A man said to the universe:
“Sir, I exist!”
“However,” replied the universe,
“The fact has not created in me
“A sense of obligation.” – Stephen Crane
In the comment thread of a recent column, there was a discussion on the relative merits of H.P. Lovecraft’s horror fiction. Now, obviously everyone is different and has different literary tastes; just before writing this I was involved in a Twitter discussion wherein I expressed the unpopular opinion that Stephen King “isn’t a bad writer, but doesn’t know when to stop” (i.e. his novels are hopelessly bloated). I say “unpopular” not because people jumped on me for the opinion, but because of the obvious fact that King is a multi-millionaire precisely because a very large number of people like his work. Similarly, a very large number like Lovecraft’s work, among them Stephen King. There is, as the saying goes, no accounting for taste; for any given thing there are those who adore it, those who like it well enough, those who don’t have any opinion, those who actively dislike it and those who run screaming from the room when it’s as much as mentioned, with an infinite number of gradations between those points. And that’s a wonderful thing; it would be a boring world if everyone had exactly the same preferences.
However, I must take exception to a factual point several commenters raised; it was opined that the chief horror in Lovecraft’s fiction derives from ill-defined monsters, or from the unknown. But actually, that isn’t true; all of the horror in the best of Lovecraft’s mature oeuvre derives not from monsters (ill-defined or otherwise) or from fear of the unknown, but rather the opposite: the recognition of the utter, total, complete insignificance of not only any given individual, but of the entire human race and all of its works. This is why Lovecraft harps upon dizzying time-scales and immense objects or creatures, and why his Outer Gods are so often mischaracterized even by casual readers: it isn’t that these beings are malevolent (as we understand the term); it’s simply that neither they nor the universe as a whole has any concern whatsoever for Mankind. His beings aren’t plotting and planning to destroy humanity; few of them even recognize that the human race exists, except in the sense you recognize that soil bacteria exist. In Lovecraft’s cosmos humans were merely the accidental byproduct of an ancient and long-lived race’s industry, and when we’re wiped out by unimaginably powerful entities it will be with the nonchalance of a cook wiping down the kitchen counters prior to preparing a meal. Now, you may be of the opinion that he does a poor job of getting that point across, or that he wrote too many tales exploring lesser or more idiosyncratic fears (such as his thoroughly racist horror of miscegenation), or that his pacing is tedious and his use of adjectives excessive, or whatever, and you are certainly entitled to that opinion just as I am entitled to mine. But I think it’s important to be clear and honest about why one dislikes something, rather than carelessly hurling inapplicable or inadequate insults at it.
On several occasions, I’ve made similar points about insults directed at me; I will listen to sensible criticism, and if it’s witty I’ll laugh right along with everyone else. But if it’s childish, tinned and factually incorrect, you must forgive me if I just wipe it off the counter. One valid criticism is that I’m often verbose: guilty as charged. After all, how many writers would take the time to write almost 800 words just to introduce a few links they’d had floating around for a while? Not many, I’ll wager. But that’s exactly what this is: merely a long (and I hope somewhat entertaining) introduction to three related websites which I hope you’ll find as fascinating as I did. The first is the largest webpage in existence, an online scale model of the solar system; the second is a set of bar graphs, each a small fragment of the one below it, which may give you some idea of the immensity of Time and the microscopic fragment of it we occupy (I prepared a similar chart for my students when I taught world history back in 1987). And the third is quite possibly the coolest thing on the internet: an interactive size-comparison chart of the universe, all to scale (don’t click on this one until you have a good bit of time to explore it). Together, they may help you to get a sense of what Lovecraft was trying to say about our utter and complete insignificance to the big picture, only without so many words. Just the same, I think he would’ve enjoyed seeing them.
Repetition is the death of magic. – Bill Watterson
What the hell is wrong with you, Internet? Halloween is less than two weeks away, and I’m seeing practically no good spooky links! The only one this time around is the first video, via Kevin Wilson; let’s get on the (eye)ball for next week, which is the last Links column before the big day! The (scary in a bad way) links before the first video are from Radley Balko, and those between the videos from Jesse Walker (“bus”), Nun Ya (“marmosets” & “bomb”), Everyday Whorephobia (“Texas”), Pastachips (“Denmark”), Mike Riggs (“Watterson”), Walter Olson (“Cumberbatch”), Jason Kuznicki (“pee”), ClarkHat (“stupidity” & “taboo”), John Stossel (“spending”), Jillian Keenan (“name map”), and Wendy Lyon (“Sweden”).
Sex worker rights activist Gabriela Leite died of cancer on October 10th at the age of 62. She organized the first Brazilian whores’ convention in 1987, then in 1992 founded a rights NGO named Davida; in 2010 she ran for the Brazilian congress (as depicted in the documentary A Kiss for Gabriela). Though she lost the election she won tremendous respect, and a bill to eliminate the contradictory provisions in Brazilian prostitution law was recently named in her honor. She was one of the greats, and will be sorely missed in the sex worker rights community.
Police in Florida have begun…recording license plate information from cars that drive through areas frequented by sex workers and sending a letter to that individual’s home…[including] a close-up image of the license plate and…reminders about the potential for sexually transmitted diseases…Authorities speaking to the media seemed to assume that someone’s mere presence near illegal activity presumes their guilt…
Charlotte Shane’s scathing review of Sudhir Venkatesh’s new book Floating City levels many of the same criticisms I and others have already made against the duplicitous sociologist (such as his total ignorance of the history of sex work, his dreadfully-low “estimates” of our income, etc). But it also contains many telling observations about his character flaws:
…when one of his subjects is assaulted, and her co-worker asks that he not report it: “I stood there, frustrated…What should I do? Go along with them or call the damn police like a normal person? I didn’t want to get sucked into their criminal value structure and end up doing the wrong thing.” This alarming response encapsulates…[his] problem. The desire to avoid arrest after suffering a brutal assault is a sensible one…but Venkatesh can’t wrap his head around it…he is “normal” and they are deviants…his responses are the right ones and theirs are not…Venkatesh clings to the notion that sex work is inherently, unavoidably risky, regardless of the legal and cultural circumstances…when the issue of…legalization…is raised, it’s only to dismiss it…
Crypto-moralists are once again trying to pretend that fatty foods are addictive, but as Jacob Sullum points out:
…the study’s findings could just as truthfully be summarized… “Research Shows That Heroin and Cocaine Are No More Addictive Than Oreos.” Putting it that way would have raised some interesting questions about the purportedly irresistible power of these drugs, which supposedly justifies using force to stop people from consuming them. But the researchers are not interested in casting doubt on the empirical basis for the War on Drugs…they are trying to build an empirical basis for the War on Fat…if the neurological effects of Oreos make them impossible to resist, how is it that most people manage to resist them, consuming them in moderation or not at all?…
…Symantec…found…that hackers…target…religious sites at a much higher rate: “…religious and ideological sites…have triple the average number of threats per infected site than adult/pornographic sites. We hypothesize that this is because pornographic website owners…have a vested interest in keeping their sites malware-free – it’s not good for repeat business”…
Ex-vice madam Natalie Rowe has had her home raided by police days before she will make new claims about her relationship with Chancellor George Osborne…12…officers…with a battering ram burst into her London flat…[at] dawn…claiming they were acting on a tip-off…no drugs were found in the two-hour search…“WHY did one officer involved in the raid ask me whether I was about to publish my memoirs and WHY did a police inspector tell me I’d be opening a ‘whole can of worms’ if I complained?”…
Beleaguered former…MLA Mike Allen has received a rare note of support…from the Alberta Sex Workers. Mr. Allen was one of 13 men caught in a St. Paul, Minnesota-area sting in July…He…could face up to a year in prison and a $3,000 fine. “Alberta sex workers wish to assure MLA Mike Allen…that his activities…would be lawful, private and welcome in Alberta…sex workers in Mr. Allen’s riding…want him to continue as their MLA. We feel he made a mistake taking his business out of Alberta to puritan…Minnesota, but sex workers in his constituency are still pleased to have an MLA who values the services they offer”…
How many more kids have to be sacrificed on this loathsome altar? “A popular 15-year-old student has committed suicide after he reportedly faced expulsion and being placed on the sex offenders’ register simply for streaking at a high school football game. Christian Adamek, from Huntsville, Alabama, hanged himself on October 2, a week after he was arrested…”
The International Committee on the Rights of Sex Workers in Europe has come up with a “tool kit” containing “information, ideas and resources…to help sex worker rights…organisations and activists…challenge…[the] Swedish model.” You can view and download the tool kit and its associated worksheets here, or visit the ICRSE website to download one individual section at a time.
This short interview with Dr. Heidi Hoefinger on her book Sex, Love and Money in Cambodia supports everything I always say about Asian bar girls, but the comments are illustrative of the deep state of denial in which “trafficking” fanatics exist: among them are the claim that a woman who spent ten years living among her subjects is “naïve” and the astonishing assertion that literally 99.99% of whores are coerced.
Rupert Everett is supporting a campaign against proposals…to criminalise sex workers’ clients. The actor, who participated in sex work as a younger man is making a [TV] programme on the subject. He has signed an open letter by the English Collective of Prostitutes and Queer Strike…journalist Cary Gee and a whole range of activist groups…have all added their names too…Former New Zealand MP Tim Barnett, who sponsored the…Act which decriminalised prostitution, described the…way…[end demand] laws were used…“Half of those arrested were transgender sex workers who were identified as men”…
…In an incident back in April, Joel Darvell, 36, allegedly choked his wife while drunk, causing his son to tackle him…Darvell allegedly pistol-whipped his son and then fired a .45 caliber round into the wall of their home. No injuries were sustained. Darvell was charged with assault…but [his] wife and children…refused to testify…Judge Michael Evans…[had them] dragged away…[to] jail…where they were held in cuffs and shackles…John Hays, who is representing Darvell’s wife…said…“The prosecutor wants to put the defendant in prison for over 20 years, and (his family members) really do not want that”…After 48 hours…the 13-year-old girl…broke…and…agreed to testify against her father. The son and mother…were made to agree…as well…
…The law also proposes to fight…[advertising] websites…all the help…[for exploited migrants] is conditional on stopping sexwork…[and] working with an “agreed organization”; of course…sexworkers rights [groups] won’t be [among] them…if students do sexwork, it is because they don’t have the consciousness that this is “prostitution”; so the solution is to add lessons about the “objectification of the body” at school…
…in January 1998, Ms. Mam was propelled…into the international media spotlight largely owing to the harrowing on-camera testimony of the young Meas Ratha…[who supposedly had] been promised a job as a waitress in Phnom Penh, but wound up a captive in a brothel…Sixteen years [later]…Ms. Ratha—now 32 years old and married—said her testimony…was fabricated and scripted for her by Ms. Mam…Ratha…said that she did not want to cause trouble for Ms. Mam’s NGO, which had provided an education for her, but that she could no longer continue a lie that had followed her for half her life…the fabrication of Ms. Ratha’s sex slave story is only the latest incident of false information to emerge from Ms. Mam and her organizations…
…Estée Lauder…has opened the Somaly Mam Beauty Salon…providing survivors of sexual slavery and human trafficking with…education and vocational training…in high-touch beauty services in hair care, makeup application and nail treatments…
Well, I guess it’s better than putting them to work in her fashion industry sponsors’ sweatshops.
[UK] police are to get the power to restrict the freedom of anyone they suspect of being a sex offender, even if the person has never been convicted of a crime…This can include limiting internet use, stopping the person from being alone with a child under 16 and preventing travel abroad. Anyone breaching the so-called Sexual Risk Order, which lasts for at least two years, could be jailed for up to five years…
WH Smith shut down its website…after it was revealed that a search for the term “daddy” brought up hardcore pornographic ebooks featuring bondage and humiliation alongside stories for children. At least 60 pornographic ebooks…could also be found on Amazon, Waterstones and Barnes & Noble…WH Smith apologised to customers and said the “explosion” of self-publishing had left book retailers exposed to pornographic content…
They weren’t “exposed” to shit; they just had a poor website design and are passing the buck.
…Jerry Brown…vetoed a bill a that would have…required…condoms [to be] available in every California prison. Supporters…argued that [this] would help reduce the spread of sexually transmitted diseases among inmates, who have higher rates of HIV/AIDS…Brown…noted that family visitors are already allowed to bring condoms for…overnight visits…
A money-making venture to lure…drug buyers into Sunrise [Florida] to purchase cocaine from police has been halted…Mayor Michael Ryan…lay blame…on the [newspaper story exposing the racket]…Ryan did not express concerns about…[the busts taking place] in such public locations as parking lots and family restaurants…
Another UN agency has reaffirmed…support of sex workers in response to Equality Now’s anti-sex worker campaign…This leaves Equality Now starkly on the fringes of the global women’s movement, as organisations as authoritative as UN Women…assert…that sex work is work, not trafficking. The statement…also…[backs] safe workplaces – which come with decriminalisation – and the right to self-determination, including the right to stay in sex work…[this] precludes…the “Swedish model”…supported by Equality Now…which tries to drive sex workers from sex work (against their consent) through making it intolerably dangerous…
This essay first appeared in Cliterati on September 15th; I have modified it slightly to fit the format of this blog.
What, you didn’t know that sex produced radiation? It’s true! Adult sexual activity is so dangerous to the “purity” and “innocence” of “children” (sorry for all the scare quotes) that any adult who has sex should be kept away from all children at all times. Sex rays, you see, induce the dreaded “premature sexualization”, without which “we would all grow up in a blissful, chaste state and never, ever, ever be interested in dirty, nasty sex”. The dirtier and more “illicit” the sex, the more intense the sex rays: regular missionary-position marital sex conducted once per month or so while the wife looks at the ceiling and thinks of England produces such a low concentration that ordinary walls can stop them, but BDSM and swinging emit concentrations that can contaminate surrounding objects, and sex work produces such intense levels that sex workers cannot be allowed near children ever again for the rest of their lives. Even objects we handle (including money and virtual objects such as emails) must be kept far away from “children” (including young adults), and the danger is so great that kids inadvertently exposed to the dreaded rays must be quarantined from other kids.
Obviously, if people really believed this nonsense, they’d demand their own children be taken away and placed in the care of nuns. But they certainly act as though it were true, to the point that (especially in the US) terms like “family-friendly” are euphemisms for “totally sexless”. If any openly-sexual person (especially a sex worker) has anything at all to do with children, or even non-child-related sacred cows like breast cancer research, you can bet there will be a hue and cry in which words like “disgusting”, “inappropriate” and “creepy” will figure prominently. Sex workers often have their children abducted from them by prohibitionist regimes on the grounds that having consensual sex makes them “unfit parents”; the children are then handed over to either abusive spouses (as in both the linked cases) or sexually abusive “foster parents”.
…Farrah Abraham tweeted a link to her Amazon wish list, asking fans to purchase her more than $13,000 worth of gifts—and they did. Now the reality star/“sex tape” star has replenished her list, asking for some more furniture, kitchen appliances, and odds and ends for her home…Creating an Amazon wish list is a common practice among porn stars, strippers, and escorts…[Abraham’s list includes]…clothes…dining room furniture…a laptop…a sleeper sofa, a juicer, a Pyrex measuring cup, etc. The saddest thing of all though, is her request for a $52 crib mattress and $12 mattress cover. It’s like, either keep your kid out of your weird sugar daddy arrangements or at the very least, get her the good, expensive shit.
You know who else has Amazon wish lists? Lots of people. And you know who else gets gifts from strangers who admire their work? Many, many entertainers and celebrities, including relatively minor ones like yours truly. So, if Penn and Teller get a present from a fan, is it a “weird sugar daddy arrangement”? Or is it only female entertainers? If someone sends Neil Gaiman a gift to thank him for the pleasure he gave the sender, is that “creepy” and “bizarre” as Mamamia opined (“Who would actually fork out their hard-earned cash for such a thing? Does it make people feel good about themselves?”), or is that only reserved for female writers like Maggie McNeill? Because, O ye Jezzies and MMs, this is beginning to look awfully…well, sexist. Perhaps this is a Madonna/whore thing? Is it only because Abraham currently does sex work that this is somehow suspect, and therefore I’m in the clear? Or does my having sold sex in the past eternally condemn my Amazon Wishlist to skeeviness in the eyes of those who write for blogs like Jezebel and Mamamia, even if the readers who send me nice things have never seen me have sex? Both websites seem to take issue with the fact that some wish list items are inexpensive; do they think the fun of gift-giving should only be reserved for the affluent? Or is this somehow intermingled with sex work in their minds, so that an economical present somehow equates to cheap sex? One would think, considering their rather insulting belief that a woman’s sexual skills aren’t worth paying for, that they would be less offended by the cheap gifts than the expensive ones, but that would require at least the rudiments of rational thought. And that, I’m afraid, is something in very short supply in the brain of anyone who believes in anything as ludicrous as sex rays.
Torture, torture! It pleasures me! – The Emperor (Criswell) in Orgy of the Dead
I started forming considered political opinions at about the age of thirteen. As I’m sure you can imagine, most of those opinions changed a great deal as I matured and learned more about reality; as I’ve said in the past, “I used to consider myself a feminist, but then I graduated from high school.” But a few of those opinions have never changed, except perhaps to grow stronger as experience handed me ever-increasing evidence that my initial judgment was correct. One such opinion is that most cops are twisted bullies and that none of them can be trusted; I don’t think I have to tell you how that one’s developed. Another one, formed before the drug war resulted in an exponential expansion of those condemned to them, is that prisons are evil torture chambers that serve absolutely no function except the sadistic pleasure of those who support damning human beings to them. And everything I have seen, read and learned since that time has only served to convince me that my original opinion didn’t condemn prisons harshly enough.
For most of human history, prisons served only two functions: the first was holding people from arrest until trial or from trial until execution, and the second torturing them so as to break their spirits (for whatever reason). And though the Greeks and Romans experimented with the idea of using prison as a judicial punishment and the British started using penal colonies at the beginning of the 17th century, large-scale punitive incarceration was one of the more monstrous brainchildren of the 18th century. The Enlightenment had resulted in a growing distaste for overt state-inflicted violence, so governments embraced the fiction that prisons were intended to “reform” those condemned to them. And though that pretense continues to this day, wiser heads have recognized its falsehood for at least a century: as George Bernard Shaw put it, “Of the three official objects of our prison system: vengeance, deterrence, and reformation of the criminal, only one is achieved; and that is the one which is nakedly abominable.” But even Shaw might have been at a loss for words had he been able to foresee the abomination of American mass incarceration, the caging of human beings on a scale no tyrant, inquisitor or sadist of the past could ever have conceived: roughly 1% of the adult population imprisoned at any given time, and more than twice that many – over seven million Americans in all – under some form of “correctional supervision” (probation, parole, etc). About that term:
…surely, no sane person believes that prisoners are being “corrected” or rehabilitated in any way; in fact, the evidence is the opposite, that locking criminals up for long periods…merely makes them worse, and imprisoning those who break minor laws destroys their lives and/or turns them into career criminals. The reasons for this should be obvious; prisons are little more than schools for crime, where those who are not thoroughly violent when they get in are forced to become more violent to survive. Furthermore, excessive sentences remove prisoners from society for so long they forget how to behave among normal people and internalize the prison mode of behavior so that it’s difficult to “unlearn” when they get out, especially since criminal background checks, offender registries and other post-incarceration punishments often prevent former prisoners from ever returning to normal society…
It’s even worse for so-called “sex offenders”, who are stigmatized, barred from virtually all social interaction and even exiled to filthy ghettoes. But all this only refers to prisoners who are confined under normal prison conditions; about 80,000 people in the US are kept for months, years or even decades in solitary confinement, a practice banned in all civilized countries as what it is: torture. Solitary confinement psychologically demolishes people, often irreversibly, but rather than face up to this fact American “authorities” respond as they always do: with lies, excuses and obfuscation. Those locked in solitary are now usually said to be “sequestered” or “secluded”, unless they’re too young to vote; then they’re tortured in “protective custody”. Far from “correcting” prisoners, American prisons couldn’t be much better at breaking them beyond repair if they were specifically designed to do, and those in most other countries aren’t a hell of a lot better.
Now, I’m sure some of you are thinking all sorts of thoughts about “public safety” and “we can’t just let criminals get away without punishment” and other such malarkey. What if I told you that it’s possible to build prisons that really do what “authorities” pretend they’re intended to do: rehabilitate criminals so they don’t offend again? And what if I told you they were cheaper than the state’s beloved torture chambers?
…at the Somang Correctional Institution in [South Korea]…guards and prisoners eat meals together in a clean dining hall…228 people have served time there and been released…only two have been convicted of a second crime…The recidivism rate at the nation’s…[other] prisons is 62 percent. About 65 percent of Somang prisoners have been convicted of major crimes such as murder, robbery and rape…counselors try to deal with prisoners’ emotional issues. Then they move on to job education…and…techniques including meditation and therapy to help prisoners empathize with crime victims. The final stage comprises social adaptation programs to help a prisoner ease back into the world outside the prison walls…It costs about…10 percent less than the cost of running [other] prisons…
…Arne Kvernvik Nilsen…[is] governor of Bastoy prison island…home to some of the most serious offenders in Norway, [which] has received increasing global attention both for the humane conditions under which the prisoners live – in houses rather than cells in what resembles a cosy self-sustaining village…and for its remarkably low reoffending rate of just 16% compared with around 70% for prisons across the rest of Europe and the US…”I run this prison like a small society,” [Nilsen] says…”I give respect to the prisoners…and they respond by respecting themselves, each other and this community…The staff…are…like social workers as well as prison guards. They believe in their work and know the difference they are making”…Bastoy is also one of the cheapest prisons in Norway to run…
What a surprise; help people to deal with their problems, to respect others and do something constructive, and they tend to become peaceful, productive citizens after release. Cage them like animals and torture them into sociopathy, and they become more bestial and sociopathic. This isn’t rocket science; any unusually-bright thirteen-year-old could understand it. Unfortunately, most of the people in charge of American prisons function below that intellectual level, and they will have to be removed from power (and Americans in general cured of their delight in torturing the “other”) before this country ever sees a “correctional institution” whose name isn’t a wicked lie.
I’m a fairly new hobbyist and I think I have found a lady I’d like to see regularly; she’s beautiful sensual, very warm and compassionate and provides sexually everything I’m looking for. There’s only one problem: I can tell she doesn’t shower directly before our session. She isn’t dirty by any means, but I like to lick a women all over her body. How do I tell her without offending her? Should I ask her to hop in the shower with me?
Yes, I think the best way to go about it is to make a shower part of your requested activities. Few women are going to react well to the implication that their hygiene is somehow lacking, especially if it isn’t for all normal intents and purposes. But if you make it into a fetish thing, like the shower itself is part of what you like to do, she probably won’t take it as an insult. Now, it is possible that she may not go for that; I never once agreed to shower with a client because once my hair gets wet, it takes a very long time to dry (and it’s very difficult to keep it from getting wet if I’m in a shower). But many, perhaps even most, escorts probably aren’t going to mind as long as the shower is within the time you’re paying for. There’s one other thing, too: I know I’m not alone in being very averse to being licked. Many women dislike having foreign saliva anyplace other than between their legs, and some don’t even like that. Your lady may not be among their number; she may be just fine with being licked. But all the same, it’s something you should be aware of.
Do you think there might actually be health benefits from sexual interaction with multiple partners? I don’t mean the psychological boost some people receive from it, but an actual physical boost to your immune system. In years long past, I would get a cold or two every year, but for the past ten years or so I have almost never been sick. I attribute that partly to the fact that I have had intimate contact about once a month for the past ten years with a good number of healthy women. You obviously exchange some germs, but at the same time you are inoculating each other because in healthy people the levels are low.
I totally believe you’re right about the immune-system boost; I know that all while I was working I practically never got sick, and I think it’s because I was exposed to so many different conventional bacteria. In fact, I actually wrote about this in my second Q & A column three years ago this month.
It is small wonder that people find “free choice” a confusing idea: [it] appears to refer to what the person being judged…does, whereas it is actually what the person making the judgment…thinks. – Thomas Szasz
I will never understand why people feel compelled to stick their noses into others’ business. Everyone is different, and has different needs and desires; we also each have different strengths and gifts. If one person has something another wants, and that other has something the first wants, and they agree to a trade, how is that anyone else’s concern? If you’ve got money and want food, and a grocer or restaurateur has food and wants money, and the two of you agree to an exchange, that’s business; both parties go away happy. And if one of you is dissatisfied with the transaction – say you thought the quality of the food was poor or the service was lousy, you simply don’t go back; you instead find another food vendor who will give you what you demand for your money. That’s competition, and it’s what keeps the free market free. Some ridiculous people want to claim that it’s somehow exploitative to sell people things they want, and some even more ridiculous people claim it’s exploitative to offer to pay someone for something. These people are living in a fantasy world; here on the material plane, there is nobody who doesn’t need or want something, and very few who have absolutely nothing to offer in exchange. As long as the transaction is voluntary, nobody else has the right to say boo. It’s only when someone is actually coercing the other that there is an issue.
“But Gloria,” you ask, “what if one party’s need for whatever the other one has is so strong it constitutes coercion in and of itself? What if the customer is addicted to the product, or the seller is so poor he’s desperate for money?” Well, what of it? You’re probably addicted to caffeine, so does that mean Starbucks is exploiting you when you walk in for one of their overpriced lattes? You could just as easily go to McDonald’s. As long as there’s a free market, you can still choose who’s going to get the money you spend on your caffeine addiction. The same goes for food, medicine, shelter and everything else. And yes, even labor; if one company offers poor wages and another fair ones, who is everyone going to apply to? It’s only when there is no real competition because there’s a monopoly or a cartel, or because a coercive government fixes prices or establishes a restrictive licensing regime or the like, that exploitation arises because the one who needs the artificially-limited thing is at the mercy of whoever can provide it.
And that is the crux of my ethical dilemma.
In my youth I developed a strong sense of morality and fair play, and despite considerable pressure to abandon it I have never compromised. But now I find myself in the uncomfortable position of having a local monopoly on the service I provide, and I’m extremely concerned that I might begin maltreating my clients because of it. I’ve even toyed with the idea of initiating another lady so that I’ll have a competitor, but the only problem with that is I couldn’t be sure she would maintain my high ethical standards. See, the service I sell is…well, kind of addictive I suppose. Once a man has experienced my…attentions, he tends to want them again and again; the temptation to take advantage is therefore very, very high, and I think it’s very likely that any self-created competition would not be as resolute as I am. In other words, in trying to avoid exploiting my clients, I would almost certainly expose them to greater exploitation.
As you’ve probably guessed, I’m a Lady of the Evening. Yes, I know that term sounds so old-fashioned nowadays, but “prostitute” is so legalistic, “sex worker” so vague and most of the other choices so vulgar…and I sincerely doubt most Americans would even know what “demimondaine” meant. And yes, of course there are plenty of others around; there are probably hundreds of women of every type and stratum within an hour’s drive, all easily contacted via email. But I offer a very unusual service, catering to a kink that used to be relatively rare but is now increasingly popular. See, in the past I could count on that rarity to keep me honest; so few men were interested in what I was selling that I had to carefully cultivate each one lest I “kill the golden goose” as it were, and be caught with fewer clients than needed to maintain my preferred lifestyle. But now, I could treat my clients like dirt were I so inclined, drain each one dry and then discard him, secure in the knowledge that there would be plenty more where he came from. And that’s not only wrong, it’s dangerous; in my line, one has to avoid attracting undue attention.
Ah, well, I didn’t really expect you to have a solution; I mean, it’s not like you’ve ever been in my position, now is it? But sometimes, it just helps to talk to somebody, to voice these things out loud instead of merely letting them rattle around in my brain. Thanks for listening; how much do I owe you? Maybe we’ll talk more another time; I really must fly now. I have to meet a gentleman at eleven, and it’s after ten now; I don’t have far to go, but it takes a lot longer to make sure one looks nice when one can’t make use of a mirror.
Soon after the publication of September’s guest column, blogger and regular reader Sasha Castel suggested that I do an essay on my beauty hints. But as I told her, that wouldn’t be much of a column because I honestly don’t have any other than “be scrupulously clean, wear your hair in an attractive style and pick clothes that flatter your figure and express your own personal style.” I know I’m very lucky in this respect, but I have excellent natural color so I don’t really require makeup unless I’m really dressing up; when I was working I never wore it unless the client was taking me out. And my hair…well, let’s just say it does what it likes anyhow and I’ve learned to live with that over the past 30 years. However, I suggested that SHE could write a beauty hints guest column…only she’s never been an escort, though she has been a mistress. Is that a kind of sex worker? Some say yes, some emphatically say no, and once again we see the absurdity of trying to draw arbitrary lines between natural female behaviors. Here’s her essay on how to be a good mistress…which not only serves as a worthy sequel to “Keep Doing What You’re Doing“, but also provides excellent advice for a courtesan, an escort with a treasured regular, or even (to a large degree) a wife whose husband fully supports her as mine does. So…what’s the real, substantive difference between these roles again? Why are some legal and some illegal? And how can any rational adult pretend that one is commendable, another is tolerable but the other constitutes “enslavement” or “crime”?
I didn’t set out to become a mistress. I met the man in question (I’ll call him Carlos) in the course of my job. He was well-known, one of the most recognized and praised opera singers in the world. We spoke, liked each other, and went out to dinner. Shortly thereafter, we went to bed, and I became “The Other Woman”. I didn’t want to marry Carlos, just enjoy his company while he was in town. He favored me with meals, drinks, occasional gifts, and most importantly, knowledge and wisdom. I learned a great deal about the music business from him, which served me well in my career. I also learned about being a mistress. Unfortunately, I can’t give advice on how to find a man (on both occasions that I’ve been a mistress, it just happened), although it behooves you to appear nicely dressed and groomed if you’re in the market. But if you do become someone’s mistress, here are seven guidelines that will make the affair a good one, for you and for him.
1. Be available.
If he calls you, go to him. In this situation, your needs are subordinate to his. What a terribly retrograde statement, but true. He is providing the material goods while you are providing the companionship; you can’t do that from a distance. Be with him as often as he wants you to be; if this doesn’t sit well with you, reconsider your position. If it’s a position of equality you want, become someone’s girlfriend rather than a mistress.
2. Be discreet.
Resist the temptation to blab to friends about your hot and powerful new lover. You don’t want to become the object of gossip, and you don’t want to cause problems with his marriage. Use a pseudonym when referring to your dates, and also when storing his number in your mobile phone. Avoid being photographed together. If you wear perfume, apply it with discretion or forego it altogether to avoid olfactory traces left behind. Be certain that all the jewelry and accessories you arrived with are with you as you leave. If you attend events together, and someone introduces you as “Mrs. Carlos”, don’t contradict, just smile and say “how do you do”.
3. Be safe.
Birth control is mandatory, obviously. The Pill or other hormonal methods are best. If you need to take other drugs while on the Pill (especially antibiotics) be aware that they reduce the Pill’s effectiveness, sometimes to catastrophic effect. Make certain you have a clean bill of sexual health before commencing sex; you don’t want to give him (or his wife) an STI. If you are having other sexual relationships at the same time (not recommended), be sure to use a condom, correctly and regularly, to prevent disease transmission. Understand that some STIs like herpes and HPV can still be transmitted through genital contact without penetration.
4. Be fun.
Get into his interests, or take up one of his hobbies, so you can have dates without necessarily involving sex. He’ll be pleased at your enthusiasm, and it takes away some of the pressure on him to perform like a sexual Superman at every encounter.
5. Be caring.
If he doesn’t want to go out, stay in. If he’s sick, take care of him. If he’s craving a food, cook it for him. And above all, LISTEN. I think that just as much as sex, what I provided for Carlos was a sympathetic ear to unburden himself. I listened. In fact, if I were to name the number-one most important quality in a mistress, it would be the ability to listen. Listen to your man, try and understand his problems, offer solutions if they occur to you, but mostly just allow him to speak his mind in a way that he can’t do with his wife. Your empathy and perspective will be as valuable to him as your sexual talents, perhaps more.
6. Be sexy.
Of course, this is the crux of the matter. If he wants to play, do it. He may have secret kinks he’s not comfortable sharing with his wife; indulge them. Does he want to role-play? Tie you up? Have a threesome? Be spanked? If it can be done safely and doesn’t repulse you or harm you, make his fantasies come true. Naturally, the usual rules of sex play apply: sane, safe and consensual. The only fantasy I’d hesitate to enact is any sort of public sex fetish, for purely practical reasons; exposure is not at all sexy.
7. Be realistic.
When it’s over, it’s over. Don’t try to hang on past the affair’s natural life. Enjoy what you had and move on. For the love of all that’s holy, don’t threaten him with exposure if he doesn’t continue seeing you. That’s psycho behavior, and it won’t make him like you: it will have quite the opposite effect. Keep the memories happy, and let him smile privately whenever he thinks of you.
We are unfortunately not ready to fight extraterrestrial civilizations. – Sergey Berezhnoy
We’re only just beginning to see the Halloween links; two qualify this time around, plus the second video. It’s the intro to the Halloween episode of The Simpsons, and was directed by Guillermo del Toro; see how many horror movie references you can spy in it. That video was provided by Neil Gaiman, and the first by Mike Riggs; everything down to the first video was contributed by Jesse Walker, and the links between the videos by Judgy Bitch (“Poe’s law”), Popehat (“elephant”), Mistress Matisse (“Twitterstorm”), Michael Whiteacre (“Kubrick”), Wendy McElroy (“MP3s”), Radley Balko (“prosecutor” & “stink”), Franklin Harris (“Snapple”), Brooke Magnanti (“Lincoln” & “future”), Walter Olson (“monsters”), Grace (“pipeline” & “bugging”), and Lucy Steigerwald (“together”).
…Benny Johnson from BuzzFeed…messaged me, asking…about…an innocent yet charming flirtation I had…with…mayor [Cory Booker] at the beginning of the year… the [resulting]…article…was cute and, to me, satirical…[then] calls and emails start pouring in from reporters. It was surreal. How could something so simple be seen as a scandal? Oh wait, I’m a stripper and nude model (how dare someone flirt with my kind!)…Gawker released a story…[implying] that…anybody I associate with is a bad person, especially men…strippers, or anyone in the adult industry, are real people, with real lives and real human relationships. What we do for income doesn’t mean we are doing those things 24 hours a day. Accountants don’t sit at home with calculators at the dinner table, nor do proctologists go around sticking their fingers in people’s butts at the grocery store…
A reader called Daz sent me a DVD I’ve been curious about for some time: Doctor Mordrid starring Jeffrey Combs, which was originally meant to be an adaptation of Marvel’s supernatural superhero Doctor Strange. Thank you, Daz!
The Silk Road, a Web based black market for…narcotics…and other illicit goods, has been shut down by the FBI, and its alleged mastermind, Ross William Ulbricht, has been arrested…I can’t help but conclude…that the world is actually going to be a more dangerous place in [its] absence…The FBI…[wrote] “the site has sought to make conducting illegal transactions…as easy and frictionless as shopping…at mainstream e-commerce websites”…compared to the epidemic violence that has characterized the drug trade for the entirety of the War on Drugs…that…[seems] like a relative utopia…[and] successor sites…are…already up and running…
…Christine Keeler and Mandy Rice-Davies, the friends who became household names when the Profumo affair was exposed in 1963, are no longer even on speaking terms…[and have] not seen [one another] for three decades…Rice-Davies has leant her support to Lloyd Webber in the making of Stephen Ward, a stage show about the society osteopath who also played a pivotal role in the scandal…
A new…proposal would isolate…strip clubs in industrial areas…City administration is recommending a 160-metre separation for adult entertainment venues from residential neighbourhoods, schools, parks, childcare centres, preschools…recreational facilities…[and] other adult entertainment venues…”You don’t [get] more street crime because of strip clubs,” said Mariana Valvarde, a professor of criminology at the University of Toronto…”It’s a myth”…Saskatoon’s proposed bylaw would [also] require [strippers] to be licensed…
…Saskatchewan…does NOT allow nudity in a business that serves alcohol…[and] this is NOT changing…[the government’s own website states] “full frontal nudity will continue to be prohibited”…[only] wet t-shirt contests and striptease without nudity will be allowed…[but] the public AND the media…are reacting as though the opposite is the case…
A plan to protect Oslo prostitutes…has been dropped after [officials] ruled it would violate people’s privacy…Bjørg Norli, director of Prosentret, said…”The problem is that buying sex in Norway is illegal. We would have been keeping a register of criminals, which the police would have been able to demand access to”…
…Sex workers from three flats in Soho were evicted…after police issued enforcement notices on landlords warning they could be prosecuted if they were found to be allowing “immoral activities”…On [October 9th] sex workers and activists…gathered outside the offices of Soho Estates, one of the main property owners in the area, and called for them to “stand up” to police. “Soho has always been one of the safest places in the country for women to work”…said Niki Adams from the English Collective of Prostitutes…Members of the local Soho Society said the character of Soho was under threat from developers…
When it awarded the Palme d’Or to Blue Is the Warmest Colour, the Cannes Film Festival jury took the unusual step of sharing the prize between its director Abdellatif Kechiche, and its two principal actresses Léa Seydoux and Adèle Exarchopoulos…but…the actresses were apparently unhappy with the director’s methods…Seydoux [said] “We had fake pussies on…I don’t make love on screen…it was kind of humiliating sometimes, I was feeling like a prostitute”…
Alicia Beltran found herself handcuffed, shackled…and detained in an inpatient drug treatment facility for being honest about a medical history that included past dependency on prescription painkillers. The State of Wisconsin provided an attorney for her fetus, but not for her. Without evidence of harm to either herself or the fetus, Alicia was made a ward of the state, all her rights and liberties suspended – including her right to have an abortion if that had been what she wanted…
Jean-Baptiste Lamarck was an 18th-century biologist who believed that characteristics acquired within an individual creature’s lifetime could be passed to its descendants; this was among the first steps toward evolutionary theory, but was disproved about a century ago. However, certain political cults (such as Soviet communism) still clung to it long afterward as a pseudoscientific means of supporting their beliefs, and apparently Swedish state neofeminism is among them:
Around the world, women are on average shorter than men. Purely biological evidence suggests that it should be the opposite…if women generally were larger risks associated with childbirth would…decrease…New theories suggest that the imbalance of power and discrimination underlie the size differences…we unconsciously give boys more food than girls, making the size difference between the sexes…persist over generations…
If this were true, the size difference would have vanished by the late 20th century in Western countries, where food has not generally been scarce in generations. But it must please neofeminists tremendously to believe that if not for “Patriarchy”, women would be bigger and stronger than men.
…As…governments have imposed…restrictions on where sex offenders can live or even set foot, members of this highly stigmatized group…have formed associations…to [argue]…that indiscriminate laws…are unconstitutional and ineffective…“I find it very offensive that…sex offenders are trying to defeat the measures we have put in place to protect children,” said Nina Salarno Ashford …with Crime Victims United. “They created their own issues…somebody was assaulted, in many cases a child”…[prosecutor] Susan Kang Schroeder…[said] “The pro-sex-offender lobby likes to bandy about percentages, as if even 1 percent is acceptable”…
The dysphemisms and lies should seem familiar. Crime Victims United are vengeful badge-lickers who support mass incarceration and the abrogation of rights of the accused; the pretense that public urination, prostitution and sex while teenage are forms of “assault” is typical for them, as is pretending most “victims” are children. And branding those fighting for human rights “The pro-sex offender lobby” is right out of the prohibitionist playbook.
…Kaitlyn Hunt…entered no contest pleas to…misdemeanor battery and felony interference with child custody…[she will] remain in jail until December 20, followed by three years of felony supervision…she will not be branded a convicted felon or registered sex offender and can ask for her case to be sealed or expunged…
…21-year-old Matthew E. Lyons approached [a] woman…[bird-watching] in a [Florida] gazebo…Lyons repeatedly complimented the woman…[when she said] she was not interested…in…sex…Lyons…threw [her] to the floor…and pulled off her shorts and underwear…[but fled after he] was unable to pull on a condom…Lyons admitted meeting with the woman but said he thought she was a prostitute…
Police in [Sunrise]…have hit upon a surefire way to make millions. They sell cocaine. [Cops] and their army of informants lure big-money drug buyers…from [all over the Western Hemisphere]…then bust the buyers and seize their cash and cars…the…money…fuels huge overtime payments for the undercover officers…and cash rewards for the confidential informants…one femme fatale informant [made] more than $800,000 over the past five years…Last year, the city raked in $2 million…the year before…twice that…
…“The World’s Largest Sugar Daddy Dating Website” says it has recorded a 50 percent jump in average daily sign-ups since the start of the government shutdown…“We usually have a lull in September and October,” Seeking Arrangement’s public relations manager Jennifer Gwynn told NPR…“Half of the new members are single moms, so we’re thinking that it’s tied directly to the government shutdown, since programs like WIC…have been stalled”…
Lest you forget: “pimp” is copese for husband, driver, landlord, roommate, service owner, bodyguard, phone operator, parent…
…Lindsey Roberson, a [North Carolina] assistant district attorney, said…if [whores] complete certain mandated steps, the charges will be dropped…they [must] accept responsibility, go through trauma counseling, a vocational assessment, and – if needed – substance abuse treatment…Thom Goolsby…said [his] new law makes North Carolina the “toughest state in the union on pimps and johns”…
So women are infantilized and brainwashed and men are “hammered”.
…the policy…is a paternalistic perception that strips women of agency in an attempt to protect them from their own choices. “Saving” sex workers, after arresting and arraigning them, will not accomplish the court’s goals…special courts fail to recognize the people who are not hurting themselves or anyone else, but are criminals only by law…sex workers are potentially human trafficking’s most effective foes, as they are ideally situated to identify sex slavery and alert the authorities. Or they would be if they did not risk arrest and prosecution for doing so…
It’s not something you expect to hear from a women’s rights group: our prostitutes are better than yours. But that’s the tone struck by Equality Now in their new campaign against United Nations recommendations that sex work be decriminalized. Claiming that the UN “ignores survivors of prostitution,” Equality Now and their allied anti-prostitution organizations have offered their own experts who have worked in the sex trade – who all also happen to agree with them that prostitution must remain illegal…despite evidence that illegality is dangerous, and despite even sex workers’ own demands. This is why you will find a former prosecutor…now leading this ostensibly human rights campaign…
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In the comment thread of a recent column, there was a discussion on the relative merits of H.P. Lovecraft’s horror fiction. Now, obviously everyone is different and has different literary tastes; just before writing this I was involved in a Twitter discussion wherein I expressed the unpopular opinion that Stephen King “isn’t a bad writer, but doesn’t know when to stop” (i.e. his novels are hopelessly bloated). I say “unpopular” not because people jumped on me for the opinion, but because of the obvious fact that King is a multi-millionaire precisely because a very large number of people like his work. Similarly, a very large number like Lovecraft’s work, among them Stephen King. There is, as the saying goes, no accounting for taste; for any given thing there are those who adore it, those who like it well enough, those who don’t have any opinion, those who actively dislike it and those who run screaming from the room when it’s as much as mentioned, with an infinite number of gradations between those points. And that’s a wonderful thing; it would be a boring world if everyone had exactly the same preferences.
On several occasions, I’ve made similar points about insults directed at me; I will listen to sensible criticism, and if it’s witty I’ll laugh right along with everyone else. But if it’s childish, tinned and factually incorrect, you must forgive me if I just wipe it off the counter. One valid criticism is that I’m often verbose: guilty as charged. After all, how many writers would take the time to write almost 800 words just to introduce a few links they’d had floating around for a while? Not many, I’ll wager. But that’s exactly what this is: merely a long (and I hope somewhat entertaining) introduction to three related websites which I hope you’ll find as fascinating as I did. The first is the largest webpage in existence, an online scale model of the solar system; the second is a set of bar graphs, each a small fragment of the one below it, which may give you some idea of the immensity of Time and the microscopic fragment of it we occupy (I prepared a similar chart for my students when I taught world history back in 1987). And the third is quite possibly the coolest thing on the internet: an interactive size-comparison chart of the universe, all to scale (don’t click on this one until you have a good bit of time to explore it). Together, they may help you to get a sense of what Lovecraft was trying to say about our utter and complete insignificance to the big picture, only without so many words. Just the same, I think he would’ve enjoyed seeing them.
