Old people overestimate online sexual predators. (via Sex In the Public Square)

Young people overestimate condom use. (Reuters)

Everyone underestimates fetishism. (thanks Jon!)

Cleveland estimates the usefulness of comprehensive sex education. (Medical News Today)

RH Reality Check tries to estimate how progressive Sanjay Gupta will be about sex. (RH Reality Check)

Humans underestimate Chlamydia. (MSNBC.com)

I underestimate how much can be written about “alt porn”. (Blue Blood Magazine)

weblogUpdates.ping Sexuality - About Sexual Pleasure and Sexual Health http://sexuality.about.com/

Is the answer:
a) They both scarred me as a child?
b) They both involve pancake make-up?
c) They’re both more believable when you’re drunk?

Not sure of the right answer here? I guess in part the answer will depend on how you feel about clowns. But you can be sure that Derek Dye, an abstinence-only clown “educator” sees many connections.

That’s right, he’s a clown AND he delivers abstinence-only lessons. I read about Derek (who is not the guy pictured on the right) and his sad-because-it’s-true clowning around on Amplify, a new website from Advocates for Youth. Here’s their take on it:

Thanks to George W. Bush and a complicit Congress, we currently spend $1.5 billion a year to fund abstinence-only until marriage sex education in our public schools. And yes, that money goes to people like Derek Dye, as he is employed by the Elizabeth New Life Center that received a $800,000 CBAE grant in 2007 to promote abstinence until marriage. His qualifications? A “Bachelor of Fun Arts” from Barnum Bailey Clown College, and an abstinence educator certification that can be purchased for $50.

Follow the link below and watch the video of Derek in action. While watching it I found myself torn between my love of clowns and my desire to shove this particular clown deep into one of those little clown cars. For guidance I turned to my friend, colleague and hero Ducky Doolittle, who is a clown, a sex educator, and the author of Sex With the Lights On):

So what do you think of Derek? I mean he had no make up, no red nose, is it fair for him to call himself a clown?

Derek is definitely not a clown. He may have graduated from Barnum Bailey Clown College but loads of untalented jackasses have come out of the college. Including Steve O. The guy who staples his balls to his own thigh and swims with sharks. A sweater vest does not a clown make.

Do all clowns talk like you?

If they are real clowns, yes.

Would you say clowns generally lean one way or the other on the issue of sexuality education?

I would say clowns will SAY they lean one way or the other. But in actuality, the clowns that claim to be all high and morally mighty are most likely secretly buying sex off real clowns. I say we examine Derek's financial record and see where he's buying those juggling balls. Fer real.

How did you become a clown?

I was born a clown!

Do you think your training as a clown supports your work supporting people's sexual health, or the other way around?

Honestly, all horn honking aside, I know a lot more people can digest what I have to say about sex because I am funny. Being able to laugh helps us relax. It's a simple formula. Which is why we need more funding for medically accurate sex educators, who may happen to be very funny. We need schools to have the opportunity to teach the fact about anatomy, pregnancy, safer sex, and STIs. This is a proven fact.

Read more – Amplify: Federal tax dollars are going to clowns…literally. CLOWNS

Learn More - Meet Ducky Doolittle

_{Photo credit: Leland Bobbe/Getty Images}

The Adult Entertainment Expo, which is the largest consumer porn convention in the U.S. and closes each year with the AVN porn award show, wrapped up Monday. From what I’ve heard it was a slow year and thinner attendance than in previous years. This makes sense as it’s what you hear from almost all trade shows these days (just ask the folks in Detroit).

I was talking today with a buyer from a retail chain about her experience at the show, and we got talking about the future of porn. Not the public policy and politics of porn, which I find dense and generally too simple minded to warrant a response, but the business and informed customer end of porn; the business of providing sexual imagery for people to watch and get turned on by.

So here are some of my thoughts about the possible big changes coming in porn. As always, I don’t recommend placing bets on any of this, but if you do and you win, please take my cut and donate it to Scarleteen.

Could We Be Porn-ed Out?
One thing I wonder about is whether or not it’s possible that we’re consuming less porn than we used to. Really we’d have no way of knowing. All the stats are juiced by the private companies that profit from the headlines, and then mindlessly reprinted by the New York Times each year which legitimizes the fake numbers for other media outlets and even some academics. We can’t trust the industry trying to cure us of porn addiction anymore than we can trust the industry trying to give us porn addictions. So how would we know if porn consumption has gone down? I’m not saying we’ll loose interest in consuming sexual imagery. It’s just that 98% of everything put out by the mainstream porn industry looks and feels the same. And we’re inundated with this stuff, so it’s not inconceivable that en masse we could actually get sick of the product.

The Porn Portals
Those who control the methods of distribution have always held a lot of power and made a lot of money. Larry Flynt knew this years ago when he bought the distribution arm of the biggest U.S. porn producer as a way of establishing what was at that time a primarily print company as a major player in moving image porn. But the DVD distribution model is dying out. People prefer digital distribution onto mobile, computers, and televisions. One of the most promising products is called FyreTV. It’s a digital box that gives you access to tens of thousands of porn films through your TV. The functionality and user interface seem simple and precisely what viewers want. FyreTV isn’t the only player and won’t be the last. Several companies are doing this online already. Consumers will vote with their wallets though, and eventually a few companies will win out. But then what? All the convenience of these services is greatly outweighed by the fact that the choices are overwhelming. How convenient is it to have 30,000 movies to flip through?

The Porn Curators
That’s where porn curators and critics come in. I suspect that some people will end up making a lot of money (and if it’s the right people, they’ll be doing a lot of good at the same time) being the ones that help viewers figure out what they’ll like and delivering it to them. Porn audiences are simultaneously becoming more discerning and more comfortable with their porn interests. I think many will pay a bit extra for a service that means they won’t have to scan through 31 volumes of “Jug Mamas” just to get to the movie they want. The fact is that most of us don’t know exactly what we want anyway. We may know what “works,” but for over twelve years I’ve helped customers pick porn to match their tastes and I can tell you that most people are surprised by what they end up finding arousing. Being able to take folks through the options and help them find something that doesn’t just do the trick but opens new doors will be a valuable service. Also, for the majority of people who won’t ever be comfortable talking to someone about their porn tastes, having a computer mediated interface that does the job without the judgment will be another thing for which people will pay top dollar.

Will Fewer Titles Deliver Better Titles?
It’s inevitable that with the death of the DVD porn producers will change the way they do business. One possibility is that the industry will slow down its output considerably. It’s interesting to think about what would happen if all of the sudden instead of 10,000 releases a year there were only 3,000. Those companies that are sophisticated and diversified in their output; the ones that invest time and money in their productions, probably won’t change much. But what about the majority of those who make porn, the ones that churn out hundreds of titles a year? If someone like Jim Powers only put out 50 movies a year instead of 100, would that improve the quality of his work? And really, do we want to see what Jim Powers would do if he had more time on his hands?

On the one hand porn producers will stop doing what they’re doing when it stops being profitable. The problem with this (from a quality perspective) is that it costs so little they don’t have to make much for it to make financial sense for them.

When Anyone Can Watch Anything
One of the exciting things about digital delivery systems will be how they will, to an extent, even the playing field for smaller producers and filmmakers. Right now if you want to watch an indie lesbian title from Fatale Media, or trans porn that is made by people who identify as trans, or a queer porn that isn’t really straight people faking it for the pay cheque you either have to watch it online (and know where to look for it online) or live in a big city with an alternative video store. When companies like Pink and White Productions, Buck Angel, and Fatale Media have their titles up against Vivid, Wicked, and Falcon, more people will have easier access to porn that’s meant to genuinely represent a range of sexual expression. Bigger companies will always have the marketing power, but the independents have already proven savvy in the ways of grassroots porn marketing, and their success, when measured against the bigger companies, may move mainstream porn along in terms of quality and representation.

A groundbreaking report called Sex and the Seminary: Preparing Ministers for Sexual Health and Justice was released last week and it reveals just how poorly seminaries and religious schools are preparing the next generation of religious leaders to deal with issues of gender and sexuality in their communities and congregations.

The report was a joint project of the The Religious Institute on Sexual Morality, Justice, and Healing and the Union Theological Seminary and was based on a survey of 36 leading seminaries and rabbinical schools of diverse size and geographic location, representing a range of Christian, Jewish and Unitarian Universalist traditions.

Here are some of the findings of the report:

• More than 90% of the seminaries surveyed do not require students to complete a sexuality-based course for graduation.
• Two-thirds of the seminaries do not offer a course in sexuality issues for religious professionals.
• Three-quarters do not offer a course in lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) studies.
• Seminaries offer three times as many courses in women’s and feminist studies as they do in LGBT studies or other sexuality-related issues.
• Where they exist, sexuality-based courses are being taught by senior professors or adjunct faculty, not by upcoming faculty seeking tenured positions.

The survey wasn’t all bad news. Many schools, and more particularly students at the schools, are finding ways to introduce the topic of sexuality into their studies. For example:

• 80% of the institutions surveyed offer classes or workshops in sexual harassment prevention And most schools have sexual harassment policies for faculty, staff, and student relationships.
• Twenty-five percent of seminaries have free standing centers or programs dedicated to a sexuality-related issue.
• Students are creating their own opportunities for sexuality-related non-curricular experiences.
• Many of the seminaries offer sexuality-related worship and student advocacy or support groups.
• When sexuality is addressed it’s often addressed within a frame work of intersecting social justice issues, such as economics, environmental issues, racial/ethnic diversity, and disability issues.

In a prepared release Rev. Debra Haffner, director of the Religious Institute and a lifelong sexuality education activist points out the irony that sexuality issues are not being dealt with in seminaries:

“With so many congregations embroiled in controversy over sexual orientation issues, or struggling to address teenage sexuality, or concerned about sexual abuse, there is an urgent need for ordained clergy who understand the connections between religion and sexuality. Seminaries must do more to prepare students to minister to their congregants and be effective advocates for sexual health and justice.”

Rev. Dr. Serene Jones of the Union Theological Seminary which partnered on the study adds:

“Religious leaders have a unique opportunity, and moral obligation, to help congregations and communities wrestle with the complexities of sexual health and justice. Is there any subject more important and more on-the-ground crucial than sexual health and human flourishing? This study challenges all of us who are charged with ministerial formation to look closely at the institutional environment we create to prepare our students to be active and informed – and hence to effect people from the pulpit and in the public square.”

Of course is the blanket understanding is that if you’re a religious leader, particularly one who has taken a vow of chastity, sexuality is not within your scope of practice, it makes sense that seminaries would see no reason to train their students. But as both women point out, and anyone who reads a newspaper or is a member of a religious congregation already knows, sex and sexuality are part of life, for clergy as much as for laypeople.

This study is important both in that it begins to shed light on what’s actually happening in the training of religious leaders, but also for drawing the public’s attention to the issue. With an entertainment media saturated in sex talk it’s easy for us to forget that we do need more open and honest conversations about sexuality; that in most cases more talk is better than less. This study will have many of us talking for months and years to come.

Read the Report – The Religious Institute on Sexual Morality, Justice, and Healing: Sex and the Seminary

Previously – The Moral Compass: Online Sex and Religion Project