November 2012

• A new study has put to bed the perception that female porn stars have low self-esteem, have been sexually abused as children and are less psychologically healthy compared with other women. The study, which was published in the Journal of Sex Research, said it found no evidence to support the “damaged goods hypothesis” that actresses involved in the porn industry come from abusive backgrounds. Rather, the researchers found the women have higher self-esteem, a better quality of life and body image, and are more positive, with greater levels of spirituality.
  Porn stars more positive, spiritually healthier than other women: Study (Toronto Sun)

• Here’s the study: The damaged goods hypothesis posits that female performers in the adult entertainment industry have higher rates of childhood sexual abuse (CSA), psychological problems, and drug use compared to the typical woman. The present study compared the self-reports of 177 porn actresses to a sample of women matched on age, ethnicity, and marital status. These findings did not provide support for the damaged goods hypothesis. I’ll be updating the porn harms and porn myths section on porn for women website Our Porn, Ourselves.
  Pornography Actresses: An Assessment of the Damaged Goods Hypothesis (PubMed: Government Study)

• Another day, another Dubai conviction for an expat for “indecent behaviour”. Yesterday, a British woman and Irish man were sentenced to three months for “breach of honour with consent” (that’s “sex” to you and me).
  In Dubai, sex on the beach isn’t a cocktail but a way to end up in jail (guardian.co.uk)

• Author of SM 101: A Realistic Introduction Jay Wiseman is going to be an expert witness in a BDSM ‘sex slave’ case. For a year, prosecutors and defense lawyers have jousted over the qualifications of expert witnesses who would testify as to whether Edward Bagley’s conduct with the young woman conformed to the practices of the bondage, discipline and sadomasochism, or BDSM, lifestyle. Prosecutors have alleged that in 2002, Bagley persuaded a 16-year-old girl to live with him and later coerced her into becoming his sex slave. Bagley purportedly tortured her, with the help of other defendants, until she was hospitalized in February 2009.
  Missouri sex slave case may hinge on expert view of subculture (KansasCity.com)

• Florida’s Department of Health sent out a survey asking for intimate details of the sex lives of 4,100 young women, offering $10 gift cards in return. People are pissed and worried about their privacy. Hundreds of women in South Florida were among the survey recipients, their names pulled from the white pages by a private company, state officials said. They were asked to voluntarily tell the state how many men they’d had sex with in the past year, whether a man had ever poked holes in a condom to get them pregnant, and how they felt emotionally when they last had unprotected sex.
  Sex survey: Florida’s Department of Health seeks details of young women’s sex lives (South Florida Sun-Sentinel)

• I covered this days ago [Hardware hacker makes open source vibrator in “Hacking My Vagina”] but it bears a look if you missed it: using open source *everything* (yayz!) A hardware hacker hacked a Lelo remote-controlled vibrator to try and make a sex toy that would facilitate a heightened feedback loop between herself and her vaginal orgasms.
  Hacking My Vagina (scanlime)

• On December 5th, Jiz Lee will be participating in CLEVER, a think tank event produced by filmmaker and California College of the Arts professor Cheryl Dunye, and held at Intersection for the Arts in San Francisco. The think tank question at hand is: “Bootleg: Can Porn be Copyrighted?” Joining me in the discussion will be artist Annie Sprinkle, entertainment attorney Alex Austin, and producer Shine Louise Houston.
  CLEVER: Bootleg, at Intersection for the Arts (Jiz Lee)

• A study released on Friday challenges the myth, showing that four fifths of French women have watched a porn movie before – one in two of them without their partners. Fully 82 percent of women questioned said they had watched an X-rated film at least once before, compared to 99 percent of men, according to the study of 579 women carried out by the IFOP polling institute in September.
  French women tuning in to porn, study says (AFP/Google)

• Casey Legler is a woman working as a male model. She looks wonderfully comfortable shrugging into tailored suits and chomping on cigars. But assigning words to the experience isn’t as easy. In an interview in her New York City studio, Legler steers around phrases like “gender identity” and “gender expression” in favor of having a conversation about freedom.
  Male Models: The Female of the Species (TIME.com, via Jiz Lee)

• Francis Sharrak managed his multimillion-dollar web porn and strip club business using just a laptop computer and a telephone from his prison cell inside the Wayne County Jail in Detroit, Michigan for 18 months.
  Convict Francis Sharrak Runs Porn Sites, Strip Clubs from Prison Cell Computer (Opposing Views)

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