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The Week in Links: July 8

Micheline Bernardini

Rather than backing down in the face of Ashton Kutcher’s attack on its advertisers, The Village Voice is amping up its articles on trafficking hysteria at large. They’ve created a dramatic infographic about actual trafficking arrests, and here’s their publication Seattle Weekly taking a closer look at Kutcher’s “philanthropy consultant.” You can also read their recent condemnation of how journalists crucified Craigslist. (VV’s self-aggrandizement is getting old quick, though. Here’s hoping they can stick to the solid facts and lay off the braggadocio, because it’s just as gross when they make the debate all about them as it is when Kutcher makes it all about himself.)

More on Ashton Kutcher and The Village Voice: Laura Augstin, SWOP-NYC, Belle de Jour, Megan Morgenson.

More on the appeals court ruling on the anti-prostitution pledge.

DSK’s rape accuser is suing The New York Post for calling her a prostitute.

The Irish Examiner, apparently not motivated by Ashton Kutcher being an ass, published its own critique of sex trafficking hysteria. And Argentina’s President, apparently acting without the urging of Ashton Kutcher, has flat-out banned all ads for prostitution.

Annie Sprinkle talks to The New York Times about her career in sex work.

The 25-year-old, unbelievably gruesome murders of two Philadelphia trans women working as prostitutes may finally be solved.

Did you know the world’s first bikini was worn by a professional nude dancer?

Stripper Planks

@whit_titty planks it up

It was only a matter of time before somebody would think to compile a collection of stripper plank photos (although one of them is maybe just a snorkeler). I’m kind of bummed that this didn’t occur to us, but that doesn’t mean that our readers can’t still submit photos of themselves participating in the hottest/most pointless trend of 2011. Send us your pics and I’ll make a stripper planks post in a few weeks. For those of you still confused as to what all this “planking” business is about, you’ve been overthinking it. Ya go somewhere, and you lie down on your stomach like a board and someone takes a picture. Yes, documenting yourself lying down is a thing. (Remember freestyle walking?) Check out Whit absolutely killing it. No wait, saying “killing it” is over, huh? Well, she’s hitting it out of the park! Look at how she’s all lying there and shit. Now do you still “feel like a 45 year-old soccer mom,” Charlotte? kat [at] titsandsass.com

From Shaking Tail to Spinning Tales

In March 2005 I started a blog. My first post was about my new hideously expensive purse, but my blog, pretty dumb things, quickly became a blog with—not necessarily of—sex. I wrote a lot, posting five or six times a week, often but not always, narrating something sexual. At the height of its popularity, my blog brought in somewhere between 4,000 and 10,000 visitors a day. Which is a dizzying number for a one-woman show of neuroses, orgasms, butt sex, blowjobs, pop culture, occasional snark and/or whimsy, and tales of when I was a stripper. My writing got noticed, and I got paid to write for various magazines and anthologies, got interviewed by Susie Bright, and got semi-pseudo-famous, in short, for my sexytime writing.

Blast From the Past: The San Francisco Stripper Wars

Hustler August 1997

This isn’t so much a blast from the past (although, I was shocked to learn that 1997 was fourteen years ago) as it is déjà vu (no, not the place with the three ugly girls). I randomly came across an old issue of Hustler last week because I had a part in an indie movie that takes place in the nineties and it was a prop. It contains an article written during the first round of stripper employee-status and back wages lawsuits that started in San Francisco, focusing on the legendary Mitchell Brothers O’Farrell Theater.

It was an interesting read despite the opening sentences: “Six nude nymphs rise into the air. Writhing together, they kiss and giggle, licking one anothers’ perfect pussies, nibbling nipples, tickling and fondling pert breasts.” What else do you expect when you have to sandwich something substantial in between a photo editorial of a woman whose “favorite pastimes” are “tanning, exhibitionism, and masturbating” (not that there’s anything wrong with that) and an illustration of Abe Lincoln with a raging boner? I learned a few things, most notably that very little has changed. The independent contractor vs. employee debate is just as relevant as ever.