The God-stick and the shame-cave

The Daily Show tackles the failings of abstinence-only sex education with far more delicacy and panache than I could hope to muster, so I'll leave it to them:



I especially like the Tennessee Republican who doubts that experts, with research experience in the field of sex education, somehow know better than parents. No parody required.

Great Porn Dragon - UPDATED!!!

It's just fun to say, isn't it? (h/t Atrios)

Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon
Great Porn Dragon

I wonder if it's like the Great Pumpkin?



UPDATE (04/28/2008): PMI has a nice graphic addition to the mockery pile-on:

Strange bedfellows

I have been generally annoyed by the hubbub over Rev. Jeremiah Wright--I certainly don't support everything he's said, but I do believe that if Barack Obama is to be held responsible for everything the man says (which might be a slight exaggeration), then John McCain should have to answer for the rhetoric of John Hagee, et al.

Coming to Rev. Wright's defense, perhaps surprisingly, is Mike Huckabee:

"[Y]ou can't hold the candidate responsible for everything that people around him may say or do," Huckabee says. "It's interesting to me that there are some people on the left who are having to be very uncomfortable with what ... Wright said, when they all were all over a Jerry Falwell, or anyone on the right who said things that they found very awkward and uncomfortable, years ago. Many times those were statements lifted out of the context of a larger sermon. Sermons, after all, are rarely written word for word by pastors like Rev. Wright, who are delivering them extemporaneously, and caught up in the emotion of the moment. There are things that sometimes get said, that if you put them on paper and looked at them in print, you'd say 'Well, I didn't mean to say it quite like that.'"

Later, he defended Wright's anger, too:

"As easy as it is for those of us who are white to look back and say 'That's a terrible statement!' ... I grew up in a very segregated South. And I think that you have to cut some slack -- and I'm gonna be probably the only conservative in America who's gonna say something like this, but I'm just tellin' you -- we've gotta cut some slack to people who grew up being called names..."

Huckabee gets perilously close to what I like to call the "context fallacy," wherein any embarrassing, inflammatory, offensive, or just plain nasty comment presented as a soundbyte can be dismissed by the speaker as having been "taken out of context," usually with no follow-up explanation (or inquiry) as to the correct context. The speaker often gets a free pass, or at least a reprieve as the news media move on to other scandals or verbal gaffes.

Regardless of context, Rev. Wright has said some pretty wacky stuff, but the question few are asking is this: how much should a parishioner be held directly responsible for the rhetoric of his/her pastor/minister/rabbi/imam/etc.? Partly it depends on the extracurricular activities of the church/temple/mosque/etc. For example, an active member of Westboro Baptist Church could certainly be said to bear some responsibility for what its pastor says and does, comsidering that church's rather single-minded focus, but that is an extreme example. For a church such as Wright's Trinity United Church of Christ, with over 10,000 members (h/t Wikipedia), that is a harder connection to make. I for one am not terribly bothered by Wright's infamous rhetoric--in part, because the broader context (now that I've looked into it a little) seems relatively benign when compared to say, Jerry Falwell or the aforementioned Rev. Hagee; but also because Rev. Wright seems to be expressing anger and frustration (cf. Huckabee, above) alone, not some sort of plan for rearranging the world order (I'm just paranoid enough to suspect Rev. Hagee has that in mind.)

At any rate, I like that Huckabee stepped up for the guy, and I wish everyone would talk about something else.

Cognitive dissonance goes great with smut!

Get this: the Parents' Television Council, whose raison d'etre is to "to ensure that children are not constantly assaulted by sex, violence and profanity on television and in other media," posts what it considers to be the most-objectionable TV material on its website as "The Worst Cable Content of the Week" (h/t SexInt).

As of today, March 21, 2008, the "worst" recipient is FX's Nip/Tuck. A clip from the episode “Rachel Ben Natan” is posted, along with a play-by-play of the salacious bits, e.g.:

Receptionist Bettina performs oral sex on Christian as he reads his phone messages. Her head briefly pops up as he asks her a question. Christian grabs the back of her neck and shoves her face back into his crotch, just below camera range.

...

Bettina has sex with Christian on the couch. Both are clothed, though she leans back, displaying her cleavage.

...

Christian is shown having sex with Bettina from behind, as she kneels on his desk wearing a bra and panties.

Bettina: "God, you're in great shape!"

Christian spanks her.

...

Christian has sex with Bettina who is lying on a desk wearing only a bra on top. She answers the phone while having sex. He buries his face in her breasts.

...

Bettina lies on the couch, her legs over Christian's shoulders as they have sex. Both are naked. No breasts or genitals are seen. Both scream as they climax.

Shortly after they’ve finished, Christian fires Bettina for mispronouncing Julia's name.

I guess if there's gonna be a bombardment of smut anyway, it might as well come from a "parents' advocacy group.

46.6%!

The purity test (h/t Kerry Howley), which guided my way through college, is back, and it's grosser than ever. (The bar is way lower at Rice, as I score a 25% on that test.) This was something all Rice freshmen were supposed to take during orientation, to be used for comparison with your score upon graduation (I dropped by about 67% in four years!)

I'm now 17.48 points less pure than the average test taker, as it turns out.

Remembering Gary Hart

I'm reminded, as I read about Der Spitzer's downfall, of what some comedian in the '80s suggested Gary Hart should say in response to his scandal (it later became a bumper sticker):

Yeah, I fucked her. Vote for me.

At least it's honest. And slightly less humiliating for the other parties involved.

"Liberal Fascism"

PMI on how to review Jonah Goldberg's new book.

Kinda NSFW.

Kinda disturbing.

Way bemusing.

I think it says all I have to say on the topic.

Still sucking after all these years

I had noticed, back in the late '90s and early '00s, when I still attended Beer Bike reunions, that the students at my old digs were slipping in their graffiti obligations (NOTE: If you have never been to Lovett College, you probably don't know what the fuck I'm talking about.) It's good to see that Wikipedia has immortalized the Cobb graffiti for internet posterity.

Lovett '97. Boat racing rules.

I must be slipping...shit

Omaha Dating

I only pulled an "R" rating, based on the words "dead," "bitch" and "hell."

I will therefore now recite the Lovett Cheer, from my old college days. That ought to raise the bar a bit.

The text is shrunken down, for the kids' sake, you know?

Cock suck, mother fuck, eat a bag of shit.
Cunt hair, douche bag, suck your mother's tit.
We are the best college, all the others suck.
Edgar Odell Lovett, rah rah fuck!

According to the Wikipedia post, this is Rice's "only officially University-banned cheer." What the fuck's up with that?

Dixie-Chicking

Truthdig has a great piece on the modern-day equivalent of blacklisting, now known in some circles as "Dixie-Chicking":

[A]ll hell broke loose after Maines’ on-stage comment made the media rounds. The Chicks lost most of their airtime on right-leaning country western radio; CD and concert ticket sales plummeted. Egged on by reactionary FreeRepublic.com bloggers and DJs, ex-fans destroyed Chicks CDs en masse during the ensuing “Dixie Chicks Destruction” campaign. Concerts were picketed by red-baiters who called the Chicks “traitors” and “communists,” although the group’s fans were divided, and some remained loyal. Worst of all, bomb-sniffing dogs and metal detectors were deployed at Dixie Chicks concerts. Under heavy security, the Texas trio confronted a 2003 death threat at a Dallas performance, after a letter threatened to shoot Maines in the same city where JFK had been gunned down 40 years earlier. For his part, President Bush appeared to egg on the Chicks’ persecutors, saying: “They shouldn’t have their feelings hurt just because some people don’t want to buy their records.”

As best I can recall, most of the backlash against the Dixie Chicks was juvenile at best ("chicken toss" parties??? Grow up, folks.) A now-amusing comment from April 2003:

Apparently Maines didn't learn much after the September 11 attacks. The American people have become much more patriotic, and while there are many opinions about the war in Iraq, there are also many casualties for those that speak out on subjects that are considered by many as un-American.

Seeing as how America was founded through the ultimate act of protest (not that I'm advocating armed rebellion per se), it can hardly hurt to have a trio of singers state an opinion (one that has been rather, uh, vindicated by the ensuing 4 1/2 years of events, I dare say). Most of the complaints against the Dixie Chicks, judging from the documentary "Shut Up & Sing," centered on their lack of patriotism and/or their stupidity.

Well, as for their patriotism, as we all learned during the Clinton impeachment, this is a nation of laws, not men, so criticism of any sitting president is not the same as criticism of America. And criticism of America is not always a bad thing. As for the stupidity comments, I'll just say that (a) the Dixie Chicks are hella-good songwriters and performers, and (b) George W. Bush once said this:

My job is a decision-making job, and as a result, I make a lot of decisions.

History will decide.



BTW, Ted Nugent is still a pussy.

I see ya won first prize!

By special request, lyrics to the greatest song about freeballin' Scotsmen ever written:

Well a Scotsman clad in kilt left a bar on evening fair
And one could tell by how we walked that he drunk more than his share
He fumbled round until he could no longer keep his feet
Then he stumbled off into the grass to sleep beside the street
Ring ding diddle diddle I de oh ring di diddly I oh
He stumbled off into the grass to sleep beside the street

About that time two young and lovely girls just happend by
And one says to the other with a twinkle in her eye
See yon sleeping Scotsman so strong and handsome built
I wonder if it's true what they don't wear beneath the kilt
Ring ding diddle diddle I de oh ring di diddly I oh
I wonder if it's true what they don't wear beneath the kilt

They crept up on that sleeping Scotsman quiet as could be
Lifted up his kilt about an inch so they could see
And there behold, for them to see, beneath his Scottish skirt
Was nothing more than God had graced him with upon his birth
Ring ding diddle diddle I de oh ring di diddly I oh
Was nothing more than God had graced him with upon his birth

They marveled for a moment, then one said we must be gone
Let's leave a present for our friend, before we move along
As a gift they left a blue silk ribbon, tied into a bow
Around the bonnie star, the Scots kilt did lift and show
Ring ding diddle diddle I de oh ring di diddly I oh
Around the bonnie star, the Scots kilt did lift and show

Now the Scotsman woke to nature's call and stumbled towards a tree
Behind a bush, he lift his kilt and gawks at what he sees
And in a startled voice he says to what's before his eyes.
O lad I don't know where you been but I see you won first prize
Ring ding diddle diddle I de oh ring di diddly I oh
O lad I don't know where you been but I see you won first prize[!]

A cappella with harmony available.

And don't forget, real men wear kilts.

America's fucked-up priorities

Just read this. Then get mad and say fuck. It won't hurt anyone.

No minors allowed in this blog

Mingle² - Online Dating

Apparently I have enough references to death and sex in here to merit an "R" rating. Dang, I was hoping for an "NC-17." Alas.

Athletic compliments as a sign of societal progress? - UPDATED

George Will, always a font of wisdom on all things baseball, writes about the way in which the praise offered to Jackie Robinson 60 years ago was often worse than the scorn:

To appreciate how far the nation has come, propelled by what began 60 years ago today, consider not the invectives that Robinson heard from opponents' dugouts and fans, but the way he had been praised. "Dusky Jack Robinson," as the Los Angeles Times called him, alerting readers to the race of UCLA's four-sport star, ran with a football "like it was a watermelon and the guy who owned it was after him with a shotgun."

I have little doubt that the LA Times writer thought he was being clever at the time. Fast forward to 2007, when Don Imus makes his NHH comment (if it's so bad, I won't type it all the way out) and gets fired. I suspect that Imus meant it as a sort of compliment about how much the Rutgers basketball team kicks ass, but it was really just stupid--plus, I assume it wasn't so much the "NH" but the "H" that got him into trouble. He was trying to get a laugh, and he tried too hard. Personally, I still think total "equality" is a pipe dream, as people will always find ways to assert "their group" over the "other," but still, in this moment, I guess I say bravo.

Now, if we could all just come to an agreement about what is and is not okay to say in public, maybe we'll see some actual progress. Here is my first proposal--if someone says something stupid and/or offensive, the best way to deal with it is with more speech, not just by shutting that person up (that's pretty much a cliche by now). Otherwise, you end up with people like Ann Coul-notgonnatypeoutherwholenamesoshewon'tgetgooglehitsthankstome, who just say shit to be shocking. If she ever had to defend even one comment she has made in her career, well, it would be fun to watch.

See, here's the thing: in 1947, someone praised Jackie Robinson in an altogether insulting manner, and there's no indication that anyone much raised a stink at all. In 2007, someone does something similar (albeit less directly offensive overall, IMHO) and almost immediately gets fired. I'm not sure I'd call that real progress on the issue.

UPDATE - Read this.

Not sure I should even go here...

Fair warning, this post deals with some prurient stuff.

As I was perusing ABC's tabloidesque "Primetime" earlier this evening (okay, fine, I Tivo'd it after seeing a promo last night), I couldn't help but wonder if the show was being a bit unfair. See, they interviewed a woman by the name of Sunny Lane, who I will pretend to have never heard of before today, and discussed how her parents work as her business managers...for her career in adult entertainment. If you watch the whole episode (not available on ABC's website, near as I can tell), the interviewer almost seems frustrated that he can't get her to seem more tortured or ambivalent about the whole thing, thereby defying the axiom that adult entertainment deadens the soul. Maybe she just hasn't been doing it long enough, but she comes across as too cute and bubbly to be all that depressing:



I'm somewhat fascinated by the psychology of the whole business--i.e. what gets people to do this sort of thing, are said people really as screwed up as their stereotypes, and so forth. The whole thing with the parents on the ABC show is a bit strange (or a whole hell of a lot strange, who knows). I do think porn should stay out of the spotlight, if for no other reason than because it might otherwise lose its cachet--I think the market will keep it around for a long time, even if no one can agree on how much money the industry makes. Anyway, it's very late at night.

I'm not letting the HPV vaccine issue go

The more I read about Rick Perry and Merck, the more I get suspicious about graft & such, but doing the right thing for the wrong reasons still involves doing the right thing. And opposing the right thing for the wrong reason (when there are better reasons) is still...you get the idea.

From Bill Maher, courtest of Salon.com:

March 2, 2007 | New Rule: If you don't think your daughter getting cancer is worse than your daughter having sex, then you're doing it wrong. Last year, science came up with a way to greatly reduce cervical cancer in young women. It's a vaccine that prevents women from getting HPV, which is a sexually transmitted disease that acts as a gateway to the cancer. And the vaccine is so good, it could wipe out HPV. I keep a stockpile near my hot tub, and I can tell you, that tingling sensation means it's really working. And I'd say that even without the endorsement deal.

Now for the bad news: Not everyone is pleased with this vaccine. That prevents cancer. Christian parent groups and churches nationwide are fighting it. Bridget Maher -- no relation, and none planned -- of the Family Research Council says giving girls the vaccine is bad, because the girls "may see it as a license to engage in premarital sex."

Which is really a stretch. People don't get the vaccine for typhoid and say, "Great, now I can drink the sewer water in Bombay." It's like saying if you give a kid a tetanus shot she'll want to jab rusty nails in her feet. It's like being against a cure for blindness because it'll encourage masturbation. It's like being for salmonella poisoning in peanut butter because it'll discourage weirdos from spreading it on their ass and calling the dog.

And yet, the anti-vaccine folks seem to think that if a teenage girl feels a little prick, she's gonna want to feel a whole lot more. But HPV shots don't cause promiscuity. Tequila shots do. Everything your kids buy is sold to them with sex. The vaccine doesn't make them want to screw: MTV does. And hormones. And having moron parents they want to escape from. Hey, when you're 15 years old, breathing encourages sexual activity.

But let's be frank: These Christian groups aren't just against the HPV shot; they're against family planning and condoms and morning after pills -- they want to make sure sex is as dangerous as possible, so that kids know, if they sleep around and get an STD, that's God teaching them a lesson. And the lesson is, you should never have tried out for "American Idol" in the first place.

There's only one kind of medical science that excites Christians, and that's anything that proves life begins earlier and earlier in the womb. If you could use stem cells to prove that life begins at foreplay, the pope would turn the Vatican into a lab. These people don't really want to see a cure for anything, except homosexuality.

But as a parent, if you're so obsessed with abstinence you'd risk your kid's health, there's a word for what you are, but it's not "follower of Christ." It's not "moral." It's not "Christian." It's not even "logical." So just admit it. You hate sex. It's OK to say you hate for the sake of hating. It hasn't hurt Dick Cheney.

I hate to tell you this, Mrs. Maher, and anyone else who thinks a vaccine gives your girls a "license to have sex": Your daughter knows she doesn't need a license for sex. She's already on the Internet exchanging bondage fantasies with a German boy she met on MySpace. Forget HPV; she's already on to S/M. We all know, there's only one 100 percent proven method to make a woman abstinent -- marry her.

SCROTUM!!!!!

Editorial: Don't let your kids read this

This is a good one. A number of librarians are complaining because the latest Newberry Award-winning children's book, "The Higher Power of Lucky," describes a rattlesnake biting a dog on the ballsack...I mean scrotum.

The book uses the anatomically-correct term, so what's the problem, exactly? That a children's book acknowledges the existence of canine private parts? I am using nearly all my strength to suppress the urge to vomit at the thought of a rattlesnake biting anything anywhere near my...scrotum, but that really isn't the point, anyway:

"Because of that one word, I would not be able to read that book aloud," one [librarian] explained, calling it "a Howard Stern-type shock treatment." We have three words for that: Oh, come on.

I recall several Newberry books I read as a kid, and many of them deal with some pretty tough issues. While I am not certain that snake bites on the junk are on the same level as death or racism when it comes to issues children must confront, I am not convinced that this is such a horrible thing for a librarian to have to say out loud.

I wonder what the book is actually about?