Ah fuck it, let's just ban masturbation while we're at it

The single most amazing, multi-cultural experience of my life was going on Semester at Sea. However, it was not for obvious reasons, like going to Cuba, seeing the Taj Mahal, walking the Great Wall, or going on a safari. No. It was because I actually met the most culturally deprived people of my life. I grew up in the NYC metro area and now I live in California, so its safe to say, I have been incubating in an ethnically diverse, liberal place for over twenty years. However, on this voyage I met those people that you have never heard about, but may have some idea that they exist.

I mean, these are the people who vote for W. right? These are the people whose big social hub is church, and not that I am anti-religious, it just so happens that all the religious people I meet seem to have beliefs that exclude everyone else's beliefs. These are the people who have never met a gay man. These are the people who form NBK clubs (Never Been Kissed). These are the people who informed me of a college in Florida where the opposite sex is not allowed to touch each other. These are the people who scare the fuck out of me. Don't they scare the fuck out of you? Aren't you going to go to bed tonight and sleep just a little less with the knowledge that there are grown ass adults in college who make political decisions based on their parents' beliefs and don't get any, I mean, ANY, pootie? Maybe it's correlated. Do liberals really do it better? Or Marxists for that matter?

However, what really floored me was a conversation I had with a couple of these people, and my friend, a gay man who was also Irish-Catholic, Republican, and obviously confused. The topic, one of my faves, masturbation.

Of course, I'm a fan. What's not to love, about self-love? However, one of my fellow shipmates shot it down, citing the following two reasons why: 1. claimed of a sex education class that taught kindergarteners about fisting and 2. reports of a girl in his hometown who masturbated with a knife handle, cutting herself.

Pause for effect.

WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?!

I swear on a stack of Capital, this is what he said. He went on to say that he agreed with the Clinton administration for firing Surgeon General Joycelyn Elders for her pro-masturbation comments in the context of fighting the AIDS crisis. My friend, confused, agreed with this idiot. Even Ann Landers was pro-masturbation.

It was a rare point in my life that I was rendered speechless.

I'm bringing all this up because of a recent article in Z Magazine entitled "Abstinence-Only Sex Education". I was amazed to read the following: "Robert George, a member of the eminent President's Council on Bioethics, wants laws passed to outlaw masturbation . . ."

Oh Robert George, who are you and why am I not beating you up?

Consider the following:
In a book entitled The Clash of Orthodoxies: Law, Religion and Morality in Crisis, George expresses the sort of views about human sexuality that will keep the money of social conservatives flowing his way. He wrote: "The plain fact is that the genitals of men and women are reproductive organs all of the time -- even during periods of sterility." According to journalist Max Blumenthal, George advocates for state laws that criminalize adultery and fornication. He also calls for a curb on "sexual practices he views as immoral, including oral sex and masturbation (which he calls ‘bad' sex)" (Blumenthal, 2006)
http://www.mediatransparency.org/storyprinterfriendly.php?storyID=142

And there you have it. You just can't rationalize with people who utter nonsense.

Wait . . . so I utter nonsense? Crap!

Revolutionaries need stylists too

I remember listening to the radio and the host was making fun of Fidel Castro, how he always wears his military fatigues. The revolution is over, he quipped. Let's get that man in some Armani suits. I agree. But would Fidel be Fidel without his ever present green uniform?

Then I started thinking, have there ever been any stylish revolutionaries? Che Guevara, Gandhi, Ayatollah Ruhollah, Osama Bin Laden?

Hmm, I'm noticing a theme! I see beards are in! And military jackets! Yes, and draping fabrics, oh yes, revolutionary-chic!

The reason I bring it up is because the Marxist seems to be determined to wear badly fitting clothes, unmatched, threadbare polos and unkempt hair. Most recently, he has decided to grow a mustache. Perhaps I set back the revolution a couple of years by insisting on cutting his hair, plucking his eyebrows and wearing nice clothes. Sorrys.

This just in: poet-dommes stealing ink cartridges all over LA

Your printer is not safe. You are not safe. I will take your ink cartridge.

Marxy just called to ask if I had taken the ink cartridges out of his printer. I didn't, but I was really pissed that I didn't think of that and had done it. Because who would check to see if you actually had ink cartridges until the last minute when the paper was due an hour ago?

But I didn't take the ink. I don't know who did, since I just used that printer.

I did, however, piss in your Johnny Walker red.

Marxist moves out, we argue historical materialism

I'm baffled by the Marxist's inability to take things that are actually his, like his butt plugs and bong, but to instead take things of mine that were purchased before our politically correct partnership commenced such as my red bottle opener.

To be continued . . .

The Marxist to go to London

Ah, hell, I'm jealous. I want to go to London too, but for entirely different reasons.

He's going to the Historical Materialism Annual Conference instead.

Incest is best, put your Marxist to the test

In an earlier post, I mentioned that a couple of people said how much Marxy and I look alike. Isolated incident. (What truly haunts me is the man on Abbot Kinney who said we were old souls who had known each other a long time. I might believe in such things, but I knew he was full of shit. I love him dearly, but I shudder to think we're soulmates. That's too romantic for a Marxist.)

A. and I were often distressed about how our neighbors rarely spoke to us. Sometimes they downright ignored us, like on the single occasion I came home at the same time as the guys who lived downstairs, said, Hey! and was promptly ignored, followed by a quickly shut door.

But you know, they might be rich conservatives or something. Anyway, one day I saw another neighbor walking to his car as well, I said hello (why bother) and he said, Hey! I haven't seen you or your brother in awhile.

Excuse me? He thinks the Marxist is my brother!?

Well, now I can totally understand why my neighbors don't talk to us. Because they think we are incestuously enjoying rent-control right in their very apartment complex! Oh and also, they are all so fucking stupid to think we are related. I'm glad we never conversed.

The Marxist moves up north to discourse, I stay in LA to party

Given the recent amicable divide of our partnership, I suggest to Marxy that he go to Santa Cruz to be with his other revolutionary-heads to discourse and what not. He always laments that people here in general and in his department are not political enough, don't work on important things and are generally uninteresting. I feel his pain. It's so difficult to grow intellectually in one's community if you do not have adequate peers to bounce ideas off. I definitely miss my little poets group, that I'm trying to get back. However, I'm also pursuing different projects at this time. For one, I have been working quite steadily as my career as a pro-Domme and there are a lot of kinky parties to go to. LA is really quite the town for BDSM and the coolest parties I have ever been to in my life. LA parties are of a different order than all other parties, I think. Its for the best anyway. I feel uncomfortable with his friends' discoursing and he feels uncomfortable with my friends beating the crap out of each other.

It was good though.

Marxy and I call it quits

I don't know where it all went wrong. Maybe it was his socialism with capitalistic tendencies, like the Chinese. Maybe it was my refusal to be nice to his political friends who would simultaneously objectify me and ignore me. Whatevs. Bygones.

The Norma Rae of BDSM

Now that I have no regular day job, I've been working more at my night job, however, the night job is run illegally.

I signed an independent contract. My taxes are filed as an independent contractor. Essentially this means that I will not pay taxes when I get paid, but later when I file. According to the IRS: The general rule is that an individual is an independent contractor if you, the person for whom the services are performed, have the right to control or direct only the result of the work and not the means and methods of accomplishing the result.

In terms of my dungeon, here are the answers to the questions the IRS asks to differentiate between independent contractors and employees:

1. Behavioral: Does the company control or have the right to control what the worker does and how the worker does his or her job? YES
2. Financial: Are the business aspects of the worker’s job controlled by the payer? (these include things like how worker is paid, whether expenses are reimbursed, who provides tools/supplies, etc.) YES
3. Type of Relationship: Are there written contracts or employee type benefits (i.e. pension plan, insurance, vacation pay, etc.)? Will the relationship continue and is the work performed a key aspect of the business? YES there are written contracts, no benefits, no the relationship will not continue, and yes the work performed a key aspect of the business.


In other words, I am being treated like an employee, but am supposed to be treated like an independent contractor. Being as such would mean that I could set my own hours, set my own rates, run my own advertisement and work wherever I please. This is not the reality. Oh no. The reality is that I have to work a certain shift, the rates are set by the house, I can run my own advertisement if the contact information is the e-mail address that does not get directly forwarded to me, but rather filtered through the owner and I am not allowed to session outside these walls. It also means I have no health benefits, sick pay or holidays. All my taxes will be taken out at the end. I can, however, deduct almost everything from clothes, make-up, internet, cell phone, office supplies, etc.

Here's the problem. The Marxist wants me to confront my boss about these illegal practices. He wants me to ask why she is treating us this way and wants to demand that she change it. He wants me to unionize the other women I work with to all fight against her illegal and unfair practices.

I try and tell him most of the other women there do not know about this and wouldn't be motivated to do anything about or they do care and they don't want to do anything about it. I don't want to lose the only income I have (besides the dole, hells yes!) and she has fired people over less. I tell him I'm not sure I want to be the Norma Rae of BDSM. She has operated this way for years, everyone in town knows about it and to my knowledge no one has done anything to stop her. Why do I have to be the one? I don't want to make other women lose their jobs.

He counters with, its not just about you and the other women who work there, its also about all the other women who got fired or didn't make as much as they could have or got slammed with taxes because of the way things are run.

I tell him, I'm just not that person. He tells me my inaction will cause him to stop supporting me until I get another day job, which to me sounds very unMarxistlike.

I get canned--the Marxist defends my honor

I got canned on a Wednesday afternoon the day after my birthday.

Amid all the other illegal things my boss does, he hasn't given me a pay stub in months which I need for obvious reasons.

Witness the following exchange:

Dear Boss

Okay, it's just imperative I have them this week so that I can file for unemployment

--Elizabeth


Boss's Response:

Instead of filing for unemployment why don’t you just go find a new job? The pay stubs will arrive tomorrow.


Marxy's Response:

Since the late nineteenth century, workers have agitated for unemployment insurance or better unemployment insurance, and it has been granted to varying degrees across the industrialized world. People who live by wages are usually only able to save enough money for short emergencies or for big purchases, e.g. moving or buying a car. When someone loses his or her job unexpectedly, he or she thus needs to find a new job very quickly. This person might, therefore, be inclined to take the first job that comes along, even if that job is not nearly as good as the lost. With unemployment insurance, workers can take a little time to find a job that is actually commensurate to their experience and capabilities. So it is not only good for the worker, but actually for the economy as a whole, since it allows for proper allocation of labor resources.

That, of course, applies during a time of general economic prosperity. In case you haven't noticed, the economy only barely recovered from the recession of 2001. Work has been harder and harder to find. To cut costs, employers have tended to offer only part-time jobs or jobs with little or no benefits. Good jobs are scarce and competition for them is brutal. That situation is only getting worse as the economy enters a recession, which seems more and more likely after the bursting of the housing bubble. Businesses are rearing up for a long period of slowdown



Is this the writer that will lead a revolution? I'm not sure.

Partners of Academics Don't Write

It’s time to mop the floor. It has been, at least months. We have no bucket and the mop sucks, but I can clean out the garbage can and use that.

He lies on the couch.

I sweep the floor throughout all the rooms from the back of the apartment to the front.

I ask him to get the laundry.

His head hurts.

I mop the wood floors, using what’s left of the cleaning fluid.

He picks up another magazine.

Dust! I need to dust, all the bookshelves are hairy, with cat hair and his intellectual Jew hair, all over his intellectual Marxist books.

He says he needs to bring books back to the library.

I have moved on to cleaning all the glass; all the mirrors, framed pictures, lamps, television.

He remarks how we rarely use the television.

I polish all the wooded furniture and the house smells of almond and lemon.

He falls asleep.

I get the laundry, putting some of it outside to finish drying, clean up dishes from lunch, make the bed and feed the cat.

He is awake.

I am awake.

He is picks up another book to thumb through and asks me if I’m hungry.

I’m not

He is, so he makes some Indian food and announces again he needs to go out and study.

He gets his things together in one small tote slung over a thin, academic shoulder. He turns,

Hey, how come you never write anymore?