Rev. to NJ church leaders: Thou shalt not Facebook

In a story that highlights the absurdity of religious ignorance about sex and relationships, the Rev. Cedric Miller is urging his congregation to delete their Facebook accounts because, he says, "the temptation" that the website offers to commit adultery "is just too great," AP writer Wayne Parry reports. "I've been in extended counseling with couples with marital problems because of Facebook for the last year and a half," Miller, whose previous preachings advised Church members to share their Facebook password with their spouse, said. Since apparently, "If your spouse won't give you his or her password, you've got a problem," according to Pat Dawson, a minister at the church.

No word yet on whether Miller will also urge deleting your email account, disconnecting your phone, or turning down invitations to high school reunions. Because, y'know, the temptation to fuck one of your exes is just too great, and so clearly the problem in your relationship is the technology you use to meet.

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Update: As it so often happens, you are what you repress the most. In Rev. Miller’s case, that means you have extramarital sexual relationships, on multiple occasions. In 2003, Miller testified in court to having group sex with his wife and a Church assistant, testimony he confirmed this Saturday. Yup, not surprised.
Update: AP reports today that Miller will take a leave of absence following a vote by the Church regarding his position as a senior pastor. Miller says it was a “vote of confidence” that apparently also included “some restrictions that he wouldn’t list.” Sounds like he’s not just a hypocrite, but a liar, too. It seems to me like he would fit right in with the Church he’s being temporarily expelled from.

Company Accused of Firing Over Facebook Post – NYTimes.com

Finally, an authoritative body realizes that the internet is used for something more than work. While this is only a small in the fight to ensure the free speech of those use the internet, it could mean the large changes for those that talk about taboo subjects, like sexuality and gender variance, online.

PS. How sad does it make me to say that sexuality and gender variance are taboo issues.

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Canadian Polyamory Court Case Rundown | Polyamory in the News

The Polyamory in the News blog assembles a whole host of links on the first-ever north american court case to test polyamory rights. The case is in British Columbia and is a challenge to Canada's century-old anti-polygamy law. Polyamorous people are concerned because the law is written so broadly that it can apply to many poly relationships, either people who hold themselves out as married (handfasted, etc) to multiple people or groups of three or more who cohabit. The Canadian Polyamory Advocacy Association has been formed in order to argue the case on behalf of polyamorous people. They have already filed an affidavit and are seeking to fly in poly witnesses from around the country—and they need donations to do so. The blog post also includes the breaking news that the Canadian and B.C. attorney generals have now confirmed that polyamorous people are subject to the law, along with links to current and past media treatment of the case.

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Female orgasm ‘overwhelms’ | Perth Now

In a news article that has amazingly managed to put the most obvious and the most awesome thing ever said about orgasms in a single sentence, the Australian Sunday Times reports professor of psychology at Rutgers University in New Jersey Barry Komisaruk and his colleagues produced the first film of women's brains as they approach and achieve climax. Okay, so what's both simultaneously obvious and awesome about that? Says the Times:

A woman not only experiences longer and deeper orgasms than a man, but they so overwhelm her nervous system that they leave her temporarily impervious to pain, the film shows.

That's right, orgasms may leave women temporarily impervious to pain. Impervious, as in "invincible", in the words of Newser's Evann Gastaldo. During climax, 30 parts of the brain are affected. And the duh part: men's orgasms, also studied, are "not as strong." Le sigh.

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Male, female or neither? Gender identity debated at same-sex colleges – CNN.com

"[Same-sex] colleges are in a very unique position," said Susan Marine, assistant dean of student life at Harvard College in Massachusetts. "How do they preserve their identity when student identities are being called into question?" The identities Marine is talking about is the College's identity of a same-sex institution and the increasingly diverse gender identities expressed by its students. She interviewed college administrators who are worried alumni won't donate to the schools if students are allowed to change genders.

Many colleges' policies are vague. Some colleges enact policies—like strict dress codes—that try to limit students' gender expression. Others skirt the issue. "We admit women," said Patricia VandenBerg, communications director at Mount Holyoke College. "We graduate students. They develop as they develop." And develop they do; when Kevin Murphy entered as a freshman there "he was female," Stephanie Chen writes. "By the time he received his diploma, he was male."

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The Sexes: The Lavender Panthers – TIME

Presented sans comment for wowness:

Formed by the Rev. Ray, a Pentecostal Evangelist and known homosexual who himself was once beaten severely outside his gay mission center, the Panthers patrol the streets nightly with chains, billy clubs, whistles and cans of red spray paint (a substitute for forbidden Mace). Their purpose, as the Rev. Ray candidly puts it, is to strike terror in the hearts of "all those young punks who have been beating up my faggots." […] The basic band numbers 21 homosexuals, including two lesbians who are reputedly the toughest hombres in the lot. Besides their goal of halting the attacks, the Lavender Panthers want to gainsay the popular notion that all homosexuals are "sissies, cowards and pansies" who will do nothing when attacked. All of the Panthers know judo, karate, Kung Fu or plain old alley fighting. For gays without defensive skills, the Panthers hold training sessions with instruction from a judo brown belt and a karate expert.

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Cox fires Andrew Shirvell, says he used state resources in attack on gay student | freep.com | Detroit Free Press

"Andrew Shirvell, the assistant attorney general under fire for his attacks on a University of Michigan student, has been fired," Lori Higgins reports. You may remember Shirvell from appearances like Look Who's Stalking, in which he defends his belief that a gay student is "Satan's representative," and tried justifying his actions with logic only his mother could accept.

Attorney General Mike Cox initially declined to fire Shirvell, saying that Shirvell's first amendment right to express himself didn't constitute any firing offenses. But after Shirvell lied to investigators during a disciplinary hearing, Cox seems to have changed his mind. Among other violations, the investigation found that "Shirvell engaged in his campaign against [the student] on company time and posted attacks on Armstrong on the Internet while at work." Good riddance, Mr. Shirvell.

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Porn in the USA: Conservatives Are Biggest Consumers – ABC News

"Some of the people who are most outraged turn out to be consumers of the very things they claimed to be outraged by," said Benjamin Edelman, whose new research shows that when it comes to online porn, conservatives consume more porn than liberals. Using "roughly two years of credit card data from 2006 to 2008 that included a purchase date and each customer's postal code," he trolled the data, controlling for differences in broadband Internet access and population, and found that despite stark differences in stated conservative and liberal values, online porn consumption differed very little between the highest and lowest consumers.

However, 8 of the top 10 highest porn consuming States gave their electoral votes to McCain in 2008, while 6 of the lowest gave theirs to Obama. Moreover, residents of 27 states banning gay marriage boasted 11% more porn subscribers than states that don't. Are we getting it yet? "If you're told you can't have this, then you want it more," Edelman says.

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Calif. judge blocks sex offender residency law

"Jessica's Law" restricts registered sex offenders from residing within 2,000 feet of a public or private school, or a park where children gather. Sounds good in theory, but "despite lay belief, a sex offender parolee's residential proximity to a school or park where children regularly gather does not bear upon the parolee's likelihood to commit a sex offense against a child," Judge Peter Espinoza wrote, blocking the law's enforcement.

The law's controversial; researchers and law enforcement groups say "residency restrictions don't prevent sexual assaults and, in fact, are counterproductive," Josh Goodman reports. Espinoza's ruling cites one such report by LA Police Chief Charlie Beck, which said if parolees can't find stable housing, they're more difficult for law enforcement to monitor. However, Beck is now distancing himself from that conclusion.

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Mob set Naroda guesthouse on fire – India – DNA

A sex worker from Kolkata has died and two other women were injured in India this week due to burns sustained after a mob of about 50 people set fire to the guesthouse they were in. The mob of vigilantes believed the guesthouse, which had been raided by local police twice before, to be engaged in presumably prostitution-related "illegal activities." Evidently, however, despite any concerns for the guesthouse's occupants, the vigilantes decided manhandling the people there, pelting the building with stones, and ultimately committing arson that lead to murder was more appropriate behavior.

It is a grizzly reminder of the violence sex workers face at the hands of so-called "rescuers." While some of the loudest anti-prostitution activists are women, their advocacy perpetuates whore stigma to the detriment of all women; they're frauds.

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