Full Frontal Politics free speech from a phone sex operator

The good news: Conservative anti-porn organization Morality in Media recently lost $150,000 in Congressional funding.

The bad news: For the past two years, conservative anti-porn organization Morality in Media had $150,000 in Congressional funding.

From the Morality in Media announcement list:

Dear Friend of Morality In Media,

You can’t save the world if you can’t pay the bills.

It’s a sad truth. Many a fine project has disappeared into the dustbin of history because of a lack of funding.

And now Morality In Media is facing a financial crisis. The Congress has changed hands, and MIM has lost vital congressional funding for one of our most important projects.

Which means that, in months ahead, MIM will have to raise $150,000 from other sources to keep this project operating!

If you want us to keep up our battle against pornography, please click here to donate your most generous possible emergency contribution!

Let me explain how this happened.

You see, for the past two years, Congressional appropriations for the U.S. Department of Justice have included critical funding for MIM’s obscenity-fighting website.

That website, www.obscenitycrimes.org, supplies vital information that federal investigators and U.S. Attorneys can use to investigate and prosecute internet obscenity.

I’ve told you in the past of the important role this website plays in our nation’s fight against internet obscenity.

In fact, since its inception, MIM’s website has received over 60,000 reports of internet obscenity!

But we are now facing what is for us a major crisis.

You see, for the past two years MIM has received an annual grant of $150,000 for our website. That money was contained in an Appropriations Bill that was passed by Congress.

But, this past November, Congress changed hands.

And with the change in Congress, the Appropriations Committees changed. As a result, the 2007 Appropriations Bill contains no funding for MIM’s obscenity-fighting project.

Yes, we can and will apply directly to the Justice Department for a new grant. But when we do so, we will be competing with thousands of other applicants.

MIM won’t know for months whether we will get a new grant from Justice. But one thing is certain – THIS PROJECT SHOULD AND WILL CONTINUE IF WE CAN RAISE THE ADDITIONAL $150,000!

That’s why I’m writing you today with this appeal.

You know, fighting obscenity and indecency is tough work. But there are also great rewards.

And I want you to know that there is one reward that all of us at MIM find very encouraging.

It is the realization that so many Americans are willing to sacrifice to help us in our battle against pornography.

Yes, the generous and faithful support of Morality in Media’s donors gives us great inspiration in our work.

But the job also has its hard parts. And today MIM is facing a potential deficit of $150,000. And today I am asking you to make a truly sacrificial gift to Morality In Media.
So here’s what I’m asking you to do…

First, we need your fervent prayers in support of our work. We simply couldn’t survive without them.

Second, we need your most generous support possible, right now. I know from what MIM president Bob Peters tells me that MIM depends a great deal on gifts of between $100 and $1,000.

Some of our donors can make donations of much more than $1000. And others of very limited means give us $10 or $25, with their enthusiastic and prayerful support.

Can you help Morality In Media at this critical time?

Please click here to make a truly sacrificial contribution! Can you support our work with a $250 donation? I know it’s a lot, but this situation is crucial.

Your critical donation today will assure that Morality In Media can continue its vital work to combat illegal obscenity and indecency in every facet of American life.

And let me assure you, with your indispensable help, we will continue that battle on all fronts.

In recent months, MIM lawyers submitted amicus briefs in two federal court cases involving the broadcast indecency law.

Both cases were filed by broadcast TV networks that are unhappy about specific indecency fines they received for polluting the public airwaves with vulgarity and nudity.

But the networks aren’t just asking the courts to reverse the fines for specific programs. They are asking the courts to declare the broadcast indecency law unconstitutional!

And by suing in both New York and Philadelphia, they think they have a better chance of finding friendly judges.

Yes, these are critical battles, and MIM needs your most generous possible help to win them!

Thank you, and may God bless you.

Sincerely,

Christopher Manion
Vice President

If that lengthy fundraising letter has you fumbling for your wallet, I’m sure the Free Speech Coalition (adult entertainment advocacy group) will be more than happy to take your money.

You can find out more about Morality in Media through their official website and through ObscenityCrimes.org.

It isn’t safe for an honest pornographer in Iran these days:

Tehran, Iran, Jan. 07 - A man was flogged in public in the town of Behshahr, northern Iran, for producing home-made pornographic videos, state media reported on Sunday.

The unnamed man was lashed 100 times in public, the daily Etemaad Melli wrote.

He had been found guilty of filming his sexual relations with married women, the report said.

Thousands of young people are flogged in Iran each year on trivial charges that include drinking alcohol, attending mixed-sex parties, and sexual misconduct. Iran’s Judiciary views flogging as the appropriate punishment for combating moral crimes, particularly among the youth. Islamic judges insist on carrying out the punishment in town squares, as “a lesson for all to see.”

“Iran man flogged in public for making home-made porn film,” Iran Focus

Oh, it gets worse. Iran’s amateur porn stars have particularly short-lived careers.

TEHRAN, Iran — An amateur porn movie could net 31 people the death penalty in Iran’s capital city. The group faces death for filming and producing an adult movie that was shot using a cellphone, said Saiid Mortazavi, the president of Tehran’s criminal court.

The group of 31 people also has been charged with sexual assault on the actress in the movie.

[...]

Iran has a track record of executing amateur adult makers. A man who made adult movies with his wife was publicly hanged in late-2005 and a female porn star was stoned to death after spending eight years in prison for performing in an adult film.

“Amateur Pornographers Face Death Penalty in Iran,” XBiz

Keep it safe and legal, folks. And remember - it wasn’t always this way.

“When I sit in the alehouse, I am a woman, and I am an exuberant young man. When I am present at a place of quarrelling, I am a woman, a perfect figure. When I sit by the gate of the tavern, I am a prostitute familiar with the penis; the friend of a man, the girlfriend of a woman.” - from a hymn to Inanna (translated)

• Commentary: Does Sitcom Strategy Explain Anti-Porn Laws? (AVN)
• Precocious Puberty on the Rise (Alternet; thanks to Sexoteric for the link)
• Forum Aimed at Limiting Spread of Free Porn Launches (XBiz)
• Stevensville man undeterred in his long battle against obscenity (Missoulian.com)
• Kink.com Acquires Historic San Francisco Armory Building (XBiz)
• Comment: Sarah Carey: We need more sex, not detox (The Sunday Times)

• The FBI Meets With Adult: 1 (XBiz)
• Citizen journalism website seeks sex-trade worker to cover Pickton trial (Canadian Press)
• Porn Sites Start Adapting to Wii (1up.com)
• Indications of a Slowdown in Sex Entertainment Trade (New York Times)
• Sex Offenders Fill Geriatric Wards of U.S. Prisons (NPR)
• Sex-Crazed Teens, Porn and Booze Bunk: 2006’s Worst Science Journalism (PNN Online)
• Massachusetts Lawmakers Advance Proposed Gay Marriage Ban (Boston.com)
• First same-sex union celebrated in Switzerland (Advocate.com)
• Do X-rated Web Sites Merit Scarlet Letter? (The Plain Dealer) *

* For more information on the voluntary Restricted to Adults label, visit RTALabel.org.

The phrase “porn addiction” has been repeated so often in the past few months that it’s becoming accepted as fact.

First: Obsessive porn usage is a compulsion, not an addiction. It’s an addiction only in the same sense that any pleasurable activity is worth endlessly repeating. It’s a form of escapism and should be no more illegal than me wasting two years of my life gaming in front of a computer, or “wasting” my childhood hiding out in a library instead of socializing. Some people are just hard-wired with escapist nerd tendencies. The cure for that isn’t legislation, it’s learning how to deal with your life balance issues.

Note to my readers: Porn “addiction” can be easily cured. Start working in adult. I guarantee you, after the first year you’ll be so blasé about gangbangs that you’ll have to start looking at softcore.

Richard of DamselTheater.com demonstrates the dangers of sensationalist reporting in his MySpace blog:

After watching another news show about the dangers of porn, I thought it might be fun to put together a written documentary about the dangers of sports addiction. Although this piece is tongue-in-cheek, the references are all valid links (as of today). What this shows is how one can make a compelling case about the horrors of a subject by focusing on only what is wrong. I was initially going to put this disclaimer at the end, but was afraid of too many people not going that far to see that it’s a joke…

–sort of.

Sports addiction is a growing problem in America that dwarfs any concerns that one may have about pornography. A search for sports in Google shows that there are 772 million sports sites compared to a only 91 million porn sites [...]

“Is sports addiction better than porn addiction?,” http://blog.myspace.com/richreynolds

It’s a great argument on the subjectivity of addiction. Check it out.

Remember the Pence Amendment?

The one that was lingering in the House, that involved making lascivious exhibitation of the genital area and simulated sexually explicit conduct - presently exempt - subject to 2257?

The one that, if it became law, would make R-rated movies subject to 18 U.S.C. § 2257 regs… Yeah, that one.

The U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill yesterday (also Blog Against Sexism day… more on that in the next post); HR 4472. Title 6 of HR 4472 contains language that was basically adapted from the Pence Amendment and adds to 2257.

Right now you’re thinking, “Oh, joy! Who else is going to have to take down their porn when - not if - this piece of horseshit passes the Senate?”

Why do I say when? Aside from the fact that the language in question is sneakily buried within a bill targeting sex offenders and street gangs (and who can say no to that, with midterm elections coming up and MySpace predators on the evening news every night?), XBiz reports:

The bill was passed under a suspension of House rules, so no debate or discussions were allowed, [industry attorney Jeff] Douglas said, further signaling a possible agenda on the part of lawmakers to rush it through to the Oval Office as quickly as possible.

“According to a House Republican, they have gotten a guarantee that the Senate also will take it up in an expedited fashion, and this suggests they don’t intend to hold any hearings,” Douglas said, adding that there has never been a congressional hearing on 2257 law since it was enacted in 1988.
“House Passes 2257-Related Bill,” XBiz

I haven’t read the language of Title 6 yet, but I’ll try to do it before lunch and post some followup. This not only directly affects me, it directly affects the chances of you seeing my sweet pink activist cunt.

If you haven’t caught the posts and discussions over at SugarBank on porn, obscenity, and the violence/sex split, get your smut-happy ass over there pronto.

If there’s reason to draw a line between violent movies and sex movies, should we be drawing it now? If not is there anything that we shouldn’t allow others to package as entertainment? When violence, fear, implied lack of consent and sex are rolled together how do we counter accusations of fetishizing rape? How comfortable are you with the crying edge of pornography? How comfortable do you think you’ll need to be?

“Could Donkey Punches KO Porn’s First Amendment Protection?,” SugarBank

That post brought up a great discussion about industry standards, sex, and violence in porn which led to this one:

For thirty years Miller has served the porn industry well, but thinking Miller will never succeed in proving any pornography obscene is wishful thinking. A 3 minute downloadable clip on a webpage is easy to ‘take as a whole’ and is increasingly likely to show an apparently distressed women being deliberately hurt by a sexually violent man. The government are confident the public won’t view downloadable clips the same way they did movies like Deep Throat in the seventies. They also know that if one judgment goes against porn it’ll put the industry in the same position as the once unassailable tobacco industry - paying fines and under constant, successful assault (the difference being that pornographers will do serious jailtime.)

“Should Pornographers Challenge the Miller Test?,” SugarBank

(Since this is my blog and not the Sam Sugar echo chamber, I have some more thoughts on that last sentence I’ll post later tonight. Yes! A real post! Feel free to orgasm in your pants. I did.)

What’s Sam’s answer to the Miller test? Canada’s Butler test. Which is a much better solution… unless you’re not straight, or unless you’re into the kinky stuff.

The line between sex and violence and consensual BDSM can be glaringly obvious or obviously blurry depending on where you’re standing. It’s one thing to think you obviously don’t mean BDSM when you say sex and violence, and another to not specifically exclude it and realize that a lot of people do see a person hitting another person with a cane, hearing that sharp swish, the resulting stripes as violence. After all, somebody’s hitting somebody with something and somebody else is getting hurt. They’re into it, yes, but as Sam brings up in comments, there’s also the issue of whether or not a person has a right to consent to getting beaten.

I like to play rough on both sides of the whip. I’m not going to try to argue that BDSM and violence are completely different. The intent is different. The emotions are different. But BDSM is as much about hurting someone until they can’t take anymore and then hearing them beg you for more as it is tying your lover up and torturing them using only your hands and tongue. Butler doesn’t clearly exclude BDSM porn - in fact, in implementation, it’s basically considered to speficically include it as being both violent and socially harmful/degrading to women (even femdom. Yep.).

You’ll have to pry my crop out of my cold, dead hands. If we’re going to draw a firm line between sex and violence we need to know what the hell counts as sex, what counts as violence, and why we’re drawing the line there. A lot of people instinctively squick at the combination, and a lot of people are instinctively turned on by it, so call it unnatural if you like but I live to bite and be bitten, to whip and be whipped. I want that natural sexual expression protected.

Go argue/agree with him in comments. It’s less satisfying than gangland jello-wrestling him but with any luck you won’t get arrested later, either…

J.T. Benjamin of ERWA fame has a great idea:

Mind your own fucking business.

“…And what is this theme? How must we respond to the Holy Terrors’ War On Whoopie? Four words.

Mind Your Own Business.

It’s firm. It’s assertive. It’s simple. It’s “Get The Government Out Of Our Private Lives.” It’s Freedom. It’s Liberty. It’s All-American.

It’s Ann Landers saying, “Dear Concerned: M.Y.O.B.” It’s Hank Williams singing, “Why don’t you mind your own business, so you won’t be minding mine.” You can’t get more All-American than Ann and Hank.

Of course, regarding child pornography and sexual assault, we all need to crack down, but when it comes to monitoring the sex lives of consenting adults, we have to say just four simple words.

Mind Your Own Business…”

(“From the Dec-Jan edition of ERWA,” All Worked Up And Then Some)

Up for a rant? Read on…

Sexual freedom in the U.S. rests on three things: the separation of church and state, the First Amendment right to free speech, and the Fourth Amendment right to privacy. (Some pro-forced pregnancy judges believe that the 4th doesn’t imply a right to privacy; you read it and tell me. Without a right to privacy, why would any search be unreasonable? It’s the violation of that recognized, everyday right that makes certain searches unreasonable.)

The separation of church and state is necessary to our continued sexual freedom because a sex-positive religious faction has yet to take political power in the U.S. Sex between any given number of people (1 or greater, and if you think about it, you damn well can be between yourself. It’s not bad grammar, it’s a jilling euphemism, dammit.) is/was considered the domain of morality - public morality (back to the 4th again) - and thusly regulated by religion, law, and law influenced by specific religious traditions.

Traditionally, the chief justification for blue laws and other laws restricting sexuality was that blurred boundary between religious doctrine, public morality, and semi-secular legislation. Of course now cultural and religious attitudes are changing and that justification doesn’t hold the weight it used to. That’s why the Religious Right and the pro-censorship left have turned to “for the children” scare tactics and pseudoscience to push their anti-sex and/or anti-porn agendas.

The idea that the state cannot legislate morality isn’t fully rooted in this country and without that guideline, the free exercise of sexuality doesn’t exist, legally, while church doctrine passes as legislation.

If we lose that, we’re fucked. In the ass. Hard. No lube and no reacharound.

Sex and religion belong together, but tell that to the moral majority.

The First Amendment is every pornographer’s best friend and we all know it. Without the right to free speech, I can’t make a living say half the fun, nasty things I do over the phone or in my blogs. Without the right to yell “Theater!” in a crowded fire or speak out against a fricking irritating Shrubbery there is no right to porn. Period. Every threat to free speech threatens your free porn privileges.

That’s hitting us where it hurts.

But it’s the right to privacy guarded by the Fourth Amendment (I won’t say guaranteed by; it’s guaranteed in the same way any person’s dignity should be, by birth) that truly protects all avenues of consensual sexuality and reproductive rights (including any combination of sexuality and money you can think of, at least in some counties). The idea that whatever happens between informed, consenting adults is okay, even if you’re offended, is as J.T. Benjamin pointed out grounded in privacy rights. The idea that it isn’t really anybody’s business who you’re fucking is the one that gave unmarried people access to birth control. Your health choices and issues are between you and your doctor, right? They thought so when they re-legalized abortion.

Georgia would rather fuck you than let you fuck yourself. No sex toys for you, my friend. The erotica and porn you’re permitted to see, or make… it all comes back to privacy and whether or not you have the right to do what you want when no one’s watching and no one’s getting hurt in ways they’re not into.

Labors of a Digital Pimp was featured on Fleshbot a couple of days ago; if you missed him then, you’ll want to check him out now. He’s had excellent coverage of the Alito nomination process and how it could impact the average surfer’s porn viewing (free speech = free porn; less freedom of speech equals less freedom of expression for smutmongers, equals less free porn). What I really like is how easy he makes it to get involved in the process and that he points out just how much less likely politicians would be to go after porn if fans of adult entertainment weren’t ashamed to stand up for it.

His last point is his best: “And it is clear: Pornography is not Obscenity. The Rove machine, and other cultural warriors have done everything they can to blend those boundaries, and it is time to take back those terms and reframe the debate based on law, not smirking, adolescent innuendo from the religious extremists…”

Make no mistake about it, this is a cultural battle, and the “other side” is in it for the long haul. It cuts across party lines: neither red nor blue has a monopoly on individual liberty or the right to read, purchase, and produce works of fiction and fantasy. There is a strong push right now toward believing that ideas are harmful. No creatively sexual society can thrive when those guys are unopposed (and our society is pretty damn creatively sexual).

This post from the Boston.com forums might be the best summary of the current U.S. porn “problem” I’ve seen yet:

The “Pornification of America” eh…

This argument is sounding erily familiar to the anti-porn arguments from the Regan era.

Sex sells…everything. So unless you think you can stop advertising agencies from using sexuality to sell thier products, which is not likely, get over it.

There are many different types of pornography for many different types of people regardless of gender or sexual orientation. We’ve been fighting over this same issue for 30 years and were no closer to resolving it.

The United States is a young country by comparison to the European nations, we are at best pre-pubecent, and like a young person on the cusp of adulthood we’re painfully uncomfortable with our own sexuality. On the one hand we flaunt ourselves sexually and on the other we bury our heads in the sand with shame and try to place the blame on the media or the press or our parents. It’s pathetic.
Posted by hex on 11:57 AM

The thread was commentary for the recent Boston Globe feature, “The Pornification of America.” (Registration required; go see BugMeNot for a workaround.)

One thing I noticed, both in the article and in the thread, was that a woman’s worth is still being defined by whether she “does” or “doesn’t;” whether she’s a lady or a whore. As we all know, any female who (by society’s standards) goes too far sexually is supposed to regret and repent. Willingly crossing sexual boundaries is about consequences and punishment.

The article was very heavy on the idea that if a woman acts brazenly sexual, it’s not because she wants to but because she feels obligated to please and entertain men. (The idea that some of us get off on pleasing and entertaining men would, obviously, not exist in Pamela Paul’s world.) As fantasy objects, women have no right to fantasies of our own; if you want to get into pretentious subject-object theory, we’re always the viewed and never the viewer.

(My blogs are going to put a different spin on that, as does the growing niche of CFNM porn.)

Human lemmings are incapable of doing anything because they want to, or not doing something because they don’t; if they think they’re supposed to behave a certain way, they will. If the current look is big-breasted, tan, and lean, then it’s not okay to be okay with milky skin and a little belly, or to like whatever it is that you like anyway. If you don’t look like everyone else thinks everyone else thinks you should look, then you’re supposed to at least be worried about it…

This especially goes for behavior. I’m a big fan of exploring to find out where your boundaries are, rather than relying on a map someone else gave you, and this goes whether yours are farther out or farther in. Mine are pretty far out there in some areas (okay, a lot) and in some ways I’m as innocent as a schoolgirl.

A Catholic schoolgirl whose socks have wear-marks on the knees, but still.

It seems like there are a lot of femmes out there eagerly claiming their place at or under the pervert’s table (it’s about damn time), and a lot of girls (that aren’t exhibitionists doing it for their own thrills) who think if they look, act, speak, and think sex, they’ll get attention - as if it was the only way.

The way I see it, if you’re doing it to put on a show anyway, and you’re not doing it for yourself, you might as well get paid for it. Scabs!