Some days it really feels like we have lost control of not only the national security apparatus and the financial institutions in this country, but also the judicial system:
New Orleans city police and the district attorney’s office are using a state law written for child molesters to charge hundreds of sex workers like Tabitha as sex offenders. The law, which dates back to 1805, makes it a crime against nature to engage in “unnatural copulation”—a term New Orleans cops and the district attorney’s office have interpreted to mean anal or oral sex. Sex workers convicted of breaking this law are charged with felonies, issued longer jail sentences and forced to register as sex offenders. They must also carry a driver’s license with the label “sex offender” printed on it.
I forwarded this to Radley Balko, so hopefully he will be able to spread the word on this insanity. It really does feel like we are a third world nation some days. Our entire country just seems broken beyond repair, we have all gone so damned crazy.
Moonbatting Average
Diaper sex, though, is still in the “natural copulation” column
Michael D.
If you wait, and if you’re patient, these laws will change. Perhaps New Orleans is just not ready for oral and anal sex to be legal. For any politician to risk political capital on trying to help these people – what with healthcare and post Katrina stuff going on – would simply be crazy.
EDIT: And I should note that I completely support the repeal of these absurd laws. I just can’t imagine the mayor or New Orleans or the Governor of Louisiana being able to influence their change in any way.
The Grand Panjandrum
Ah, yes. From the state that sent David Vitter to the Senate.
BenA
This is an arguement I have all the time with people: Things have always sucked. Things have always been out of control… we are just more aware of it than we ever have been. For example crime rates had fallen for much of the last 20 years… we now have a violent crime rate that is right out of the 1950s… but ask your average person on the street and they’ll say things are worse than they’ve ever been. It’s one part fear mongering media insanity and one part simple information overload… you didn’t hear about a kidnapping in texas 20 minutes after it happened in 1985.
Police and prosecutorial absuses have just gotten more light on them recently… but they’ve been going on forever…
The real disease in this country is that fear and hatred are fed constantly by the right wing media… of course that’s been going on forever too…
I guess my point is don’t get discouraged that these things are happening… feel encouraged that we’re actually finding out about them.
Econwatcher
Law enforcement in New Orleans has always been nuts. If I recall correctly, a few years ago it was discovered that their police force had not one but two officers who were moonlighting as hitmen.
I don’t necessarily disagree that the country is going down the tubes, but the New Orleans mess is nothing new.
CoffeeTim
@BenA
What you said.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
And just think, one more conservative judge will make things more consistent.
Mumphrey
I swear, you can tell which people have the most fucked up sex lives by listening to who makes the biggest deal about what other people are doing. I’m still scared that one day we’ll learn what Rick Santorum’s sex life is like. I don’t want to know that. I pray every night that I never have to hear about that. If and when we do hear about it, it’ll make the wetsuit guy in Alabama look like a prude.
bjacques
James Lee Burke’s stories aren’t fiction.
kid bitzer
“They must also carry a driver’s license with the label “sex offender” printed on it.”
well, if prostitution is your business, then this might make a pretty swell business-card.
(but seriously–i agree that this kind of thing is moronic. it would be moronic even if this country didn’t have a hundred other problems far more pressing. given that we do, it’s mega-moronic.)
Ripley
The Army had similar regulations when I went through Boot Camp in the early 80’s, going so far as to prohibit “consent to sodomy” (which meant oral, as well as anal sex). I’m not sure how long those regs had been around or if they’re still in force, but they applied to male/female sexual contact as well as same-sex contact.
I wonder if this LA law applies to married folks, as well. ??
twiffer
ah, blue laws. that’s the problem with never bothering to repeal silly and unenforced laws…eventually, some prick might decide to enforce them.
SGEW
How is this law not in violation of Lawrence v. Texas? Isn’t it just another sodomy law?
jibeaux
Well, if one of them challenges the conviction, it seems like a straightforward win under Lawrence v. Texas to me. But in the meantime, it clearly sucks that people are getting convicted and punished for things that, to me anyway, would seem to obviously violate existing law in the form of Supreme Court jurisprudence.
GReynoldsCT00
@bjacques:
true that
Mumphrey
Oh, and by the way, since nobody else has brought it up yet on this thread, John is a fascist and we need to teach the Democrats a lesson by voting for Republicans. Also, Obama’s a secret Republican because there are still some things left to fix in this country. I thought he was a magical wizard who could wave his wand and give me everything I want. Now that I find out he isn’t, I want my money back.
Why oh why
What about anal or oral sex through a diaper?
MattF
The Global War On Fun continues, and is not a laughing matter.
geg6
This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard of. And, no surprise, it comes from a poor city with the stupidest municipal, state, and federal officials on the planet. I adore NO and its people. But LA and NO government? Vile and ignorant, pretty much regardless of party.
Instantly Moderated Commenter
When blowjobs are outlawed, only outlaws will give blowjobs.
Blame it on the Clenis!
GReynoldsCT00
As someone mentioned in a previous thread, all it would take is a politician getting caught doing this…
Mumphrey
@ Why oh why:
Anything is legal–and moral–as long as you’re a Republican. These laws are there only to keep Democrats in line. Oh, and black people, too. Need to keep them from getting to high on themselves.
GReynoldsCT00
@Mumphrey:
Just had to light the match, huh?
Uriel
@SGEW:
I’m not sure if it applies here, but this might be influenced by the fact that NO follows a variation of napoleonic code, as opposed to the the variation of english common law the rest of the US follows. This allows NO to contravene some decisions that are considered binding in the rest of the US, I believe. Could be wrong, though.
scav
[shhhhh. they hate us for our freedom.]
Ash Can
The sex workers should all agree to sing like canaries if they’re hauled in on these charges. I can see a few police and city council muckety-mucks suddenly deciding that no legal action needs to be taken against the workers after all.
Shell
Jesu, maybe this is the End of Days. To add to all that, an over-5.0 earthquake hit the Cayman islands today.
KCinDC
The definition of “sex offender” has been extended so far that sex offender registries serve no useful purpose (assuming you believe they ever served a useful purpose). What percentage of those on the registries bear any resemblance to the sort of person people have in their minds when they hear the phrase “sex offender”?
Phaedrus
@BenA
I agree. You grow up sheltered as a kid, unaware – and then you start to see how the world works and, blam, the this new world suck compared to how it used to be.
I really liked that Noam Chomsky, always the dour carrion crow, said he was very optimistic about the trend of our Democracy – how much more aware and open the discourse is than even fifty years ago.
I feel the same.
Uriel
Though I mentioned it in the prior thread, it seems appropriate to bring it up here- but the real crazy doesn’t stop there. You have factor in this, from Incertus’s article, to get the true depth of f’ing lunacy in play here:
Lunacy.
SGEW
@Uriel: I’m not too familiar with Louisiana’s bizzaro non-common law exception (it trumps things like the UCC and such, right?), but I’m pretty damn sure that every SCOTUS decision is binding on every jurisdiction, regardless of that jurisdiction’s jurisprudence.
beltane
And with this sex offender designation hanging over their heads, these unfortunate women are effectively prohibited from ever turning their life around. They are for all intents and purposes barred from meaningful employment while those who exploit them sexually and financially endure no punishment whatsoever.
We have a caste system in this country, like it or not.
PurpleGirl
It hasn’t been asked yet… but… is it only the sex worker who is gets branded a sex offender? How about her/his customer? Do they get called a sex offender and have it put on their driver’s license?
I didn’t think so.
kay
I watched the hysteria build on sex offenders and I felt as if this was inevitable. The registry system is just too appealing an idea for police and prosecutors to pass up. I’m not surprised they’re jamming prostitutes inside the system set up for sex offenders. They’re jamming “youthful offenders” inside the system set up to protect youths from offenders. My state’s “reporting requirements” can extend for 25 years.
It started as a way to protect children, which seems to be the genesis of every bad law, incidentally, and it’s already completely out of control. I do not understand why lawmakers and others go completely insane when dealing with issues involving children. There should be a mandatory 1 year waiting period before any law written to “protect children” goes into effect, so everyone can take a deep breath and calm down, and look at the thing.
I knew the registry system was going to be a disaster.
We’re effectively creating an entire group of people who can never again apply for a job, and ironically, making the stated goal of the registry system itself completely useless, because the people they’re jamming into it aren’t sex offenders, and they aren’t any threat to children. If the point was to warn citizens, it’s not much use if everyone and their brother is a registered sex offender.
kommrade reproductive vigor
Shorter New Orleans: Our officials need an up-to-the-minute database of hookers who’ll give b.j.s, engage in buttseks and won’t dare complain if we slap them around and refuse to pay.
ellaesther
Not to be one, but I would submit that this particular law is not a sign that we have gone crazy so much as stayed crazy. What with it having been written in 1805, and all.
Here’s my question though: The sex workers are charged with felonies, registered as sex offenders, etc, etc (and in a quick digression, I’m sure that the bureaucracy that deals with actual sex offenders is well-enough staffed and funded to deal with this sort added case load. Right?) — what happens to the johns? Are they similarly charged, etc, etc? Because honestly, they’re the ones sticking their Cheneys into the wrong hole — clearly they’re even more abnormal than the women.
I rather suspect that, mostly, we don’t like women to be durrty, but it’s their own damn fault if men take them up on it, so we’re going to make sure they get punished.
Fucking hell, I’m getting more and more angry as I type.
And finally: Who is Radley Balko?
ellaesther
@PurpleGirl: Damn it! You were so succinct and I was my usual long-winded self and you got there first! I was probably typing on and on as you hit “submit.”
I am very long-winded. Sigh. Anyway: Jinx.
Paul L.
Don’t blame the entire country. This is New Orleans. They don’t care about the Constitution.
The New Orleans Police had to be sued by the NRA before returning guns they stole instead of doing their jobs during Katrina.
Michael D.
@ellaesther:
He is an editor at Reason Magazine who goes ballistic over crap like this and actually gets results.
Uriel
@SGEW: I honestly don’t know. I was throwing it out there because it occurred to me that it might be an explanation for something that seems pretty inexplicable otherwise.
To be honest, I kind of posted that hoping someone with more knowledge about NO’s legal structure might come along and tell me whether that had any bearing, or if I was proposing complete nonsense.
I should have been clearer about that, I guess.
Joey Maloney
@Michael D.: I suggest you counsel patience to the women whose lives – which were already crap – are completely, permanently ruined by this travesty. I’m sure they’ll be willing to wait indefinitely.
John Dillinger
Sounds like a perfect topic for the Vitter v. Dem challenger debates.
low-tech cyclist
The biggest nutso-ness is that in many states, being a “sex offender” gets you tagged for life.
The problem that motivated such laws isn’t sex offenders; it’s sexual predators such as child molesters, rapists, and so forth. Unfortunately, a lot of state legislators over the past couple of decades were too dumb to make that distinction.
ellaesther
@Michael D.: Thank you! Results would be good here, I think.
Rick Taylor
And meanwhile we’re discovering three prisoners at Guantanamo who the military said committed suicide may have been brutalized and murdered. But the consensus is it would just be awful to investigate or prosecute anyone for torture.
KCinDC
Hell, in some places they can’t even live anywhere except under an overpass at the edge of town, since everywhere else is within N yards of a school, park, church, etc.
Zifnab
@KCinDC:
It’s a bit of a joke now, isn’t it? The whole purpose of the registry was to single out particularly dangerous individuals. Now having sex with a high school girlfriend/boyfriend ranks you with Jeffery Dommer. When everyone is a sex offender, no one will be.
rea
Uh, complete nonsense. Louisiana’s code-based law rather than common law has no effect on the applicability of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution. Lawrence v Texas controls.
That’s unconstitutional, too. You can’t punish people for appealing their convictions.
JD Rhoades
It gets worse. In some jurisdictions, the Child Protective Services people keep what’s known as a Responsible Individual’s List, or RIL for short. It’s a list of people the CPS has deemed “responsible” for acts of abuse or neglect involving children. So far, so good, right? Except that you can be put on the RIL even if you’ve been exonerated of the charge. You can even be put on it if CPS hasn’t even filed a petition in court to have the child declared an abused or neglected juvenile. And yes, the RIL is accessible by some employers. And the only way to get off of it is for YOU to go to court and prove the Social Services Director had “no rational basis” for putting you on the RIL.
I represent kids in abuse and neglect cases, and even I think this is nuts, as does the attorney for CPS. We’re all sure it’s either going to be amended or overturned, but in the meantime, the CPS people are going wild with this thing.
kay
@low-tech cyclist:
Well, state legislatures, and then it became so politically charged that the feds got into the act….
“The overall bill is named the “Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act,” after the murdered son of “America’s Most Wanted” host John Walsh, who was present in the Senate gallery as the bill passed. Walsh has lobbied for the bill for many years.”
How’d you like to be the Senator that proposes repeal or revision of “Adam’s Law”?
scav
@rea: well, apparently there are two things that trump the constitution: protecting the children!! and protecting the bankers’ bonuses!!
This whole registry thing is now making me think of the Do Not Fly list and causing me to giggle manically.
Uriel
@rea:
Fair enough. Like I said in the original post, I wan’t sure if it applied.
A little harsh, to be sure- but fair. :)
(BTW, just to be clear, the second part isn’t me- it’s from the post that generated this one.)
Do you have any idea how they’re getting away with contravening this stuff? Is it nothing more than the mechanism of pure bullheadedness?
Chad N Freude
@Michael D.:
Perhaps England is just not ready for the Colonies to have a voice in Government.
Perhaps the US is just not ready for universal affordable health insurance.
Perhaps Iraq is just not ready for self-government without an occupying force.
Perhaps the world is just not ready for reduction in carbon emissions.
Perhaps … Well, you get the idea. Michael, you mean well, but this is not a justification for continuing the status quo.
Chad N Freude
Are we now talking about Balloon Juice discussions?
Joey Maloney
@kay: Anyone remember who was the main House sponsor of that particular piece of turd sausage? If your guess begins with “Mark” and ends with “Foley”, you win a page.
@scav: Or as some slashdotter once put it: “Terrorism” and “child porn”: the root passwords to the US Constitution.
kommrade reproductive vigor
The ultimate irony will occur when an underaged prostitute is charged under a law originally designed to protect children from sexual predators.
Assuming it hasn’t happened already.
kay
@JD Rhoades:
I deal with children’s services a lot, so I completely understand your frustration.
This may be ridiculously hopeful but I feel personally, “on the ground” there’s a recognition by local judges and others that we’re embarking on another lunatic witch hunt here. Maybe they’ll dial it back. The problem that I anticipated, and that came to pass, was no one wants to be the legislator that dials it back .
scav
I’m so right round the bend. New Orleans, that known geographic bastion of prudish sexual rectitude. Annual parades involving floats with purity beads, yeah, that’s it!
Uriel
@Chad N Freude:
No- Just my participation in the aforementioned. Which, again, I have to admit- fair. Hash but fair.
Deb T
We’ve always been crazy. It’s part of the human territory. It’s just now we see it and hear it and discuss it more. It’s like rape. I’ll bet folks in the 40s, 50s, and even 60s never thought it was that much of a problem – because no one talked about it (for all the reasons you imagine including sexist patriarchal law enforcement – i.e. if a woman was raped she: a. deserved it – was asking for it, b. didn’t really get raped was either being malicious or regretful, c. “What’s the big deal? Lay back and enjoy it.”). But then everyone started to talk about it (let’s not go into those awful 70’s made-for-tv movies where rising TV starlets were humiliated in basically what I called “How to rape a woman and get away with it tutorials”.)
But I digress. Now everyone has a platform. We hear about everything. We know the depth of our depravity second hand right before we see it dramatized on some TV show.
SGEW
Harsh but fair should be our shibboleth here.
Michael D.
@Joey Maloney:
@Chad N Freude:
I was making a point. As a gay person who wants to get married, and who wants to see people NOT get discharged from the military for being gay, trust me, I am totally on the side of the people in N.O.. I’m told I should wait and shut up though. I’ve been told I need to be patient, and I’ve been told now is not the time for politicians to risk political capital.
Funny that it’s suddenly important to people here that some hooker be able to give a john a blowjob and it’s suddenly worth it for politicians to take a stand on this, but when we ask that politicians take a stand on our causes, we are roundly criticized here and told that we’re insufferable.
Silver Owl
I think the judge and cops want to make sure that no one ever has sex with a conservative man. lol
Phyllis
Having just finished reading Zeitoun by Dave Eggers this morning before coming to work, I find this not the least bit surprising.
Compelling read, btw.
kay
@Joey Maloney:
Oh, God. You are kidding me.
I’m so wary of laws named after children.
There have been lots of challenges to the state registry system itself to my state supreme court. I find them completely persuasive, but I’m probably in a minority.
Adam’s law muddies that mess even further, which may be good, because no one knows how to apply anything, so I can run around screaming that “we have to wait for clear guidance! we don’t want to make law!” and I get at least a sympathetic ear in my conservative jurisdiction.
Zifnab
@Chad N Freude:
I don’t know if it’s a justification so much as a rationalization. Like watching a six-year-old stab a cat with a fork. Maybe we’re just not mature enough as a nation to stop acting like this.
scav
@Zifnab:
Wilde, wildly mangled.
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
@Uriel: “Hash but fair.”
And a good hash it was! Nothin’ like tokin’ on some good hash to make yer day.
Chad N Freude
@Michael D.:
Sorry. I wasn’t aware of that. I guess reading all of the outrage on this blog over the pro-Prop-8 position distracted me from the posts that criticize the proponents of gay marriage, DADT, etc.
Demo Woman
I lived in LA from 74 til 76. Since I was married, I could not have credit in my name. It had to be in my husbands name. I could not be called for jury duty unless I went to the court house and registered to be called. The law had previously stated that only males could serve on a jury. When challenged in the federal courts they changed the law so females could serve but with a caveat. When I moved to IL several years later the pediatrician’s, that I used for my children, daughter was going through an ugly divorce in LA and she was prevented from getting a restraining order against her abusive husband. The pediatrician just asked me how one state could get away with such arcane policies and I just shook my head.
WRC
what about the cop that gets a blowjob for not giving a ticket?
Uriel
@DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal):
Quit misrepresenting me, damn it- I said the hash was fair! Not good, FAIR.
Go hawk your straw men somewhere else, o-bot troll!
Michael D.
@Chad N Freude: You’re not getting what I am saying. I know EVERYONE here supports SSM, for the most part. But when we demand that politicians, like Obama for example, take a major stand against the laws as they stand, we’re told in these very comments that healthcare, the economy, the war on terror, and a number of other things are more important for Obama to risk his political capital on.
Yet, we’ll imply that we think Ray Nagin and Bobby Jindal should set aside the stuff they’re working on to make it easier for hookers to make a living.
In this post, John is not saying we should be outraged over this – clearly we should be – he’s saying he wants politicians to DO SOMETHING about it.
I’d like you to be outraged over Prop 8 as well, and I am glad you are. But I, too, want politicians to DO SOMETHING about it, and I want them to risk political capital on me – just as the people in this thread want them to risk political capital on anal sex and blow jobs for hookers.
VOR
So we’re going to label the prostitutes as sex offenders, what about the customers?
Would this apply to their Senator?
SGEW
@Michael D.: Just my 2 cents, as to why this particular issue is more immediately actionable than the repeal of DOMA and DADT:
– This is a narrow state law that is in direct contravention of standing precedent, as opposed to sweeping federal policies that have yet to be successfully litigated in the SCOTUS. This one’s much more local, and amenable to simple repeal, than national legislation effecting the entire USA, or executive policies that effect the administrative behemoth that is the Pentagon.
– Arguably, being unjustly placed on a sexual offender registry for decades is more directly harmful to one’s life than being denied marriage equality or access to the military. It affects far fewer people, of course, but the consequences are utterly disastrous.
[Also, as to the attention, the article directly mentions oral and anal sex, so there’s a certain Wonkette-ish giggle factor for many commenters here (not to point fingers, of course).]
rootless_e
The whole concept of “political capital” is a media confabulation. WTF does it mean?
gex
We give way too much deference in our society to people who claim to be moral and appoint themselves the morality police. It still drives electoral politics at the very top, so naturally this crap festers in the dark.
Michael D.
@rootless_e:
Basically, Obama got elected by a fair margin. So he had a lot of Political Capital – meaning Republicans would be (presumably) thinking to themselves, “Uhm, hey guys, we got trounced. It might be a little dangerous for us to piss off all the people who voted for Obama by opposing everything he does – at least for the first two days”
Or something like that. You have a lot of PC when you have a lot of support and people might be nervous about opposing you initially.
EDIT: Also, If you have Political Capital to spend, you can only do it if you’re a Republican.
Uriel
@Michael D.:
I just want to say that, while I understand your frustration to some degree, reducing the discussion to people demanding “anal sex and blow jobs for hookers” or making it “it easier for hookers to make a living” is a lot off base. By many orders of magnitude.
It seriously harms the credibility of point you’re actually trying to make.
Pigs & Spiders
We are all sex offenders now.
gex
@Michael D.: You quite simply are wasting your breath. No matter how long we draw this parallel, our allies will always discount the depth of the injustice we receive. End of story.
It just simply isn’t as devastating to not get married, one commenter suggests. As though the suicide rate for gay teens is an innocuous statistic, and certainly not as tragic as the suffering of these prostitutes.
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
@Uriel:
I thought you were being modest about your hash. Must be the blind O-bot in me that made me do it.
BTW, whose turn is it to fan John with the palm fronds?
Michael D.
@Uriel:
Isn’t the point of the outrage here that sex workers are getting into disproportionate amounts of trouble for giving blow jobs and having anal sex because of anachronistic laws? Ok, I could have said it less crassly, but that IS the point. And gay people are disproportionately harmed by anachronistic military and marriage law.
And you want politicians to get right on this sex worker thing, but the gay thing can wait, because “it’s not the time, what with the economy, healthcare, and everything.”
Chad N Freude
@gex: It sounds like you’re saying that gay teens commit suicide because they can’t legally marry. What am I missing here?
Mnemosyne
@Michael D.:
I missed the part where, unlike these “sex offenders,” gay people can be sent to prison for 20-to-life for challenging their sentences. Can you please point out to me which state does that?
Claiming that you have it just as bad as people who are being sent to jail on flimsy pretenses is really making you look like an asshole.
Michael D.
@gex:
I know, but until I am banned here, I am going to make the point every time.
gex
@Chad N Freude: Perhaps the concept of legally being unequal to others and the social stigma that is applied to gays by passing constitutional amendments against them with arguments that they are damaging America and families is damaging to them at a tender age.
Do I really have to draw the lines between society’s attitudes towards gays and the unusually high suicide rate for gay teens?
Persia
@beltane: This. It’s the encouragement of a permanent underclass.
Uriel
@DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal):
I don’t know- all I know is that I’m supposed to be hand feeding him succulent dates and carefully peeled grapes lovingly plucked from only the sweetest of vines and I’M LATE FOR MY GODDAMN SHIFT!
Gotta go!
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
Dammit! I want a pony NOW! Fuck everyone and everything else! PONY!
NOW!!
Ok, I’m off to destroy things for a living. Party on doods.
Joey Maloney
@Michael D.:
I must be dumb, because if you were trying to make a point, it escapes me. The only one I can extract from this is that you think sex workers are inferior beings, and I know that can’t be right.
Seriously – never mind that cop-out passive voice shit. “You’re being told” – by whom? Are you implying that I have told you that you should wait your turn? If not, are you implying that every time any discussion of any denial of human rights comes up, I have to make ritual obeisance to the issue of gay marriage before I can make my point?
FTR, in my opinion you deserve the right to marry exactly as much as a New Orleans prostitute deserves not to have her life ruined. OK?
Pigs & Spiders
Lets institute a Federal Law that requires all laws enacted more than 100 years prior to undergo a judicial review.
Actually, the more I think about it, that’s not a half-bad idea.
Chad N Freude
@gex: I believe the problem for teens is society’s attitude as expressed by their peer group more than discriminatory laws. But I acknowledge that your and Michael’s experience may refute this.
Persia
@gex: I didn’t realize there was no such thing as a gay sex worker. I feel all educated now.
Uriel
@Michael D.:
No, the issue is that people are using those laws in a predatory way to ruin the lives of people who are among the most marginalized of the marginalized for no other reason that to promote a warm and fuzzy feeling over “getting tough on crime.” They are taking people who are already in straights more desperate than most of us could imagine, and branding them for life based precisely and entirely on the fact that none of them will be able to do jack shit about it.
For some reason, that strikes me as a crummy thing to do. But that could just be me.
And where exactly did I ever say anything about expecting you to “just wait” for any reason what-so-ever?
gex
@Joey Maloney: Well, Joey, I don’t recognize your handle, so I will just fill you in.
That passive “being told” is probably a specific reference to specific threads on this blog that raged to thousands of comments in which “now is not the time” was the overriding sentiment. So instead of ascribing manipulative rhetorical devices to Michael D., it’s more helpful to realize you entered in the middle of this discussion.
gex
@Persia: What the fuck are you talking about? Bonus points for being needlessly snarky, but I didn’t say one word about gay sex workers.
Pangloss
Is sex with the lights on also illegal?
Chad N Freude
@Pigs & Spiders:
Fixed.
Mnemosyne
@gex:
You certainly don’t seem to care about sex workers — which includes gay ones — having their lives ruined by malicious prosecution and being labeled as sex offenders. But I guess all of their problems will be solved if they can legally marry and join the military, right?
Persia
@gex: Apparently you don’t think they exist. Those of us who pay attention realize that if you’re a teen gay sex worker who’s just been labeled a sex offender for the rest of hir life, that might increase your suicide risk.
But continue being a misogynistic concern troll, it’s clearly working out for you.
EDIT: I see Mnemosyne beat me to it.
gex
@Uriel: So what about when the military sidesteps DADT by asking a soldier if he ever participated in community theater, and after answering in the affirmative, considering that “telling” started an investigation, and discharging him under DADT? This happened.
I would think that would count as
Uriel
@DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal): I believe you left out “LOUD NOISES!”
Uriel
@gex:
And I think that’s a case of supreme bullshit and shouldn’t be tolerated either.
It’s not a god damned binary choice.
Joey Maloney
@gex:
Oh, nonsense. Michael’s post was in reply to me. That’s the significance of the link to my post that prepends his response.
Now, I don’t recognize your handle, so perhaps you are not aware of all internet traditions.
Pigs & Spiders
@Chad N Freude: Good point, we shouldn’t wait until 2109 to review THAT shit.
SGEW
@gex:
No. I was saying that it is arguable that the harmful effects of the legislation in question (sex-offender registries) is more directly harmful to specific people then anti-marriage equality laws, and is more amenable to immediate and specific action then the harmful effects of intolerance and homophobia in general. Repealing/overturning this particular law = immediate relief for those affected. Repealing/overturning DOMA and DADT =/= immediately reducing bashing and suicide in toto. Lawrence v. Texas, which did more for equality in this country in the last twenty years than anything else I can think of, has yet to put a significant dent in the suicide rate – culture, society, arc of history, long, bending towards justice, etc.. Overturning this particular law will immediately result in relief from an injustice that can utterly destroy an individual’s life.
Basically: I am speaking about specific legislation and its direct effects on individuals (marriage equality & military enrollment vs. decades of legally proscribed segregation), while you are talking about incredibly complex and widespread bigotry against a vulnerable segment of the population, and how it is influenced by such legislation. I suppose you’re looking at the bigger picture, and I was focusing on the smaller one; I do agree that repealing DOMA and DADT will probably, in the long term, have a more ameliorating effect for many more people, over all, than this particular law under discussion – but this particular smaller picture can be completely rectified by a discrete action, while we have a long way to go before hetero-normative discrimination is a thing of the past.
Finally: Do you really think that I’m “discounting” the depth of the injustice towards LGBT people in America? I guess you think that I haven’t been personally affected, huh? Talk about self-appointed “morality police.”
gex
@Persia: Well, I’m a woman, so quit assuming shit about me. And two, how do you think those gay kids end up as sex workers?
I think you, and others, are willfully misconstruing what is being said. I don’t think this law should be applied this way or that these women should be victimized like this. What I am pissed about is that it seems the only time anyone around here (specifically this blog/commenter group) gets outraged and demands immediate change about these archaic laws legislating morality is when it isn’t specifically about gays. If the bad law is about gays, suddenly there are more important things. There are posts on this very blog with over 1000 comments that essentially list the very many problems that straight people think need to be addressed before they can even think about working on our issue. And that is what Michael D. is snarking against, not these prostitutes.
Punchy
This would be child rape.
The Moar You Know
@gex: There’s no need to worry about any supposed “suffering” of prostitutes; they aren’t human, and you needn’t concern yourself.
carlos the dwarf
@Zifnab:
“Jeffrey Dommer” is a fantastic (unintentional?) pun.
gil mann
The right wing gets an awful lot of credit for the effectiveness of their “divide & conquer” strategy, and I’m not sure it’s warranted. Maybe we could try not doing their work for them once in a while, see what happens.
gex
@SGEW: I wasn’t calling you or anyone else here the morality police. I refer to the people who wrote or support these laws. So let’s start there.
And I really should know better than to get into these, because I get emotional. So let me just say:
I am not against addressing these laws or protecting those women. I never was.
So, sorry.
The Moar You Know
@gex: A. Link please. Extraordinary allegations require extraordinary proof.
B. If it’s anything like my local community theater, I can’t blame the military. Those people can’t act their way out of a paper bag.
Cassidy
@Michael D.: Perhaps the fruits like you should stop acting like you’re the only issue that are important in this country.
You know what, screw it, I’m gonna vote republican the next round, just so I can come back and tell you, after DADT and DOMA are put back in place, that it was partly your fault for being such a selfish prick.
Face
If a militant lesbian tells me my sex (male) is offensive, does that make me a sex offender?
Persia
@gil mann: That would be a happy day, wouldn’t it?
SGEW
@gex: No problem, gex. It’s a pretty emotional subject, all right (I, myself, often try to count to ten before commenting).
@The Moar You Know: linky
South of I-10
@SGEW: See State v. Thomas, 891 So.2d 1233. Wish I had more time to comment, but busy today!
SGEW
re: @Cassidy:
Ban this asshole.
Sir Nose'D
Printing sex offender on a driver’s license does not go far enough. I think all sex offenders (as broadly defined as possible) should have to have the words “SEX OFFDENDER” written in giant scarlet letters on their external clothing, so we can better identify them when we see them.
As we know, this will solve the problem of sex offenses, and we will all have more freedom. Also.
Cassidy
@SGEW: For voting republican? That’s a little harsh.
SGEW
@Cassidy:
Again: ban-hammer, please.
[No counting to ten for me on this one.]
Comrade Kevin
@Cassidy:
What? FOAD.
Cassidy
@SGEW: What, should I have used queer?
Jamey
Am I here too late to ask a Vitter question?
ET
There is a sense that anything goes in NOLA which is not true. It leads to a lot of people doing shit they would never do at home and acting all surprised when they get caught.
I find this sort of amusing….This is the city that created Storyville. Which is a source of a lot of stores of truly unnatural sex acts acts….
Of course 1805 is after the Americans came and ruined everything which probably explains this law.
Joey Maloney
@Sir Nose’D: I’m thinking of something a little more fashionable. Maybe a nice star. Or, I know, the old motif that decorated the inside of Denny’s restaurants, that looked like an asterisk made of 8 pen1ses. Stylish and appropriate.
Uriel
@Cassidy: Cripes- really?
Seconding SGEW’s motion.
ellaesther
@Uriel: Wow. Thirding.
Joey Maloney
via Radley Balko – Three Words That Will Save The Economy
inkadu
Thank goodness I read this am now aware of this whole “sex offender registry” thing! I’m going to stay with less serious crimes now, like murder and assault & battery.
Persia
@ellaesther: Fourthing, please ban the troll.
SGEW
@South of I-10: Thanks for th’ cite, South. I only have the time (and energy!) to briefly skim, but it seems as if the defendant in that case was challenging the constitutionality of prostitution laws using Lawrence (and, as we know, Lawrence did not (quite) strike down all “moral code” ordinances, despite Scalia’s slippery slope dissent); the sexual registry law in question here punishes particular sexual conduct that need not be commercial in nature (it’s only being enforced in those instances). That’s my quick take on it, in any case.
Cassidy
Stop ignoring the real problem. A post goes up where people’s lives are being ruined because of anachronistic laws and have little resources to fight it, yet somehow, some selfish scumbag was able to hijack the thread and make it about his pet issues and his problems.
Micheal D., you’re a prick. There are more people in this world than you and your SO, and a lot of them are suffering, regardless of their sexual orientation. You seem to live a pretty good life from what I remember of your attempts at writing, so shut your fucking pie hole for a while and do something to help those people, regardless of what thier orientation is.
SGEW, really? If I’ve offended your delicate little sensibilities, then perhaps you should go outside for a little while and toughen up.
SGEW
@Cassidy: Go ahead, call me a “fruit” or a “queer” already. Lord knows I’ve heard it before, from tougher fucking guys than you.
asiangrrlMN
@Michael D.: Don’t make it about you, Michael D, because it isn’t.
Full disclosure: I am a bi woman who couldn’t give two shits about marriage at all. The fact that I have to care about gay marriage pisses me the fuck off because I think there is inherent privilege in marriage and it’s steeped in patriarchy, and I would rather not have to think about it. That said, if straights can get married, then so should gays. And, I have stayed off the gay threads on this blog mostly because well-intentioned people tell gays to wait wait wait until…well, sometime later to see DOMA repealed. So, I share the frustrations of Michael D. and gex on that subject.
I, personally, care more about DADT and job equality than gay marriage, but equality is equality. There. Those are my creds.
That said, Michael D., you’re being a dick for making the comparison–and I agree that you are not helping the cause any. Most sex workers were abused as kids and see no other way of life. They are in a dangerous business, and insane laws like this just makes their lives that much harder. To equate getting married with this is pure bullshit. It’s clear you don’t think much of hookers or don’t really care that their lives are hell by your statements on this thread. That’s your prerogative. However, this thread is not about you. Don’t make it about you.
Just a FYI, Cassidy is not a troll. Homophobic? Maybe, but not a troll.
Corpsicle
@Cassidy: To be honest, I’m no fan of Michael D., but that doesn’t make it ok for you to be a total douchebag.
asiangrrlMN
@Cassidy: Yes, Michael D. was being a prick, but so were you. Can you both put it back in your fucking pants and be adults already?
@Corpsicle: OK, you said it better than I did.
Chad N Freude
@Cassidy:
Do you use the words
[ALERT – HIGHLY OFFENSIVE LANGUAGE FOLLOWS]
N-gger, K-ke, W-p, D-go, Sp-c, and C-nt?
Or do you use offensive language only when talking about gay people?
EDIT: You are certainly entitled to express your opinions, but using offensive language that demeans your opposition doesn’t enhance the credibility of your argument.
Cassidy
@asiangrrlMN: Not homphobic. I grew up protecting my “effeminate” little brother his whole life. When he came out of the closet, the only person this was a revelation to was himself. I just enjoy pissing people off. Plus, I figured if Mikey D was gonna make this about him, then I would give him what he wants.
@Corpsicle: I’m an asshole. Always have been. It’s what I do. I don’t see it as a personality flaw. I do the things other people are too scared or timid to do. And, don’t knock it. I may not be your best friend, or the guy you share your feelings with, but I am the friend you call when times are tough.
Cassidy
@Chad N Freude: It depends if I’m trying to get someone’s attention and the situation. Do I personally hold stock in them, no. But I also don’t get offended by name calling. I’ve got a thick skin.
Sinister eyebrow
I used to work for a criminal court judge in NOLA when I was in law school. They’ve always used the “unnatural copulation” wording to hit prostitutes with felonies. I thought it was ridiculous, the Judge thought it was ridiculous, the clerks did, as did the DA’s. But for a DA, you use the tools available to you. Keep in mind that the Judges, DA’s and criminal defense attorneys are pretty much interchangeable. DA’s become judges or defense attorneys, Judges leave the bench and go into private practice as defense attorneys, some defense attorney’s go to work for the DA’s office for the steady paycheck. And in all those jobs, you use the swords and shields available regardless of what you personally think of their merit in the broader legal sense.
But, it’s NOLA. Or, more importantly, it’s Louisiana, and the legislature in LA is a bunch of reactionary, know-nothing, populist, fire-breathing religious nuts (for the most part) who’ve never read the Constitution much less know what all them thar fancy words like “rights” and “liberty” and “deprived” and “due process” mean. My God, this is the state where a legislator put a bill up for consideration that would have allowed corrections officers to pump condemned prisoners full of “truth serum” and psychoactive chemicals to try to elicit confessions from them prior to execution. Another legislator actually tried to have baggy pants criminalized. And people treated these as serious proposals worthy of consideration.
The unnatural act approach to blow jobs? Been going on for years. Nothing new, nothing surprising about it for Lousiana. Also, no political will or sanity (or brain cells) to do a damn thing about it.
Incertus
@Sinister eyebrow:
But you don’t have to tag someone as a sex offender in order to try to reduce prostitution. In fact, to tag someone as a sex offender pretty much condemns them to staying a prostitute because you’ve limited their future options in a myriad of ways. This isn’t a matter of using the tools available. This is a matter of abusing a segment of society just because you’re able to.
satby
@gex: Don’t assume all sex workers are women servicing men.
bago
A clear case of Symbolic Baiting.
Chad N Freude
@Cassidy:
A number of people argued with Michael without resorting to thought-blocking offensiveness. You may be as tough as you claim, and you may be the guy I want to call on if I’m being mugged, but you are not the guy I want to call on if I’m trying to engage in a debate.
Mnemosyne
@Sinister eyebrow:
Is there any way to find out if our hunch is right and it’s only the prostitutes themselves and not the customers who are ending up labeled for life as sex offenders? Because if that’s the case, I’ve got to get to NOLA and start punching some DAs in the throat.
MattR
@Mnemosyne: You might want to clear your calendar. From the article:
And just in case you weren’t pissed off enough already.
Corpsicle
@Cassidy: Using language that is very offensive to large groups of people for shock value, or to show everyone how brave you are, is something I can completely understand. I thought that was cool and tough too. When I was 13.
Cassidy
@Corpsicle: Had nothing to do with it. Scoot on back over to Oprah. You haven’t gotten your soccer mom psycholgy certificate yet.
Cassidy
Seriously, if you’re so easily offended by a word, then you should probably go back to the basement.
Zuzu's Petals
If this really is the substance of the law, I have to wonder – aside from the Lawrence v. Texas problem mentioned – whether it isn’t an example of abuse of prosecutorial discretion.
It seems to me every married couple who is found to practice oral sex should also be branded as sex offenders.
Incertus
@Cassidy: I’m not so much offended by the word as I am by your seeming inability to carry on a conversation without proving just how big an asshole you are–and that you’re proud of that. It’s anti-intellectualism on par with Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh. Congrats.
Tsulagi
@Chad N Freude:
Goddamn, when are you epithet-creating palefaces finally going to recognize NAs? Best some of you ticking skin-cancer time bombs can come up with is something lame like “blanket ass.” We never get any respect.
burnspbesq
@rea:
Of course it is. But if you bring a federal habeas challenge, your case starts out in the Eastern District of Louisiana, and when you lose there, your appeal goes to the Fifth Circuit.
That, it seems to me, is the definition of “no meaningful remedy.”
burnspbesq
@Pangloss:
Yes, you prevert. Report to your nearest Supermax prison immediately. Don’t make us come looking for you.
burnspbesq
@Cassidy:
No, you should have read what you wrote before hitting “submit,” said to yourself, “Gee, that’s an awfully stupid and dick-ish thing to say,” and deleted it.
Tsulagi
@burnspbesq:
You must be new here.
Tax Analyst
@ #61 SGEW said:
I always preferred “Cruel but fair”, as in “Ah, the Captain…he was a cru-el man…cru-el, but fair”
Tax Analyst
@ #155 Tsulagi said:
Took me awhile to figure out that “NAs” meant “Native Americans (I think?)”
Do you mean to tell me there are NO offensive epithets used to denigrate you Pesky Redskins?
Ugh.
Dulcie
@asiangrrlMN: Preach it, sister!
Tsulagi
@Tax Analyst: Little slow there, Tax Analyst. Actually, I prefer American Indian, but thought I should go more current PC with NA, Native American, in case someone would be offended for me.
Don’t worry, I’ve some got some epithets to choose from; I’m only part Indian. Obama is a pure breed compared to me. My family on both sides have long been equal opportunity fuckers. A tradition I’m proud of and have done my best to uphold.
Nylund
But does the Republican Senator who wore a diaper while receiving the services of said Louisiana sex workers also get “sex offender” added to his driver’s license?