Alison Gardner

The Sexual Freedom Project: ‘Escorting’ v. ‘Prostitution’

We’re talking another look at this Sexual Freedom Project video in light of our recent post, “Voluntary sex work is destined to evolve into a legitimate Sexual Healing Industry.” Regardless of what money exchanges whose hands, sex work is a legitimate part of our culture in that it is, with the exception of forced prostitution, an expression of comfort and love however foreign that idea may sound to some people.

What do you think?

Is there a difference between between what “escorts” are paid to do, and what “prostitutes” are paid to do?

Is sex work labeled differently depending upon the socioeconomic status of the person performing it? Or the status of the person paying the sex worker?

Why do legal authorities round up prostitutes who work on the streets, while looking the other way when it comes to escorts who find their clients online and in other invisible ways? Is this a legitimate distinction or just another form of discrimination based on wealth and status?

Again, let us know what you think. Make a video, write a poem, song, or an essay — or even create an original work of art — and express your thoughts on this and other topics that people like you have recorded for the Sexual Freedom Project. If we feature your contribution on the site, we will send you a free VenusPlusX t-shirt to thank you.

Click here for more videos.

 


Are you sleeping through a revolution?

Portrait of Martin Luther King, Jr., by Chris Tank located in the MLK Jr. Memorial Library, Washington, DC Flickr/Creative Commons

Portrait of Martin Luther King, Jr., by Chris Tank located in the MLK Jr. Memorial Library, Washington, DC
Flickr/Creative Commons

“One of the great liabilities of history is the fact that all too many people find themselves amid a great period of social change, and yet they fail to achieve the new attitudes and the new mental outlook that the new situation demands.”
— Martin Luther King, Jr., Springfield College Commencement , June 14, 1964

It was empowering this week to re-read and reflect on an oft-overlooked commencement address by Martin Luther King, Jr., delivered 50 years ago at Springfield College.

Just days before the speech, King was arrested with a group of demonstrators attempting to eat at a restaurant and sent to St. Johns County Jail, an infamous building that housed many civil rights pioneers for non-violent demonstrations in and around St. Augustine, Florida. He wasn’t sure he would get out in time to go to Springfield, Massachusetts, for this commencement address, or to Yale University where he was scheduled to speak the following day.

Here are some excerpts from Springfield College address, but we urge you to read it in full.

The theme of this speech cautions all social change advocates and activists to make sure they are not “sleeping through a revolution” by not doing everything possible each day to make the world a better place. He urged his listeners first to adopt a world perspective to understand the breadth of our collective social ills. Next? Wipe out poverty. And, third, recognize the “urgency of the moment.”

As long as there is poverty in this world no one can be totally secure. Somehow we are all tied together in this great system of humanity. For some strange reason I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be; and you can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be. This is the inter-related structure of reality. John Donne caught it years ago and placed it in graphic terms: “No man is an island entire in itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main,” and then he goes on toward the end to say, “Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee.”

When we recognize this, King goes on to say, and “are concerned about our brothers who are less fortunate, then we are remaining awake through a great revolution.”

[I]f we are to remain awake through this great revolution, we must work passionately and unrelentingly to remove the last vestiges of racial injustice from our nation and from the world.

In exposing the modern problem of failing to “recognize the urgency of the moment,” King’s words cross time, just as pertinent today as they were 50 years ago.

There are people all around who are saying, “Cool off.” There are individuals all around who are saying, “You are pushing things too fast.” And they are saying only time can solve the problem. The only answer that we can give to the myth of time is that time is neutral. It can be used either constructively or destructively. And I am absolutely convinced that the forces of ill will in our nation have used time much more effectively than the forces of good will. And I am absolutely convinced that the Wallace’s, the extreme rightists and the individuals committed to negative ends have used time much more effectively in our nation than the individuals committed to positive ends. And it may well be that we will have to repent in this generation not merely for the vitriolic words and the violent actions of the bad people who will bomb a church in Birmingham, Alabama, but for the appalling silence and indifference of the good people who sit around and say wait on time. Somewhere we must come to see that human progress never rolls in on the wheels of inevitability. It comes through the tireless efforts and the persistent work of dedicated individuals . . .time itself becomes an ally of the primitive and insurgent forces of irrational emotionalism and social stagnation.

 

The speech happens to elucidate the roots and foundations on which VenusPlusX stands, articulated in our recently release of our Manifesto for a New Age of Sexual Freedom, which begins: “The New Age of Sexual Freedom is synonymous with the end of sexism and racism (the greatest form of sexual oppression), and the end of nationalism for the purposes of war (the greatest form of racism), in the shortest amount of time (because we are killing each other).”

We hope social justice advocates everywhere will be inspired by this speech and more of King’s writings, and reflect on what more then can do, how many other people they can awaken to their cause, and how we can all avoid sleeping through the revolution.

Photo by Anne Adrian Flickr/Creative Commons

Photo by Anne Adrian
Flickr/Creative Commons

 

MSNBC’s Toure: Can a man be a feminist, too?

We were so happy to hear Toure, one of the anchors of MSNBC’s The Cycle, talk about a favorite topic of ours: men can and should ascribe to feminism.

The battle for any identity group’s liberation cannot and should not proceed solely with members of that group, and it never does.

MSNBC's Toure, on The Cycle (video below)

MSNBC’s Toure, on The Cycle
(video below)

Not only is feminism the most modern expression of progressivism, men’s direct involvement is crucial to its continued success in setting aside old, useless, coercive, and harmful systems imposed on society in favor of preserving that which is old and also good, and melding that with new, more humane and voluntary associations. You can read more about the process of true progress in our Manifesto for a New Age of Sexual Freedom.

Toure echoes several feminist memes we wrote about  a couple of weeks ago, including our promotion of Zaron Burnett’s’ wonderful essay, A Gentlemen’s Guide to Rape Culture, a piece of work that is both fun to read and highly instructional, a must read for every man, young or old.

I came of age with the birth of modern feminism over 50 years ago. The men I chose to surround myself with, in college and since, were all feminists, ascribing to this renewed vision of how to make the world a better place. We had words to describe men who fought feminism, degraded or ignored it. Luddites, Knuckle-draggers, Unenlightened, and, oh yeah, just Stupid. Because, as Toure has reinforced, the oppression of some contributes to the oppression of many.

As a post-script here, I would feel remiss in not differentiating true feminism from its mangled 1980s radical feminism. The word mangled is appropriate because of this splintering wave’s angry misdirection in rejecting men, and in particular trans women (and trans men). The very idea of non-inclusive feminism is intellectually self-contradictory, regressive (and decidedly not radical) and has contributed nothing but weakening feminism by confusing its underlying principles. Again, the word Luddite comes to mind.

So young women, study feminism’s history to help you understand why it enfranchises all women, all men, all trans people, and everyone in between.

Related: NYT’s Is it possible to be a male feminists? and How can we help men? By helping women. 

 

 

Supreme Court: Don’t F#ck it up

Congressional Clarity: Americans United, Allies Deliver Briefing on Hobby Lobby Suit

“Should the Supreme Court rule in favor of Hobby Lobby, employers would be able to privilege their religious convictions over their employees’ – something we consider to be an egregious distortion of the principle of religious liberty” — Litigation Counsel, Greg Lipper, Americans United for Separation of Church and State

A robust national debate has been going on leading up to the soon-to-be ruling from this session of the Supreme Court regarding the standing of a corporation’s religious liberty, (in this case, Hobby Lobby) with respect to its employees’ access to birth control has been mired in the plaintiff’s misinformation and misdirection. This week, Lipper was joined by others, including  Sara Hutchinson of Catholics for Choice, Roy Speckhardt of the American Humanist Association, and Nancy Kaufmann of the National Council of Jewish Women,  tried their best to brief Congress on the potential consequences of a Hobby Lobby victory for real religious liberty, and lay the ground work for legislative rescue should this the court rule in favor of Hobby Lobby.

4156193126_f2ac736727_bSince the court has previously ruled that corporations have “personal” rights, the fate of this case is worrisome.

Hutchinson said, “those consequences would be profoundly negative for most Americans,” adding that organizations such as the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops do not represent popular support despite its claims to the contrary.

“We firmly believe that contraception coverage protects women.”

“Catholics believe that women’s conscience rights deserve respect.”

Kaufmann reinforced the point.

“[A Hobby Lobby victory] would undermine a woman’s religious liberty to make a faith-informed decision about birth control.”

. . . [P]eople of color, who tend to be low-income as a result of racial inequalities, would be “disproportionately” affected by a ruling that limited contraception access.

“We hope the courts uphold the religious liberty of all people”

Flickr/creative commons

Flickr/creative commons

Speckhardt spoke up for the rights of non-theists.

“True religious liberty must include the option to be non-religious . . .”
“It must not be used by those abusing it for partisan agendas.”

Religious minorities would be burdened by a Hobby Lobby victory, Speckhardt asserted, and he cited concerns that employers could deny access to other necessary medical procedures if religious exemptions to the Affordable Care Act are broadened.

 

The effort to define religious liberty is sure to continue no matter what the verdict, but activists in every other arena would do well to understand the importance of religious liberty for all as a pillar of civil rights because it affects everything.

 

Super-hero Holder calls out Boy Scouts

Boy Scout Ceremony Flickr/creative commons

Boy Scout Ceremony
Flickr/creative commons

Last week, we lamented the flagrant hypocrisy of newly appointed Boy Scouts President, Robert Gates (former Bush and Obama Defense Secretary) in failing to step up to resolve the organization’s dislocation when it comes to accepting gay scoutmasters.

Last year, after public pressure, the Boy Scouts finally reversed a century of discrimination against gay people with a new policy allowing young, openly gay boys to participate. The organization’s failure, however, solidified with the hiring of Gates, lies with continued discrimination against adult scoutmasters. They couldn’t justify excluding gay scouts, and they will not be able to justify excluding gay scout leaders, and until they do they are systematically removing positive gay role models from the gay scout’s experience while sending the opposite message that there is a serious problem when gay adults fraternize with young people.

For example, what to do with gay Eagle Scouts who at age 18 or subsequently want to continue their involvement as a scout leader? Or what about a gay parent who wants to share the Boy Scout experience with their (straight or gay) children?

Now, at Monday’s 14th Annual Lambda Legal Reception in Washington, DC, Eric Holder, the most progressive Attorney General we have been so lucky to have, has stepped into the breach.

And in far too many organizations, policies and practices that discriminate against LGBT individuals remain persistent concerns. Lambda Legal is among the groups that have led efforts to address these conditions – for instance, through your work in 1992, in Boy Scouts of America v. Dale, to challenge the termination of an Assistant Scoutmaster when the organization found out he was gay. Unfortunately, the continuation of a policy that discriminates against gay adult leaders – by an iconic American institution – only preserves and perpetuates the worst kind of stereotypes.

Holder went on to say . . .

Today – 45 long years after Stonewall – we can finally envision a day when the sun will rise on an America that sees LGBT individuals as full and equal citizens.

But that day has not yet arrived.  I firmly believe that the struggle to make it a reality constitutes a defining civil rights challenge of our time.  And that’s why President Obama and I are committed to standing shoulder-to-shoulder with everyone who has the courage to reach for the values of equality and opportunity.

We come together tonight at an important juncture – in a moment defined by challenge, consequence, and great opportunity.  Remarkable achievements stretch behind us.  Important, life-changing work lies ahead.  And I want the American people to know that this Administration – and this Department of Justice and this Attorney General – will never be content to be bystanders to the march of history.  We will march, we will fight, and we will work alongside you to help shape it.

Holder’s complete remarks can be found here.

Related: A Hypocrite the Boy Scouts can love

 

 

Desire and accomplishment are inseparable

With the last released excerpt of our upcoming book on sex and spirituality, we introduced the concept of an eventuating Supreme Being, free from superstition or myth, and available for both the believer and non-believer. Here we are continuing this thread, and welcome your feedback.

3759375253_2de9c1992e_bIt is difficult for some of us to imagine how a being can be identical to a desire. Are not our desires just feelings that drive us to act? Are not beings just consciousnesses capable of action? When we unify the desire for action with the accomplishment of that action as one and the same occasion we enter the universe of effective action. Here the desire and accomplishment are inseparably identified.

We seek to perfect this experience in our own lives through the practice of the presence of Love—our “communion” with our desire to do good towards others and our experience of oneness with the Supreme. Although every human has the innate ability to experience this, major enterprises (e.g., human religions) have been established on the false idea that a third party, perhaps a priest, is a necessary intermediary between a human and this highly personal and individual communion. Or that one must have a detailed gnosis of the qualities of God in order to “worship the right way.”

Nonsense!

This communion (our desire merged with the entirety of the Supreme) assures that the true desire is realized insofar as it is synchronous with the manifestation of the Supreme.
© VenusPlusX, 2013. All rights reserved.

Already available now as a companion reference, A Course in Immortality (and in Spanish, Un Curso En Inmortalidad), which will be published as an included Appendix in the new book.

The Sexual Freedom Project: Let’s Talk About Sex

We are taking a second look at this video which asked a lot of basic questions. Many of you contacted us privately with your answers, and often with questions as well. So what do you think?

Who taught you about sex? Were you able to talk with your parents about it? Do parents have realistic expectations about the sexual activities of their children?

How does a person know when they’re mature enough to begin having sex? How can we ensure that young people have the relevant facts they need to make the best decisions about their sexual behaviors?What role does the Internet play in sexual education today?

Does more sexual information equate to more sexual freedom?

Let’s hear your voice. Make a video, write a poem, song, or an essay — or even create an original work of art — and express your thoughts on these topics. If we feature your contribution on the site, we will send you a free VenusPlusX t-shirt to thank you.

More videos.


New “SecureDrop” is a game changer

Guardian Launches SecureDrop System for Whistleblowers to Share Files

We took to Facebook the other day, so thrilled to see that The Guardian has just launched something called SecureDrop for use by anonymous whistleblowers to securely submit documents and data. Our first reaction?

This . . . will be a real game-changer.

Flickr/creative commons

Flickr/creative commons

Game-changer really understates the significance of this matriculation from grassroots efforts such as Anonymous, a loose, silent brotherhood of freedom fighters, and WikiLeaks, a bold and successful effort to organize these nascent efforts. Now the Pulitzer-winning Guardian, a 200-year-old news organization with a growing international media presence, and important progressive voice, has stepped up to formalize the very first secure drop that whistleblowers anywhere can safely bring material directly to the public.

This makes a huge, planet-wide, progressive stride towards our better future, a world free from nationalism and war and the racism on which they are based.

The Guardian’s SecureDrop will be managed by Freedom of the Press Foundation and Daniel Ellsberg. Ellsberg was a hero of my generation of anti-war activists, bringing us the secret Pentagon Papers when we needed it the most, and helped hasten the end the Vietnam War. (The Foundation accepts tax-deductible donations, if you can help that way.)

“A cantankerous press, an obstinate press, a ubiquitous press must be suffered by those in authority in order to preserve the even greater values of freedom of expression and the right of the people to know.”  —Judge Murray Gurfein, Pentagon Papers case, June 17, 1971

Any new material received through SecureDrop will be professionally evaluated, corroborated, and then carefully time-released to the public, protecting the sources to the full extent of the law, while arming ordinary citizens with the information they deserve to know about world governments. Lawyer, author, and international columnist Glenn Greenwald was the Guardian journalist who took receipt of Edward Snowden‘s waterfall of government surveillance secrets, and won his own Pulitzer Prize (and George Polk Award) for doing it. (In 2014, Greenwald went on to found First Look Media and its first online publication, The Intercept.)

Too many people have wrongly labeled whistleblowers outright traitors (Chelsea Manning, for now still incarcerated, and Edward Snowden, in temporary exile, and even Greenwald, and just as they once did Daniel Ellsberg), but all of these accusers are misinformed luddites, failing, tragically, to see that there will be no peace in our collective future unless we live in a world where there are no secrets, no necessity for them under any circumstances.

Manning, Snowden, and Greenwald rightly, and now the Guardian news organization, know with certainty that they have made giant steps toward releasing humankind from the enslavement imposed upon us by a consortium of fear-driven, power-drunk oligarchs who occupy themselves, not with the health or well-being of the all people, but willing do absolutely anything and go to any lengths necessary to control anyone they possibly can in order to protect their selfish special interests, whatever they might be.

We have brave hearts in our midsts, again when we need it the most. We need more of it.

Never fear and never stop exposing the truth and disinformation around you, starting at the grassroots upwards, even to SecureDrop yourself. You can do you part, so what’s stopping you?.

For more about the progressive transference from old and coercive systems to new, and completely voluntary associations, check out our Manifesto for the New Age of Sexual Freedom.

Related: Internet Giants Erect Barriers to Spy Agencies 

National Sex Study reveals what we are up to

National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior

Strand Book Store by Nick Sherman (flickr/creativecommons

Strand Book Store
by Nick Sherman
(flickr/creativecommons

A new study, the largest in 20 years, represents a clarion call for anyone having sex (or not having sex for that matter). Researchers from the Center for Sexual Health Promotion (CSHP) at Indiana University’s School of Health, Physical Education, and Recreation examine the sexual experience and condom-use in almost 6000 people, ages 14-94.

“These data about sexual behaviors and condom use in contemporary America are critically needed by medical and public health professionals who are on the front lines addressing issues such as HIV, sexually transmissible infections, and unintended pregnancy.” (CSHP Director, Michael Reece)

Here are a few things that caught our attention, but it is definitely worth a fair read because you will learn a lot and, more important, it allows you to analyze your own behaviors.

[T]he study helps both the public and professionals to understand how condom use patterns vary across these varying stages in people’s relationships and across ages, adding that “findings show that condoms are used twice as often with casual sexual partners as with relationship partners, a trend that is consistent for both men and women across age groups that span 50 years.” (CSHP Associate Director, Debby Herbenick)

Condom use is of course up to 1 in 4 sexual encounters, although for single people it is 1 in 3, and people of color in America use condoms more than their white counterparts. That may sound like good news except that that means as many as 66-75% are having unprotected sex. 

Adults using a condom for intercourse were just as likely to rate the sexual extent positively in terms of arousal, pleasure and orgasm than when having intercourse without one.

Click here to see Condom Use Graph

Sexual behaviors, from solo and partner masturbation and oral sex to vaginal and anal intercourse. Males masturbate alone more than females, not surprising. But there is near gender equity during our 40s, with males at 76% and females at 65%.

Females are having very little anal penetration, 4-5% before age 18, jumping to 18% by age 20, and then stays around 22% until age 40 and then dropping drastically after that.

Males performing oral sex on females gets into the double digits, 18%, by age 16, and steadily rises to its peak at 74% for ages 25-29, and then slowly declines after that.

Females performing oral sex on males is predictably is substantially greater but males do actually reciprocate in greater numbers only in our 30s.

Click here to see Sexual Behavior Graph

The data continues to show that adolescents are actually having less sex than previous studies (that focused only on teens) have suggested.

Photo of Roman Lesbian Statue by Rob Meredith (flickr/creativecommons

Photo of Roman Lesbian Statue by Rob Meredith (flickr/creativecommons

The study confirms that beyond the stats of sexual orientation in men and women, the numbers of American’s having had same-gender sex at some point in their lives is “higher.”

And, oh yes, the study confirms that males report the incidence of their female partners’ frequency of orgasm at 85% while females say it’s only 64%.

You can download the study’s full report by going to the National Sex Study website.

Voluntary sex work is destined to evolve into a legitimate Sexual Healing Industry

Jamie Raskin, law professor and Maryland State Senator, is trying in vain to explain to the luddites in Congress why free speech shouldn’t cover things like bribery to politicians, recently okayed by the US Supreme Court in several rulings. He wisely invokes prostitution to get their attention, to show the context of free speech, but it’s just used as a expositional device.

2309188862_4769c9c6fd_bBut let’s take his point in another direction. The legalization or decriminalization of prostitution is a campaign VenusPlusX and other civil rights organizations have long-championed because it is a necessary and often vital part of life and there are many reasons why it hasn’t gone away on its own, it will not go away, and it’s ready for real reform so that it constitutionality can be protected as vigorously as any other human right.

The desire for love, for touch, for compassion, and for companionship and the improvement of physical health doesn’t have and shouldn’t have any boundaries or interference by governments or religions because our erotic senses are foundational to our connection with others and the cosmic technology around us.

Crime, sex trafficking, and financial exploitation accompany sex work only because it has always been criminalized.

If money paid to a sex worker (or a casual dinner and a movie with a new boyfriend) leads to sexual activity, why should this warrant any interference at all. The dinners, movies, jewelry, etc., accepted by girlfriends and wives is the very same thing as the commercial transaction made by a sex worker.

So, let’s consider a new model: A Sexual Healing Industry.

Note that this industry and network of professionals already exists. Highly skilled masseurs have become well known by word of mouth, as empaths who can safely shepherd you towards greater understanding of yourself and your body. They see you in well suited surroundings although right now they don’t explicitly advertise themselves as sexual healers. Why shouldn’t every sex worker who is involved in commercializing their skill on a voluntary basis be able to put out a shingle in a safe environment?

“Oh, by the way, I am going out to my yoga class and I have an appointment with my sexual healer after that so I’ll see you for dinner around 6.” Why not? This is the future, get ready for it.

Let us know what you think by commenting here or contact us at columbia@venusplusx.org.