April 7, 2021 by Maggie McNeill
If there is one thing more powerful than shame, it is the need to find someone else to blame. - David Flint
It Looks Good On PaperYet another state touts bullshit "safe harbor" laws:
Send In the ClownsThe Virginia General Assembly unanimously passed two bills to [pretend to] help [wwomen labeled] sex trafficking survivors [when it's convenient for the state. The bills will]...allow...["perfect victims"] to have convictions related to [sex work] removed from their personal records...[if they can jump through enough hoops to] prove t[o authoritarian busybodies that they were passive, doll-like "victims"] forced...to commit crimes...
Not a clown, but still about kids hoaxing credulous adults:
To Molest and Rape (#956)Merseyside Police ha[d]...to reassure [gullible parents th[at no]... "plague man"...dressed in all black and wearing a crow-like mask similar to that of a 17th-century plague doctor...was...[lurk]ing in parks...to kidnap [their brats]...the sightings...turned out to be...a...hoax...[perpetrated by] students [falsely] reporting sightings...
At least the BBC uses the word "rape" when a cop is the rapist:
Whither Canada? (#1017)A [typical and representative cop] has been charged with rape and sexual assault...Ben Lister...has been suspended from [West Yorkshire Police]...
Sex workers ask the Canadian Supreme Court to uphold its own judgment:
Rotting Fruit (#1055)The Canadian Alliance for Sex Work Law Reform - an alliance of 25 sex worker rights groups across the country led predominantly by and for sex workers - along with several individual applicants, have filed a Notice of Application seeking to strike down the [laws establishing Canada's Swedish-style] sex work prohibitions...because they violate sex workers' constitutional rights to security, personal autonomy, life, liberty, free expression, free association, and equality...National Coordinator Jenn Clamen [said] "This government has spent five years paying lip service to human rights and to feminism, and it's time for them to act." In 2013, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled three prostitution prohibitions in criminal law to be unconstitutional because they caused harm to sex workers and contravened sex workers' rights to liberty and security. This was the federal government's opportunity to recognize sex workers' rights and well-being by decriminalizing sex work. Instead, the government...created a set of laws...that reproduce those same harms...
Given the filth spewing from every aspect of this affair, there's no way to tell whether Maxwell's conduct could legitimately be considered "sex trafficking":
False Witness (#1121)Prosecutors added two charges against Ghislaine Maxwell in a case accusing her of grooming and abusing young women and girls for Jeffrey Epstein...The new counts against Maxwell now include sex trafficking conspiracy and sex trafficking of a minor...the new charges...prolong...the length of the alleged conspiracy and adds a "Minor Victim-4"...
Sunlight really is the best disinfectant:
Predictable Consequences...Texas [pigs have been shamed into]...end[ing]...the [monstrous] practice of using hypnosis to [manufacture "evidence"]...more than forty years after its inception...The decision [seems to be the result of unwel]come...[public attention due to]... The Dallas Morning News ...series, "The Memory Room," which [showed how]...Texas...repeatedly doubl[ed] down on the practice despite scientific evidence that hypnosis can distort witness memories and lead to false convictions...Texas officers continue[d] to [use]...the debunked technique...[t intentionally] send...dozens of men and women to prison and some to their deaths. The Texas Rangers are among the most [egregious offenders]...performing at least 1,700 hypnosis sessions since the 1980s. The...[most] recently [w]as October 2020...Even without the program, local police departments may still be using hypnosis to [manufacture]...evidence [which Texas law still allows] to be used in courts...
I wish I could believe that this tragedy would finally put a stake into the heart of the "sex addiction" myth once and for all:
...the press and the authorities...have spent years not only pushing the idea of sex addiction...[but also] portraying...sex workers and...sex-positive academics as evil, corrupt enemies of the state, traffickers and the wreckers of civilisation...they are complicit in crimes like this...[because] their constant demonisation of consensual sex between adults...has stoked the fires of hysteria, anger, social shaming and violent retribution...men who visit sex workers or masturbate to porn and then feel disgust afterwards are going to hold the sex workers...responsible, because it deflects blame from themselves...Often, this transferred disgust and unwillingness to accept responsibility for sexual desire shifts into campaigning against the sex industry...We see this in assorted anti-porn, NoFap, incel and rescue movements, dominated by very angry and aggressive men who want to punish women (and men) for giving them erections. Are we surprised that some people are taking this anger beyond online rape and death threats and into the real world? Yet these people have been indulged, encouraged and supported by politicians and the media...Set yourself up as anti-porn, anti-trafficking or anti-sexualisation, and you can pretty much say whatever you like without having to provide evidence, while your aggressive and exploitative responses to anyone who questions you will be glossed over...