LOUISVILLE, KY and UNIONTOWN, IN -- Patrons of adult stores in at least two locations have recently been victims of an effort to shame them by posting their photos online at War-line.com, a Website supposedly dedicated to a war against rape. A Christian activist group has been demonstrating outside a Lion’s Den in Uniontown and posting photos to the site as well as handing out bibles and “witnessing,” which has, according to an Agape News report, resulted in a number of store patrons being “saved.”

In the meantime, War-line Webmaster John Reneer has been targeting a Fern Valley Road adult store in Louisville with his camera, managing to capture images of patrons even though store owner Jeff Keinhans has set up sprinklers and parked semi-trailers to try to block the camera’s view.

According to reporter Maria Gum of Louisville’s WLKY NewsChannel 32, Reneer is a convicted felon, now on probation for armed robbery, sodomy and murder.

"I can't change what I've done," Reneer told Gum. "I'm not going to try and hide it. I'm just going to try to make a difference now."

Information from Allie Martin, AFA’s Agape Press, 5/30/06
And from Maria Gum, WLKY News, 5/30/06

MAJOR FEDERAL INDICTMENTS HANDED DOWN

PHOENIX, AZ -- Federal obscenity indictments have been unsealed here against JM Productions and a distribution company, Five Star Video (based in Tempe, Arizona) as well as the principals of the two companies. The indictments, which are phrased in terms of interstate transportation of obscene materials and related charges, involve videos directed by Jim Powers, including American Bukkake 13 and Gag Factor 18. Watch for more reports as information becomes available.

Information drawn from a report by Mark Kernes, AVN.com, 6/1/06.

SCARIER AND SCARIER

SAN FRANCISCO, CA -- The extent of potential spying by the U.S. Government on Internet communications may reach even further than in our worst nightmares, according to testimony -- and now new documentation supporting that testimony -- from Former AT&T technician Mark Klein, who came forward to support an Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) lawsuit against AT&T for its alleged complicity in National Security Administration electronic surveillance. Wired News published Klein's public statement, in which he describes a secret room at the AT&T Central Office in San Francisco, a room in which equipment was installed (in 2003) capable of conducting what amounts to “vacuum-cleaner” surveillance of all the data crossing the Internet -- whether that be peoples' e-mail, Web surfing or any other data.

Now, documents (and photos) have been released by court order and published by Wired News that seem to support Klein’s accusations. The new information “shook the blogosphere,” according to Dan Mitchell, writing for the New York Times, but have not yet rung alarm bells in the mainstream media. Klein’s testimony and the newly revealed documents are indeed paranoia-inducing, a Big Brother scenario.

See for yourself at Wired.com News, 5/26/06
See also: an earlier Wired.com News report

BRITAIN: A HOTBED OF ADULT INTERNET GROWTH

BRITAIN -- A survey by Nielsen NetRatings shows Britain to be the fastest growing market for adult entertainment on the Internet. One in four adults, including 1.6 million women, download images each month, according to the study. More than nine million men -- almost 40 per cent of Britain's male population -- viewed adult Websites last year compared with an estimated two million in 2000. One in four men aged 25 to 49 -- 2.5 million -- visited an adult Website in the last month alone. 1.5 million women viewed adult entertainment on the Internet pornography in the last 12 months, up from one million in the previous year. Men and women spent an average 40 minutes each month looking at adult Websites while half of all couples watch adult entertainment on the Internet together. British Web users look up the word "porn" on search engines more than any other word.

Survey summary from Anthony Barnes and Sophie Goodchild, The Independent, 5/28/06
See also, John Oates, The Register, 5/30/06
Thanks to Robbie Swan of EROS Association for the news alert.

BROUHAHA OVER GAY CHRIST IMAGES

BEUGENE, OR -- A University of Oregon campus publication called The Insurgent has become the center of controversy after running artwork that depicted Jesus Christ having sex with a male devil character. A coalition called Students of Faith formed around the incident and Bill O’Reilly of Fox News called for the firing of University President Dave Fronmeyer. Essays -- reminiscent of the discourse around the Muslim outrage over cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed -- appeared in the student newspaper The Daily Emerald on both sides of the issue.

Johnny Correa, the artist who created the radical images, also published a lengthy and well-crafted essay in The Daily Emerald, not backing down an inch.

“I am queer,” said Correa. “In my view queerness is a natural part of the human experience. Therefore, for me, it follows that Christ -- who, remember, lived the human experience -- could just as easily have experienced queerness as any other human being. This is a heartwarming notion for me and many other queers since it poses a direct challenge to conservative Christian doctrine and exposes it for what it is: the bigoted rules of the heterosexist majority and not divine decree at all.”

For the views of Zachary White, the UO student who first started the controversy, see The Daily Herald, 5/25/06
The Daily Herald Columnist Ben Lenet on the subject, 5/25/06
Thanks to Michael Dickinson for the news alert.

A BATTLE OVER STATISTICS

ALLENTOWN, PA -- The May 2006 issue of the Journal of Sex Research (JSR) includes a study by Daniel Linz, Bryant Paul and Mike Yao called “Peep Show Establishments, Police Activity, Public Place and Time: A study of Secondary Effects in San Diego, California.” Following the study is a rebuttal of the study by Richard McCleary and James Meeker; and following the rebuttal is a response by Linz, et al. The two teams of scientists are, in essence, reprising the roles they played as researchers and expert witnesses on opposite sides in Mercury Books, Inc., v City of San Diego, and in other secondary effects cases as well, only this time in a scientific journal.

Some of the arguments and counter-arguments in the three-part debate are straight-forward and easy to understand. Other issues hinge on varying interpretations of the most valid statistical methods for analyzing the effects of adult businesses on neighborhoods, as well as other technical matters. The adult industry has a substantial stake in the evolution of scientific knowledge in this area. Secondary effects cases are being debated in courtrooms across the country. (See, for example, X-Press Report, “Another Shoddy Ordinance Challenged," 5/26/06). We applaud JSR for profiling this issue. Too often public policy around adult entertainment is formed based on naïve stereotypes with inadequate attention to scientific debate and consensus.

Single copies of the May 2006 JSR can be ordered ($25) from Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality, POB 416, Allentown, PA 18105.