Category Archives: sex

Selling Sex Pt. II: Sex at the Super Bowl

Posted on February 15, 2014 by | 3 comments

In the week leading up to the Super Bowl my Facebook feed was exploding with information regarding sex trafficking.There were articles like this one, which included first-hand accounts from victims, as well as videos like this one and the one below.


I was excited to see the increase in awareness around the time of the Super Bowl because I hoped that it would prompt a crack down on trafficking activities. In fact, that’s actually what ended up happening. For example,  Attorney General John Hoffman of New Jersey “assembled a task force, which, among other things, aim[ed] to teach the public how to identify and assist trafficking victims.” Additionally, “this year’s host, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie [was] tweeting frequently about sex trafficking at the Super Bowl and his state’s commitment to stop it.” Continue reading →

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Posted in politics, sex, sports

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I Kissed Kissing Goodbye [And Present Thoughts on the Matter]

Posted on February 14, 2014 by | 11 comments

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. There’s, uh, hugging, obviously, and holding hands . . . there’s hanging out and talking of course . . . I can, uh, tell you that I love you, that seems pretty straightforward . . . write you some poetry, maybe? I feel like that’s probably a pretty good list already.

Oh, uh, kissing? Well, uh . . .

Maybe back when I was 15-years-old or so I decided, purely on a whim, to not kiss until I knew I was going to marry the person I was locking lips with, while I was casually talking on the phone with my then-girlfriend. A decision that could, in all likelihood, lead to something more or less like this:

Continue reading →

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Posted in bizarreness, Christianity, morality, relationships, religion, sex, Youth

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Shame Day: The Portrayal of Christians in Popular Media

Posted on February 11, 2014 by | 10 comments

I’ve ragged on Christians and Christianity alike, both in practice and doctrine, and I’ve never felt unjustified in doing so.  Nevertheless, and for all its issues, it really can’t be denied that in the past 20 to 30 years the religion’s really gotten the short end of the stick. In the interest of equity to all, we’re going to spend some time hashing out some of the more popular portrayals of Christians and explaining why they’re unfair, inaccurate, or even just plain spiteful.

I. Christians as One Group

Evan’s already covered the topic of how we’re drifting further and further away from a common cultural understanding- especially when it comes to religion. I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing in and of itself, but it is starting to have some negative effects.

There was an episode of Weeds (gah- there’s hours of my life I’ll never get back) depicting the creation of this megachurch in the suburb that the show was (at first, anyways) largely centered on satirizing. And that’s fair; these things do exist, and usually in the wealthier, WASPier neighborhoods of this nation. And that was all fine and well until the episode where the zealous church-goers started speaking in tongues.

Continue reading →

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Posted in Africa, America, Asia, Christianity, Europe, film, history, media, morality, religion, science, sex, television

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Naked Ladies and the Balance of Power

Posted on February 8, 2014 by | 7 comments

Not so long ago a friend sent me an article called “6 Reasons Female Nudity can be Powerful” by Soraya Chemaly. He wanted to know what I thought of it.

To give you some context I should tell you that this friend and I have debated on issues regarding sexuality and nudity since we were teenagers. Back in high school we would have probably taken polar opposite stances on an issue like this. I was a fairly indignant teenager who wanted her gender to be taken seriously, and since he was a teenage boy and boobs held a certain appeal for him I didn’t think his opinion could ever be unbiased. While we continue to debate on these issues now and then, I think we are both coming to slightly less extreme, and maybe more realistic, perspectives. And when it comes to this article I have to agree with him. Female nudity can  be a powerful tool.

According to legend, Lady Godiva rode through town naked in order to convince her husband to lower his taxes on the people of Coventry. This rendition is by Jules Joseph Lefebvre

Continue reading →

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Posted in feminism, media, politics, pornography, sex

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Shame Day: Dark, Gritty Fan Art of Beloved Childhood Characters

Posted on January 28, 2014 by | 2 comments

I was in a dark place when I wrote the post I am least proud of: Fame Day: Creativity [and Imagination]. It’s not that I don’t think it’s a relevant topic, especially right now when it’s more common to see children in front of screens than playing make believe with their toys, it’s just that at the time I figured that writing it was the easy way out. As luck would have it, all of that segues really smoothly into today’s topic-

I hate dark and gritty fan art because it is both uncreative and lazy.

To be totally transparent, I was a high schooler once, so I did think these were really awesome once upon a time. It wasn’t until much later when I realized that if you want to take a beloved childhood character and make it appeal to a large section of the internet you have three simple options:

1) Make said character a killer/capable of killing.

There are altogether far too many gritty Inspector Gadget pictures out there.

Continue reading →

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Posted in art, bizarreness, cartoons, internet, sex

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An Asian Man’s Reaction to AMWW Magazine

Posted on January 10, 2014 by | 2 comments
amwwmag

I want to write an entire separate post about this logo, which goes against everything I learned in Graphic Design.

To start with, AMWW Magazine is a website, not an actual print publication. The letters in its title stand for “Asian Man White Woman” which makes it sound like it’s a place to find niche pornography; I assure you that it is not. Under its About section the writers describe the work they do as:

“…a resource for both men and women in order to learn how to connect and hopefully meet their romantic, cross-cultural partner. Whether it’s for a brief, passionate and illicit one time liaison to a lifelong romance that smolders well into the twilight of your life, our interracial dating advice blog aims to give both men and women practical and solid information from both sides of the gender lines on how to improve your dating, sex, and love life.”

Now I found AMWW while being linked from race site to race site, probably starting with the racebending tumblr, but when I found it I wasn’t quite sure how to react. After showing it around to friends online and reading through a good number of the articles myself, I arrived at the very vague conclusion that it made me uncomfortable.

Writing this post is a way for me to explore that feeling. Continue reading →

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Posted in bizarreness, race, relationships, sex

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