Web Log Archive: Week of 4/8/02
Sunday, April 14, 2002
Kuro5hin has an excellent review of reactions to Judith Levine's Harmful to Minors, followed by a lengthy discussion thread.
Kuro5hin
The New York Times looks at the furor surrounding Judith Levine's Harmful to Minors: The Perils of Protecting Children From Sex, slated for release in May. Conservative politicians, pundits and talk show hosts have blasted the book for supposedly endorsing pedophilia. University of Minnesota Press has responded to criticisms by setting up "an extraordinary two-month review of the way its press acquires and reviews books, to be conducted by people from other academic presses." Civil libertarians criticized the press's concession to ideological antagonists, saying it "invites future attempts at intellectual blackmail." This article lays out some of Levine's arguments.
The book does not, in fact, endorse pedophilia. What Ms. Levine does argue is that the fear of pedophilia is overblown and that the age of consent should be lowered in certain circumstances. Ms. Levine tries to separate what she sees as real risks — H.I.V. infection, unwanted pregnancies and sexual violence — from risks she calls exaggerated or even invented. She argues forcefully against abstinence-only education and what she sees as a pervasive tendency to view all manifestations of childhood sexuality as dangerous or disturbing. "The reaction to the book is an example of the kind of hysteria I'm writing about," Ms. Levine said. [....]
But by far the most explosive part of the book, one that is directly related to the current scandal, has to do with the age of consent. Ms. Levine argues that sex between teenagers and adults is not always wrong, and that many people are too quick to deny children and teenagers the right to make their own sexual decisions, often by labeling all such contact "abuse."
Not surprisingly, controversy has been good for business. "The first printing of 3,500 copies has already sold out, and a second printing of 10,000 is on the way."
New York Times
Saturday, April 13, 2002
Sarah Klein reviews the clumsily titled but exquisitely kinky Sex: Take a Walk on the Wild Side — Masterpieces of Erotic Fantasy Photography, a new anthology edited by Tony Mitchell.
The title is a bit of a misnomer, as the contents of this provocative and powerful photography book have little to do with sex in the conventional wisdom, and focus wholly on the fetish scene. Sex is an act, while fetish is a concept, and Mitchell’s anthology is both highly cerebral and downright smutty. Fetish is the art of fixation; finding your kick in something other than the norm, be that a fantasy, an escape, a role-playing game or just an object which represents something forbidden, taboo and irresistibly desirable.
Link snagged from New Pages.
Metro Times Detroit
Ursula K. Le Guin's newest collection, The Birthday of the World and Other Stories, deals with sexuality on assorted alien worlds. The first story, "Coming of Age in Karhide," takes place on the planet Gethen, the setting of Le Guin's 1969 novel The Left Hand of Darkness. Reviewer Kim Colton writes, "Upon arriving on one of the planets in Le Guin's cosmos, prepare yourself for new discoveries: Le Guin fucks with every notion you've ever had about alien sex." Colton provides a guide to the sexual practices, mores and anatomy of three planets in Le Guin's universe.
Willamette Week
Guy Kettelhack celebrates the life and work of Quentin Crisp. "I can't think of anything he said that hasn't hit home for me. His animating premise seemed and still seems to me inarguable: that connecting to people describes the most illuminating, pleasurable pursuit and experience we can know. Anything that doesn't enhance this connection is thus a "mistake."
Nightcharm
Friday, April 12, 2002
More on the Ernest and Bertram affair... Legal threats from Children's Television Workshop forced the Cleveland International Film Festival to drop scheduled screenings of Ernest and Bertram last month. Planet Out reports:
"Sesame Street" producers were also reportedly disturbed by the fact that the 8-minute film showed Ernest shooting himself in the head after a tumultuous fight with Bertram. In a similar story, Mattel recently got its panties in a bunch and banned the screening of "Barbie Gets Sad, Too," an Argentinean film that shows the doll having lesbian sex with her Latina servant.
In his regular ABC News column, Buck Wolf discusses CTW's legal campaign against Ernest and Bertram and traces the history of Bert and Ernie gay rumors:
Even before this incident, Ernie and Bert have been under constant attack. In 1993, TV Guide received dozens of letters railing against Sesame Street for condoning a homosexual relationship. Shortly after, a North Carolina preacher began a campaign on his radio show to ban them for their immorality. In Hollywood Urban Legends, critic Richard Roeper traces the rumors of Ernie and Bert's sexuality to Spy magazine founder Kurt Anderson, who once joked that "Bert and Ernie conduct themselves in the same loving, discreet way that millions of gay men, women and hand puppets do. They do their jobs well and live a splendidly settled life together in an impeccably decorated cabinet."
The second half of Wolf's column deals with the Bert is Evil website, which CTW also successfully shut down through legal bullying.
Planet Out | ABC News
A swingers convention sponsored by the Lifestyles Organization will take over the Radisson Deauville hotel in Miami Beach this weekend. Lifestyles booked the entire 17-story resort for its thousands of participants and vendors. "We generally rent the whole hotel. The reason being that we don't want to make anyone feel uncomfortable." The Deauville offered employees the option of taking the weekend off if the event made them uncomfortable, but the hotel's general manager says "there were no takers." Hotel management also conducted advance training sessions for staff for dealing with the convention ("The golden rule: Beware of 'Do Not Disturb' signs").
Miami Herald
From David Letterman earlier this week: Top Ten Accountant Euphemisms For Sex.
CBS
Comedian/actress Sarah Silverman explains the 10 Things Men Don't Know About Women. "1. We go to the bathroom together because we're doing coke."
Esquire
Liberal political weekly The American Prospect has a special issue on the politics of family, children and marriage with pieces by Stephanie Coontz, Robert Kuttner and others.
American Prospect
Thursday, April 11, 2002
Artist Peter Howson unveils a new exhibition this weekend, which includes nude paintings of Madonna done without her knowledge or permission. Madonna's handlers have criticised Howson's "voyeurism," and some art world detractors see the paintings as an obvious gimmick to launch Howson back into the media limelight. After attending a media preview of Howson's exhibition, Guardian critic Elisabeth Mahoney writes, "Feeling neglected by the media after a period in the limelight in the 1980s, when the Tate and National Portrait Gallery vied with celebrities (including Madonna) to buy his paintings, the 44-year-old artist is loving every minute of this cat-and-mouse game with the press." . . . Peter Howson's website has large, high-resolution JPEGs of two Madonna paintings and a public statement about the controversy. . . . BBC News also covers the exhibition and controversy. "[Howson] said the collection of portraits were designed to show Madonna as a powerful and charismatic person while also touching on her religious upbringing. The singer is an avid collector of Howson's work and has previously posed fully clothed for the artist."
Guardian | Peter Howson | BBC
Children's Television Workshop is threatening legal action against the short film Ernest and Bertram. The eight-minute mock documentary by Peter Spears depicts Sesame Street's Bert and Ernie as angst-ridden gay lovers. It played at the Sundance Festival earlier this year, where program notes described it as: "Lillian Hellman visits Sesame Street. A tale of rumors, innuendo, and felt as the secret lives of childhood icons are revealed." (Unfortunately, the "View Entire Film Online" button at the Sundance website doesn't seem to work). The Guardian notes:
Gossip about the private life of the pointy-headed, pedantic Bert and the benign, cuddly Ernie is nothing new. Back in 1993, CTW even went so far as to issue a statement which appeared to insist that the duo were red-blooded Sesame straights: "Bert and Ernie, who've been on Sesame Street for 25 years, do not portray a gay couple, and there are no plans for them to do so in the future. They are puppets, not humans."
Geez, couldn't they at least follow Tom Cruise's lead and add something like, "Bert and Ernie do not disapprove of puppets who lead a homosexual lifestyle, but ..."?
Guardian | Sundance Online
Playboy.com has thirty thumbnailed photos from Hugh Hefner's 76th birthday party, where celebs like Mickey Rourke, Gavin Rossdale, Matthew Perry and Kato Kaelin hobnobbed with playmates.
Playboy
Douglas Cruickshank reviews The Beggar's Benison: Sex Clubs of Enlightenment Scotland and Their Rituals by David Stevenson, which he thinks would make a great movie with Mike Meyers and John Cleese. Debra at Pursed Lips bemoans that fact that no major US booksellers are carrying this book. Tuckwell Press specializes in books on Scottish history (occasionally stretching to "books on the north of England") and has probably never had much demand for US distribution. Let's hope someone picks it up. Tuckwell's website reprints a rave review from The Spectator (the British political magazine, not the San Francisco sex magazine).
Salon | Tuckwell Press | The Spectator
Debra also comments on the collapse of Penthouse in the form of a song.
Pursed Lips
In this week's alt.sex column, Andrea Nemerson answers some cringeworthy questions from readers.
[Question 2:] My wife and I love anal, and we want to know if Icy Hot is safe as a lube. We've used it externally, but we're not sure if it's safe internally.
Andrea answers all the questions with her usual common sense.
San Francisco Bay Guardian
Tuesday, April 9, 2002
The Village Voice prints six letters about "Partying Like It's 1979," followed by a response by author Steve Weinstein. (Read the original article here.)
Village Voice
Nicholas Urfé ponders the imminent death of Penthouse and argues that the steady decline in circulation is due more to the magazine's failings than competition from Internet porn.
Have you opened an issue lately? Despite the much-vaunted “hardcore” additions (penetration shots and the occasional piss take, oh my), the magazine doesn’t look or feel all that different from its heyday, back in the late ’70s and ’80s. The models still all look like they’re hanging out in the back room of an endless wrap party for a ZZ Top video; the poses and the staged sex still look like bad Vegas floorshows lit by the cinematographer for Caligula; even what new stuff they’ve had, like those grainy black-and-white lesbian shoots they’ve been enamored of lately, still somehow manage to look like something I would have found under my dad’s side of the bed back in the day. It’s stuck, lost, dropped down a time warp, a retro that isn’t working—a former party animal in a bad toupee with a hidebound St. Tropez tan, scratching his chestful of gold and hair and wondering where all the chicks went.
But Nick also thinks the 70s-era Guccione magazines (Penthouse, Omni, Longevity) deserve a bit of nostalgia.
Inexplicably Fancy Trash
Monday, April 8, 2002
More on sploshing and mess fetishism: Nerve interviews Bill Shipton, founder of Splosh magazine. Asked to define "sploshing," Shipton explains:
It's best defined as lurking around with messy or wet things — food, mud or paint — or just getting wet with your clothes on. Sploshing forms two categories. There are people who do it in a sensual way, as a form of foreplay. That side is quite mainstream. At the other end, there are people who like to take a terribly formal situation and destroy it. For them, the fun is the sheer anarchy of acting out a formal role-play situation, which they destroy by having a food fight or rolling around in the mud in their wedding dress.
Afterwards, intrigued interviewer Grant Stoddard decides to try out sploshing at home with his girlfriend.
Nerve
The New York Times picks up the story about Penthouse's financial woes. Bob Guccione attributes the collapse in Penthouse's circulation primarily to the rise of Internet porn, saying there's "no future for adult business in mass market magazines. The future has definitely migrated to electronic media." The magazine will probably cease publication soon. This long article also details Guccione's many disastrous business decisions over the past three decades.
New York Times
Spectator's Anthony Petkovich covers the opening of Larry Flynt's Hustler Club in San Francisco, an upscale, glitzy but eroticly tame entry into the strip club market. Apparently SF strip clubs can have full nudity or a liquor license but not both, and the Hustler Club opted for the liquor license. The "Hustler Honeys" will "regularly perform glitzy 'Las Vegas style' floorshows. To follow permit standards, the dancers may bare their breasts during the final 30 seconds of their last song."
John Koopman also wrote about the Hustler Club opening in the San Francisco Chronicle a few weeks ago. This piece has some illuminating background on the history of the North Beach strip club scene. Not surprisingly, there were protests surrounding the new club's opening, Flynt's opening night appearance and the club's advertising.
Anti-porn protesters were particularly incensed with an advertisement for the club. It showed two naked women embracing. Both women appeared to be quite young. Flynt said that the women were both of legal age and that he had proof of it, and that the women were chosen because they're beautiful.... "Larry Flynt's ad ... is an example of pseudo-child porn," Russell said. "Men's lust for young sex objects has become normalized in this hard-core culture."
The Spectator article has a picture of the controversial ad, as reproduced on a protester's placard.
Spectator
