People (most of them polite) called FetLife out on both the comment and what sounded like a justification wrapped in apology packaging. All in all, they were pretty gentle reactions for a tweet that encouraged the stereotype of the incapacitated hooker:
One of these tourist reports typically pops up in my Google alerts every week. Someone ventures inside a strip club for the first time and shares his/her tale with the world as if he/she is Neil Armstrong. Last week it was an insecure lesbian who felt threatened when a stripper at Jumbo’s talked to her date. Even cool writers are guilty of lame tourist reports where they sound grateful to have made it out alive.
This week’s gem is featured on dating advice website, YourTango, and it’s a doozy. (YourTango was never even on my radar until the founder/CEO embarrassed herself last summer with that bizarre Indian fetishist piece in the Huffington Post.) The author starts off by letting us know that she’s boldly going where no woman has gone before: a bachelor party weekend in Atlantic City with 27 dudes.
Last week I saw a SXSW panel called “Secrets of Fake Twitter Accounts.” The speakers included @BPGlobalPR, @JasperSloburushe, @MayorEmanuel, and @FakeAPStylebook. They were all pretty diverse in their reasons for starting fake Twitter accounts, from “What’s going on in the world outrages me” to “Those guys are dicks” to “We were just emailing jokes.” The guys behind @FakeAPStylebook, the “just making jokes” dudes, also have a mock eHow/Demand Media parody site called The Content Farm, where they publish fake how-tos like “How to Pour Milk” and “How to Tell If You Are Bleeding From the Scalp.” It’s a pretty great idea for a humor site. The submission page warns “We are a content farm, so odds are you won’t be paid.”
But today in You’re Not Funny, we bring you the recent “How to Bury a Hooker in the Nevada Desert.” “Note that this guide offers no instruction on how to bury a prostitute, escort or stripper in any region but the Nevada desert. Refer to the article, ‘How to Bury a Prostitute, Escort or Stripper in Areas Outside the Nevada Desert.'” OH HILARITY. I look forward to future “How to Lynch a Black Man” and “How to Kill Your Domestic Worker” articles from this dude. Making sport of the real dangers created by the marginalization of sex workers? Buddy, you’re not funny.
Last Sunday, BDSM community site FetLife did what a lot of popular sites do every once in a while—it crashed. And the person running FetLife’s Twitter account made a poorly chosen joke: “Whoops… FetLife just went down like a drunk hooker…”, later saying that they “Couldn’t think of anything better to say!” and “I make equal fun of everyone.”
