Louisiana GOP sacrifices bestiality law on altar of homophobia

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you: The modern Republican Party.

In Louisiana, a proposal to strengthen the law against bestiality is facing unexpected opposition from conservative lawmakers who see it as an underhanded move to strike the state’s unconstitutional ban on sodomy.

[…]

“This bill was written because the far left wants to undermine our other laws that protect family and traditional values that the people of Louisiana hold dear,” said Sen. Ryan Gatti, a Republican who was one of 10 senators to vote against the bill.

Where to even begin …?

The thing is, they could have made the plausible argument that the state already has a bestiality ban on the books and that the party of Small Government and Fiscal Responsibility and whatnot is opposed to expanding a legal definition that’s already sufficient. They could even have argued – and I’d agree – that it’s a waste of the legislature’s time and taxpayer money to pass laws to cover problems that are so rare as to be practically nonexistent. It would still have been evident what their end goal is, but at least it might have let them save face.

But they just had to stick to their anti-gay guns, even at the cost of being publicly labeled as the party that prefers letting humans have sex with animals over allowing consenting adults of the same gender – and species – to get it on. Particularly given that the anti-sodomy law is blatantly unconstitutional and is one court challenge away from being stuck down anyway.

(via Joe.My.God.)

OkCupid users agree: Golden showers much preferable to Trump

OkCupid is one of the bigger matchmaking sites out there, and one way they leverage this is by periodically polling their vast user base to glean what’s trending in the online dating world (and presumably society in general). One such survey conducted in February, which included some political questions, netted almost 270,000 US respondents, and they gave some very interesting answers.

First, on the question of everyone’s least-favorite White House occupant:

Trump Is A Deal Breaker

Trump certainly gets people riled up, and daters’ views on him — positive or negative — are considered a major deal breaker for singles considering potential matches. 74% of OkCupid respondents answered “Hell no” to the question “Trump?” Only 4% responded “Hell yes.” The more demure responses of “yes” and “no” came in at 7% and 15% respectively. […]

Nearly three quarters of OkCupid members share the same stance on Trump.

Naturally, they followed up with something now intrinsically Trump-related, with hilarious results:

And now for the golden ticket, er, shower. Believe it or not, some things are more shocking than Putin — like golden showers, and singles’ thoughts on them. Perhaps Trump’s recent scandal made them mainstream (excuse the pun), but a somewhat surprising discovery was how down daters are with golden showers — or at least how open they are to discussing them. While Trump proved to be a major deal breaker, golden showers did not; nearly a quarter of respondents claimed a golden shower was either a turn-on, or they could be convinced to try one out. The central takeaway here? More singles say they are willing to get pissed on than support Trump.

If anything, that’s understating it. According to those numbers, that’s twice as many people who’d either certainly or possibly be okay being pissed on as would put up with dating someone who supports Trump. And given how these numbers come from February and that Trump’s support base has only been eroding since then, that ratio would be even higher now.

Of course, the follow-up question is: How many people would be okay with, or would at least consider, pissing on a Trump supporter?

(via Dispatches From the Culture Wars)

Daily Links: 11/06/17 – Egyptian TV host gets prison for discussing pregnancy outside of marriage

Doaa Saleh

• Egyptian TV host ^[pictured] sentenced to three years in prison for “outraging public decency” by discussing pregnancy outside of a conventional marriage.
  (via @fark)

• Teachers in Oregon’s Salem-Keizer School District have to report sexually active students to authorities. Maybe lawmakers thought the state’s sex offender registry seemed a little sparse.
  (via @FreeRangeKids; RT: @radleybalko)

• Orange County school students rebel against a Confederate mascot.
  (via @fark)

• Last Week Tonight with John Oliver takes an amusing, bemused look at Ken Ham’s Big Gay Ark in a larger piece on economic incentives. (The video is restricted to US viewers, but the link includes a transcript of the relevant bit.)

• Finally, in other news, I’ve overhauled and republished one of my earliest songs, “Lone Wolf”, a piano/orchestral theme song for an old novel project.

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Limbaugh understands the Left, but not rape (or something)

Rush Limbaugh

In which Rush Limbaugh is completely right about liberals, and at the same time, so desperately wrong:

You know what the magic word, the only thing that matters in American sexual mores today is? One thing. You can do anything, the left will promote and understand and tolerate anything, as long as there is one element. Do you know what it is? Consent. If there is consent on both or all three or all four, however many are involved in the sex act, it's perfectly fine. Whatever it is. But if the left ever senses and smells that there's no consent in part of the equation then here come the rape police. But consent is the magic key to the left.

That’s a breathtaking insight into a diseased mind. Yes, “the Left” – by which I presume he means decent, reasonable people everywhere – will indeed be okay with any kind of sexual activity so long as every participant involved gives their valid consent. And they will absolutely call the police on you if you do something to someone else without their consent, since that’s the definition of … oh, what’s the word? … rape.

I wonder what his point is, here. Is he really upset that the Left puts so much emphasis on people being willing to engage in sex before sex happens? Or is he just disturbed that the Left will condone all kinds of activities and positions and arrangements that he, narrow-minded moral crusader, cannot abide?

(via Pharyngula)

Lazy Saturday Links: 10/07/17 – A Sick Country Filled With Guns

• The Intercept’s Jeremy Scahill is blunt about the US’s gun pathology: A Sick Country Filled With Guns.

• University of Wisconsin wants to protect speakers’ free speech rights by banning protestors from exercising their free speech rights.
  (via @studentactivism)

• There’s nothing wrong with sex work. There’s something very wrong with how society treats sex workers.

• US Creationist group Answers in Genesis wants to infect Canada. I hope we give them the same reception we gave “Fox News North”.

• Finally, I consider myself a reasonably imaginative guy, and I still can’t conceive of how this teacher possibly thought having sixth-graders draw Nazi mascots was a good idea.
  (@fark)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Links: 09/12/17 – House passes asset forfeiture amendment

[source]

Oh, look, I’m still feeling lazy. Shameful. Have some more links.

• Surprising, most likely futile, but still welcome: Republican-controlled House of Representatives passes amendment to reverse AG Sessions’s expansion of asset forfeiture ^[pictured].

• Iraqi-American man tries to deposit a $150K cheque after selling his family home. Naturally, fifteen police cars turn up to arrest him, his wife and their two children, and detain them for hours before releasing them with zero charges.
  (via @Popehat)

• More zero-tolerance stupidity: Eighth-grader accidentally brings a pocket knife to school, informs the principal, gets suspended.
  (via @fark)

• After two years, PETA agrees to settle their bottomlessly stupid lawsuit against the “monkey selfie” photographer. Techdirt has more.

• Sen. Ted “no right to stimulate one’s genitals” Cruz (R-TX) has a Twitter-porn problem.
  (via @KrangTNelson [NSFW])

• Ken Ham apparently thinks adding a “damaging” hyphen will defeat “gay mar-riage”.

• Finally, your headline of the day: Woman trapped in window trying to retrieve poo after Tinder date
  (via The Daily Grail)

If you have any story suggestions, you can leave them in the comments or send them in.