In theory, it’s a good idea. I fully support measures that prevent feckless yoofs watching anything that’s strictly for grown-ups.

What I don’t understand though, is how it would be implemented. Would there be any incentive for adult sites to spend time and money uprooting to .xxx? Would this be enforced? And what is porn? It’s a bit of a clumsy classification in some cases. There are sites that are, quite obviously, mainstream wank-fodder and would fit comfortably into a .xxx domain, but how about BDSM? A lot of sites aren’t suitable for children, but aren’t necessarily sexually explicit either. How would they be categorised?

Anyway, here’s the article from bbc.co.uk:

‘Moves to create a web domain for adult content have intensified with the group which has applied for the .xxx address demanding a decision on its fate. Net regulator Icann (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) – the body which oversees web addresses – has been delaying its vote. It gave the domain the go-ahead in 2005 but reversed the decision two years later. Proponents says that having a .xxx domain will make the web safer.

“One of the requirements of anyone registering a .xxx domain is that the site carries meta-tags that will be automatically picked up by the popular browsers and allow people who want to avoid the content to easily do so,” he told BBC News.’

Original article here.

A little while ago, I posted about Echonews’ ludicrously naive and judgemental review of “Whip Smart”. The book itself is the memoir of academic and former Dominatrix Melissa Febos, and she examines addiction, the psychology of kink, and her realisation that – at times – playing out a domination fantasy that was not her own in the name of empowerment was actually more humiliating for her than for the client. However, Echonews somehow missed the complexities of Febos’ experiences and observations, instead retreating back into the reviewer’s own traditional preconceptions of right and wrong, purity and perversion:

“You feel the dirty black tentacles of depravity seeping into her mind and body,” said the reviewer. “Many times I felt I had to put this book down and walk away to avoid contamination myself.”

Anyway, I’ve discovered an amazing NPR interview with Melissa Febos which has turned out to be more enlightened and enlightening than many of the morally squeamish reactions from elsewhere. The audio is 35 minutes long. Click here to download the file as an mp3, here to listen now, or here to read the text transcript of the interview.

Having come from a background of patriarchal Christianity and Roman Catholic schooling (I know, I’m such a cliché), I am slightly obsessed by any examination of women and divinity within the Church. The Goddess archetype seems to rise up in every male-oriented tradition, whether a religion, society or philosophy, no matter how much she is deliberately stifled.

Over the years I’ve spent as a working Dominatrix, I’ve been approached by a number of men who were, from a young age, indoctrinated into particularly repressive and misogynistic interpretations of Christianity or Islam. Many had contacted me because they craved the opportunity to worship at the feet of a woman. They couldn’t explain it. It went against everything they’d ever been taught, yet it was a need that could not be ignored.

When the balance of power is tipped so far away from the feminine, it always seems to find a way of righting itself, even if in secret, in the hearts of individuals. The more patriarchal a tradition is, the stronger the compulsion seems to be for its people to seek out Goddesses anywhere they can.

Here’s an excerpt from a wonderful article by Michele Somerville in the Huffington Post:

“…Mary Magdalene is a mystery, but looking at how Catholics perceive her is telling. The version of her that Dan Brown presents in The Da Vinci Code isn’t based on any reliable scholarship, but neither is the long-standing presumption that Mary was a prostitute. A Jewish woman of uncertain parentage would have been an outcast in the world of Jesus; a girl past puberty without a husband, a woman who had been raped, and a woman travelling alone with money of her own would each have been taken for prostitute. Church teaching discounts the (Gnostic) Gospel of Mary and cites her non-membership in “the twelve” as the central clue to Jesus’ clear and obvious disinclination to include her — or anyone of her gender — in the priesthood. Defenders of a “male-only” priesthood make much of the fact that none of the four approved accounts of the Last Supper refers to Mary by name, despite the fact that of “the twelve,” only Judas and Peter are mentioned by name. And yet according to the Catholic gospels, Mary Magdalene was the first to see the risen Christ. Mark, Matthew, and John have her at the foot of the cross on the occasion of the crucifixion. There is nothing to indicate that Mary was not at the Last Supper, and there is no cause to assume that she and his mother would not have celebrated Pesach with Jesus.

Catholic teaching tells us that the seeds of Catholic thought sprouted from Jesus’ Jewish worship and heritage. His Adonai was a male creator, a king, and certainly his religion was patriarchal. But the religious life of Jews in antiquity was various, and there was within it a place and thriving regard for female wisdom, teaching, and mysticism. The Gospels tell us that Jesus worshipped among women and travelled with women, that he touched women some might have considered unclean. There is good reason to believe that Jesus sought to challenge the patriarchy and include women fully in his earthly ministry, but the men in miters fear this. In ordaining women, the hierarchy would give women power — which, they fear, would undercut their sovereignty…”

For the rest of the article, click here, and to read “Sex and the City of God: Part 2” click here.