would be fine; however, it’s clearly intended as a confinement system: “Several communities in Italy have launched a campaign to ban street prostitution and reintroduce brothels, which have been banned since 1958…”
As I predicted last year, the cancer keeps spreading:
…[new] legislation…in North Carolina….increases punishments for sex traffickers, i.e. pimps, as well as for purchasers, i.e. johns. It also focuses on “treating minors involved in prostitution as the victims they are, instead of criminals,” [the bill’s sponsor] said…”The legislation also offers hope to women who escape a life of prostitution by allowing them…relief to expunge their criminal pasts once they get treatment and help”…[another law] requires pimps to register as sex offenders…
As I’ve explained before, “safe harbor” laws are bullshit that help almost nobody; “treatment” means (usually religious) “re-education”, and a “pimp” means just about anyone prosecutors decide to railroad.
Tulsa cops continue to justify persecution of adult women by pretending they’re “trafficked”: “Human trafficking has developed into a booming enterprise in Oklahoma…on a given night, the Vice Unit may deploy undercover police officers to respond to as many as 40 online advertisements posted by ‘escorts’ in preparation for prostitution stings that sometimes uncover cases of human trafficking…” Note the misplaced scare quotes, around “escorts” rather than “trafficking”.
Jessica Land interviews Dr. Melissa Ditmore, a prominent academic ally, on her research, The Encyclopedia of Prostitution and Sex Work, sex worker projects and organizations, and international issues.
Here’s an interesting article on the connection between harlotry and witchcraft:
…Prostitutes were widely believed to be specialists in erotic magic, especially the use of philtres to sway the feelings of those around them…For example, a woman may resort to a binding spell, to handicap rivals in the trade or lock down a steady client…These women were also sought by those outside the trade for their magical expertise. Those in troubled marriages might consult a prostitute to concoct a love potion to rekindle the affections of a wayward spouse…
Most of this CNN story is the usual lurid “sex trafficking” rubbish, but I want to call attention to a fascinating new development: “king of the hill” stories are now specifically claiming their subjects are the “third-busiest area for sex trafficking in the United States” (see also “Under Every Bed” below) rather than just “one of the busiest” or “in the top ten”. As usual, the Department of Justice is credited for the “statistic” despite the fact that neither it nor any other agency keeps any kind of state-by-state “trafficking” statistics. I suspect the “third largest” designation arose through confusion with the claim that “human trafficking is the third-largest criminal enterprise” (though that one’s been upgraded to second), but it will be interesting to see how many claim to be the “third largest” before anyone in the mainstream media starts to awaken.
What the Hell Were You Thinking? (TW3 #135)
A new Irish company named Safe IQ “develops safety products and services for sex workers…and raises awareness of the need for [them] to have the same protections as other workers.” Here’s its first product:
Ugly Mugs for Android is a [free] mobile phone app that automatically screens incoming and outgoing calls and text messages and alerts the phone user if the…number…is listed in the UglyMugs.ie database…When a sex worker encounters a dangerous person, they [sic] can report the incident to the ugly mug scheme, and a warning will be made available to all sex workers…
Only Rights Can Stop the Wrongs (TW3 #312)
Only a hopeless lawhead could imagine that closing red-light districts will make prostitution go away:
Hundreds of sex workers confronted the mayor of Indonesia’s second-largest city…angrily denouncing the closure of the Klakah Rejo district…The crowd later tore down a “Prostitution-Free Town” billboard erected by officials…”What’s going on?”…the mayor [said]…”We’re trying to help but they are refusing.” Surabaya is also home to Dolly, reputedly the largest red-light district in South-East Asia. The mayor said that one and other red-light districts would be closed as the city aimed to be prostitution-free by 2014.
Wisconsin is one of “the top three states” for sex trafficking, according to…Michelle Mayefske… Not all prostitution is trafficking. Some women, referred to as “renegades,” simply decide to sell sex and are not controlled or managed by anyone, but “that is very, very rare,” she said…“Gangs are now turning from drugs to human trafficking…[because] drugs can be sold only once and then they’re gone, whereas…a woman or a child can be sold over and over and over…Georgia, California and Wisconsin have the highest rates of sex trafficking in the United States, so we are in the top three”…
1) This is the second time I’ve heard this “renegade” bullshit; neither I nor anyone I asked knows where it comes from. 2) I think Mayefske is extremely confused about the concept of “sale”. 3) She needs to talk to Florida.
Veteran human rights activist Scott Long argues that activists who compare Russia’s anti-gay purge to the Nazi campaign against Jews are not only wrongheaded, but missing the most obvious comparison:
If Western gay…activists want to know what Putin’s decree will mean in practice: ask a sex worker…Before every big sporting event, the same rhetoric reverberates: Prostitutes are going to take over this town…The predictions are nearly always couched as concern for “trafficked” women, but they…come down to…anxieties over nuisances to “normal” neighbors, and…the reputation of the host city…What major sporting events bring is not an “explosion” in prostitution, but an explosion in repression…not in evil Russia, but in liberal Canada and the UK, countries that value human rights, except for sex workers, who aren’t human…Yet in London, few powerful voices opposed the Olympic rollback of sex workers’ freedom — and certainly few LGBT activists…
“The treatment of sex workers in Cuba, including confinement for the purpose of ‘re-education’, was raised by the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women…the…committee said it was “deeply concerned” about Cuba’s reluctance to address the issue of prostitution…” The United States’ confinement and “re-education” of sex workers, however, causes the committee no concern at all. Funny how that works.
…two of the largest and most well funded LGBT rights groups in the US have stayed quiet about Manning…whose revelations about the US Army’s actions epitomize social justice in action…the [silence of the] Human Rights Campaign and GLAAD…has been deafening… the HRC…[has] the financial backing of…Lockheed Martin…Booz Allen Hamilton…[and] Northrop Grumman…GLAAD has…Goldman Sachs…and Verizon…
Kate Zen takes a long, thorough look at Texas’ “prostitution diversion” program and its founder, Kathryn Griffin; she examines the program’s lack of any of the normal benefits of such schemes, its close relationship to the rescue industry, its pervasive Christian moralism and its ignoring all of the actual reasons women turn to prostitution in favor of a sin and victimization narrative.
Federal and state law-enforcement officers poured into Tukwila [Washington]…seizing three motels whose operators are suspected of participating in illegal drugs and prostitution…U.S. Attorney Jenny Durkan…said that the three hotels…have accounted for 17 percent of all calls for police services in the past year…investigators believe the owners actively profited from criminal activity…Durkan said…[her] office will…actively use…seizures to force compliance…
Uncommon Sense (Extra Edition)
Though most English-language media is pretending Zurich’s tippelzone scheme is something new, it is nothing of the kind; this article lists a number of other cities in Germany, Italy, Belgium and the Netherlands with similar setups.
…Donald Hill was acquitted…on a charge of [paying]…Alexis Wright, after a judge ruled prosecutors were not able to prove that money was exchanged. The ruling could affect any additional charges of individuals alleged to have engaged Wright’s services…
An example of why “porn filters” are a spectacularly bad idea:
A man using the British Library’s wi-fi network was denied access to…Hamlet because the text contained “violent content”…the…library said the fault was caused by a newly installed wi-fi service from a third-party provider. One security expert said the incident highlighted the “dysfunction” of internet filters…Prof Ross Anderson…[said] internet filters were “pointless” and that it was “completely inappropriate” to have one in the British Library…
That’s a bit hyperbolic … and that may be an understatement on my part.
That was Florida did that … not the U.S. government. Also – that guy is what you would call … an “outlier” as we have tens of millions of people who view porn in this country who suffer no harassment from the government at all.
Additionally – that guy was found in possession of child pornography – a particularly controversial type of porn not only in the U.S. – but just about every nation in the world.
Conversely – you’re comparing him to a guy in Iran who’s treatment is completely typical of any pornographer on the “glide slope” in any nation ruled by radical Islam. Actually, no he’s an “outlier” too since most would be executed and he’s only getting life. Lucky guy.
There is no comparison here. Hell, the guy in Iran wasn’t even accused of MAKING porn – but in constructing websites for it and promoting it. Apples and Oranges.
Chinese penalties for running porn websites … anywhere from 11 months to 11 years.
http://english.people.com.cn/90001/90776/90882/7002588.html
There’s a lot of nations that react strongly to porn. Russia? Maybe not … then again Russia has a whole other mess of problems.
No. It isn’t hyperbolic in the least, and it isn’t “apples and oranges”. It’s two men sentenced to LIFE IN CAGES for the possession of pictures their governments deem offensive. That is the truth, and everything else is window-dressing.
“Child porn” is another “trafficking” — that is to say, nearly all people charged with possessing it are not really child abusers at all, but are merely consumers of ordinary porn where either (1) prosecutors are making the felony accusation with no evidence, to force them to cop a plea; (2) cops have gotten some “informant” to e-mail the person a contraband picture, also to force them to cop a plea; or (3) a contraband picture got onto somebody’s computer without his knowledge or control (for instance, somebody used his open wi-fi to download porn, or some teenager misdialed while “sexting”).
The cops have no compunctions about ruining an innocent person’s life even if they know perfectly well that one of these circumstances applies. They’re just out to rack up another “score” and advance their careers.
Any law that makes this kind of abuse by prosecutors possible is much to dangerous a law to have, even if it also covers some seriously wrong behavior.
Look, you’ve got to do it properly to make this sort of thing work.
In the 1960s MAD magazine’s Don Martin gave complete instructions for getting high from banana peels.
1. Carefully scrape the inside of a banana skin into an oiled frypan, discarding the remaining skin over your shoulder
2. Heat carefully and gently until it begins to brown
3. Pack the results into your hash pipe, light it and take several deep tokes
4. Throw away the hash pipe in disgust, turn and stride from the kitchen
5. Slip on your discarded banana skin and fall, braining yourself on the stove
Now just lie on the floor in a concussed heap enjoying your altered state.
There was also the report of a mass execution in North Korea, ostensibly because the victims made porn.
Ah, but that was because they didn’t include Dear Leader on their emailing list!
Perhaps, or perhaps because they had bibles. Or were just surplus to requirements; who knows. And if N Korea is such a ghastly place with its leader vying with Assad for dictator of the year, why aren’t we bombing him too?
We only bomb people who are trying to get nukes. N. Korea HAS nukes, so they’re safe.
>”The legislation also offers hope to women who escape a life of prostitution by allowing them…relief to expunge their criminal pasts once they get treatment and help”
Oh bollocks. Treatment and help? Is wanting to make a decent living using one’s natural talents now a disease or malady? Do we do that with any other occupation? How about
“The program allows former priests and minsters to deny their former delusions of all powerful superbeings after they get help and treatment?”
Or:
“The program offers hope to former lawmakers once they get treatment for their compulsion to control the behaviour of all around them?”
Besides, expunging records only goes so far. An employer or neighbor may not be able to find out about your past conviction, but the police keep their own records, and ignore such court orders.
>Wisconsin is one of “the top three states” for sex trafficking, according to…Michelle Mayefske… Not all prostitution is trafficking. Some women, referred to as “renegades,” simply decide to sell sex and are not controlled or managed by anyone, but “that is very, very rare,”
More rubbish. Does Mayefske really think the north woods and dairy farms are crawing with hookers and pimps? Has she ever been to Wisconsin?
I must have been a renegade. I took a hard look at my situation, oh so many years ago, and saw that i could barely eke by waiting tables or live well stripping. I then expanded the stripping into porn and escort when I had the chance. Why is it so shocking to this person that women might choose to do this? Does it shock her that some men turn athletic ability into lucrative careers?
What world do these people live in, that economic struggles and compromises are not part of their lives?
And that women are totally unable to conceive of having sex for any but reasons of “romance” or “fun” without a man’s help…thus implying that women are permanent adolescents without any economic sense whatsoever in our pretty, empty little heads.
Maybe she’s one of the (far too many) women who have “The Chip” on their shoulders. The ones who see nothing wrong in taking a (non-abusive) ex to the cleaners on child support and then denying him visiting rights. The ones who think that past injustices against women other than themselves justify screwing some guy out of everything they can, and then complaining about what little sex they have to do to string him along. I got lucky; my Lady would no more pull such cr*p on me than she would eat kittens, but there are a lot of such harridans out there. They are phantasmagorically unpleasant and soon grow to be phenomenally unattractive as well. And they deeply, DEEPLY resent any woman who will provide men with sex and some level of non-humiliating companionship for something like a fair trade rate. Because if treating men as nicely as one treats customers ever caught on, they know full well that they would get kicked to the curb for the venomous parasites that they are.
Not that I would blame someone for suppressing the fact that they’ve been to Wisconsin, the obvious answer here is, no…no she hasn’t. Cities and towns in Wisconsin are small and I’ve been through Milwaukee, Madison, Eau Claire, and Green Bay enough to know it’s crawling with naught but cheeseheads and cow-tippers.
I live in Wisconsin. Believe me, this is not a hot spot for crime.
Lying Down With Dogs
This is because so many of us think that the proper role of law is to punish people for being nasty, instead of to prevent harm. When people receive harsher sentences for looking at dirty pictures, even truly horrid pictures, than for actually molesting children, it’s pretty obvious that our priorities are screwed.
The Eye of the Beholder (June Updates)
Can I visit Arkansas if I already have an implant? I’m thinking of that bridgework I’m still paying off.
Gullible’s Travels
Since they’re spreading this notion far and wide, somebody will try it. Of course, if we had legal pot, acid, peyote and ‘shrooms, nobody would try nonsense like this, robotripping, or even nutmeg. BTW, there is a germ of truth to iDosing.
Moloch
Glad to know somebody’s protecting the world from all those predatory ten year old girls out there.
Only Rights Can Stop the Wrongs (TW3 #312)
Obvious mistake in HTML is obvious. Sorry.
That one… was totally Blossom’s fault!
Under Every Bed
I’ve always known you were a bit of a renegade, but this isn’t what I meant.
More seriously, I’ll say that this is a good sign. They have to admit that the non-trafficked, non-slave working girl exists. It’s like the first time the government had to admit that sometimes, every now and then, maybe, just possibly, somebody smokes pot without dying of a heroin overdose within the next six months. It’s the first step to debunking the whole mythology.
Chauvinism
How about instead of comparing Russian persecution of homosexuals to Nazi persecution of Jews, people compare Russian persecution of homosexuals to Nazi persecution of homosexuals?
Opting Out
Alas, poor *beep*, I knew him.
OK, let’s see if I can do better this month lol.