Web Log Archives: July 27, 2003 - August 02, 2003
Tuesday, July 29, 2003
The Smoking Gun awards its Legal Document of the Year award title to this motion defending a Colorado teenager arrested for yelling "some variants of the 'F' word" at a school vice principal. TSG reports, "Faced with what he thought was a speech crime, Eric Vanatta, the teen's public defender, drafted the below motion to dismiss the misdemeanor charge. The District Court document is an amusing and profane look at the world's favorite four-letter word, from its origins in 1500 to today's frequent use of the term by Eminem, Chris Rock, and Lenny Kravitz. . . . TSG's favorite part of the motion is the chart comparing Google results for the "F" word and other all-American terms like mom, baseball, and apple pie."
Omaha World-Herald: "From a small office in midtown Omaha, one of Nebraska's most widely known families is carrying out a low-profile international campaign to protect abortion rights and widen access to birth control and family planning services. The campaign is being financed by Omaha investor Warren Buffett and his wife, Susan, and carried out by the charitable foundation bearing their name. The Buffett Foundation quietly, almost secretly, has become one of the nation's most generous benefactors for organizations at work for abortion rights, population control and women's reproductive health. The foundation awards most of its grants — $21 million in 2001, or 75 percent of its total giving — to groups that work in abortion access and reproductive health." A sidebar lists twelve organizations and projects that have received Buffett Foundation grants.
Pornography not just for the fellas as women fess up. This Sydney Morning Herald article looks at a federally funded study called "Understanding Pornography In Australia." The headline is based on the fact that 20% of their 320 online survey respondents to date have been women. One of the researchers says, "What we want to do is get really specific about what's in porn and who's consuming it, so we can start asking ethical questions on the basis of what we know, not what we think. The amount of porn that's distributed suggests the idea of the porn consumer as deviant doesn't add up, otherwise you'd have to say large numbers of Australians are deviant. Clearly more people consume porn than are fans of reality television."
Patricia Leigh Brown New York Times says there's a lot of sex on television these days. Interesting historical factoid: "In 1962, a female character getting a pap smear on 'The Guiding Light,' was considered pushing the envelope."
This page cannot get laid. (Link snagged from Safer Sex.)
Good Sex for Mutants is a new niche dating service. The questionnaire allows you to specify things like whether your ideal mate "has encoded messages embedded in the skin" and "likes long romantic walks by the reactor cooling towers." (Link snagged from Technoccult.)
Monday, July 28, 2003
Police in a small north Texas town have ordered a local art gallery to remove a mural from its outside wall. The painting depicts Eve in the Garden of Eden, and she's totally naked and you can see her boobies and everything! The police told the gallery owner that the mural violates a state law against distributing "harmful material" to a minor.
A longer local newspaper article requires registration, but it's reprinted here at Free Republic.
Ananova: "A giant statue of a naked man with a two-foot erection has caused a row in Salzburg after it was unveiled on the eve of a visit by Prince Charles."
The local burghers are outraged, which was probably the whole point. One of the artists insists, "We didn't do it to shock the prince and we hope he will get to see it. We think it's beautiful and has a distinctly royal theme about it, with the majestic arch of the man bending over." Slightly longer piece and different photo at BBC News, which notes that Prince Charles is "not a big fan of modern art." (Link snagged from World Sex News.)
