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Posts Tagged ‘Toys for Tots’

‘Tis the Season

Posted in Miscellaneous, Perception, Philosophy, tagged , , on November 25, 2016| 5 Comments »

To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.  –  Ecclesiastes 3:1

Toys for Tots 2003Long-time readers know that I am a firm believer in the Ecclesiastean principle, that there is a proper season for everything and that everything should be in its season.  And because of this, I get very vocal (let’s be honest: bitchy) when I see freaking stores putting out Christmas decorations before Thanksgiving; this year my patience was sorely tested by stores actually putting out Christmas shit BEFORE FUCKING HALLOWEEN.  But because I’ve gone over this so many times before, I’m going to give y’all a break from my anti-gun-jumper, anti-“Black Friday” shrieking; those of you who haven’t read one of my day-after-Thanksgiving rants before (or those who have, but are feeling a tad masochistic today) can click on the links I’ve helpfully provided there for the last four such polemics.  Instead, I’m going to give you three wonderful ways you can help St. Nick’s favorite people, whores and children, this holiday season.

1) SWOP Behind Bars has a new program that will help you bring some cheer to incarcerated sex workers.  Seasonal depression affects many people, but for people locked up in prisons it must be almost unimaginably difficult to bear.  Getting mail is one of the few bright spots in their days, and even if you don’t have the time or dedication for a full-time pen pal, SWOP is making it easy for you to send greeting cards to them:

You provide greeting cards and stamps…
…We provide names and mailing addresses of incarcerated sex workers…
…Your guests can send holiday greetings and messages of cheer and goodwill without taking on a full time pen pal!

Just click on this link and write a short email saying how many guests you expect at your party; SWOP “will send you the names of 3 incarcerated sex workers per guest to send a card to!”  Such an easy, inexpensive way to show support, and if you want to do more you can send them books from their wishlists!

2) Every year at this time, I run a “Toys for Tots” special: from today until Friday, December 16th, anyone who books with me for at least an hour at my normal rate and brings new, unwrapped toys will receive an extra 10 minutes per toy (maximum 60 extra minutes for 6 toys).  For just one short trip to a toy store or big-box store and a modest expenditure, you can double your time with me and bring joy to a needy child who might otherwise be cheated of a holiday gift.  If you don’t want a date but would like to meet me, for $100 and three toys I will have an hour-long coffee meeting with you anywhere in the Seattle area.  And if you don’t live near me, please consider donating a toy or money anyway!

3) The Salvation Army is a horrible, anti-sex organization which uses a large fraction of its income to fund anti-whore and anti-GLBT campaigns; though its bell-ringers are ubiquitous at this time of year, please DO NOT give them any money!  Contribute to either of the worthy causes above, or if you prefer charities which help the homeless there are many more deserving than the Sallies, such as this one headed by my friend, Allena Gabosch.  And if you want to be like a politician and “send a message”, you can print out the protest slip below and shove it into a kettle in lieu of real money.

Do any one, or all three!  Because they’re all a lot more positive and life-affirming than trampling children to get 20% off a new blu-ray player or something.Salvation Army donation

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No Thanks

Posted in Philosophy, tagged , , , on November 27, 2015| 4 Comments »

Were it not for Halloween’s growing popularity as an adult drinking holiday [Christmas displays] might have broken into October by now.  –  “The Most Wonderful Time of the Year”

Black Friday memeIt didn’t take long for my prediction to become a reality; last year I saw Christmas displays at a farm supply store two weeks before Halloween, and this year I saw them at Lowe’s around the same time.  Stores that don’t carry Halloween merchandise have now broken the Halloween barrier, and even retailers like Wal-mart are inching past it in parts of the store, with full-on Christmas displays emerging on Halloween afternoon.  Long-time readers know that though I love Christmas, I like seasons to be seasonal; part of what makes Christmas fun is that it’s a special time of year, and something that occupies a quarter of the calendar can hardly be considered “special”.  Did you notice the color of my nails in the photo I posted Tuesday?  Brown.  For autumn, and for the browned foods of Thanksgiving.  They won’t go Christmas red until my next visit to the nail parlor this coming Tuesday.  And they haven’t been black since shortly after Halloween; no matter what the marketers may push, black is not the appropriate color for today or for any other part of the Christmas season.  If you want to go out there and risk death, dismemberment or police brutality for a chance at one of an artificially-small number of low-priced bait-and-switch items hurled down by the millionaire top-management of “big box” stores like scraps tossed off the palace balcony to the starving peasantry, be my guest; I won’t be joining you.  Though I won’t be spending the day out in the country as I have for the past 10 years, I’ll mostly be spending it with friends and I’m not going anywhere near a retail store.  I will, however, be continuing one of my long-standing traditions:  collecting toys to donate to needy children via the Toys for Tots program.  If you live in or near Seattle and would like to help me in this effort, please email me; from now until the 18th I’m also offering a special deal for clients as part of that effort, and if you’d like to take advantage of that you can click here to get in touch with me about it.  Christmas is what we make it:  it can be a time to rush and stress, or a time to relax and enjoy; a time to let marketers lead you around by the nose, or a time to share what you have.  I know how I’m going to celebrate, and as I do every year I invite you to join me.  And if you see any Sallies ringing bells, please give them this with my compliments.Salvation Army donation

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The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Posted in History, Holidays, Philosophy, tagged , , , , , , on November 29, 2013| 55 Comments »

It’s the most wonderful time of the year!
With the kids jingle belling
And everyone telling
You “Be of good cheer”…
It’s the most wonderful time of the year.

It’s the hap-happiest season of all!
With those holiday greetings
And gay happy meetings
When friends come to call…
It’s the hap- happiest season of all.  –   Edward Pola and George Wyle

Macy's parade Santa ClausWhen I was a wee lass, and the song which provides today’s title and epigram was a recent holiday hit rather than a hoary standard, today would be the first day in the American calendar year that one might be likely to hear it in a public place.  For most of the 20th century and perhaps earlier, the day after Thanksgiving was the agreed-upon beginning of the Christmas season in the United States; since most people (outside of retail) were off from work that day, it was a convenient opportunity to put up decorations, obtain and trim a tree or even go shopping.  Macy’s department store in New York has reinforced this every year since 1924 (with the exception of 1942-44) by the inclusion of Santa Claus in its popular Thanksgiving Day parade, heralded as the “official” kickoff of Yuletide festivities.

But as the years rolled by, marketing became a science and advertising became ever more aggressive.  Merchants began erecting early Christmas displays even before Thanksgiving, and were it not for Halloween’s growing popularity as an adult drinking holiday they might have broken into October by now.  On November 1st every large retail chain (anxious to sweep away any lingering thoughts of mortality which might have entered less-impenetrable consumer skulls from the rare horror imagery among the sexy Muppets, sexy foodstuffs, sexy police-state functionaries and sexy superhuman serial killers) rips down the Halloween décor, shoves it into closeout bins and plasters the entire premises with red and green, fake snow, creepy Saint Nicholas caricatures, incessant Christmas and winter-themed music (including modern arrangements of the eponymous tune), and unrelenting encouragement to buy, buy, buy!  But the traditional launch date hasn’t been forgotten, oh no!  Now it’s become “Black Friday”, the worldwide festival of conspicuous consumption which started out as an in-joke among Philadelphia retailers in the 1960s.  Thanksgiving has been reduced to a sideshow, one of the less important events of “Black Friday Week” as advertising trash infuriatingly insists on calling it; those unfortunate enough to depend on retail employment for their livelihoodBlack Friday mob are forced to skip the day altogether as their employers shift “Black Friday Sales Events” back further and further into Thursday and demand that the wage-slaves be on hand to deal with hordes of drooling morons who lack the sense to stay home and enjoy the sorts of activities that Christmas songs still pretend characterize the season.

As you can probably tell, I most certainly do not approve.  We’ll be spending the day as we always do:  finding a Christmas tree on our property and decorating it, and having Thanksgiving leftovers for dinner.  Unless there’s some dire emergency, none of our vehicles are going farther than the mailbox, and we aren’t going to do any online shopping either, not today and not on the newest pseudo-event, the even-more-stupidly-named “Cyber Monday” (and no, not on Boxing Day either).  I’ve already bought most of my presents, and will obtain the rest on my trip to New Orleans week-after-next; and though I do love this season for the festivities and the visiting and the gift-giving and the donations to Toys for Tots (my favorite charity), I will be staying as far away from retail establishments as is humanly possible for the next month.  I also won’t be donating to the Salvation Army, who as I’ve explained before were one of the originators of “sex trafficking” hysteria and are still among its most vociferous and dishonest proponents.  By all means, donate to the needy during this season of goodwill, but there are plenty of charities who manage to accomplish that without also funding crusades against human rights. Salvation Army donation

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That Was the Week That Was (#50)

Posted in Biography, Current Events, History, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, The Dark Side, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on December 15, 2012| 11 Comments »

Rhoda Grant…believes sex workers are imbeciles who should be denied the right to earn a living and subjected to state-sanctioned sexual assault to ensure that they comply with the dictates imposed upon their profession.  –  Kate Gould

New Book Reviews
Xaviera Hollander at 69

An interview with Xaviera Hollander, now a 69-year-old hotelier in Amsterdam.  Here’s my favorite bit:

It’s not as if she became a prostitute through lack of options. She speaks five languages. She was once voted Holland’s best secretary. She reads Philip Roth and Dostoyevsky. She…calls herself “a theatrical entrepreneur.” Yet she has never regretted her main career choice. “To get paid for what you enjoy? Is good, no?”

Think of the Children!

[Carol Ann Eastman,] an English teacher…in North Canton, Ohio…[published] a raunchy erotic novel [entitled Schooled] under the pseudonym Deena Bright…According to The Repository…Eastman’s students are responsible for outing [her]… the novel follows a teacher who has steamy sexual encounters with fellow teachers…[and] former students…to get revenge on her two-timing husband…many local parents feel Eastman shouldn’t teach high school…if she also publishes bawdy fiction…[she] agreed to a five-day suspension without pay for violating the…computer use policy…

License To Rape

It’s a sad statement about our society that this was necessary:

…jurors…won’t hear about [the] prostitution conviction…[of a woman who] says [Denver cop Hector] Paez arrested her…in May 2010, drove her to a secluded spot and coerced her into performing oral sex by threatening to take her to jail.  Paez’s defense…asked to question the woman about…a prostitution charge…[but] Judge John Madden said…”The information is highly unfairly prejudicial and (runs) a significant risk of confusing the issue”…The woman…has told jurors about her history of theft and heroin addiction.  Prosecutor Doug Jackson said it is precisely that troubled past that…made her an appealing target…

Meanwhile, in Ireland: “A [policeman was]…arrested…after a woman alleged he had raped her…he…was among a number of gardaí working on a…brothel…raid…[he later] went to one ofLucius Crawford the properties…and committed the alleged rape…”

Shifting the Blame

Lucius Crawford, 60, was arrested for stabbing a woman and has now “confessed to three murders, including the slaying of a Bronx prostitute…Long Island authorities are investigating if he is connected to the mass murder of sex workers in Suffolk County…”

Not an Addiction

In a word:  No.

Confessed serial killer Israel Keyes was a murder addict…”Israel Keyes didn’t kidnap and kill people because he was crazy…[or] because his deity told him to or because he had a bad childhood.  Israel Keyes did this because he got an immense amount of enjoyment out of it, much like an addict gets…out of drugs,” said Anchorage, Alaska, police Detective Monique Doll…

Against Their Will

Careful reading finds the most interesting details tucked away in news stories: “Senators [in the Philippines support]…strengthening the law against human trafficking… the bill…[would] ensure added protection for…law enforcers, who have been recipients of harassment suits for ‘lawful acts done in good faith during authorized rescue operations’…”  In other words, it makes cops and bureaucrats immune to lawsuits filed by sex workers who were “rescued”Fuck you, traitor against their will.

My Readers Write

Mary Elizabeth Williams of Salon just can’t understand why some women prefer not to identify as feminist, so Aspasia brilliantly explains it to her.  Of course Williams won’t read it and wouldn’t understand if she did, but I’m sure you’ll appreciate it.

Somehow, I Doubt He Thought This Through

…[Scott Pipher was] charged with hiring a prostitute…[after] he called police to complain that the woman “shorted him 10 minutes”…[the] investigation…[also] led to the arrests of two alleged prostitutes…Pipher is named on the Web sites National Blacklist and Bad Boy Client List as…being “notorious for booking out-calls and then not answering his door or phone”…

Though the author uses phrases like “so-called escort”, it’s interesting that she thought to consult those sites and didn’t bother to define “out-call” [sic].

Guest Columnist:  Norma Jean Almodovar

On an information page prepared by Norma Jean for the students of Dr. Rhacel Parrenas, I encountered the following chart: examine it and consider the amount of money, manpower and press devoted to “human trafficking” in comparison with the vastly more common (and real) violent crimes.US criminal statistics for 2011

Follow Your Bliss

Moon Tae-Hwa stares at his computer, dizzy and nauseous from the hours of porn he’s viewed…He feels no shame — only a righteous sense of mission…Moon is among the most successful members of the “Nuri Cops”…a squad of nearly 800 volunteers who help…censors by patrolling the Internet for pornography in their spare time…pornography is illegal in South Korea, though…easy…to find…”It’s like shoveling snow in a blizzard,” Moon conceded…

The Nuri Cops:  selflessly devoting their lives to watching porn so others can’t.

Presents, Presents, Presents!

This week Korhomme sent me a copy of Sex and Punishment, a history of attempts to regulate sexual activity (see picture below).  Thank you very much!

The Immunity Syndrome

Compare and contrast with similar kerfuffles in the US:

…Ganz schön intim (“Really Quite Intimate”) is a 152-page…[sex education] publication…[which] includes detailed…information on masturbation, homosexuality and intersexuality…[conservative and religious groups]…called it “disturbing” and “a discredit to the so-called core family”…[and] called for [it] to be withdrawn…the government in Vienna and the pamphlet’s producers…[are] largely unmoved by the brouhaha…

Above the Law

How police privilege and anti-prostitution laws endanger all women:

…Forest Park [Georgia] police arrested Omar Shannondoah Chester…[after he] forced [a woman] into his apartment…beat her…[and] stated, “I am an FBI agent and you are under arrest for prostitution”…When she said she was not a prostitute, and her children were outside, he…[let her] go…[she] then ran out…and called police…

Sex & Punishment
Small Choice

If this article had been published in the US, you can bet it would be warped to fit the “trafficking” paradigm.  But since it’s from Al Jazeera, the problems are discussed without denying the women’s agency or the advantages of their arrangement:

…commercial brokers fly Korean men into Vietnam to meet women, and many tie the knot within a week.  The South Korean government is concerned these marriages could breed greater social problems. So it is investing to increase these couples’ success rates [via] “orientation” classes [for Vietnamese women]…some marriages crumble [if] Vietnamese women [marry] for money only.  Another factor is the…average 17 years’ difference [between spouses], according to researchers Daniele Belanger and Tran Giang Linh…there have been reports of South Korean men beating and killing their foreign wives…[and] migrant wives committing suicide…International marriages, however, have worked out for many couples in South Korea.  Belanger and Linh have written that “marriage migration” has empowered Vietnamese women.  Girls who once served their families have now become decision-makers thanks to the [economic] leverage granted to them…

Uncharted Seas

Gay activist Alex Andreou on “Why I’m Conflicted About Marriage Equality”:

I…fear that it will create an added pressure to conform.  I recall fighting…in…the late eighties…hand-in-hand with transsexual prostitutes and militant dykes…being chased by police and beaten with clubs.  What we were fighting for was an acceptance of all different ways of expressing love and sexuality; it was a desire for more, not less, sexual liberation…What we have instead is an attempt to absorb that sexual freedom into conformism.  Instead of dragging the world into liberation, we have somehow managed to drag the LGBT community into neo-Puritanism…

Longtime readers will remember I made the same point in “Divided We Fall”.

Metaupdates

Creeping Rot (July Updates, Part Two)

The European Women’s Lobby (a group so detached from reality that it believes a video of a dude performing cunnilingus on a bunch of women will somehow turn men off to paying for sex), claiming to represent over 200 (unnamed) women’s groups, last week “demanded” the European Union impose the Swedish model on member states despite the fact that it does not actually have that power.  The English Collective of Prostitutes responded with a well-linked nine-point refutation of the EWL’s absurd, unsupported claims; guess which one got worldwide media coverage?

Toys for Tots (First Updates of the Year, Part Two)

The Platinum Cabaret…in Fayetteville, Ark…is…offering free lap dances in exchange for donations to Toys for Tots…“As long as it’s done in a legal manner, as long as people are bringing us new, unwrapped toys, we don’t get into how they were gathered and what the process was,” [said] John Staples, coordinator for Toys for Tots…But another Toys for Tots chapter wasn’t quite as forgiving when…Pleasures — an adult toy store in Huntsville [Alabama] –- [offered] any customer who brings in a gift for Toys for Tots their choice of a complimentary sex toy…”Toys for Tots should not be advertised at an adult store,” [said] Ret. Major Brian A. Murray…

Considering how much money US Marines collectively spend on sex workers every year, it’s absurd for some Marines to make nonsensical anti-sex work statements just to please prudes.

Crime Against Society (TW3 #14)

sex offender licenseAs I reported, people who were on Louisiana’s “sex offender” registry due to the overturned “crime against nature by solicitation” law can petition to be removed.  According to Deon Haywood of WWAV, “around 75 people have already had themselves removed from the registry, and around 100 people are waiting for a judge to hear their motions…We haven’t had one person that’s been rejected…”

What a Week! (TW3 #22)

I’m sure this had absolutely nothing to do with the owner’s winning a judgment against the city a few months ago:  “State and federal police have raided inner-city Sydney brothel Stiletto, owned by gambling identity Eddie Hayson…A spokeswoman for NSW police said the search warrant was attached to a joint operation codenamed Polaris making investigations ‘into a drug and money laundering syndicate’…”  Unsurprisingly, they found absolutely nothing.

Wise Investment (TW3 #31)

Officials admit that they knew their law to hold websites criminally liable for third-party content was unconstitutional:

The state of Washington has abandoned its defense of legislation…that could have exposed website operators to legal liability…The Internet Archive, represented by the Electronic Frontier Foundation…worried that [the law] could effectively make its archives of the Web illegal…so it joined a lawsuit by Backpage.com…now Washington state officials have…[agreed] to permanently block the law…[and] will pay $200,000 to defray the plaintiffs’ legal expenses, and Washington state attorney general Rob McKenna will “work with the…legislature to repeal the current unconstitutional version” of the law.

A Tale That Grew in the Telling (TW3 #35)Sunitha Krishnan

You’d think that in the age of ultra-realistic digital effects, people would recognize that just because someone made a movie doesn’t mean the subject is real:  “[Sunitha Krishnan] has rescued thousands of women from prostitution and [has taken]…her advocacy to films, through [Ente,] a depiction of a real life sex-trafficking story…The activist…says she has received death threats and been targeted by acid attacks and even beaten up over a dozen times…”  All the beatings have succeeded, yet not one of the acid attacks or death threats have?  How convenient!

The Course of a Disease (TW3 #49)

Kate Gould is not a sex worker, but she’s done her homework and clearly “gets it”.  Her attack on Rhoda Grant’s Swedish model campaign, “Why I’m Opposed to Criminalising the Purchase of Sex”, is excellent, but the comment thread is suffering from the usual influx of lie-vomiting trafficking fanatics and deserves input from rational sex worker supporters (hint, hint).  Meanwhile, here’s Dr. Brooke Magnanti on how the proposed law as written will actually (like California’s Proposition 35) criminalize many human interactions virtually nobody would call “prostitution”.

This Week in 2010 and 2011

This week I exploded lots of lies, including ones about adolescents, the Super Bowl, decriminalization, STIs in porn, the purpose of a law, prostitution terminology and “sex trafficking”, and Julian Assange.  We also looked at bad jobs and the meaning of “legalization”, and saw a sleighful of short articles on HIV, halfway whores, maid cafes, sex rays, spiders, Rachel Wotton, Jill Brenneman, an important “trafficking” study, pompous masseuses, politician sex crimes, France, a pervert prosecutor, lethal butt injections, “sex school”, schadenfreude, Pedobear and strippers.

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The Giving Season

Posted in Miscellaneous, Perception, Philosophy, tagged , , , , , , , on November 23, 2012| 20 Comments »

We choose this time, because it is a time, of all others, when Want is keenly felt, and Abundance rejoices.  –  Charles Dickens, “A Christmas Carol”

It’s that time of year again!  Despite the efforts of retailers (I’m especially looking at you, Wal-Mart) to move it up as early as possible, today is the traditional start of the Christmas season in the United States.  As I wrote in my first Christmas Eve column,

…Christmas displays [now] start going up on November 1st, and many have referred to Thanksgiving as a “forgotten holiday”, overshadowed even by what is vulgarly (and endlessly) referred to as “Black Friday”…now touted as an observance in its own right.

A few years ago I noticed that many email ads now refer to Thanksgiving week as “Black Friday week”, and online merchants created their own pseudo-holiday called “Cyber Monday” (which has also spread to Canada, Europe, the UK and other countries).  People have been decrying the increasing commercialism of Christmas at least since the 1950s, but I think some of those early critics would have a stroke if they could see what it’s turned into now.  I try to deal with it as little as possible; most of my presents have already been purchased and wrapped, and as soon as we finish decorating our tree today they’re going under it.  The few things I still need will be purchased on normal shopping trips, and I’m not going anywhere near a store either today or anytime between December 21st and 28th if I can possibly help it.

Though it may sound sentimental to some of you, I really do believe it’s a greater pleasure to give than to receive, and though I no longer have the kind of surplus cash I did when I was hooking I still make the effort to be especially generous at this time of year.  As Christmas approaches I will make up gift boxes full of homemade treats for all the local businesses who regularly trade with us, and I always give what I can to the US Marine Corps Reserve’s Toys for Tots program, my favorite charity.  If you’re in the United States please read the linked column and consider donating at least one new toy for an underprivileged child who might otherwise have to do without; if you don’t want to go to a toy store you can even donate money directly on the website via credit card.  Furthermore, as I have the past two years, I will make a donation of equal monetary value to Toys for Tots in the name of anyone thoughtful enough to send me a present from my Amazon wishlist anytime from now until Christmas.  If you’re outside the US in a country that celebrates Christmas, won’t you please take a few minutes to discover if there are any similar charities where you live?  As I’ve said before, being a poor adult at Christmas is bad enough, but children can neither control their situations nor understand economic realities.

There is one Christmas-associated charity which I ask my readers to avoid, however, and that is the Salvation Army.  As I explained in “Bell, Hook and Kettle”, the SA was among the earliest promoters of “sex trafficking” hysteria:

…by 1884 Salvationists were composing lurid accounts of “child sex slavery” and soon launched a campaign to raise the age of consent in the UK from 13 to 16.  The moral panic they helped to create was the driving force behind most modern anti-prostitution law, especially in the United States.  Once these laws were in place the Salvationists’ efforts to persecute whores became much less energetic…but in 2003, the Salvation Army reclaimed its prominent place among crusaders against harlots by establishing its “National Anti-trafficking Council”, one of whose principles is “Prostitution and related activities are not forms of work, are inherently harmful and dehumanizing, and contribute to the phenomenon of trafficking in persons.”  It was one of the instigators behind the “Anti-prostitution pledge”…its propaganda calls all prostitution “sexual slavery”, and its name is always found alongside that of the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, Polaris Project, the Hunt Alternatives Fund, Shared Hope International and other anti-sex worker organizations whenever they agitate for further criminalization…

Though the bell-ringers make it easy to donate and most of the money put into the kettles does indeed go to helping local poor, there is just no way to know how much of it will be diverted to buying anti-whore ads and lobbying governments for increased criminalization.  So please, take the time to find a charity worthy of your generosity, especially ones like Toys for Tots or food banks where the distribution is not only local, but the donations are in a form which cannot easily be diverted to promote a political agenda.

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First Updates of the Year (Part Two)

Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, News, Perception, Philosophy, Tyranny, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on January 4, 2012| 29 Comments »

It is as hard for the good to suspect evil, as it is for the evil to suspect good.  –  Marcus Tullius Cicero

Four more articles which relate to earlier columns.  Male readers who are sensitive should probably skip the third item; you have been warned!

Gorged With Meaning (November 21st, 2011)

In this column I discussed silly British people who, by trying to impress a rigid and incorrect definition of “prostitute” on reality, get all upset upon discovering that young, attractive women are whoring themselves to older, wealthier men as they have since the dawn of civilization.  In this December 14th column from the Daily Mail, Dominique Jackson makes essentially the same point:

…The rise in tuition fees, soaring living costs and government cuts to maintenance grants are all reportedly forcing more and more young women to turn to prostitution and other forms of sex work…I am afraid I have to disappoint but these headlines, with their sly mix of prurience and moral outrage, are not in the least bit new.  The vast majority of students, those who cannot rely on the Bank of Mum and Dad, have always had to come up with ingenious ways of making ends meet.  Intelligent girls…have never been averse to using their patent attractions to part gullible men from their money.  It is, of course, the oldest profession in the world…

Doctor Ron Roberts from Kingston University said their own recent studies showed that the number of students who knew someone who has worked in the sex industry to fund their studies had gone up from three per cent to 25 per cent.  He also said 11 per cent would consider escort work and called the statistics:  ‘worrying’.  Eleven per cent?  Is that all?  I am pretty sure that working as an escort…has crossed plenty more bright young female minds.  Escort work would seem to be the most palatable end of a spectrum which presumably includes pole or lap dancing, stripping and goes through to full-blown intercourse in exchange for money…There was a strictly enforced ban against taking on jobs during term time when I was a university student in the 1980s.  Nevertheless, many of my bolder friends chose to defy the authorities, usually by working a few shifts as a waitress in Brown’s Restaurant, where the only qualification needed was to look good in an absurdly short mini-skirt.  Back then, I wasn’t aware of any of my own peers capitalising on their assets in any more direct way.  However, scores of cannier girls made sure they bagged a boyfriend who they knew could well afford to take them out for nice dinners and, ideally, had a car to boot.  As most women realise, it is more or less the same form of exchange…

I am still in close touch with several dozen young women from my old college…In the best traditions of popular journalism, I carried out a quick straw poll which revealed that the furthest any of these girls had been prepared to go was to stoop to silver service waitressing at the local stately home.  Curiously, though, almost all of them had certainly heard of, or even knew of one or even a couple of fellow students who had indeed, worked as an escort, or funded their studies with the occasional pole dance.  So nobody owned up to turning to sex work themselves, yet the anecdotal evidence that some students definitely do turns out to be overwhelming.  Funny that, isn’t it?

Funny indeed, Dominique; like you, I suspect that many of these ladies took advantage of their natural assets, but simply won’t admit it.

Toys for Tots (November 25th, 2011)

As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve donated to Toys for Tots every year since I started sex work in 1997, and I’m not remotely alone; last year I mentioned that a friend of mine was offering extra time in exchange for donated toys.  But when the sick, evil minds of cops (and some suburban housewives) see a charity offer like this, they imagine it as the sort of twisted scheme they would come up with to victimize someone, and the piggish, juvenile minds of yellow journalists see only a way to get a story literally at the expense of women and children:

A toy drive during the holidays — but this one unlike any we’ve ever seen before.  An ad posted on an adult escort website promises more time with the woman in exchange for donations to Toys for Tots…The person who answered the phone told me that she was, in fact, Robin Jordan — the woman who was arrested earlier this year and convicted last month for operating an Internet-based prostitution operation out of her Fort Bend County home…The site, which shows an undressed woman in provocative poses, wishes you “Happy Holidays” and claims if you pay for one hour of services and bring an unwrapped gift, your second hour will be free.  “It’s awful, obviously, especially in a neighborhood like this,” said neighbor Jennifer Vontz…”For them to use that just to lure people in, I think that’s just really sad,” said neighbor Valerie Work…

Jordan would not confirm she placed the ads, but by phone earlier told me she would meet for us to hear her side of the story.  Jordan never returned calls when we repeatedly tried to contact her this afternoon, nor did anyone wish to comment at her…home.  The Houston Police Department has launched an additional investigation, based on the evidence we have submitted to them.  We’ve learned Jordan faces a charge of child endangerment in Fort Bend County.  Child Protective Services is also attempting to terminate her parental rights based on this case and the way she allegedly treated her three-year-old daughter.

The fact that it’s “unlike anything he’s seen before” demonstrates the reporter’s colossal ignorance.  My opinion of “child protective services” is well known, and as for the Houston police…I wouldn’t waste my water spitting on them.  The TV station, neighbors and cops involved in this story are all beneath contempt.

Not To Be Taken Internally (December 11th, 2011)

Feminists who believe that only women have unrealistic body-image issues, please take note of this item from the December 13th Huffington Post:

Authorities say a New Jersey man who died after having his penis injected with silicone was trying to get it enlarged…The Essex County prosecutor’s office says 34-year-old Kasia Rivera gave 22-year-old Justin Street the injection in May.  She has pleaded not guilty [to manslaughter] but remains in jail on $75,000 bail…[after] a medical examiner [determined that Street] died of a silicone embolism.  Rivera also faces charges [for] the unauthorized practice of medicine out of her…apartment.  Authorities say they’re investigating whether she gave other people similar injections.

The Liars’ Club (December 13th, 2011)

Maybe the adult film industry won’t have to fight Michael Weinstein’s asinine “your sex life is our business” ballot initiative after all, because according to this December 9th press release from the Free Speech Coalition, the City of Los Angeles is doing it for them:

A lawsuit was filed yesterday by the City of Los Angeles challenging the constitutionality of AIDS Healthcare Foundation’s (AHF) ballot initiative…[which] would force local officials to enforce mandatory condom regulations on adult production sets.  Named as defendants in the suit are various AHF personnel, including AHF President Michael Weinstein.  “Clearly AHF has chosen to squander its donors’ resources by filing frivolous lawsuits and ballot initiatives instead of providing valuable resources toward the prevention and treatment of HIV,” FSC Executive Director Diane Duke said.  “It is heartening to know that the City of Los Angeles will draw the line on AHF’s political grandstanding when it comes to wasting taxpayer dollars.  History has shown us that regulating sexual behavior between consenting adults does not work.  The best way to prevent the transmission of HIV and other STIs is by providing quality information and sexual health service, all of which are successfully provided through adult industry protocols and best practices,” Duke added.

The city’s complaint argues that the ballot proposal is preempted by state regulations that require barrier protection on adult sets and that enforcement of those regulations falls under state jurisdiction.  There have been two previous rulings in complaints filed by AHF, where the judge decided that L.A. County officials are not compelled to enforce regulations on behalf of state health & safety agency Cal/OSHA.  The city also states that the process involved in bringing the ballot measure to the voters would be a “waste” of taxpayer money…[and] that the ballot initiative is potentially unconstitutional; if passed by voters in June, the city raised concerns of more money being spent if the initiative was overturned on constitutional grounds…

I suspect that somebody in LA government woke up and realized how much money the city stands to lose if the adult film industry moves its shoots elsewhere.

One Year Ago Today

“Doublethink” explains the concept from George Orwell’s 1984 and provides real-life examples.

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Toys for Tots

Posted in Current Events, Miscellaneous, Philosophy, tagged , , , , , on November 25, 2011| 11 Comments »

Toys have become commodities instead of playthings. – Beth Copeland Vargo

I’ve mentioned my partiality for Marines before, so it probably won’t surprise you to hear that my favorite charity is the USMC Reserve’s Toys for Tots program, which collects toys for needy children.  As I said in last year’s “Yuletide” column:

It’s bad enough being a needy adult at this time of year, but children lack our mature understanding of economics and it’s heartbreaking for them to think they have been forgotten by Santa Claus.  I urge all of my American readers who are financially comfortable to please donate at least one toy this year; even bargain stores such as Big Lots and Dollar Tree have donation bins, so for only a few dollars you can send a little bit of Christmas cheer to those less fortunate, and so experience a little of the joy of giving and help to make a Merry Christmas for some child who cannot control the conditions in which he lives.  Those who prefer not to go near shopping malls during this season can even donate money directly on the website via credit card, donate in memory of a loved one or specify that toys go to American Indian children, many of whom live in some of the most shamefully poor conditions in this country.  Also, if any of my readers chooses to send me a gift from my Amazon wishlist this season, I will make a donation of equal monetary value to the Toys for Tots foundation in your name.  My international readers might also inquire if there is some similar program to benefit needy children in your country.

Giving to a program like Toys for Tots is more important now than ever because it helps us to remember the true meaning of this time of year.  Despite the increasing tendency of retailers to push it back to November 1st, today is the traditional beginning of the Yuletide season in the United States, and has long been among the busiest shopping days of the year.  It’s also the day on which many U.S. retailers finally go “into the black” after running in the red for the previous eleven months; this is one possible origin of the name “Black Friday”, an in-joke among retail managers in Philadelphia since the 1960s which slowly spread across the country in the 1980s and became known to the general public by the late 1990s.  By the turn of the century retailers were referring to their after-Thanksgiving sales as “Black Friday sales” instead, and since then marketing experts have inexorably worked to replace Thanksgiving (a day to give thanks for what we already have) in the public consciousness with the artificial “Black Friday” (a day to go out and buy more).  A few years ago I noticed that much of both spam and legitimate email advertising alike now refer to Thanksgiving Week as “Black Friday Week”, and this year many retailers are beginning their “Black Friday sales” at midnight (and Wal-Mart at 10 PM Thursday), essentially ruining Thanksgiving for those employees who are drafted for the graveyard shift.  Since 2002, the violence associated with the day has also increased, especially at so-called “big box” retailers such as Wal-Mart, Target and Best Buy; this hearkens back to another possible origin of the term “Black Friday”, a negative reference to the massive traffic jams and rude, pushy crowds which characterize it.

Do I need to point out that this is not only insane, but totally contrary to what the Yuletide season is supposed to be about?  I haven’t set foot in a store on the day after Thanksgiving since the late ‘80s; it was the day my family always decorated our Christmas tree, and I’ve continued that tradition.  This afternoon my husband and I will go out into our woods, find a suitable tree and bring it back here to decorate; we’ll play Christmas music and have Thanksgiving leftovers for dinner, and tonight we’ll watch one of our favorite Christmas shows.  Readers, why don’t you do the same?  Instead of battling pathetic, deluded “consumers” for a marked-down big-screen TV you don’t really need, stay at home and do your holiday shopping next weekend or even online.  But whenever and however you do it, spare a thought and a little cash for an unfortunate small person, and consider giving a toy or donation to Toys for Tots.

One Year Ago Yesterday

Last year, Thanksgiving fell on the 25th so I noted the column from last Thanksgiving yesterday, thus pushing the column from last November 24th to today.  It’s called “Lying Down With Dogs” and it calls attention to the fact that besides the U.S. and a couple of its client states, every country in which prostitution is criminal is a “totalitarian state, a country only recently emerged from totalitarianism, a theocracy or near-theocracy, a postage stamp, a third-world shithole or some combination of two or more of those categories.”

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