In the News (#958)

By Maggiemcneill @Maggie_McNeill

If registries are…about punishment…we need to admit it and deal with the unintended consequences.  –  Michael Seto

Counterfeit Comfort 

Facts have absolutely nothing to do with US sex laws:

In 1994, when Congress passed the first sex offender registration law, the list was reserved for [cops] and only applied to the most serious offenders.  Since then, American lawmakers at every level have relentlessly increased its scope and severity.  The registry now includes more than 900,000 people, a population slightly greater than Vermont’s.  At least 12 states require sex offender registration for public urination; five apply it to people charged with offenses related to sex work; 29 require it for consensual sex between teenagers…people [are] forced to spend decades on the registry for crimes they [were accused of at] as young as 10 years old…More than 30 states now require registrants to live at least 1,000 feet away from schools, churches and other places children congregate — a requirement that renders up to 99% of ho[uses] and apartment buildings off-limits.  Some states require regist[rants] to submit to regular polygraph tests and random police inspections.  Florida adds “sexual predator” to the front of registrants’ driver’s licenses.  Louisiana doesn’t allow [registrants] to evacuate from their own homes before natural disasters…Despite child sexual abuse declining by 60% between 1992 and 2010, states continue to legislate as if lenient sex offender laws are a national emergency…registries are disproportionately black and overwhelmingly poor…registries continue to enjoy enthusiastic bipartisan support and meager media scrutiny despite any evidence that they achieve their stated goals…

Buried Truth

Why do straight vanillas have so much trouble recognizing sexual behavior when they see it?

Multiple victims have come forward to accuse a New Jersey [Presbyterian minister] of sexually assaulting them as part of exorcism rituals…Newsweek reported…[that Rev. Dr. William] Weaver…would…tell the men that he needed to “suck” out demons through their semen, citing Native American rituals and a verse from Ephesians telling Christians to “put on the full armor of God”…Weaver would order [men]…to strip naked and lie down.  Then he would place an “angel coin” on their foreheads and have them balance stones on their hands and ankles…then…perform oral sex on them…An investigation by the Presbytery found credible evidence of “multiple acts of idolatry and sexual misconduct”…[including] gay porn on a church-owned computer in Weaver’s office…

Skin To Skin (#312)

A baby step forward for disabled Australians:

The Administrative Appeals Tribunal recently granted a woman with multiple sclerosis the right to have a sex therapist paid for under the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS)…This is a significant milestone in the advancement of sexual rights of people with disability…To further recognize this, [they] should also be able to access sex workers under the NDIS…While a sex therapist will offer verbal coaching, a sex worker has a specified role in providing a paid sexual service.  Sexual expression is a fundamental part of being human, and disability does not dampen a person’s sexual desire, nor their need for intimacy…

If Men Were Angels

“Youth pastors” are as bad as cops:

[An] Alabama youth pastor has been sentenced to 20 years in prison for sexually abusing a young girl…Christopher Cody Stutts pleaded guilty…to abusing a child younger than 12 [in order to escape] four other charges, including rape and sodomy…

A Procrustean Bed (#655) 

These programs to warp women’s minds and indoctrinate them in anti-sex dogma are very popular in Ohio:

Ohio…[politicians] are [now claiming that] victims [are forcibly and magically] hooked on drugs and then forced into a life of prostitution…Judge Renee DiSalvo is beginning [yet another “diversion” brainwashing] program through Youngstown Municipal Court…DiSalvo…[pretends] the women are not able to make clear decisions…the…program…can take up to two years to go through…[during which time] some women may be [locked] in secret [prisons under the pretense of] protect[ing] them from [imaginary ninja pimps]…

Follow Your Bliss (#745) 

Prohibitionists supported at least one delusional cop who was deeply involved in this hoax:

A [man] who lied about being abused by a murderous VIP Westminster paedophile ring is facing a lengthy jail sentence after he was convicted of perverting the course of justice and fraud.  Carl Beech’s malicious, repeated and determined deceit ruined the reputations of those he accused and led the Metropolitan Police to raid the homes of 91-year-old Normandy veteran Field Marshall Lord Bramall, the late Lord Brittan and former Tory MP Harvey Proctor…Their £2 million Operation Midland [probe] into the lurid allegations…ended without making a single arrest…Beech…[himself a paedophile with an interest in pre-teen boys, fantasized] to…detectives…how his late step-father, an Army Major, raped him, then passed him on to generals to be tortured at military bases and sadistically sexually abused by other Establishment figures in the 1970s and 1980s.  He named former prime minister Sir Edward Heath…disgraced TV star Jimmy Savile and security chiefs Sir Michael Hanley, the head of MI5, and MI6 boss Sir Maurice Oldfield among the gang…Beech…was due to be tried on indecent images and voyeurism charges last summer but went on the run to Sweden, where he bought two remote properties and tried to evade [the cops] using false identities…

Sharp readers may recognize the resemblance of these accusations to those made by brainwashed children during the daycare prosecutions of the Satanic Panic.

Across the Pond (#862)

Redbridge has a history of harassing sex workers while belching up stupid “crime” rhetoric:

Police are encouraging [busybodies] to use a new real-time phone line to [snitch on women they imagine might be sex workers]…”There have been very few prostitutes on Ilford Lane for the past few weeks,” a…spokes[pig oinked]…”These ladies can sometimes be seen walking through seemingly on their way to work which we believe are in brothels…[disguised pigs] start at 7pm targeting…any person [they don’t like the look of, with no evidence whatsoever.  A busybody group called]…Clean up Ilford Lane is also urging residents to use the line if they see…people [visiting each other or emitting sex rays]…

Remember, indoor sex work is legal in the UK, hence this branding of incalls as “brothels”, which aren’t.

Pyrrhic Victory (#880)

Everything cops and other “justice” officials tell you is a lie:

…an ongoing lawsuit against the…NYPD brought by the Bronx Defenders…[revealed] that the police department has for years illegally used databases of arrests that were supposed to have been dropped, declined by prosecutors, downgraded to citations or infractions, or otherwise thrown out in court…cops…have access—on their smartphones—to reservoirs of records they shouldn’t be able to see, allowing them to continue to stop, search and arrest people…based on “criminal histories” that shouldn’t even exist.  The lawsuit, which in the coming weeks may be ruled a class-action on behalf of potentially tens of thousands of New Yorkers, comes just as a nonprofit research organization releases a 50-state report revealing that in 25 states, police are allowed to access sealed or expunged arrests—and then profile you based on these past allegations that no judge or jury ever found you guilty of…Jenn Rolnick Borchetta, the lead attorney on the Bronx lawsuit…[said] “They’re running their algorithms and their facial-recognition software on arrest records and mugshots that were supposed to have been destroyed”…

Dangerous Speech (#953)

The government keeps demonstrating that it doesn’t really care that its war on thought is wholly and incontrovertibly unconstitutional:

As proceedings against Backpage.com founders Michael Lacey and Jim Larkin continue unraveling in California courts, the sentencing of former associate Carl Ferrer, now cooperating with the government as a witness against them, has been delayed until July 2020.  Ferrer, the former CEO of Backpage.com, was due to be sentenced this [month]…Lacey’s attorney, renowned criminal law and First Amendment expert Paul Cambria…[said the] delay is an expected ploy by the prosecution to exert pressure on Ferrer to testify against his client and Larkin…