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Thomas Roche

The Russian Sex Wars: “Let’s Do It Together.”

27 November 2011
If you lose sleep worrying, as I sometimes do, that Russia's nascent democracy has been torpedoed by the rising tide of Neoliberal oligarchs and centralized political power within a small ruling elite with total disregard for human rights and egalitarian democracy, let me reassure you that, "Well, maybe they're not […]
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Some Fascinating Argentinean LGBT Rights PSAs

26 November 2011
The above Argentinian PSA got me all verklempt. It shows a series of transgender Argentinians talking  about how it feels to have the name on one's ID not match one's identity. It's in Spanish, with English subtitles added after-the-fact by Blabbeando (the link comes via Charlie Glickman at Good Vibrations). […]
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Does Higher Testosterone Mean Safer Sex?

22 November 2011
A new study from the University of Michigan is sure to get trotted out for years to come as proof that "real men have safe sex." But to my eyes, what the study actually says is pretty unclear -- and, in fact, it may not really say anything. The study was […]
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Sex, Lies and Hamsters

22 November 2011
In case you're wondering why it's dangerous to put loaded science in the hands of journalistic toddlers, the article Why Macho Men Are More Likely to Have Safe Sex at The Daily Mail is a perfect example. I know, I know, all my UK friends keep telling me: "Don't read bloody […]
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Sexual Assistants in Switzerland and Sex Surrogates in the US

6 November 2011
An article today on South Africa-based News 24 leads me to a fascinating piece of information I was somehow unaware of. In Europe, there is a profession called "sexual assistant" -- and in Switzerland, the Netherlands, and Germany, it's a fully licensed profession with "proper legal status." Though I've never heard […]
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Do German Catholic Bishops Own a Porn Company?

4 November 2011
In a story headlined Catholic Church Makes A Fortune In The German Porn Business, Worldcrunch condensed and simplified a sensationalistic story from the conservative German newspaper Die Welt that didn't stop at throwing around accusations not just about porn, but about atheism, magic and Satanism. I'm willing to bet that the […]
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The San Francisco Transgender Film Festival

31 October 2011
If you like puppets, googly eyes and trans pride, you'll squee like I did over the above trailer for the 10th Anniversary San Francisco Transgender Film Festival, which kicks off this coming Thursday with a night of performance by transgender and gender-variant artists, and follows it up with full two […]
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TSA Misses Loaded Guns, But Finds Silver Bullets

25 October 2011
As you may know, the Transportation Safety Administration doesn't have an impeccable record when it comes to sex and sexual assault issues, the simple sanctity of passenger bodies, passenger privacy, et cetera. Sure, sometimes that can be pretty funny -- because, hey, what's not hilarious about being non-consensually groped? Other […]
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GOP Frontrunners Would Make Contraception Illegal; Rachel Maddow Responds With Basic Sex Ed Lesson for Romney

24 October 2011
As you may know, one of the big questions in the Republican U.S. Presidential primary is just how rabidly anti-choice each candidate can be. Afraid of being labeled not-rabidly-anti-abortion-enough by Republican voters, the candidates have been struggling to one-up both each other and themselves -- with anti-choice positions migrating ever […]
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Ig Nobel Award Sex Research Roundup!

17 October 2011
The Ig Nobel awards are given every year by The Annals of Improbable Research to, as Annals puts it, the purveyors of "research that makes you laugh, then think." The caption-crazed felines I know would call that a LOLWHUT, as in "LOL!...whut?" I'm on record as thinking that the Ig Nobel […]
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Skydiving Sex Scandal! But Who’s Getting Screwed?

17 October 2011
By now you might have heard about two skydiving porn stars who had sex in free-fall over Taft, California (near Bakersfield). If not, well, it's like this: two skydiving porn stars had sex in free-fall over Taft, California (near Bakersfield). Both participants got fired from the skydiving outfit they worked […]
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BBC One Takes on Disorders of Sexual Development

11 October 2011
I'm pleased to see a very respectful article on BBC.co.uk about people with "disorders of sexual development" (DSD) -- the category of disorders formerly placed under the "intersex"umbrella. The article precedes the documentary "Me, My Gender and I," which airs tonight on BBC One at 10:35pm, UK time. (As far […]
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Occupy Wall Street: Anti-Sex Hysteria Fuels Anti-Protestor Propaganda

9 October 2011
Are the Occupy Wall Street protesters really out there taking a stand for economic justice, or are they just dirty hippies who don't want jobs? No, they're even worse than that! To hear one UK bastion of responsible journalism tell it, they're actually sex fiends! The Daily Mail has already shown its political […]
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The Latest Sex in Space Hoax

8 October 2011
The reason space sex has been on my mind lately is that since last weekend, the internet has been packed chock-full of "Sex in Space" articles that, unlike classic space sex hoaxes and zero-G porn, have no sex. While I'm thrilled to see space sex headlines, all the articles seem […]
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Sex In Space Hoax Roundup

7 October 2011
Like every proud American who has sexual fantasies about green-skinned Orion Slave Dancers, I was crushed when I found out the secret NASA mission to test sexual positions in space (strictly for the good of humanity, of course) was in reality a a Bigfoot-in-a-freezer-sized hoax. Maybe NASA's astronauts just aren't drinking […]
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Police Tell Brooklyn Women Not To Wear Skirts If They Don’t Want To Be Raped

1 October 2011
In the wake of 10 unsolved sexual assaults, South Park Slope, Brooklyn women are being harassed by cops -- told that if they want to avoid being raped, they shouldn't wear skirts. According to today's Wall Street Journal article: "In a neighborhood with a reputation for liberal and feminist tendencies, […]
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Shibari, “Extreme Sex,” and Anti-Sex Prejudice

29 September 2011
A Shibari-related death in Italy has prompted some American bloggers to show their blatant discomfort with sexual variation, with the result that bad information about bondage is being coupled with a grotesque and sensationalistic disregard for what really happened. It's bad enough when Erin Elzo at "Jerk Magazine" headlines a September […]
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Pre-Halloween Monster Cock Roundup

26 September 2011
In the language of adult industry marketing, the "monster" in "monster cock" has traditionally meant "kind of big, and we shot it from a weird angle." No longer! If you've got a taste for damnation by dong, you can get it with a little help from Fleshlight. And with plenty of […]
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China and the Problem of Comprehensive Sex Ed

19 September 2011
China Daily, the largest English-language publication in the PRC, has an interesting if somewhat bizarre article about a new initiative to try to get effective sex education into Chinese schools. An English summary of an article from China Features, the article has some interesting facts, like so: "At present, there is […]
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Sex Dreams Survey of Men is Sexy, Dreamy, Manly

18 September 2011
Patrick McNamara, a Professor of Neurology at Boston University School of Medicine, has a great short piece on his blog at Psychology Today about a recent survey in Hong Kong where male college students were asked about their sexual dreams. The survey was only of 58 students, but the results, […]
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