Adult News
Stripping Sarah Palin
Behind-the-scenes shot of strippers preparing for a Sarah Palin look-a-like contest in Las Vegas.
Link
Categories: Post-Modern Pop Culture
Sex and Culture
Sexual Beauty
Sexual Politics
Posted on 10/25/2008 1:29:14 AM by Gloria Brame
Prodommes tortured by economic woes
Almost missed this article in the NY Post from the other week, about the formation of DomPAC, a political lobbying group which will aim to gain legal rights for BDSMers (and specifically the sex-workers who cater to BDSMers). Apparently between some recent busts in NYC, and generalized fear that the economy's going ass-up, prodommes are having a hard time earning a living and are doing what they can to protect their businesses.
New York's dominatrixes have been getting spanked by the economy recently - and now, they're lashing back.
Already reeling from a series of local prostitution raids, dommes have also had to grapple with disobedient clients who can't afford to pay for their punishments.
To address the double-whammy hitting their industry, many of them want to form a political-action committee and union to represent their interests.
"It's never been worse. Business is down 70 percent," said Mistress Johanna, owner of Chelsea's Le Salon DeSade. "We've had all these busts, and now the economy is out of control. The uncertainty is torturing us."
...Mistresses say the economic downturn and recent spat of busts - namely
of Rapture NYC, Rebecca's Hidden Chamber and Avalon - has created an
atmosphere of fear and panic.
Link: BINDING ARBITRATION
Categories: Sex and Economics
Sex and Sadomasochism
Sex Laws and Crimes
Posted on 10/25/2008 1:28:15 AM by Gloria Brame
Spartacus and Me
Over the years, I've occasionally written about the impact that the Kubrick classic "Spartacus" has had on my life. But since we watched the movie for the nth time last night, I'm musing some more.
I was five years old when the movie was released in 1960. My parents faithfully took me to see it, as they took me to see all the "important" movies of the day. Though one might rightly assume that Spartacus is too politically sophisticated (and intellectually incomprehensible) for a child of five, the sheer technicolor spectacle of it all -- the costumes, the sets, the physical beauty of so many of the actors ( Tony Curtis as the bisexual poet/boytoy; Woody Strode as the ultimate noble warrior) enchanted me. I didn't understand its historical import, much less the social commentary inherent in the script, but every molecule of my pre-pubescent viscera understood that Spartacus was the bomb.
Nothing had ever fascinated me as much as Kirk Douglas playing the noble warrior and slave. I followed every minute of his humiliation and mental torture at the hands of the Romans with gaping (and possibly drooling) passion. At one point, I rose to my feet in a trance and proceeded down the aisle. Apparently, I thought I could climb into the screen and join Spartacus' world. I vaguely remember my father lunging after me, scooping me up, and planting me back in my seat, muttering embarrassed apologies to everyone we'd trampled.
I managed to sit still for the rest of the film, but from that moment on, a part of me lived in ancient Rome with Kirk. I had no idea what sex was at that age, but I fantasized about Spartacus constantly, creating new dialogues and scenarios in my head. Invariably, he would end up suffering. When I walked to school, I imagined him appearing around a corner or entering my classroom, clad in his little loincloth, arrived to carry me away. At night, I fantasized about him lifting me in his strong, tan arms and holding me tight, smiling at me the way he smiled at Jean Simmons when they spoke their first I Love You's. And of course I fantasized about him suffering...
From age five to ten, my happiest times were when I could block out the world and focus on Spartacus. I got very good at it. On the outside I looked like hundreds of others elementary school girls
in 1960s Brooklyn, but on the inside, I was living the Gladiator/Slave
lifestyle 24/7. I learned during those years how to vanish from the chaos at home and and live deep inside my imagination. My parents' quarrels became a vague, irritating background buzz. In later years, that skill turned out to be more of a curse than a blessing, but as a child, it was a survival skill.
It all came to an abrupt end when, at age 10, I discovered that Kirk Douglas was 43 -- which was practically ready for the grave, from my POV. I immediately realized that he and I probably would not get married after all. And with the charming sociopathy of children, I promptly transferred all my affections to a 5th grade teacher at school. While he was definitely no Spartacus, rather a shy, gawky bespeckled Jewish bachelor, the unknowing object of my new obsession, inspired a second wave of torrid yet chaste sadomasochistic fantasies. I never fantasized about Spartacus again.
As Will and I sat watching the movie last night, I realized that Spartacus really is still wonderful and exciting to me. It is fleshy and lush, passionate and depraved, crammed with sadomasochism and interpersonal power dynamics. It is not my favorite movie (that honor goes to Lawrence of Arabia) but it is my favorite movie to watch.
Even though I didn't come to terms with the truth about myself until I was 30, I can't remember a time when I didn't have sadomasochistic needs and impulses. If I wasn't born a sadomasochist, then I became one in infancy. I remember doing weird stuff as early as age three. But the world that Kubrick and Douglas made gave a shape to my sexual identity and a context for my fantasies. That world of cruel women buying men, and cruel men buying women, and near-naked gladiators, and slaves caged and whipped and humiliated and hung on crosses gave me a vision of an alternate reality. It did more than that. Spartacus gave my wild, perverse sexual imagination its first home.
Categories: Autobiographical Urges
Sex and History
Sex and Sadomasochism
Posted on 10/25/2008 1:27:17 AM by Gloria Brame
FOUND: Spice is the variety of life
Ah, yes, the good old days, when domestic violence was a regular rip-snorter. Behold these vintage salt and pepper shakers. A testament to the family values of yesteryear, when men elbowed their wives in the tits, and women beat the shit out of them with wood rolling pins. While topless. Um. What?
Anyone know anything about these, these *things*? Are these part of an old series?
Category: FOUND
Posted on 10/24/2008 2:55:03 AM by Gloria Brame
FOUND: My favorite kind of operation
Another delightfully cheesy cover featuring a bit of bad girl art. But what does the image have to do with the book? Did some artist provide generic bad girl art, while the publisher slapped whatever eye-catching image was in the hopper onto the next book on their list? Cool! This would work for a wide range of tawdry sex novels -- books about voyeurism, panty fetishes, even someone's secret life as a cross-dresser.
Category: FOUND
Posted on 10/24/2008 2:54:05 AM by Gloria Brame
Love (on-line) hurts
If you've ever doubted that the emotions people experience for their on-line lovers are real to them, and sometimes desperately so, check out this story from Japan. The "murderess" got busted for violating all sorts of privacy laws to carry out her virtual revenge against the guy who jilted her.
TOKYO – A 43-year-old Japanese woman whose sudden divorce in a virtual game world made her so angry that she killed her online husband's digital persona has been arrested on suspicion of hacking, police said Thursday.
The woman, who is jailed on suspicion of illegally accessing a computer and manipulating electronic data, used his identification and password to log onto popular interactive game "Maple Story" to carry out the virtual murder in mid-May
Link
The Internet element to this story is probably why it's making off-beat news headlines today. If reporters tried to cover every angry ex who slashed their partner's tires or broke into their houses to take something, newspapers would look like phonebooks. It's odd to me that now, more than 25 years since computer connectivity first allowed geeks to frolic at whim, news media and readers alike still find it bizarre and humorous that Internet users take their on-line relationships seriously.
It's impossible to quantify just how many regular Net users are seriously involved in virtual relationships but if you add up all the people you know who have intense on-line relationships, and then multiply it by all the chat-room and dating services throughout the Internet, and then multiply it again by all the sex-worker sites, you get some vague idea of just how HUGE a number of people are falling in and out of love and sex all over the place.
As well they should. First, they're human, and to be human is to need to form emotional connections, intellectual friendships, and sexual bonds. So anyplace where people congregate socially, whether it's at a bar, an office party or in a "hot, hung, horny" chatroom on AOL, there's bound to be some degree of flirting and philandering. Second, people don't turn to cyber-flirting when their daily lives are already overwhelmingly exciting. More often, they look to cyber for a type of fulfillment they're not getting in 3D.
Cyber-relationships don't have all the same ingredients as 3D relationships. They depend on language and imagination more than anything, sometimes with a heavy dose of fantasy projection thrown in. But so what? How many real relationships are based on real things? Does grocery shopping and movie-watching with someone in 3D necessarily mean you share a closer bond with them than with someone on-line who knows all your darkest, dirties secrets?
Cyber love may be different from 3D love -- based on different things, with different limits and boundaries -- but that doesn't make it less real. The above story reminded me of that: love is love, and heartbreaks hurt just as bad on the Internet as in 3D.
Categories: Post-Traumatic Tabloid Disorder
Sex On-Line
Posted on 10/24/2008 2:53:06 AM by Gloria Brame
Sexual Seating
via Gawker

This is a chair. It's by Neptunes producer and N.E.R.D. Pharrell. It's on exhibit in a Paris gallery. Because the chair refers to... you know... sex, that makes it art. The seat is all velvety. LINK.
Category: Sex and Arts
Posted on 10/24/2008 2:52:08 AM by Gloria Brame
FOUND: Pocket Pin-Up
Saw this a few weeks ago: statue miniature of a sexy siren (I believe it's Gina Lollobrigida) in a seductive pose. Presumably cast in resin, and done by someone who put a whole lotta love into its details. Just the kind of thing to take along on a long and lonely business trip, or keep on your lap the next time Solomon and Sheba comes on.

BTW, IMDB provides this stellar snip of dialogue from that classic slice of cheese.
Solomon: From the first, I knew that behind those lovely eyes is the brain of a very clever woman, who could never have traveled eight hundred leagues without a purpose.
Sheba: You have found me out. How could I hope to deceive you? I have been trying to entrap you, with these (shakes arms), to bind you with soft chains, so that I may do with you as I will.
Category: FOUND
Posted on 10/23/2008 5:46:41 AM by Gloria Brame
UK to pervs: The Beat May NOT Go On
I've blogged before about the deeply troubling new law being written in the UK, putatively to protect women and children from sexual abuse -- and, in the process, legalizing discrimination against BDSMers. Thanks to Phil for pointing me to the latest dreadful news.
Government tied in knots by bondage protest
"Forget the whips and chains: it's actually a lot more serious than that". This was the view of Consenting Adult Action Network Spokesperson and disability activist Clair Lewis, as she joined fashion photographer Ben Westwood and a bevy of bound and gagged models in a demonstration against what they believe to be the latest government witch-hunt.
"It is easy to trivialise this as being about a bunch of people worried about their porn stash when the extreme porn law goes live in January," said Clair. "But the issues run far wider.
"Back in 2006 government were still openly claiming that they had no evidence that porn did any harm. Despite that, they changed the Safeguarding Vulnerable Persons Act at the last minute to make it possible to bar individuals from ‘regulated jobs’ just for possessing porn of any degree of violence. In that one act, they effectively ruled our community out of almost half the jobs on offer.
So, to summarize: in their misplaced zeal to protect victims of sex crimes, UK politicians have decided to enact a law that, in effect, destroys the civil rights of kinky people and makes them vulnerable to prosecution. If the law passes as written, depictions of consensual kink will be criminal. Adults who enjoy BDSM images, stories, and, yes, even relationships, may be subject to state-authorized persecution. Overnight, the consenting kinky adult becomes a criminal, subject to workplace and other forms of discrimination.
No doubt some of the politicians pushing this through are gleefully exploiting this opportunity to advance a larger anti-sex agenda. It's a conspiracy of twisted Victorian prudes and sexual hysterics. Lawmakers are ignoring the facts about sex in favor of beliefs about sex. As has been proven time and again, such laws barely make a dent in predatory behaviors. Sociopaths will break the new laws, just as they broke the old ones. It's the law-abiding kinky citizen who will suffer the most. Police and other legal authorities will now have a club to beat down BDSMers. Indeed, this piece of legislation may cast a general chill over the free and open expression of human sexuality in all its permutations.
For those Brits who believe it's justifiable to sacrifice the rights of kinksters in order to protect children and potential rape victims, I say, what a steaming pile of BOLLOCKS. Lawmakers can write laws in ways to protect minority interests if and when they want to. They can change wording, modify clauses, they can even include clarifications and exemptions. Better still, they can more successfully enforce existing laws. Or, hey, here's a radical concept: how about not continually writing new laws which dictate what kinds of sex consenting adults may or may not choose to enjoy?
Categories: Sex and Sadomasochism
Sex Laws and Crimes
Sexual Politics
Posted on 10/23/2008 5:45:44 AM by Gloria Brame
Smaaaaaaaaaaaack! Your Tuesday Rorschach test
This is from 1910 and the French translates to "Martyrs' Street." Can't make out the signature. Perhaps one of the wise people who visit can identify the artist.
So what do you think?
Will says the guy probably grabbed her ass and that's why she's slapping him.
I say she probably always treats him like that.
Your opinion, Dr. Freud?

Categories: Sex and History
Sex and Sadomasochism
Sexual Humor
Posted on 10/22/2008 7:29:18 AM by Gloria Brame
Reading for Old Whippersnappers
Two funky old book covers and a men's magazine....showing us yet once more what our poor, pre-Internet forbears had to turn to for their kinky jollies.
For example, a lot of people had to satisfy their fascination with whips and bondage by reading pseudo-scientific books. You could tell yourself you were simply a student of human behavior instead of admitting that you were a perv starved for a little kinky stimulation.

Or you could read sensational novels whose covers were probably the most sensational part of the book.

And then there was the faithful standby -- the men's adventure magazine -- that offered tales of scintillatingly sordid worlds.

Categories: Sex and Culture
Sex and Sadomasochism
Sexual Humor
Posted on 10/22/2008 7:28:20 AM by Gloria Brame
A change will do us good
So much has been going on here, I haven't had time to stop and write about it. A few free-floating bits of extraordinary crap (v. the usual crap), but mainly good things, just too many packed into too tight a schedule. Or maybe I am spending a little too much time with my fish-tanks and dogs, relaxing into their strangely ritualistic, surrealistic universe like (Tang, thanks for your fascinating comments) a lotus-eater obsessed with a peaceful alternate reality. Or maybe I'm more like the gardener who sits beside a flower bed, waiting for things to grow, while nuclear bombs are exploding down the road. Ah. Who can say?
But never mind my existential angst. There are some upcoming changes to the blog that will, hopefully, improve the whole Gloria's Oversexed Mind experience for you. You! For whom I write and occasionally spread my confessional legs! You, dearest reader.
I finally bit the bullet (but don't be sad, it is a soft and chewy chocolate bullet), and hired the super-cool lady who designed this blog to *drum roll* RE-design this blog. Since she first designed this in 2004, well, um, could be it's time for a bit of an update. You know, one which takes into account the fact that five years in Internet time is like four-score and seven in 3D.
So look forward (if you are the type who does look forward and does not sink into somber melancholy about what once was) to a spiffed-up, state of the art kind of look to things. I mean, we'll be re-arranging columns! OOOOH. Jiggering graphic formats! AAAAAH. Making archives more readable. MMMMMM. There might even be navigation buttons! *handing you a towel* Meanwhile, we're now revved up for Typepad's latest great feature: pagination. Meaning you might actually be able to navigate around the blog.
Ok, it isn't that exciting. But the blog should look and act better by the time it's done. I'm especially hoping it won't be such a bear to dig through the achingly huge archives. We think it might be 6 weeks+ until it's all done. Hopefully there won't be any interruptions or glitches along the way but if there are, please be patient and I promise things will be better than ever once the dust settles. You can count on it.
Category: Autobiographical Urges
Posted on 10/22/2008 7:27:22 AM by Gloria Brame
I Ams All That
Well, awwwwwwwwwww. What an incredibly beautiful little creature. And you can tell the cat knows. The facial expression is all "Yes, I know I reign supreme!"

Blade Runner, a 1.5 years old Russian Blue cat who was presented as winner of Best in Show, looks out at the crowd at the CFA-Iams Cat Championship in New York October 19, 2008. Link
Category: Pets and Animal Love
Posted on 10/22/2008 7:26:24 AM by Gloria Brame
Sweet spanking vixens
Last but certainly not least, another random find on a spanking theme. Obviously pretty contemporary. I don't have a name for the artist or know what this is from, so please chime in if you do.

Category: Sex and Sadomasochism
Posted on 10/21/2008 11:44:39 AM by Gloria Brame
Stargazing Spankers
From a comic book series I've never heard of. Do you know it? Any idea when it was published? Looks like it's from the 70s or 80s to me.

Category: Sex and Culture
Posted on 10/21/2008 11:43:42 AM by Gloria Brame
Spanking Sweetpea
Can we all agree this is wrong? Particularly if Popeye just ate some spinach?

Category: Sexual Humor
Posted on 10/21/2008 11:42:43 AM by Gloria Brame
The brat's dilemma
From 1911, this adorable brat weighs the consequences of greed. Personally, I think her greed will win.

Category: Sexual Humor
Posted on 10/21/2008 11:41:44 AM by Gloria Brame
Old-fashioned paddling
This card, ca. 1910-1915, offers an ironic comment on a brutal and realistic punishment spanking.

Category: Sex and Culture
Posted on 10/21/2008 11:40:45 AM by Gloria Brame
The family that spanks together
Here's a twisted little window into some 1940s-style family values.

Category: Sexual Humor
Posted on 10/21/2008 11:39:46 AM by Gloria Brame
Spanking good evening
Have you been naughty?
Going to share some random finds on the theme of spanking this evening, starting with this still from a movie (anyone know the title?) in which Kirk Douglas gives Laraine Day an on-screen spanking. He looks like an old hand at it.

Category: Sex and Culture
Posted on 10/21/2008 11:38:46 AM by Gloria Brame