Houston Press Writer Outs Journalist as Stripper, Makes Ass of Himself

Meet Sarah Tressler. By day, she writes about Houston society for the Houston Chronicle. It’s not the most fascinating job, but a great place to start for a journalist trying to make her way through the decaying body of an industry that still hasn’t managed to come up with a model that supports their costs in this time of the open web.

Once deadlines are met, assuming she’s not teaching writing as an adjunct professor at University of Houston, Tressler packs it up and heads to her other gig — at any of a handful strip clubs in Houston. Unsurprisingly, this job is the one that inspires the bulk of her writing. … Continue Reading

If You Want Your Insurance to Cover Birth Control, You’re A Slut and A Prostitute

Rush Limbaugh has betrayed his audience. I won’t pretend that I write without an angle, but I know that it is possible to do so without lying and distorting the facts. This is not the case for Limbaugh, as it became clear on his show on Wednesday night, during which he again lashed out against student and contraception coverage mandate supporter Sandra Fluke. … Continue Reading

12 Sorry Stories from the LA Weekly’s Sex Issue

Every year, the LA Weekly releases a sex issue. This year, their masterpiece about sex in Los Angeles is in the style of Chuck Palahniuk — if you gave him a tranquilizer and forced him to remain PG-13. … Continue Reading

The NYT Says Vibrators Carry the Conversation

The New York Times built on some of the points we made last week when we interviewed OhMiBod founder Suki Durham about the difficulties in running a small business when your niche is sexual pleasure.

Their take is a lot more optimistic. They point to the massagers now ubiquitous at pharmacies, suggesting that the public has become far more comfortable with vibrators and is finally viewing them as legitimate consumer products. Everything from conversations during the AIDS crisis to Sex and the City and Oprah are cited for helping bring this about. … Continue Reading

The Naked Man Isn’t the Only One Exposed

On Tuesday, a naked man took off running on the 405, one of Los Angeles’ most congested freeways. Within moments, the internet was abuzz with stories. According to personal accounts, the man was perspiring heavily and reaching out as he ran, suggesting to by-standers (sitting in traffic), that he was under the influence.

Between the 405 and a detour onto Santa Monica Boulevard, the man allegedly attacked a woman, but details of the attack were lost in the frenzy of news reports, which gave preference to amusing celebrity tweets detailing the situation as stars and well-known personages sat in their cars. … Continue Reading

There’s Nothing Wrong With You

In a piece for New York Magazine, Davy Rothbart spends a lot of time agonizing over how the availability of porn online is affecting his sex life. He’s faking orgasms.

The article brings some good points about the difficulty some men may be experiencing in regard to how they understand the role of masturbation in their lives. The article is rife with the suggestion that masturbation and fantasy via porn is destroying men’s libidos. It’s a good conversation to initiate, however misguided, but it takes a turn for the intolerable when it suggests that women are changing their behavior to compete against pornography. … Continue Reading

CNET’s Chris Matyszczyk Blames the Victims of Porn Wikileaks

It was only a matter of time before someone decided to get on a high horse and wag a finger at the victims of the Porn Wikileaks release of some 15,000 real names and addresses of porn performers and their families.

CNET’s Chris Matyszczyk, known for his irreverent commentary, took it too far when he commented about the wiki, saying, “For some reason, I am reminded of Eric Schmidt’s dictum. You know, the one that went something like: ‘If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place.’ It comes to mind because someone whose motivations seem slightly troubling has taken it upon himself to be the Julian Assange of porn. The site doesn’t display diplomatic messages from one porn star to another. Instead, it attempts to offer a comprehensive revelation of who these stars really are.” … Continue Reading

The Trivialization of the Pimp in the News

Jomo Zambia tried to recruit an undercover police officer to work as a prostitute for him. He’s since been convicted of pandering, the act of encouraging another to join the sex trade. His lawyer has come up with a crafty loophole and is arguing that pandering only applies when an innocent victim is targeted, and not someone already involved in sex work.

The California Supreme Court will be settling the matter in 90 days. In the meantime, the media has had a field day with the case, offering up images of fur-wearing, bejeweled, usually African American men to make the point that we don’t seem to have a working definition of the word “pimp.” Because that’s really helpful.

Per CBS Los Angeles: “Is it the fast money and flashy cars, or is it the fish tank platform shoes? Whatever your personal opinion, the issue of when exactly someone becomes a pimp has reached the highest court in the state.”

Over at LAist, Lindsay William-Ross writes: “Is it the neck laden with big, blingy gold chains? The omnipresent sunglasses, walking stick, or dapper hat? The animal print mixed with bold-colored garb?”

What makes a pimp? The floss! Not his or her position in the sex trade or the coercion and abuse that occasionally accompany it. No, not that. It’s a look, yo! And never mind citing the law and talking to more attorneys. That kind of reporting is hard. Besides, blogs and web publications these days do much better with silly snark.

Great job, everyone!

Image via LAist.

Orgasm Stock Image Fail

Doing a little research on a recent study about female orgasm by Barry Komisaruk, professor of radiology over at Rutgers, we encountered something mildly thought-provoking.

A few news outlets reporting on the female brain’s response to orgasm feature photos of Meg Ryan, in that infamous scene from When Harry Met Sally, in which she fakes an orgasm in the middle of Katz’s Deli. … Continue Reading

The G-Shot: “So she’s enjoying penis a little bit more, then?”

The g-shot, a $1,200 injection of collagen to the g-spot that helps it become more prominent and is said to revolutionize your sex life, recently got some air-time that was… amusing to say the least. Watch the whole thing for the full lolz:

Via BlogHer’s Wall of Shame.