"Age of Love"? More Like "You Know it's Gonna be 20."

“Age of Love,” NBC’s latest foray into screw-ball matchmaking, follows Mark Philippoussis, a 31-year-old professional tennis player from Melbourne, Australia, as he attempts to find true love among a group of 13 women ranging in age from 21 to 48 years-old.

One assumes that the show’s premise of “cougars versus kittens” is supposed to entice not only Philippoussis and, hopefully, a large audience, but butt-loads of unnecessary animosity between women as well. Isn’t it bad enough that all across America, single women over 30 are already having chest pains over there non-married status? Do we really need to drive home the point that unless you’re cellulite free with a neck pulled back as far as the dawn of time, men will not be as interested in you? Does any one out there really think that good ol’ Mark, who in an interview with People Magazine claimed “Age doesn't matter to me. All the women are beautiful,” is really going to pick one of the “older” women? Pu-lease.

Even sadder, though, then Philippoussis’ obvious, self indulgent, soon-to-be hypocritical piety, is the horrific act of purposefully pitting women against women. Watching the show, you have to wonder if the “kittens” realize that they too will one day be “cougars.” Or if they have yet to familiarize themselves with Karmic law. Cause heaven only knows when the implant pops, it’d better be saline. And what about the sad, desperate (their word, not mine) “cougars”? Have they forgotten all about they’re younger days of unabashed conceit? Judging by the amount of time (and presumable money) put into their appearances, they must have been somewhere on the obnoxious scale during their so-called heyday.

So forget about “cougars versus kittens.” The real question is, how are women supposed to fight the universe when they’re too busy fighting amongst themselves?

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when tech meets sex: iphone's hidden talents

Dear AmSex-

Before I shell out $600 for the new iPhone, I wanted to check and see if it will be compatible with my-iPod friendly iGasm.

Do you have the inside scoop on this? I've been looking everywhere for a definitive answer but have yet to find one.

Yours truly,

i'm Stumped in East Xenia



Dear iSEX-

Good question!

Sadly, I was not one of the "distinguished" journalists chosen to review the iPhone. However, iCan tell you this, Apple has confirmed that it does not work with all detachable devices that work with the iPod.

Reliable sources say that Apple is considering a software update to fix this. Maybe Steve Jobs has realized the importance of making the new device iGasm-friendly.

Hey, if you're going to rule the technology world, might as well get off on it right!

Anyhow, I digress.

Though the jury's still out on its iGasm compatibility, we can assure that there are some sex-friendly features on the iPhone. We've gone ahead and translated them from "tech speak" to "sex speak":

3.5" Vibrant Display: up close and personal sex-positive internet at your fingertips (yum!)

Extended Battery Life: if the iGasm does work with the iPhone, expect 7 hours of nonstop action

Video Access: as long as your house (or work or local restroom) is equipped with wifi service, xxx video pleasure options abound (sorry no recording your own exploits for upload-the iPhone does not record video)

Calendar and Contact Features: keep those hot dates straight boys and girls, no more embarrassing incidences

E-mail Terminal With Graphics: all the better to receive dirty pictures from your partner sturdy glass smudge proof screen: because Apple cares about your heatlh, none of that silicone nastiness

Best of all, for all of you singles out there just sick of being played:, the iPhone does not support games

And if worse comes to worse and it's not iGasm compatible after all, just put that baby on vibrate.

Hey, one less thing to fit into your bag.


AmSex

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Study finds Americans a bunch of sex crazed druggies

Clue #69 that state mandated abstinence-only-education does not work: a study by the US National Center for Health Statistics found that a whopping 96% of Americans under 20 have taken part in some sort of sexual act (oral and anal included).

The report also managed to discredit the War on Drugs, concluding that 20 years after Nancy urged us to 'just say no!' 20% of adults have done the opposite and 'just said yes' to at least one street drug. Street drug meaning crack, coke, ice, crystal meth, PCP, LSD, and whatever craziness the kids are doing these days (not including pot).

There's only one possible deduction to be made from this study…American’s really love to party!

Oh yeah!

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Before, During, and After Birth

For all the young women looking forward to having kids in the future--don't let this photo freak you out. It's picture of Kate Gosselin, who with her husband Jon, spawned twins and then septuplets (shown here in utero).

The Gosselins star in their own reality tv show, Jon and Kate plus 8, on the Discovery Channel, and in one episode Kate reveals to the cameras her wrinkled, deflated belly. By today's standards, it isn't pretty. Jon expresses mild disgust saying he wishes he could take a paper cutter and slice off the extra flab. Nice Jon. Lucky for Kate, a good samaritan offers to pay for tummy tuck surgery.

At some point in everyone's life, the body sags and becomes tired looking. If your partner finds it ugly, what should you do?

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small victories

It's always nice to usher in the weekend with some good news.

And, there was a significant victory in the world of politics this week. The House of Representatives voted yesterday to ease up on some of the ideologically based global funding restrictions that have contributed to the failure of international HIV prevention and family planning programs.

Victory #1) HIV Prevention: This allows the president (well we can dream!) the right to remove the provision that 1/3 of HIV prevention funding go to programs preaching abstinence-only rhetoric. Apparently, the house came to realize that much like democracy, abstinence-only-education may not be our most successful export.

Victory #2) Family Planning: Coincidentally, the provision that this challenges, The Global Gag Rule, was proposed in Mexico City in 1984. This is a coincidence why? you ask. Well, dear readers, the coincidence is this: Mexico City just passed a law decriminalizing early term abortions. Hmm, what a wonderful time to strike down this silly moralistic clause that restricts reproductive funding to family planning NGO's that provide abortions, abortion counseling, or offer information about abortion. The outcome of this restriction is not so silly. As more NGO's are refused funding, less contraceptive options are available to women, resulting in more unplanned pregnancies and unsafe abortions.

We need to keep the pressure on our senators and local politicians cause the battle has just begun.

I'll leave you with this quote from Serra Sippel, Executive Director of the Center for Health and Gender Equity (CHANGE):

We take it as our mandate at CHANGE to ensure that U.S. policies promote the health and rights of women abroad. We of course view this bill as a victory, but must keep up the momentum of our work in order to ensure that these provision make it into law.

If you want stay informed, here are some good places to visit

www.genderhealth.org
www.pepfarwatch.org
www.preventionnow.net

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so a pig walks into a bar...(video)

Sounds like the start of a joke, but Trojan Condoms has made it into an ad campaign. Their new advertisement features a pig...in a bar...who... with the help of one mighty Trojan condom...shall walk out a man. A sexy man, who, it alludes, will get lucky with one very foxy babe.

While both CBS and Fox have refused to air the ads on ambiguous moral terms. I can’t help but wonder if there’s an irate Pig Anti-Defamation League out there somewhere prodding Rupert Murdoch not to air the ad. Otherwise it really makes no sense that the network that is known for pushing the envelope, would have such a boa-rish (sorry couldn’t help it) excuse for saying no to what could be a powerful, public health message.

Well, I suppose if people did start carrying around condoms for pregnancy prevention, Fox may have trouble finding guests for the ever popular "who's the daddy" DNA test on Maury Povich.

If you want to read a really interesting and perspective on the decision, Jill Filpovic wrote a great post on Huffingtonpost

Also, Planned Parenthood is urging Fox and CBS to air the ads You can sign the petition here

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...and justice for all

First there was this guy who was ordered to marry his goat back in February and now there's this girlfriend abuser who received an unprecedented sentence of 'no girlfriend for three years' from one very innovative judge.

Compared to the '20 boyfriends for 2 years' alternative, I'd say he got off easy!

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loving and marriage

I just wanted to write a little blurb commemorating the anniversary of Loving v. Virginia, a landmark court case passed by the Warren Court in 1967 that ended all race-based legal restrictions on marriage.

Call it ironic (or sad), that here we are 40 years later, immersed in a similar civil rights struggle, only this time it’s sexual, rather than racial, minorities that are on trial. And, in the wake of the times, I can only assume that a federal mandate to end to legal restrictions on sexuality-based marriage is a distant flicker on the political landscape…

However, I am happy to report that today, only 2 days after we celebrate the 40th anniversary of one major civil rights achievement, Massachusetts has stepped up and helped to lead the way to celebrating another one. By voting to block a proposed constitutional amendment that would allow voters to decide whether to amend the state constitution to ban same-sex marriage, state lawmakers protected the right to same-sex marriage in the only state in the US to allow it.

I think Governor Deval Patrick said it best,

“In Massachusetts today, the freedom to marry is secure,"

Now only 49 states to go..

Below are a few sites that celebrate the Loving decision:

www.ipride.org: Serving mixed heritage and transracially adopted youth and their families
www.swirlinc.org: Serving mixed heritage community to empower members to create change
www.marriageequality.org: An agency fighting for marriage rights for LGBTIQ couples, including queer couples who are of mixed heritage, transracial adoptees and in interracial unions.

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Breast reduction...for guys

Golfer Phil Mickelson has them. So does Simon Cowell. What are "them"? Man boobs--otherwise known as gynecomastia. Unsurprisingly perhaps, increasingly adolescents with the condition are going under the knife to remove that extra bit of fat and breast tissue. A superficial quick fix, sure, but at least it puts an end to the teasing and taunting. I say yay for plastic surgery.

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Edwards wants no snaking by Liz's gay friend

Elizabeth Edwards tries to explain her husband's views about gays and lesbians. Democratic strategist Bob Shrum claimed that the presidential candidate told him he was "not comfortable around those people." According to Liz, John was just uncomfortable with her gay friend. Okay, got it...Wait, what was your point again, Liz?

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make love, not war

On Friday, the Pentagon confirmed that it had once considered developing a non-lethal "h" bomb. A weapon so powerful that it would forgo those tired old objectives, death and destruction, and hit enemy combatants with a brand new style of 'atrocity': the crazy gay orgy.

According to Edward Hammond, a member of the Sunshine Project:

The Ohio Air Force lab proposed that a bomb be developed that contained a chemical that would cause enemy soliders to become gay, and to have their units break down because all their soldiers became irresistably attractive to one another

Hmm I wonder if the Pentagon budgeted a disco ball and copyright permission for "It's Raining Men" into that plan...

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Do women really have sex online?

Yes, Virginia, of course they do! And we now know more about the ways they create safety for themselves when they connect with sexual partners they first met online. Paige Padgett, in her article, "Personal Safety and Sexual Safety for Women Using Online Personal Ads," just published in the newest issue of Sexuality Research and Social Policy: Journal of NSRC (locate abstract at http://caliber.ucpress.net/loi/srsp), reports that her study showed that "women used e-mail communication prior to a face-to-face meeting to negotiate such issues as safety, boundaries, sexual preferences, history of sexually transmitted infections, and condom use." Padgett's article documents the fact that women do indeed meet sexual partners online and provides one of the first accounts of how these women take care of themselves and create mechanisms for increasing safety when they meet these men in person.

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Knocked Up but pro nothing

Writer-director Judd Apatow's most recent film "Knocked Up" is the kind of messy and complex comedy befitting our post modernist, post Roe vs. Wade world. The film’s plot centers on Alison (played by Gray’s Anatomy’s Katherine Heigl) and Ben (Seth Rogen); two strangers, who after having a one night stand, get pregnant and decide to go ahead and have the baby. Together. But what makes the movie so interesting is that it purposely omits the decision making process surrounding Alison’s choice to keep the baby, (rather than abort or put the child up for adoption.) In my oh so humble opinion, Apatow’s exclusion of any pro life or pro choice dialogue isn't intended (and should not be interpreted) as “a right to life” stance. As Stephanie Zacharek wrote in Salon.com:
“The movie is simply delicate-handed enough to know that neither it nor the Supreme Court can dictate what a woman's choice should be. And it's intuitive enough to know that such a complicated choice can't be easily explained -- at least in terms that will satisfy anyone's politics.”
Well, we know what I (and Zacharek) think, but what do you think? Anyone out there disagree?

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Whipped? How About Beaten to a Pulp Instead?

Funny or sooo not funny?

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girls on film

Yesterday, I ran across this post while perusing Feministing.

It's an eloquent testimony to things distant and surreal, that can affect us deeply.
Grainy cellphone footage of a Kurdish woman being stoned to death in Iraq or a security tape of a young womans' abduction in some random Target parking lot. How these images form a sort of gender-based collective memory, a subconscious mantra that becomes difficult to shake: "this could be you, this will be you"

I particularly like this part:

i wish that we would stop apologizing. it's not easy - we've learned to say 'i'm sorry' to try to preempt the whipping, or to lessen the lashes, or just to quiet our own minds while it's happening. we've learned that 'sorry' helps us survive. but i wish we could start fighting back, just a little, in little ways.

And as a chronic apologizer, take it as a personal challenge.

I just want to thank kate, the author of this post, obviously this really resonated with me. I only wish that I could express such things as eloquently.

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oral sex sends youth to slammer

Genarlow Wilson has spent more than two years in prison for having oral sex with a 15-year-old when he was 17. Ironically, if he had had sex with the girl he would be a free man because that act would have fallen under Georgia's "Romeo and Juliet" exception. In general, people are supportive of Wilson and see the tragic absurdity of the case. But not Eric Johnson. The state senator is quoted as saying "This was not two star-crossed lovers on a date." Gives you one more reason to question whether conservatives have the brains to lead.

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Girls' Knife Out

Pics recently popped up on the Internet showing Lindsay Lohan and Vanessa Minnillo—who is the girlfriend of Nick Lachey, who is the ex-hubs of Jessica Simpson in case you didn't know—playing with knives. And they weren't cooking dinner. No, they were engaged in some type of S&M, lesbian play fantasy. A few of the headlines: "Vanessa Minnillo Regrets Knife-Wielding Photos With Lindsay Lohan", "Lindsay Lohan Knife Photos: Blade Held by Lohan's Breast", "Lindsay Lohan: from alcohol to cocaine and knives", "Lohan plays dangerous game with knives". Right. Clearly, no one was hurt. Clearly, this was all for fun. Clearly, this is no big deal. Clearly, this is great for publicity!

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cheney can't win

So, in case you missed it, Mary Cheney, aka 'Dick Cheney's lesbian daughter', had a baby last week. A preliminary google image search for “mary cheney baby” turns up a lot of nice glossy promo shots of grandpa (dick)/grandma (lynne)/baby (what’s his name) but not one pic of Mary and her partner with the baby.

Hmmm, can we say ‘damage control’?

In a classic case of , ‘you just can’t win’, the man who helped uphold the ban on gays in the military, is now on the receiving end of a moral spanking from both the Concerned Women of America and the Americans for Truth, or as I like to call them: the Americans Concerned about Truthiness:

Both organizations are apparently overjoyed that a white, conservative, global warming refuter, has been brought into this world, yet at the same time, horrified by the idea that lil’ cheney has two mommies.

In fact, as quoted below, the Concerned Women of America seem just completely befuddled by the whole situation:

How is it that Ms. Cheney’s lesbian partner has “[given] birth to a boy”? It is a biological impossibility for a homosexual “couple” to conceive a child without the assistance of a third party who is a member of the opposite sex.

Quick, anyone have a spare copy of Our Bodies, Ourselves to donate to the CWA?

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