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Archive for October, 2016

Halloween 2016

sexy-witch
Happy Halloween, dear readers, and Blessed Be!

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Obviously, she didn’t come out of it well.  –  Danielle Bargala

Another Halloween cartoon?  Yep.  Pleasant dreams.  The links above it are from  Tim Cushing (“fascism”, “serves” and “hope”), Jesse Walker (“machine”), Amy Alkon (“shoes”), and Women With A Vision (“cops”).

From the Archives

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If you don’t like that someone has sexual needs that you don’t understand…that is your problem.  –  Ryan Thomas

The Swedish Pimpocracy

It’s illegal to pay for sex in Sweden, unless you film it for everyone to see:

…Swedish health minister Gabriel Wikström…is championing…a…fairtrade perspective…for porn…“In which way has it been produced, and is there consent?  Then you can move forward in minimizing porn that is misogynistic and produced under bad conditions”…

Sex, Lies and Busybodies

Why do so many losers want porn movies to be condom commercials?

A British university is offering to pay young couples £400 to be filmed having sex in a bid to promote the notion that using a condom does not “kill the mood.”  Coventry University is looking for three couples aged between 18 and 25 to have sex on camera.  They will be filmed in “natural settings” such as student accommodation and a car.  It will be “tastefully shot” and use “real couples in loving, consensual relationships,” according to the academics behind the project…Dr. Katie Newby said the videos aim to show that sex can still be fun and sexy even when stopping to put on a condom…The project is being financially backed by the government-funded Medical Research Council…

I make more than £400 about half the times I have sex, and not much less than £400 the other half of the times.

Pyrrhic Victory

Once men turned their thinking over to machines in the hope that this would set them free.  But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them.”

Imagine a security camera that can…spot drivers who are texting when they should be watching the road, potentially passing on this information to law enforcement officials that can then issue a ticket…Security cameras with this level of visual intelligence are…worrisome.  Hikvision cites the case of a senior citizen who became lost and was located using the facial recognition built into its cameras.  But a camera that can find a lost child or identify a criminal suspect can just as easily be used for invasive government surveillance, like the case of protesters targeted through facial recognition…

Any Old Port

The real reason people get addicted:

Blunt Instrument

“Safe house” in this context means “jail”:

…[Houston pigs] began a major [pogrom against] the…sex trade…Ying Wen was arrested during an early-morning raid and charged with money laundering…Wen was the owner and operator of Hana Top Spa…Three young women, [fantasized by furiously-masturbating cops as] victims of human trafficking, were removed and placed in a safe house…crime stats over the last three years…show [no increase]…But [myths] of problems near the spa persist…

Note the language representing human women as inanimate objects: “removed and placed in”.  If you have the stomach, read the original for the pompous DA claiming that sex workers are liars and comparing us to filthy insects.

All About the Men

As I’ve written many times, prostitution is a “crime” defined entirely by motive; if a woman has sex for any other reason than profit the same exact behavior is not criminalized, but if she has that motivation in her mind her “legal” acts are magically transformed into “illegal” ones.  Given this bizarre and evil belief that it’s OK to criminalize certain thoughts in the service provider‘s head, it’s not really surprising that prohibitionists also obsess about what’s in the service buyer‘s head as well; most of the propaganda on this is pretty horrifying and better reflects the prohibitionists’ views of sex and women than it does the buyers’.  So it’s really nice to see an article like this, in which a sex therapist thoroughly debunks prohibitionist propaganda about clients by setting forth the many reasons men see sex workers, as revealed by hundreds of sex workers and clients and supported by research.

Surplus Women (#445)

Nothing they can do to this monster would come close to what I’d do to him:

A banker tortured a prostitute for three days, then slashed her throat and hid her body in a suitcase…Rurik Jutting…filmed himself subjecting Sumarti Ningsih, 23, to a horrific ordeal after fuelling himself with booze, cocaine and Red Bull…He forced [the] terrified…Sumarti to lick a toilet bowl before he cut her throat with a serrated knife.  But she did not die immediately so he dragged her to the shower where he sawed through her neck.  Sumarti was one of two Indonesian sex workers killed by Jutting in his luxury [Hong Kong] flat…His second victim, Seneng Mujiasih, 26, was killed five days later. Her throat was also cut…

The Pygmalion Fallacy (#445) 

One would think that so-called “futurists” would have the sense to put their “predictions” far enough in the future that they won’t be disproved quite so soon:

David Levy…says, ‘The very first primitive sex robots will arrive next year…but it will take at least a decade before truly sophisticated sex dolls go on sale.”  The breakthrough point is likely to be when celebrities start to have sex with the dolls, says Levy…”When somebody like Tom Cruise goes on the record and says, ‘I had sex with a robot,’ the whole world will notice”…

Checklist (#633)

Sex workers: Uber now wants its drivers to spy on us and rat us out to the pigs.  I suggest you start using Lyft instead:

An organization that fights [sex workers]…is [colluding with] taxi and ride share drivers.  The partnership between “Ending Child Slavery at the Source” and Uber will [indoctrinate] drivers to [harass]…sex [workers]…Faiza Mathon-Mathieu…hopes the transportation industry can…report people they encounter [to the cops]…“They don’t necessarily know that they’re victims…they are not going to…be seeking help,” said Mathon-Mathieu.  This group hopes Uber drivers will use their interaction with [sex workers] to [betray them]…Guidelines developed by [prohibitionists]…will help these ride share drivers detect someone [to rat on]…“Youth with name or symbols tattooed…if they have multiple phones”…

One Born Every Minute (#645) 

Another sleazy scam artist raping aspiring sex workers:

A Kansas City-area man is accused of duping dozens of women into having sex with him on camera as “rehearsal” for pornographic movies.  Federal prosecutors announced a 21-count indictment…against…Mario Antoine…[who] is accused of creating online aliases as a talent manager, photographer and videographer and claiming to work for fictitious companies in the pornography industry.  Investigators say he promised to pay the women thousands of dollars…[and] when the women complained about not being paid, Antoine forwarded images of the sexual activity to their employers or significant others…

Saving Them From Themselves (#678)

Pro Libertate featured an absolutely scathing denunciation of the district attorney, cops and other “authorities” who worked to turn a group of ordinary teens into “sex offenders” and are being challenged by the parents of one of their victims.  I’m not going to quote it because it really needs to be read in its entirety, but I will say that the author not only correctly characterizes the “officials” as sexual perverts, but includes lovely lines like “They lied, of course.  That’s what police officers are trained to do.”

Send In the Clowns (#682) 

And here some of you thought the clown thing was kind of off-topic for me:

…the recent uptick in creepy clown sightings has correlated with a significant uptick in the demand for clown porn…Now, in a move as disturbing as it was inevitable, Porn.com has purchased ClownSex.com in hopes of cashing in…

Between the Lines (#683)

I’m not getting lazy; I just knew that Liz Brown would do such an awesome job on this, I didn’t feel there was any point in even attempting it myself:

The results have been pouring in from Operation Cross Country X, the FBI’s tenth annual, nationwide sex sting targeting what the agency [pretends is] “underage human trafficking.”  Each year, FBI agents across America team up with [cops]…state attorneys…and others for a few days of posing as people buying or selling sex…This year…According to the FBI, “82 sexually exploited juveniles” were recovered and “239 pimps and other individuals” arrested.  The average age of the minors was just under 16…the bulk of OCCX efforts involved cops contacting adult female sex workers while posing as customers and then arresting them, if not also seizing the women’s money and throwing them in jail…nearly three-quarters of all arrests were for simple solicitation or prostitution…Regardless how old someone selling sex is or how willing their involvement, anyone accompanying them may be arrested as a “pimp”…In Mississippi, a man from out of state who was visiting his 22-year-old daughter was arrested for promoting prostitution because…he was…aware she was doing it…I’ve identified approximately:

  • 534 arrests for prostitution
  • 163 arrests for attempting to pay an adult for sex (solicitation)
  • 145 arrests for charges such as pimping, pandering, promoting prostitution, or contributing to the delinquency of a minor
  • 14 arrests for attempting to pay an undercover-cop pretending to be a teenage-girl for sex
  • 10 people arrested on human-trafficking charges
  • 9 people arrested for “keeping a bawdy place,” in conjunction with massage-parlor prostitution businesses in Virginia…

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Back Issue: October 2013

Death will claim us all soon enough; it’s both foolish and counterproductive to waste one’s life trying to escape the inescapable, and to suck all the marrow out of its bones in a futile attempt to delay the inevitable.  –  “Halloween 2013

Zombie Rising from the Grave by Diane DiederichMy natal month is, of course, dominated by my natal day, and besides the directly Halloween-themed “Trick or Treat“, the tangentially-related “Total Perspective Vortex” and “Book Review:  The Science of Fear“, and the strong influences on the harlotography (“Aileen Wuornos“) and fictional interlude (“Monopoly“), several of the titles of otherwise non-horror-oriented columns were horror-inspired (as were their illustrations).  It’s not hard to pick them out of the list of Q&A columns (“Your Move“, “It Takes All Kinds“, “All Clean“, “Buried But Not Dead” and “Horns“) and Cliterati reprints (“Dark Corners“, “Imaginary Evils“, “Sex Raysfeminist heretic burningand “Everything Old is New Again“), and then of course there’s “Torture Chamber“.  After the guest column (Sasha Castel on being a mistress), two stats columns (“Frequently Told Lies” and “Handy Figures Revisited“), and an extra news column (“Hysteria on Parade“), that leaves only two columns on prohibitionist tyranny: a look at Swanee Hunt’s “Vendetta” against whores, and a critique of the US government’s “Whimsical Notions” that men can be ordered to be asexual.Temptations of St. Anthony by Bernardo Parentino (c. 1494)

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Taking Sides

lady lawyerAs my close friends know, I have a deep-seated dislike of interpersonal conflict.  Now, I don’t mind mocking idiots on the internet, or chastising a stranger for being an asshole or a customer service person for not giving me what I want, or having an intellectual debate.  And I’ll always support someone I love in an argument with a person I don’t, without even a moment’s hesitation.  But when it comes to disagreement with a person I love, I will go a long way to avoid arguments, even to the point of giving in when I know I’m right because it isn’t worth the emotional pain.  In fact, the single most abusive thing my first husband, Jack, used to do in our relationship (and there were many) was to refuse to let me avoid arguments; he’d insist on cornering me and goading me no matter how much I just wanted it to stop.  So while I deeply disliked arguments before, I now have an aversion to them bordering on the pathological.

As you can probably guess, this also means it’s deeply uncomfortable for me when two of my friends argue with one another.  I don’t particularly even like hearing one friend complain about another, but as long as they respect my desire to remain neutral I can live with that.  But when there’s an implicit or explicit request for me to validate the person’s feelings (beyond the level of, “I’m sorry you and so-and-so aren’t getting along right now”), I have to draw a line.  It’s possible I might be able to mediate a reconciliation, as long as the parties both agreed to be calm during the process, but even then I wouldn’t like it.  And actually hearing two people I care about hurling harsh words at one another is so painful it makes me want to run away.

Lately, I’ve had a few requests from sex worker readers I don’t know to help them in fights with other sex workers I don’t know.  And while I can understand their desire to get a well-known and highly-respected member of our community on their side, my answer has to be “no” because if I don’t know either participant there’s just no way I can separate facts from emotions and decide which actions were understandable reactions to provocation and which were pure assholiness.  If the two of you can agree to calmly state your cases to me, and furthermore will agree to abide by whatever decision I make or compromise I propose, I can probably be persuaded to act as judge.  This doesn’t mean I want that role; if I wanted to be a judge I’d have gone to law school rather than library school.  But I understand that my position as one of the grande dames of the demimonde and my reputation for wisdom and rationality will naturally cause some people to want me to act in that role, and I won’t shirk my duty.  Also, if you’re a sex worker and your adversary isn’t, it’s possible I may be able to help you (though again, I won’t like it) because I’m naturally going to sympathize with a member of my own tribe.  If, however, you’re a whore fighting with another whore who just comes up out of the blue and expects me to take your side without hearing the other, I’m afraid I must decline.  I mean, think about it for a minute:  What if she had thought to contact me first?  The only way to stop the drama is to lay everything out in the open, and that’s impossible unless I can hear both sides.

(Have a question of your own?  Please consult this page to see if I’ve answered it in a previous column, and if not just click here to ask me via email.)

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I have the right to choose what I do with my body.  –  Katherine Stone

Safe Targets 

In case you can’t quite figure out what this site is actually for, I’ll spell it out for you.  After Tom Dart’s megalomaniacal assault on Backpage left it unable to take payments except by money order or Bitcoin, many sex workers who weren’t comfortable with adopting the latter opted for the former.  But now that other sociopathic politicians have demonstrated that they won’t even let the law stop their jihad, many sex workers are terrified that their identities will be uncovered by pigs illegally rooting in Backpage’s records in a future raid.  Into this opening have stepped profiteers who, like Dennis Hof, are perfectly happy to charge an exploitative 50% by charging $2 for every $1 worth of “safe Backpage credit” (presumably in bitcoin) that can’t easily be traced back to them.  This is what “law enforcement” means when it claims it wants to “help” sex workers.

Presumption of Guilt (November Updates)

Fascist scum like this will be the first up against the wall after the politicians they worship:

There is $1.38 trillion worth of cash in circulation; $1.08 trillion of this is in the form of $100 bills…that works out to 34 hundreds in circulation for every man, woman, and child in the United States — even though a normal American rarely carries even one…No one knows exactly who has all those large bills because physical cash, by its nature, is hard to track…consequently most C-notes are used for a variety of illicit purposes — tax evasion, drug dealing, bribery, and so forth — both in the United States and overseas.  Harvard economist Kenneth Rogoff believes that the solution is to get rid of cash.  In a new book, he argues that abolishing $100, $50, and perhaps even $20 bills will seriously inhibit crime and tax evasion while doing little to hamper legitimate commerce…

Note that the buying power of a $100 bill today is less than that of a $5 bill in 1900.  In Rogoff’s totalitarian fantasy, the government would have total control of virtually all commerce; sex workers and others in the irregular economy would be forced to deal in barter, cryptocurrency or the currencies of less-totalitarian states, which would make life a lot more difficult…presumably the outcome this bootlicker wants.

Gorged With Meaning

“British students are going to extraordinary lengths to fund their studies, including doing lucrative work”.  That’s how extraordinarily dumb this sounds to me:

British students are going to extraordinary lengths to fund their studies, including sex work and drug dealing, as the cost of university continues to rise…one in 10 undergraduates admitted to knowing someone who has turned to drug dealing to earn extra money, and as many as one in 20 said they knew someone who pays for their course by escorting.  Some 17 per cent of students said they considered stripping an acceptable way of funding university life, and one in 25 students surveyed said they were considering looking for a sugar daddy to support them financially…

The Pygmalion Fallacy 

Deep self-deception about technology, pearl-clutching about sexuality and offensive ignorance about sex work, all under one roof!

…Goldsmith University in London…is where the International Congress on Love and Sex with Robots is to be held this upcoming December.  The congress was supposed to be held in Malaysia on November 16 but was subsequently banned by the country as it deemed the whole premise as “too extreme”…The session will focus on humanoid robots, robot emotions and personalities, teledildonics (cybersex toys), intelligent electronic sex hardware, entertainment robots and more…Joel Snell…warns that engaging sex with a robot can be addicting…sex therapist Gurpreet Singh says…robots shouldn’t replace humans entirely…Dr. John Danaher believes that sex robots are an excellent replacement to human prostitutes…”They won’t need to ‘fake it’ the same way as human prostitutes.”

Imagination Pinned Down

This ridiculous fantasy is nauseating even by “sex trafficking” standards:

Rachel Pointer…[of] Omaha…[claim’s her neighbor’s] boyfriend raped [her when she was six and] then…started [pimping] her…It wasn’t always the same person selling her.  Pointer said after a few months someone else “took over that role”…It was surprisingly easy for this to happen without anyone noticing…The kids were homeschooled and there weren’t regular doctor appointments.  In other words, there were no outsiders to see what was happening.  The traffickers would tell Rachel to do things like fake an illness and go to bed early, then sneak out her second floor window and climb down a trellis to be sold for sex at night.  “Drugs and alcohol became part of the picture at a very young age, 7, 8, 9-years old,” she explained.  “Cocaine mostly and alcohol..enough to take the edge off and to keep me up and to keep me compliant…this was her life three, four, five times a week.  For 10 years…“When I got older, when I was a teenager, I started not being able to make as much.  I wasn’t as profitable”…The traffickers made one final threat of what would happen to Rachel and her family if she ever said anything, then it was over.  She never heard from them again.  There was no investigation, no charges, no punishment for the men who sold her and those who bought her…

As usual, there are no names and no evidence, and it’s all set conveniently decades in the past.  And nobody bothers to question the blatant, ugly and totally-bizarre lie that there are more adult men who would be interested in fucking a six-year-old than a 16-year-old, nor the absurd premise that nobody would notice a schoolkid was constantly drunk or hopped up on coke.

Whatever They Need To Say (#350)

Three years later, another massive pogrom in Soho, troublingly timed to coincide with similar pogroms all over the world:

Late…on the evening of Thursday, 20 October, [cops with]…sniffer dogs raided six massage parlours in Chinatown and Soho, when their cash registers were full with most of a day’s takings.  Women…were dragged out onto the streets past midnight, before 12 were detained and removed for immigration offences, with a further 6 arrests of maids and other staff members…The Met [pretends]…that the “aim of the operation is to identify, safeguard and remove victims of human trafficking, sexual exploitation and modern slavery offences”…[reporters repeated the propaganda that the arrested] women had been “rescued”…The use of sniffer dogs highlights the absurdity of the Met’s claims to deploy their raids, in the middle of the night, for the protection of women.  Can a sniffer dog tell us if a massage parlour is “utilising trafficked women”?  Can a sniffer dog say if a sex worker is being paid fairly for work, in decent conditions?  No.  In fact, all a sniffer dog can do is to intimidate women and provide evidence for laying charges, which was, of course, the Met’s primary aim all along…The police also saw fit to take away tens of thousands of pounds from workers at the end of a day of seeing clients…

See also “Between the Lines” below.

Little Boxes (#419)

There’s a shorter phrase for “those who believe a woman’s virginity should only be shared for love”; it’s “prudish busybodies”:

At one of Nevada’s…legal brothels, a 20-year-old woman recently signed up…to sell…Her virginity.  Like the brothels themselves, Stone’s choice has been controversial, particularly for those who believe a woman’s virginity should only be shared for love…In 2014, Stone’s family home in Seattle…was destroyed by a fire.  Without insurance, Stone and her family found themselves forced to remain in the scorched property…Brothel tycoon Dennis Hof…agreed to sell Stone’s one-time service…[for] a 50% cut from the profits of the final bid…”People say you are suppose to do it for love,” Stone says…”But…I am doing it because I love my family”…At the moment…[the high]  bid is a little over $400,000…While she waits, Stone is…”contracted by Dennis Hof to legally provide services to gentlemen who are seeking experiences” other than intercourse, she says…Even after her virginity is auctioned, Stone says she has no intentions of leaving the ranch. “I anticipate to continue working at the ranch for the next five years,” she says. “I plan to go to law school in the future”…

Under decriminalization, she could’ve stayed here in Seattle; the sex worker community here, including me, would’ve helped her to arrange this and supported her emotionally through the experience without even taking a cut.

Between the Lines

In a very troubling development, the FBI’s “Operation Cross-Country” appears to be spreading to other countries; a few of the articles on the annual pogrom mentioned international operations, and this confirms that:

An impressive…28 countries teamed up with Europol to deliver a major blow to organised crime groups involved in trafficking in human beings across the European Union and beyond.  During the operational activities of the EU-wide Joint Action Day (JAD) named  Ciconia Alba, one part of the intelligence-led police actions and controls focussed explicitly on [sex workers]…11,161 locations…were [raided]…43,405 persons were [harassed, questioned & detained]…and 549 [sex workers were labeled] potential victims…Data gathered during the operations led to the launch of 102 new investigations…Fourteen underage victims were reported.  Overall fifty-two countries and four international organisations were involved…

Yes, over forty-three thousand people were subjected to police violence, all to discover 14 underage sex workers, of whom statistically all but one or two were working of their own choice.  In other words, the operation had a “success rate” of roughly 0.003%.

To Molest and Rape 

More brave heroes from Washington state, “saving” women:

In a matter of six months in 2014, three Colville [cops] either resigned or were fired.  Two…were accused of sexual misconduct…the third, Rex Newport, pleaded guilty to felony sex crimes…That’s 30 percent of the department — three of 10…in a city of less than 5,000 people…Newport…took a plea deal and served time in prison.  He must register as a sex offender and can no longer work as a cop in Washington state…Jeffry Finer…and…Richard Wall filed a civil lawsuit at the beginning of 2015 and recently agreed to a $230,000 settlement for their clients…[the] attorneys…found that [cops] were routinely unsupervised and allegations of sexual misconduct…were not thoroughly investigated, which…perpetuated a culture of such misconduct…

Neither Addiction Nor Epidemic (#663) 

“Sex addiction” is now being used as a defense even for violent sex offenders:

A young man who tackled a heavily pregnant woman off her bike and tried to rape her was addicted to pornography and had violent sexual dreams in the lead-up to the attack…Casey Tennent said he “couldn’t help it” and rambled “I imagined doing it and then dreamt about it, and then did it tonight” when he was arrested after the assault in Melbourne…Tennent was chased off by three men…who were able to surround him, take him down and restrain him in a laneway until police arrived…

Of Course It Is

While Oakland appears to be starting a purification campaign to get rid of cops who deal honestly with whores instead of raping us, Celeste Guap fired her prohibitionist attorney for, apparently, refusing to stop spewing anti-whore bullshit at her (in fact, she didn’t even stop after she was fired).  Fortunately, a competent and less-judgmental defense attorney immediately took her place on the legal team.

Send In the Clowns 

While Canadian “authorities” are so far content to “suggest people do not dress up as clowns and walk around with what is going on,” threatening them with unspecified criminal charges, those in Mississippi have gone totally (and unconstitutionally) ape shit:

A Mississippi county has declared it illegal to dress like a clown, and is threatening to levy $150 fines against anyone caught in a clown costume.  The Kemper County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously [last] Wednesday to implement the ban, which expires the day after Halloween.  It makes it unlawful for anyone of any age to appear in public in a clown costume, clown mask or clown makeup…the measure was passed at the request of Kemper County Sheriff James Moore…

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Diary #330

selfie 10-21-16When I bought my first smartphone a year and a half ago, the folks at Verizon didn’t bother to tell me that the model I liked was already over four years old.  So even though I liked it a lot and didn’t really want to get a new phone, I was eventually pushed into it by necessity.  It only had 8 gigabytes of memory, which apparently isn’t much once all the apps one doesn’t want (but can’t remove) keep repeatedly updating themselves without permission; I was constantly getting errors and my text program was so slow that it was really difficult to keep up my end of a text conversation because my phone kept bogging down & acting screwy.  Plus even though I have international service on my plan, I was told the old phone wouldn’t work internationally.  So a few weeks ago I decided to get a new used phone, and after TWO false starts (basically, the phones that looked like they would work wouldn’t accept a data transfer from my old phone) we finally got one that would work and I spent most of last Monday afternoon & evening moving into it.  As those who’ve been reading for a while know, I’m really very OCD about how I like my environment (including my online environment) to be set up, and I don’t like change.  So the trick of getting a new device for me is making it as much like the old one as possible so I don’t fail to appreciate the new one’s advantages by obsessing over the features I’ve lost.  Anyhow, it’s finally mostly straight except for a few kinks I need to work out, and I’m told that next time I upgrade these newer phones (my new one’s less than 2 years old) allow everything to be copied to the new phone, including the settings (which I had to laboriously reconfigure this time).  All in all, I’m very pleased with the upgrade, which for me is saying a lot; the new phone is a helluva lot faster and my texting is so smooth now, and I was actually able to upload this selfie (the first one with the new phone) directly to the blog instead of having to email it to myself & upload from my computer, which is how I’ve had to do them since the spring.  It’s too bad the new version of my weather app is so much uglier than the old one and lacks the lovely background pictures, but I guess I’ll survive.

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this-tricks-a-treat It has been my custom for the last few years to present a collection of spooky stuff in order to get y’all in the mood for Halloween.  Last year’s column contains links to those of previous years, so if what I share with you today isn’t enough (and really, is it ever possible to get enough spooky fun?) you can go back to those previous columns for more!  Since last year’s column, there have been a few dark or horror-themed columns and stories, including “Windows of the Soul“, “Knock, Knock, Knock“, “May Eve 2016“, “Out of the Dark“, “Clowning Around” and last year’s thanatopsis, “A Necessary End“.  I also featured creepy or spooky-fun videos in Links #277, #278#279, #287, #293#295, #309, #315#316, #318#327  and #328, and here’s a collection of appropriate links:

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Because drug traffickers have been seen breathing, then breathing is an indicia of drug trafficking.  –  Justices Quinn, Campbell & Pirtle

There’s nothing “banned” about this Betty Boop Halloween cartoon from 1933; presumably, the label refers to the fact that once the Hays Code started being enforced the next year, Betty was given much less sexy clothes.  The links above it were contributed by Scott Greenfield (“more”), Brooke Magnanti (“Lovecraft”), Tim Cushing (“idiots” and “posters”), Nun Ya (“attention”), Inspireland  (“Because”), and Grace (“whatsoever”).

From the Archives

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All that criminalization of prostitution does is make people afraid.
–  Tara Burns

Droit du Seigneur 

Though pimps are pretty rare, a disproportionate number of the ones who do exist are cops:  “[An] Oklahoma City [cop]…was arrested…on multiple complaints, including aiding in prostitution.  Lt. Alex Edwards…was [also charged with a bunch of vague ‘crimes’ used by prosecutors to stack penalties]…

Pyrrhic Victory

When they smash down your door in the middle of the night, murder your dogs, terrorize your family and embroil you in a decade-long court battle which will utterly bankrupt you because some computer decided you look like somebody who supposedly broke some law, don’t say I didn’t warn you:

Half of American adults are in a face-recognition database, according to a Georgetown University study…”The Perpetual Line-up: Unregulated Police Face Recognition in America” shows that one-fourth of the nation’s law enforcement agencies have access to face-recognition databases, and their use…is virtually unregulated…Alvaro Bedoya…co-author of the study [said] “By [scanning]…the faces on 26 states’ driver’s license and ID photos, police and the FBI have basically enrolled half of all adults in a massive virtual line-up.  This has never been done for fingerprints or DNA”…researchers obtained documents stating that at least five “major police departments,” including those in Chicago, Dallas, and Los Angeles, “either claimed to run real-time face recognition off of street cameras, bought technology that can do so, or expressed an interest in buying it”…

Spotlight (#47) Asstoon

I wonder if Asstoon will ever get professional help for his delusions of grandeur?

Ashton Kutcher [made grandiose and unsubstantiated claims]…about how Thorn, an organization founded by himself and ex-wife Demi Moore, has been working to combat human trafficking…Kutcher [fantasized] that his organization had saved more than 6,000 victims from human trafficking in 2016, identifying more 2,000 trafficker in the process…An additional online menace that Thorn intends to combat…was online pornography…“I’m going to eliminate child pornography from the internet.”

Imagine a reporter neither expressing skepticism of nor demanding proof from a person who claimed to have saved 6000 rape victims and vowed that his next super-deed would be to eliminate every opium poppy in Asia.

Pearls Firmly Clutched 

Using Suzy Favor Hamilton’s story without her input is pretty sleazy even for an anti-whore sleazefest like Law and Order:

…an…episode on Law & Order SVU…revolved around a female Olympic Pole Vaulter who had been sexually assaulted while secretly escorting…They flash in the intro, “The following story is fictional and does not depict any actual person, entity or event.”  Well that’s kinda laughable because with the exception of the sexual assault and a couple minor modifications, it’s pretty much me out there.  Olympian?  Check.  Track & Field athlete?  Check.  Married?  Check.  Mom?  Check.  Secretly escorting?  Check.  Bipolar?  Check…It’s strange to me that a show like this…can rip off a story so blatantly.  I don’t pretend to know the ins and outs of how all this works, but what I do know it that as I watched, it felt a little icky and sneaky.  Like someone had broken into my life uninvited…

Torture Chamber

Americans keep pretending to be shocked by this, then support sending more people to prison:

A former inmate of a Louisiana private prison is suing the company that runs the prison after two guards [orally raped] him [on several occasions]…Aaron Franklin…was abused by Derrick Deshotel and Tyler Strothers…at the Allen Correctional Center…An investigation by the prison substantiated his allegations…The guards were fired…and criminally charged…[but] received only probation…

O, Canada! (All Traffick, All the Time)

Canadian cops are trying to intimidate sex workers again:

Holed up in a hotel room close to Calgary’s airport, a handful of [pigs]…dig through piles of online escort ads as they prep for Day Two of Operation Northern Spotlight…they make calls to unsuspecting sex workers and [lie to them to] set up “dates”…they hope to [intimidate them] to leave the world’s oldest profession…The women all react differently to the initial contact with the detective.  Some are hostile, as they realize the [cops have robbed them of hundreds of dollars of their time]…

Between the Lines

Sex workers, our clients, our associates and our families were once again subjected to the FBI’s periodic anti-sex worker pogrom, “Operation Cross-Country”:

This year’s Operation Cross Country—the largest to date—involved 55 FBI field offices and 74 FBI-led Child Exploitation Task Forces throughout the country composed of more than 400 law enforcement agencies.  Hundreds of law enforcement officials took part in sting operations in hotels, casinos, truck stops, and other areas frequented by pimps, prostitutes, and their customers…

The FBI learned years ago not to give any clear figures on the number of peaceful adults whose lives are destroyed in these fanatical jihads, preferring instead to represent any underage sex workers they arrest as “rescued victims” and pretty much any male unlucky enough to fall into their hands as a “pimp” (though the conviction rate is only 4%).  So it may take a week or two to get a picture of the extent of the carnage; right now the coverage is dominated by nauseating fluff like this in which cops and politicians engage in a vast circle-jerk to fantasies of enslaved teen girls:

Calling child sex trafficking a “scourge,” FBI Director James Comey announced Monday that 82 minors had been rescued…through an international effort held this month to locate victims and arrest the perpetrators…”These children trapped in this hell need a hero,” he said. “And the men and women who work for us, federal agents, state agents, local police officers and partners around the world are those heroes.”  Comey’s comments came during the International Association of Chiefs of Police convention in San Diego…

But the tide has turned, and this time the usual cacophony of cop-fellation which accompanies these pogroms is interrupted by a few voices speaking the truth:

…sex-worker advocates [explain that]…better results could be achieved by decriminalizing prostitution.  They argue that eliminating the fear of arrest would sharply increase the reporting of abuse and exploitation from both sex workers and their customers.  Tara Burns…said people involved in the sex trade can’t rely on the hope that [a cop]…they encounter will use their arrest discretion to zero in on abuses, and could just as easily wield it to commit them, as seen in the ongoing East Bay police sex scandal…

To Molest and Rape 

It’s unusual for reporters to actually use the word “rape” in reference to rapist cops:  “A Festus [Missouri cop] charged with rape and domestic assault…has been [given a desk job]…Andrew J. Hirth…was charged Sept. 15…

No Moss

Let’s hope Rolling Stone‘s fortunes follow its credibility down the anti-sex toilet:

[Nicole Eramo] the University of Virginia dean [of students is] suing Rolling Stone for defamation over how she was portrayed in an article about a campus rape report…Sabrina Rubin Erdely [falsely] described a woman named “Jackie” being gang-raped by seven men…and portrayed the administration as not doing enough to help…“I don’t think anyone at Rolling Stone thought of me as a real person,” Eramo said…“You can’t just do drive-by journalism”…Rolling Stone made her “look like the devil”…[even though]…Jackie [had written]…”Dean Eramo has truly saved my life….[she] was helpful and understanding and, above all, compassionate”…Eramo disputed that she ever said any of the [quotes attributed to her in the article and]…no one at Rolling Stone contacted…[her] during the fact-checking process…Jackie forwarded an email to the reporter showing that the dean had set up two meetings with police so Jackie could report the alleged rape to authorities.  A reference to these meetings…was included in a draft of the article but was later edited out…

In other words, Erdely & Rolling Stone knew that the dean had supported “Jackie” in her claim, but willfully chose to depict her as a villain to make it a better story.

Send In the Clowns ooh-so-scary

As clown hysteria continues to mount, institutional responses to it grow increasingly more stupid:

The Russian government warned citizens traveling to Britain to beware of clowns…San Francisco schools went into lockdown during a clown fear wave, and have now claimed the FBI is looking into things…in Concord…a mother [claimed] a “creepy clown” tried to kidnap her 1-year-old child…The woman [supposedly] kicked the clown in the shin and the person fled…Sonoma State University has responded to clown sightings as well as an unrelated person in a gorilla suit…That’s the second…clown-gorilla connection

Meanwhile, elsewhere in California:

Police arrested a juvenile Tuesday following a social media post that suggested “armed” clowns would visit three Hanford schools…police began receiving calls about the post…from [idiots] fearing for their own safety or for the safety of their children…Capt. Karl Anderson attributed the fast resolution to citizens who [snitched]…The Spooky Halloween Super Store…and…Halloween City…said the recent clown scares around the country haven’t hurt sales of creepy clown masks, costumes and decorations…

But while these entrepreneurs are sensibly making money from people’s herd behavior, Target decided to “send a message” that it’s part of the Establishment:  “Halloween costume shoppers won’t be finding any ‘creepy clown’ masks on Target store shelves or online.  The decision was made late last week to pull all clown masks from stores…”  And Snopes is fielding some manifestations of the hysteria:

On 17 October 2016, the Empire Herald web site published a gruesome article about the arrest of a clown after police found eleven human bodies stuffed in a freezer at his Memphis residence…this story…was…a…fabrication intended to exploit…clown hysteria…The Empire Herald is a fake news site that does not publish any factual stories…

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