Jodie Marsh in Zoo Magazine...

This post is in the "tattoo series". I really like tattoos.

I wonder if the Minister of [Mis]Communication and [Lack of] Information in the Republic of Indonesia would like to shake hands with Jodie Marsh? After all, they are not related.

Although, I am guessing that a few people will be thinking that they might want to be reincarnated as a stuffed bear!

Glee & Promoting Pedophilia...

Hmmm...

Glee is a TV show that airs on Fox in the US. It is classed as a musical comedy-drama, and it follows the trials and tribulations of high school teenagers as they wend there collective ways through some good old teenage angst issues. Interesting a lot of the cast are not teenagers at all but adult actors playing the role of teenagers. Apart from being a pretty popular TV series, Glee has come in for some closer scrutiny after a recent photo-shoot of some of the 20-something actors (Lea Michele, Dianna Agron, and Corey Monteith) from the show appeared in GQ magazine.

The controversy arose because the Parents Television Council in the US has labelled the photos as "bordering on paedophilia". This in turn raises some interesting legal issues as to how one should proceed when adult age actors who are play the roles of teenagers then pose for sexy photos. Can the sexy photo of a 20+ something actor ever be an image that promotes pedophilia. It would seem that the assumption is that because these actors play the roles of not yet of age teenagers then any image of them that sexualises them is promoting pedophilia.

The reality is that if these young people use their fame to promote themselves through sexy photo-shoots, even ones that overtly sexualise them, don't they have a right to do it? After all, the people involved are all of legal age, and by any definition of the law have a right to make the decisions that they have. The photos themselves are not pornographic and do not violate any decency standards or norms for television or for print media.

Nevertheless, this is an interesting legal issue that extends beyond this particular instance. For example, can purveyors of porn be arrested and jailed for the upload / download of images of adults wearing, or part wearing of, school uniforms? In a lot of jurisdictions the law has been amended or worded in such a way as what the image attempts to convey or the content as being the key determiner in whether an image is classified as child porn.

So, simply if the point is to provide sexual gratification through the belief that one is looking at a naked or near naked child, even where the "child" in question is in fact an adult, then a crime has been committed. At least this is how I understand the law to work (time for more research and update myself on the laws in this area).

Therefore, if that interpretation of the law is accurate, then is it possible to mount a child porn case with images like the ones in GQ? I would argue not. Any reasonable person would know that the young people depicted in these images are adults and not children.

I am not sure how these particular photos promote pedophilia. I must be missing something.

There is Silly, then There is Stupid, and then There is Matt Nicholls...

This post needs to be premised with a disclaimer of sorts. It is based on facts currently available to me. I reserve the right to amend this post should "other" facts come to light which force we into a back down and apology to Mr. Nicholls.

Here we go!

There was a recent shooting death in Sydney of a NSW Police Officer. Constable William (Bill) Crews was involved in a raid on a house in Bankstown (Southwestern Sydney). The raid was drug-related. During the raid Constable Crews was shot in the head and subsequently died. One man has been charged with discharging a firearm with the intent to kill. Another has been charged with the possession of an illegal firearm.

The charges in themselves are interesting in that they highlight the forensics team is still trying to work out who fired the fatal bullet. There is current speculation that Constable Crews may have been shot by a fellow officer. Ultimately, forensics will reveal all with respect to who fired the fatal shot.

However, I digress. Constable Crews is from a reasonably small rural town in NSW called Glen Innes. I passed through there not long back on my way to Moree for a practicum placement. The editor, Nicholls, of the local newspaper, the Glen Innes Examiner, has updated his Facebook status to suggest that the paper can capitalise on the death of Constable Crews and the devastation of the family he has left behind because of his history with the town of Glen Innes.

For Nicholls, the death meant that it was a perfect opportunity to boost the circulation of the Fairfax-owned tome. Not content to leave it there, Nicholls decided that it was worth noting on Facebook that the paper must be looking at exploiting the death for all it is worth by making the most of the tragedy.

Now, Nicholls has denied that he made the offending Facebook posts. Nevertheless, he has been stood down effective immediately. Fairfax has issued an apology for any offense that has occurred to the Crews family.

Here is the commentary part to this post. Even if you were thinking that, and even if you believe that, where was the common sense kick in that said, "do not post this publicly on Facebook?" If we were to be perfectly honest about this whole thing, then it is fair to say that papers, as do magazines and television, endeavour to capitalise on the tragedy that befalls people and their subsequent suffering. That is the nature of the game, is it not?

What is not done is confessing this in public spaces such as Facebook within 24 to 48 hours of the tragedy unfolding. We as people, as consumers of news, are a little more savvy, perhaps cynical, than this. We certainly do not need the editor of the Glen Innes Examiner to be telling us this on his Facebook page.

Final point. The alleged Facebook posts of Nicholls are disrespectful more than anything else. The decision to become a police officer and dedicate your life to the protection of others and the community as a whole is one very few men and women take. Perhaps it is because, for some of us, we are not prepared to lay it all on the line and make the ultimate sacrifice as Constable Crews has done. Maybe this is what we should be considering in this case.

My condolences to the Crews family on your loss.

Luna Maya -- Law Student and Porn Star...

It is hard not to feel for Luna Maya. She seems to be a really nice young woman caught up in something that she never would have imagined for herself in a lifetime of entertainment. It is funny how those things happen when one is least expecting them to. She is most definitely a reluctant porn star and appears genuinely remorseful for placing herself in such a situation.  

It might be argued that if you play with fire, then it is only a matter of time before you get burned. This may be true, but it is also unfair to watch a person be victimised and vilified for at its very worst a misjudgment in allowing herself to be filmed in a compromising position. 

The reality remains that no one would have ever seen this video or been any of the wiser about its existence but for the commission of a crime. That crime, I put to you, ladies and gentlemen of the court of public opinion, is not the making of the mobile camera video, but rather the theft of that film and its subsequent publication on the internet. Luna Maya is innocent.

It is hard to work out whether this is just an unfortunate coincidence or a case of a very sad irony, but Luna Maya is also a law student. She is in her fifth semester at the Langlang Buana University in Bandung. The law faculty has been quick to note that she has been an above average student and successful in her studies to date. But, without missing a beat, the Dean of the Faculty has also said that there would be no problem expelling her if she was found guilty of a crime. 

Although, it would be of no surprise if she was expelled for other reasons that were unrelated to her most recent porn acting credits, such as failure to attend sufficient numbers of classes or some other administrative reason. Then again, guilty or not, perhaps the university and faculty expel her for bringing the name of the university into disrepute by linking it forever with pornography.

In a perfect world, she cannot be expelled as she has simply not committed any crime. Nevertheless, it would be  understatement in the extreme to say that stranger things have happened in Indonesia. 

I hope that the storm in a tea cup that this is will soon blow over and all those involved can get back to some semblance of normalcy in their respective lives. Their lives are never going to be the same as this will always be there, out there, in cyber space. But, it has been milked by the gossip shows for all it is worth, it is now time to move onto something of much greater importance to the future of Indonesia.

How about education? Specifically, how about making university education affordable to anyone who wants to have a crack at it?

Megan Fox, Panties, Crotch Shot, and Criticism...

It would seem that there has been much criticism of Megan Fox lately.

But some of the more recent is that she is somewhat "slutty". However, Ms. Fox responds with the charge that the reason her detractors think and talk like that is because she is beautiful and smart.

Nevertheless, I will reserve my judgment for some other day. But, I do post these pictures for your viewing pleasure, and so that you may make a determination for yourself about whether the criticisms are warranted or not.

These photos are classed as outtakes from a recent photo shoot she did for the New York Times (NYT) Magazine.

Obama's Indonesian Wedding Ring...

As media stories go, this must mean that there is no news of real importance out there in the world of national or international affairs or the design of Obama's gold wedding band is in fact news of both national and international importance. I will leave you to be the judge on this one.

The photos are courtesy of The Huffington Post.

Just about everyone in the world must know that Obama has a black Kenyan father and a white American mother. Most all must also know that he spent some of his formative years in Indonesia. Apparently he still has fond memories of the country, and still speaks a little of the local lingo, Bahasa Indonesia, or just plain old Indonesian to the rest of us.

The New York Times magazine has a story on the "First Marriage" , and the story identifies that Barack Obama's wedding ring is not only gold, but that it is crafted in a traditional Indonesian style.

I wonder whether this gives more fodder to the birthers who seem to still be fascinated with whether or not Obama is qualified to be president as they dither between whether he was born in Kenya or Hawaii and whether the president ever held Indonesian citizenship or not as a boy (courtesy of his stepfather, Lolo Soetoro).

In any event, the fact that the "most powerful man" in the world is wearing a wedding band using an Indonesian design is a bit of an advertising and marketing scoop for Indonesian jewelry artisans everywhere. Perhaps, there may now be a run on wedding bands with an Indonesian design.

Thanks Obama!

Tiara (Tia) Lestari -- For "The Stump"...

Stump...

I believe Tiara or Tia has a blog. But, if you were so inclined this is the Google search and this is the Google picture search.

Polygamy and Life Expectancy

If one ever needed a good argument for the practice of polygamy, then it seems researchers have found one. The University of Sheffield has found that men in polygamous cultures live 12% longer than those from non-polygamous cultures.

The research has been published in the New Scientist magazine and is based on a survey of older men from 140 polygamous cultures and those from 49 monogamous cultures. The findings do not get into much debate about the "why", but rather leaves it open to possible social and genetic factors.

The findings were presented in a recent conference in New York.

(Photo from here)

Beer Goggles

It has finally been proven that what most of us men already knew is a scientific fact, beer goggles are real! A team from the University of Bristol has proven in a controlled study that alcohol intake increases the regularity of our thoughts on sex and improves the appearance of those around you.

The team conducted a controlled experiment on 84 heterosexual volunteers. The experiment involved half of the group getting a little bit drunk and then the whole group being asked to rate the attractiveness of others in a series of photographs. The results of the study are reported in the New Scientist magazine.

The results indicate that those that were slightly drunk rated the attractiveness of those in the photos that they were shown as being more attractive than the group that was sober. An interesting aside was that the slightly drunk volunteers also found members of the same sex to be more attractive.

This would seem to end the argument as to whether the "beer goggle" theory is true or not, it seems that it has now been scientifically proven. I reckon that this will now become the scientific reason and excuse for those many indiscretions of one's youth.

Happy drinking to you my loyal readers!