Links - 20th February 2013

Group sex is new ill afflicting pupils - ""Colleagues are coming across reports of young people having sex in large groups. It is known as daisy-chaining and is obviously very worrying as far as sexually transmitted infections and pregnancy is concerned. "As we understand it, it involves groups of older teenagers going round to each other's homes and having sex ... It is very new and is only just starting to be talked about""

Sexual Freedom Always Curtails Other Freedoms - "Men like Teddy Roosevelt wrote letters to other men that expressed great love and tenderness, to the point it makes modern day readers feel uncomfortable... Today, there is little freedom for men to be physically affectionate toward one another. Writing an affectionate email might be seen as “girly” or “unmanly,” although it’s hard to imagine Teddy Roosevelt as a wimp. What happened? As society has rushed to embrace homosexual behavior, the normal bonds of friendship between men have been curtailed. When Hollywood produced Brokeback Mountain, a movie that celebrated the relationship of gay cowboys, people began joking about men who go camping together and sleep in pup tents. Men no longer express affection and friendship in ways they did a generation ago."

Women's "Token Resistant" and Compliant Sexual Behaviors are Related to Uncertain Sexual Intentions and Rape - "Muehienhard and Hollabaugh reported that 39% of college women engaged in "token resistance" (said "no" but wanted to have sex). Many of these women's reasons for their behavior explained a sexual refusal but not token resistance. The authors hypothesize that many token resistant women honestly refused but later decided to have sex. Evidence indicates that token resistant behavior occurs on or after the 11th date, whereas resistant behavior (said "no" and meant no) occurs earlier. In addition, 83% of token resistant women had more than one sexual intention during the token resistant episode. They said they resisted or were uncertain before they said "no" and neant yes. The authors conclude that most token resistant behavior is a change of intention that is poorly recalled because of memory consolidation. Women's compliant sexual behavior (agreeing to unwanted sex) occurs for relationship maintenance reasons. Both behaviors are related to women's histories of rape."
When a lady says no...; What women say they want, what women think they want and what women really want aren't always the same
See also below
Note: Cross-posted as this isn't an anecdote of a woman displaying this behavior

Examining Stereotypes About Token Resistance to Sex - "We found that 39% of the respondents reported having [said no when they meant yes] at least once... Studies done at universities in Kansas, Pennsylvania, Hawaii, Texas (two schools), Illinois (three schools), and Japan (two schools, using a questionnaire in English) all found that between 37% and 39% of women reported having engaged in token resistance (Muehlenhard & Hollabaugh, 1988; Muehlenhard & McCoy, 1991; Shotland & Hunter, 1995; Sprecher, Hatfield, Cortese, Potapova, & Levitskaya, 1994). Only one sample of women reported a higher prevalence rate; in a sample of Russian women, with a TR scenario translated into Russian, the prevalence rate was 59%... more men than women reported having engaged in token resistance... one respondent wrote, “I thought and felt I should say ‘no’ because I was unsure if it was the right thing to morally do. Yet I had every intention of participating in sexual intercourse that night” (Muehlenhard & Rodgers, 1998, p. 453). Another wrote, “I believe I act this way because I get embarrassed about the situation and I want to be ‘the good girl’”. Other themes that respondents mentioned were adding interest to an ongoing relationship, not wanting to be taken for granted, testing a partner’s response, and increasing their power and control in the relationship... many described ambivalence about having sex; it was clear that not all sexual activity could be neatly categorized as either totally wanted or totally unwanted. Many described multiple dimensions of wanting or not wanting sex (e.g., my body wanted to but my heart and mind didn’t, Muehlenhard & Rodgers, 1998, p. 449). Many wrote that they had wanted the sexual act but not the consequences (e.g., pregnancy, appearing to be using the other person). Many described wanting to have sex but deciding not to—that is, wanting to but being unwilling to have sex... some women who had been raped rated the intercourse as wanted. For example, one woman wrote that her boyfriend frequently got her intoxicated and had sex with her despite her protests. Although it was clearly nonconsensual, she rated the intercourse as strongly wanted overall"
This also problematises the concept of "enthusiastic consent"

Court rules state voyeurism law doesn't outlaw photographing up skirts - "Photographing or videotaping up a woman's skirt in a public place doesn't violate a voyeurism law, the state Supreme Court ruled Thursday. The unanimous ruling found that the law only protects people in places where they have a reasonable expectation of privacy. The court rejected prosecutors' arguments that people reasonably expect privacy under their clothing... "Although Glas' and Sorrells' actions are reprehensible, we agree that the voyeurism statute, as written, does not prohibit upskirt photography in a public location," wrote Justice Bobbe Bridge, one of four women on the nine-member court."
Of course, Washington quickly changed the law

What’s so wrong with incest? The case of Stübing v Germany - "the Court reaffirmed the principle that, in sensitive matters of morality where no consensus exists within member states, the margin of appreciation will be broad. Individual states are better placed than the European Court to evaluate the moral convictions of the people and the manner in which these convictions should be translated into domestic law, if at all. Germany, like the UK and many other European countries, prohibit incest between adult siblings. In other countries, such as Portugal and Serbia, incest has been decriminalised. However, such is the Court’s reliance on the margin of appreciation that Lord Lester’s concerns that the concept has become as “slippery and elusive as an eel” and a “substitute for a coherent legal analysis of the issues at stake” spring to mind... Taking cover behind the ‘margin of appreciation’ and the variability of European approaches to the issue of incest, the European Court chose not to meddle with the conclusions of the Federal Constitutional Court. This is an understandable approach, but one that will leave the philosophically minded unfulfilled and, more importantly, will provide scant comfort to Patrick Stübing."

Gardener 'beat woman with a rope in sadomasochistic sex session they planned after reading Fifty Shades of Grey' - "A gardener indulging in a sex fantasy inspired by Fifty Shades of Grey repeatedly beat his lover - because she didn't use the secret 'code' word for him to stop"
Of course, they only name the man - the masking of the woman's name already prejudges who the victim is

From two jags to two fingers - "In 1990, the Sun newspaper did its bit for the entente cordiale by urging its readers to stick two fingers up at then President of the European Commission Jacques Delors. Its "Up Yours, Delors" front page attracted scores of complaints about its alleged racism. But the now defunct Press Council cleared the newspaper after it said it reserved the right to use vulgar abuse whenever it felt it justified in the interests of the British people."

North Carolina teacher who had sex with student, 15, escapes jail by MARRYING him - "under North Carolina law a defendant's spouse cannot be made to testify in criminal cases."
How would one prosecute marital rape in North Carolina?

Genetically Engineered Babies Are Moral Duty, “Ethics” Guru Claims - ""We’re routinely screening embryos and fetuses for conditions such as cystic fibrosis and Down’s syndrome, and there’s little public outcry," Savulescu claimed... "What’s more, few people protested at the decisions in the mid-2000s to allow couples to test embryos for inherited bowel and breast cancer genes, and this pushes us a lot close to creating designer humans," Savulescu correctly observed"

'Gay Marriage' Confusion - "Love affairs are personal relations. Marriage is a legal relation. To say that government should not get involved in legal relations is to say that government has no business governing... If judges of the Massachusetts Supreme Court or the mayor of San Francisco want to resign their jobs and start advocating gay marriage, they have every right to do so. But that is wholly different from using the authority delegated to them under the law to subvert the law. Gay rights activists argue that activist judges have overturned unjust laws in the past and that society is better off for it. The argument that some good has come from some unlawful acts in the past is hardly a basis for accepting unlawful acts in general. If you only want to accept particular unlawful acts that you agree with, then of course others will have other unlawful acts that they agree with. Considering how many different groups have how many different sets of values, that road leads to anarchy... The last refuge of the gay marriage advocates is that this is an issue of equal rights. But marriage is not an individual right. Otherwise, why limit marriage to unions of two people instead of three or four or five? Why limit it to adult humans, if some want to be united with others of various ages, sexes and species? Marriage is a social contract because the issues involved go beyond the particular individuals. Unions of a man and a woman produce the future generations on whom the fate of the whole society depends. Society has something to say about that. Even at the individual level, men and women have different circumstances, if only from the fact that women have babies and men do not. These and other asymmetries in the positions of women and men justify long-term legal arrangements to enable society to keep this asymmetrical relationship viable — for society’s sake. Neither of these considerations applies to unions where the people are of the same sex."

Jetman Yves Rossy flies alongside passenger plane for first time - "According to his website, he became the first and only man in the history of aviation to fly with a jet-propelled wing in 2006."

RPGs, challenge, and grinding - "the disabled aren't the only people who are often turned away from games, and physical skills are simply one barrier among many. Plenty of non-disabled players are turned away in droves from games they could have otherwise enjoyed, usually by the game's difficulty... how can a game remove difficulty without under-mining the experience? A perfect example of an incredibly difficult and hard-core game that expands its audience through accessibility is VVVVVV. The accessibility options allow you to slow the game down, turn visual effects on and off, and even make yourself invincible... Personally, I like the feeling of achievement that comes with unlocking things myself - so you know what I did? I didn't unlock them from the menu... Grinding is one of the oldest accessibility options in games. If the player can't beat the next boss, she can always beat up some monsters, level-up, and try again. This allows players of widely different skill levels to complete the same game on their own terms... ame designers often misjudge what counts as "easy," so I will join with Ernest Adams' in demanding that "Easy Mode is Supposed to be Easy, Dammit!"... Not only does casual mode offer a solution to getting stuck, it offers a solution to not having time... Inevitably, some small fraction of players will find ways to see the endings to games they can't beat. Either they will use a cheat code, hack the game, or wait for tools like emulator save-states to arrive that let them play the game in a way they can handle. Rather than forcing these persistent few to jump through hoops simply to enjoy a video game, why don't we as game developers meet them half-way, and just give them well-balanced tools up-front that don't spoil the experience for anyone?"
Comment: "In PC gaming circles at least, "accessible" has nearly become a code word meaning "simplified to the point of banality to run on consoles."