The Jeff Booth Show Internet Radio with Pictures
Show Transcripts August 8th, 2009 You can contact us at: (818) 613-9248 |
On Saturday we were at the Fetish Nation event, a gathering of the fetish crowd at a 40,000 square foot facility in Hollywood. They had a huge turnout, and as always at events like this, there is lots of eye candy. It still amuses me to look up at a nearly nude woman tied to a cross and being whipped for a gathering crowd and realize “Hey, wait, I know her- we met naked in a Jacuzzi at a party.” It makes me appreciate that I have had the opportunity to lead a very interesting life. Lots of people there that Kris and I knew, plus we got to meet and talk with a lot of interesting people, including award winning adult film director and photographer Jack the Zipper. We share that conversation with him and his gorgeous girlfriend Zoe Minx on this week’s show. Next week in Los Angeles I’ll be doing an appearance and performance at a fundraiser for the Woodhull Freedom Foundation. Hope to meet some of our listeners for what is a very important cause. Learn more about it and why it is important in our Sexual Rights segement. Finally, it is Sex science Sunday, where we bring you all of the latest in sex science and research.
On August 15th, The Woodhull Freedom Foundation is holding a fundraiser in downtown Los Angeles. A Washington D.C. based 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation named for 19th century activist Victoria Woodhull, the WFF fights for freedom of sexual expression for consenting adults. As the Free Speech Coalition defends the right to sell and produce adult content, WFF defends the rights of those who might want to emulate some of the forms of sexual expression on display in adult entertainment. Not only are some forms of sexual expression between consenting adults illegal in some areas, even when they are legal, the practitioners can face significant penalties that can severely damage their families. It was perfectly legal for a woman to be involved in swinging in Southern California. But when her bosses accidentally discovered it, she was fired as a Ventura County EMT. You can lose your job because of your sexual activities, even if it is never mentioned in the work place and discovered by co-workers outside the workplace. It was perfectly legal for Hollywood based adult and BDSM performer Mz. Berlin to appear in adult movies. When her real name was outed in an article in the San Francisco Weekly, her ex-husband used the fact that she was an adult performer to have her child visitation rights revoked. Both men and women lose child custody and visitation rights because of what they do sexually, even though their activities are legal and have no negative impact on their children. It is perfectly legal to be lesbian in Florida. But a Florida woman lost custody of her 12 year old daughter because the judge wanted the child to live in a non-lesbian world. The child was removed from her comfortable home and from a reportedly excellent mother to live with her father in a trailer park. Her father had a long history of violent and abusive behavior and had served eight years in prison for the murder of his first wife.
It is also legal to be an adult film actress in Florida. But your husband might have to pay the price. The Fort Myers Beach town council voted 5-0 in an emergency meeting to fire City Manager Scott Janke “without cause.” The without cause they fired him for? He married Anabela Mota, who turns out has done work in the adult industry. The council said it reflected badly on the city and did not reflect their family values. The family man raising triplets is now out of work and his family is leaving Florida.
And technically, adultery is illegal in Tennessee. But don’t expect to see State Senator Paul Stanley prosecuted for his affair with a 22 year old intern. Even so, a Tennessee woman had her 3 year old daughter taken from her because she was married and in a polyamorous relationship with another man. The child was put in the care of the paternal grandmother. The father had run out on her when he learned that she was pregnant and had no relationship with the child.
If someone is part of the gay community, or into BDSM, swinging, polyamory, or any other non-traditional mode of sexual expression or works in a wide range of sexually oriented businesses such as adult films, exotic dancing or as a sex worker — they know firsthand the condemnation that many in our culture direct at them. They can be discriminated against, lose their jobs, and suffer the pain of having their family broken up by the courts. But today, more and more people are beginning to stand up for the right to express their sexuality with other consenting adults without harassment or discrimination.
The Woodhull Freedom Foundation works to affirm sexual freedom as a fundamental human right. WFF fights to protect and advance freedom of speech and sexual expression. WFF promotes sexuality as a positive personal, social and moral value through research, advocacy, activism, education and outreach.
Nina Hartley Carol Queen Mistress Shae Flanigan Other Guests: Lamalani – Ms. International Leather 2009 Ernest Greene – Award-Winning Adult Film Director Jeff Booth – Erotic University Other guests to be announced
Sponsored By: The Stockroom Toys in Babeland Hustler Hollywood MikeyandMandy.com
Science
Older woman are having less sex, but according to a new study by Alison Huang published in Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, its not for lack of interest. Lack of a partner capable or interested in sex may contribute more to sexual inactivity than personal health problems or declining desire. The notion that women lose interest in sex as they age is apparently a myth. Longer lived women just lose their partners. Just another reason why marrying a younger man is not such a bad idea.
In the worst cases of the Hepatitis C Virus, the only option is a liver transplant. But since there is no cure, there is no guarantee that the new liver won’t also be affected. Human phase 1 trials have started on a new antibody therapy that can neutralize the Hepatitis C virus. For now they are looking at its use for liver transplants, where there is a 40% failure rate, but it also holds the possibility of eventually offering a better treatment for those with HCV than anti-virals alone.
HCV and HIV are the two most concerning sexually transmitted diseases, and there is some significant progress on the HIV front as well. This month’s issue of Nature has an article on a significant accomplishment- the complete mapping of the HIV genome. According to Dr. Kevin Weeks, lead researcher from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, "There is so much structure in the HIV RNA genome that it almost certainly plays a previously unappreciated role in the expression of the genetic code." HIV has proven to be much more complex than originally thought- two strands of RNA with nearly 10,000 nucleotides each. Getting a full understanding of the structure of HIV is a key step in finding a way to wipe it out.
And just as we are getting a handle on this HIV thing, a new strain has been discovered in Cameroon. The three known strains are all variations from simian strains found in chimpanzees, but this new strain is related to one recently discovered in gorillas. How widespread this strain is is unknown.
Don’t you just love meaningless surveys? The latest was conducted by Kodak Lens Visions Centers in Britain. It found that the average man spends 43 minutes a day looking at 10 different women, and the woman only spends 20 minutes day looking at six men. These timings are based on self-reporting, a notoriously inaccurate way to get this type of information. But supposedly, men spend a year of their lives ogling women, where women only spend six months. But what about women who also spend a little time ogling other women? My wife does quite a bit of that. Or what about men looking at men? I’m guessing self-reporting isn’t going to give us much of an answer there. The report makes it sound as if all this ogling is wasted time, but the great thing about it is that you can do it while also doing other things. Like shopping. In fact, men reported that the supermarket was their top place to ogle. If it gets men to help with the shopping, it seems like a pretty productive activity.
The supposed cure for gayness is called reparative therapy, making gays sound like they simply need to be repaired like a broken appliance. A toaster interested in other toasters instead of sliced bread. Finally, the American Psychological Association has officially come out as opposed to therapy or treatments that supposedly cure gayness. This is a long time coming, considering that they stopped declaring homosexuality a mental illness quite a number of years ago. There is no evidence that anything can change someone’s sexual orientation, and trying to do it can lead to depression and suicide. The supposed cure is much worse than the gayness. The report they produced is highly detailed, surveying 83 studies done on attempts to change sexual orientation since the 1960s. The report also deals with helping psychiatrists deal with patients whose sexual orientation and religious faith are in conflict. The best advice I thought they had was to tell the person to switch churches. I think you are much better off in a church that doesn’t hate and reject you, and there are plenty of them. The response from the fundamentalists has been predictable. They are going back to the 1973 APA decision to remove homosexuality as a mental disorder and trying to show that the entire decision was flawed based on bad science and pressure by homosexual activists. Everything since then has been wrong, including the notion that you can’t cure gayness. The people with a religious agenda who hate both gays and science are trying to tell us what the real science is. Thanks, but I’ll stick with the APA conclusions.
And this next study will also make conservative fundamentalists quite upset. I think we are in agreement that child pornography causes great harm because it exploits children sexually. But one of the arguments that has lead to a lot of legal overreaching has been that child pornography leads to actual child sexual abuse. The over reach has been when anti-child pornography laws have been applied to things like art and drawings (even depicting adult fantasy characters who only appear young). Max Hardcore went to prison in large part because his movies featured women who appeared young. There have also been prosecutions based on simple nudity- predicated on the belief that naked pictures, no matter how innocent, could lead to actual child molestation. Teenagers have even been charged with the creation of child pornography for sexting naked pictures of themselves to their boyfriends. A vice-principal was even arrested for possession of child pornography because he had naked pictures of students on a cell phone he confiscated and reported to the police. The legal theory has moved beyond protecting children to protecting adults from images that might turn them into child molesters. But does imagery actually lead to child molestation? According to research published in BMC Psychiatry, even for those with past convictions for viewing sometimes loosely defined child pornography, viewing child pornography had little correlation between actual molestation. According to Frank Urbaniok from the Canton of Zurich Department of Justice, "When investigating the prevalence of internet child pornography consumption, an important practical question is whether consumers of child pornography pose a risk for hands-on sex offenses. Our results support the assumption that these consumers, in fact, form a distinct group of sex offenders. Probably, the motivation for consuming child pornography differs from the motivation to physically assault minors. Furthermore, the recidivism rates of 1% for hands-on and 4% for hands-off sex offenses were quite low." So having a naked picture you took of your child playing or in the bath doesn’t make you a child molester, nor does erotic art with young looking figures. The focus should be on adults who sexually use children- whether it be for taking pictures or taking them behind the alter.
Can science tell us what makes great sex? It can according to sex therapist and University of Ottawa psychologist Peggy Kleinplatz. Her article “The Components Of Optimal Sexuality: A Portrait Of Great Sex,” was published in the Canadian Journal of Human Sexuality. According to her research, the key ingredients to great sex are:
Here is where my skepticism comes in. The research focused on couples over 60 who had been together for over 25 years. And in that list of eight they didn’t mention Viagra? On the face of it I don’t see anything wrong with this list, but societally so much as changed. Those over 60 come from a time that would not be recognizable to people in their 20s in terms of relationships. They were raised to believe that women were homemakers and not equal to men, even as sex partners, that sex was secretive, that sexual exploration and education was not something moral people did. Attitudes have changed dramatically about sex and men’s and women’s roles in it in the last 60 years. How that affects what makes great sex remains to be seen- but I suspect it does have some impact.
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