Bombastic 'Mo

Let’s Vilify Some More People

Representative Mark Miloscia just introduced a bill that would add an 18.5% sales tax to all adult entertainment items.  The Digest of the Bill reads:

“Dedicates revenue from a tax on the sale and use of adult entertainment materials and services to crime victims’ compensation, with an emphasis towards providing services, support, or therapy to those children who are victims of sexual abuse.

Imposes an additional tax on each retail sale of adult entertainment materials and services equal to eighteen and one-half percent of the selling price.  Requires all revenue collected on sales and use of adult entertainment materials and services to be deposited in the general fund to be used solely for the general assistance unemployable program.”

I’m pro-tax in almost any regard, and I really appreciate that we’re in dire need of new streams of revenue.  But this bill is completely wrong.

I believe in the “sin tax”.  I think raising the taxes on cigarettes makes sense, as they do have a tangible cost to society.   (Full disclosure: I’ve never smoked in my life.)

I can also get behind taxes on alcohol.  Like cigarettes, they have an associated cost to society (DUI’s, disintegrating livers, urine in alleyways) that’s not bundled into the cost of production.  (Full disclosure:  I got so drunk in Portland last weekend I vomited in my pants.)

But this doesn’t pass those same standards.  First off, it’d be very difficult to associate any real, tangible, negative affects of pornography or sex toys on society.  If anything, I think it’d be easier to prove their positive effect.  (One example would be this study that links an increase in access to Internet pornography to a decrease in rape.)

Second, this tax is simply meant to impose a tax on people who generally would be unwilling to speak up for themselves.  Unfortunately we’re still living in the remnants of a very Puritanical society, and many people are rather closeted about their adult entertainment expenditures.  It’s a very dangerous precedent to set to tax people who are either afraid or unable to defend themselves.

And third, the adult entertainment industry isn’t a good revenue source.  With the rise of YouTube-style porn sites, the vast majority of porn is now available for free.  In addition, unless the state gets a LOT better at policing our Internet use, it’s going to be a hard item to itemize.  Especially since the providers (who are mostly out of state already) will simply move further away from Washington.

Seriously folks.  It’s time for a fucking income tax.

Maybe I’ll start watching football afterall

I skipped this year’s Superbowl, as I’ve never been one to take an interest in watching sports. Or eating nacho dip and drinking Bud Light.

But apparently this year I missed out.  Viewers in Tucson, Arizona were given a brief intermission from the normal ball-play shortly after “Larry Fitzgerald’s heroic comeback(ish) touchdown for the Cardinals” (reports i.gizmodo… I’m not even going to try to report on the actual football).

The video feed cut directly to the Club Jenna channel, and showed porn star Evan Stone bouncing his junk back and forth across his thighs like a game of pong.

Comcast has yet to give a concrete reason for the err, although their poor Call Center employees are likely never going to hear the end of it.

Anyone wishing to experience the blooper themselves can catch a video on http://i.gizmodo.com/5144199/comcast-tucson-airs-graphic-porn-during-super-bowl-nsfw

OMG Becky! Your body’s not your own.

In a startling example of sex-negativity, invasion of privacy, and just plain stupidity, the police department of Greensburg, Pennsylvania is charging six teenage students of Greensburg Salem High School with child pornography offenses.

The charges stem from the nude and semi-nude photos three 14 and 15-year-old girls took of themselves and sent to three of their male peers via cell phone.

Police are charging the three girls with “manufacturing, disseminating or possessing child pornography”, and the boys are being charged with possession of child pornography.

“Taking nude pictures of yourself, nothing good can come out of it,” said Police Captain George Seranko in a statement to local news affiliate, WPXI.

The photos were discovered in October, after officials at the high school took the cell phone from one of the boys.  Cell phone use is against the school’s policy.  The first photo found was a self-portrait taken by one of the girls.

Apparently Captain Seranko decided to file the charges in order to send a strong message to other students.

“It’s very dangerous,” Seranko told WXPI. “Once it’s on a cell phone, that cell phone can be put on the Internet where everyone in the world can get access to that juvenile picture. You don’t realize what you are doing until it’s already done.”

MSNBC picked up the story, and spoke with Patrick Artur, a Philadelphia defense attorney regarding the charges  “It’s clearly overkill,” Artur told MSNBC.  “… The letter of the law seems to have been violated, but this is not the type of defendant that the legislature envisioned.”

This entire debacle makes me sick.  According to a Cincinatti article on “sexting”, 20% of teens have sent or posted online nude or semi-nude pictures of themselves.  Cincinatti.com also contacted Christopher Kraus, the director of the group Postponing Sexual Involvement based out of the Cincinatti Children’s Hospital.

“Adolescent sexuality is part of normal human development,” Kraus told Cincinatti.com. “Teens are trying to figure out how to express their sexuality appropriately. They are learning, and they are learning from adults.”

Apparently they’re learning that the adults are hypocrites.  Although there are no mandatory minimum sentences under Pennsylvania’s child porn laws, the teens could still be forced to register as sex offenders for at least 10 years.  Pretty heavy-duty attack on civil liberties.

Perhaps more disturbing, in the comments section at the bottom of the WXPI article were frustrated pleas from the mother of one of the young boys now charged with possession of child pornography. [Edited for grammar/spelling throughout.]

“Please don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying what my son did is right and that he shouldn’t be punished.  He should have deleted the pic when the other boy sent it to him.  If I would have found the pics on his phone, he would have been grounded and he wouldn’t have his phone anymore ( I have a daughter).  What I’m trying to say is that my son shouldn’t be charged with sexual abuse of children. My son never touched or hurt anyone!  For the rest of his life he will have to register with Megan’s law.  He won’t ever be allowed around kids.  How will he ever go to college or get a job?  This charge will label my son as a sex offender.  If I don’t find a way to get the charge dropped, my son’s life is over.”