Always a good one, but really touchy to bring up.
`Honey, I'm going to strangle you as you orgasm, is that OK? No, no,
not to death ...'
> In an environment of AIDS it is acceptable and even sexy to mutually
> masturbate rather than have intercourse.
Now, this ties us back into memetics (thankfully). I think what we
have here is an example of an opportunistic meme. Riding high on the
spread of the `intercourse kills' meme, `mutual masturbation' gets
linked to `safe sex' and explodes into an entirely new set of niches
in people who are afraid of contracting AIDS. This one bears
watching, because in its exploited niche, its well positioned to
accrete into a rather radically different meme-complex.
> Actually this could get to be an interesting thread.
>
> Too bad there's no Virus CU-Seeme reflector. ;) (ha ha)
I /really/ didn't need that image. No, really. :)
> My paper on the contemporary gothic lead me into researching fetishism.
Gah, not Goths, /anything/ but Goths ... [sounds of machinegun fire,
heavy artillery bombardments, nuclear missiles heating the silos]
> I read a number of Skin two issues while reading an essay on the
> oppressed/repressed in gothic fiction-- a marxist take on sexualized
> power relationships.
Skin's an interesting rag. Its full of interesting people doing
interesting things, but the articles ... the articles give me pause to
stop and wonder about the uses to which we're putting language and
whether it wouldn't be better off put down and out of its rabid
misery. The articles in Skin are more pompous and self-important than
/I/ am.
> This is a serious proposal. If you have the time and are willing to do a
> bit of research for each article-- we could eventually end up with a
> significant body of text.
>
> (Besides-- I'd like to have an excuse to explore fetishism ;)
I barely have time to eat and sleep, much less write scolarly articles
on interesting subjects. :) Who needs an /excuse/ to explore
fetishism? :)
> David-- remind me, next time you are in Vancouver to take you and Barb
> to the Twilight Zone on Fetish night. Last time my friends went they
> came back with stories of people inserting knitting needles through
> their face and people on the dance floor stark naked.
Sounds like The Chamber down here in Atlanta ... actually, sounds like
several clubs of differing degree down here. Sometimes I think we
have more `alternative lifestyle' clubs per square block than Seattle
...