Sex News: Heteroromantic bisexuality, Voice nixes escort ads, BDSM psychotherapy

0 pieces of BRILLIANCE put forth by a DARING and DELIGHTFUL reader

Cybercrime and passion: Wetware: Cyberpunk Erotica (ebook, $3.89)

Anthony Mirial

Image by Mirial via Beautiful Bizarre

  • Warning for survivors. Hundreds of women in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) — including domestic workers who are victims of rape — are routinely imprisoned under laws that forbid sex outside marriage, a BBC investigation has found. Under the UAE Penal Code, which is based on Sharia law, those convicted of zina (charges of illicit sex which include adultery, fornication, and homosexuality) face severe penalties. The extent of the abuse is unknown. In 2014, another HRW report, which suggests that there are at least 146,000 female migrant domestic workers employed in the UAE, stated how some employers accused workers of zina “to counter rape or sexual assault allegations that the worker had made against the employer.”
    Rape Victims Are Being Jailed Under Extramarital Sex Laws in the UAE (Vice)
  • Although people might separate their romantic orientations from their sexual orientations, some feel that these distinctions are problematic and steeped in centuries of homophobia. Charles Pulliam Moore discussed the phenomenon of “bisexual but hetero-amorous” men in a Thought Catalog piece and how their willingness to have sex with men, while withholding the emotional attachment, prevents them from being accepted by both the heterosexual and LGBT communities. “Bisexuals get a bad rap for not being able to explain their emotional actions that seem so incongruous with their sexual proclivities. That doesn’t need to be the case.”
    Are You a Heteroromantic Bisexual? A Guide to One of the Most Misunderstood Sexual Orientations (Mic)
  • Peter Barbey is wasting no time as the new owner of the Village Voice; he’s nixed the thought of changing the print edition size, pitched to staff the concept of special themed inserts and decided it’s time for a major ad dollar shift. Barbey plans to get rid of escort ads, a racy fixture of many an alt-weekly. “Adult women can be escorts, that’s fine with me,” Mr. Barbey said, “but it’s not the kind of advertising that fits where we want to go.”
    New Village Voice Owner Plans to Ditch Escort Ads (Adweek)

Thanks to our sponsor in Spain, women-run Lust Cinema.

  • Dana Zzyym has spent most of their life struggling to conform to social and legal categories of gender. But now Zzyym is claiming the State Department violated their constitutional rights when it denied them a U.S. passport last year for failing to pick either a male or female gender box.
    Intersex Activist Denied A Passport Sues The U.S. Government (BuzzFeed)
  • The Food and Drug Administration this week advised consumers to not purchase eight penis pill brands. The FDA said distributors of the brands claim that the ingredients are “all natural” but laboratory analysis confirmed the pills were found to contain the active ingredients in the FDA-approved prescription drugs Viagra and Cialis. So far this year, the FDA has blacklisted 34 penis pill brands.
    8 More Penis Pill Brands Blacklisted (XBIZ)
  • An Egyptian actress and TV personality has ignited a nationwide controversy for suggesting that Egyptian men would benefit from watching more pornography. In fact, she’s facing jail time.
    Watching Porn in Cairo (Reason, thanks P!)
  • “Historically, we’ve tended to view masturbation as a pathology. And for that we can thank the English charlatan John Marten, who in the early 1700s published a tract, with an insufferably long title, that sought to identify autoeroticism as a disease (which is odd, because it’s the safest form of sex) …”
    The Weird Ways Kids Learn to Masturbate (NY Mag)

Much gratitude to our thoughtful sponsor, Nubile Films.

  • “While conventional psychotherapists still debate the ethics of hugging their patients, Rogers and Thole have pioneered a form of intensive therapy that incorporates consensual BDSM activities into their sessions with clients. The objective is to activate repressed emotions in order to process them in a safe and supportive environment. In order to better understand their technique, which they call Light/Dark Therapy, the couple invited me to participate in an immersion with them. For the next forty-eight hours, we will not leave this cabin.”
    That Time I Tried BDSM Therapy (The Atlantic)
  • “The hetero (and non-hetero, but, let’s face it, mostly hetero) sex on offer to young women is not of very high quality, for reasons having to do with youthful ineptitude and tenderness of hearts, sure, but also the fact that the game remains rigged. It’s rigged in ways that go well beyond consent. Students I spoke to talked about “male sexual entitlement,” the expectation that male sexual needs take priority, with men presumed to take sex and women presumed to give it to them. ”
    Why Sex That’s Consensual Can Still Be Bad. And Why We’re Not Talking About It. (New York Magazine)

Thank you to our sponsor in Holland, Abby Winters.

  • China produces 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, despite strong regional taboos surrounding sexuality, and its sex shops now outnumber Starbucks. The coffee giant has more than 1,500 stores in China, but that’s small potatoes compared to the countless dispensers of condoms, vibrators and costumes. The over $2 billion Chinese sex toy industry relies in large part on exporting, particularly to South Africa, South Korea and Russia.
    Sex Shops Now Outnumber Starbucks in China (XBIZ)
  • Last Monday evening, a woman had the awful but, unfortunately, not uncommon experience of getting flashed while using the New York subway system. As the NYPD told Gothamist, the 38-year-old was standing on a platform in the Fifth Avenue N/R station “when she heard a hissing noise beside her. (…)
    Hissing, Gun-Wielding Subway-Station Masturbator Turns Out to Be a Retired Cop (NY Magazine)

Thank you to our sponsor and friends, Pink Label TV.

  • Great review: Bacchus at ErosBlog took a look at a new 35-minute “featurette” called Gone: A Story Of Love And Courage “that’s also a moving and affecting erotic musing on the role sex plays in grief and loss.”
    Gone: A Story Of Love And Courage (ErosBlog: The Sex Blog)
  • A new law in the conservative Indonesian province of Aceh will punish those thought to have had gay sex with 100 lashes from a cane. Although gay sex is not illegal according to Indonesian national law, Aceh has some autonomy from the central Jakarta government and has adopted a form of Shari‘a law. Human-rights activists have called the new law “inhumane” and “cruel.”
    Gay Sex Now Punished With 100 Lashes in Indonesia’s Aceh (TIME)
  • Marie Claire contributing editor Amanda de Cadenet surveyed 3,000 women to determine their relationship with porn and 31 percent admitted to watching adult films at least once weekly. Contrary to popular belief, 76 percent of [those] women did not feel that adult films negatively impacted their sex lives or relationships.
    A Third of Women Admit They Watch Porn Weekly (XBIZ)

Share This Post

You might also like:

Post Comment