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Sep '03
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Bishops and Bigots
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Canada is now in the midst of an important stage in the evolution of rights for
gay and lesbian people-- and religion is not necessarily on the side of the angels in
this fight. |
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Aug '03
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Shooting the moon
By: Blanche Poubelle
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When Miss Poubelle was a teenager, one of the few entertainments available in her small southern town was driving down to the river and getting drunk. After a few cans of Miller, some teenage boys would often feel emboldened to drive back into town,
mooning any cars that they passed. |
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Jul '03
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I Vant to Suck Your...
By: Blanche Poubelle
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When Miss Poubelle was grow- ing up in small town South Carolina, there must have been some high school kids who were having sex, but there wasn't much evidence of it. Nobody was obviously pregnant, and abortions were carried out discreetly across the border in Georgia. |
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Jun '03
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Memo to Senator Santorum...
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Although you faced a storm of public criticism for your statement "If the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual sex within your home, then you have the right to
bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything," we at PACTUP would like to thank you for the clear logic of
your statement. |
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May '03
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Sinful sperm?
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Miss Poubelle has been enjoying the fascinating
book A Mind of its Own: A Cultural History of the
Penis, by David M. Friedman. In this book, Friedman explores different ways that
Western society has viewed the penis and its products over the centuries. |
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Apr '03
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French fiction
By: Blanche Poubelle
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The language of the warmongers consciously plays on this history of hostility to the French
to bolster their case for war on Iraq |
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Mar '03
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Foreskin conformity
By: Blanche Poubelle
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The US and Canada these days boast an unusual distinction-- they are two of the few places in the world where you are fairly likely to encounter both cut and uncut men in any context
where naked men are to be found-- gym locker rooms, saunas, or bath houses. In most other countries, circumcision is either very rare or nearly universal. The general rule is that for
religious reasons, circumcision is nearly universal in Muslim countries and among Jews, wherever they are found. In most of the rest of the world-- Latin America, Europe, East and (non-Muslim)
South Asia, and Australia-- circumcision is fairly unusual. |
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Feb '03
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Tickled Fancy
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Miss Poubelle's friend Kit used to date a big handsome guy from Brandeis. Returning from a weekend there, Kit confessed that he was torn about whether to return. His date had held
him down and tickled him over and over again till he finally pissed his pants. "What was weird," Kit said, "was that he had a big hard on while he was doing it. And I got one too!" |
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Jan '03
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Balls & Strikes
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Miss Poubelle's friend Sig has had a broad experience with the range of gay male sexuality. But even Sig was surprised when he met a big Quebecois trucker who wanted to be punched in the nuts. |
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Dec '02
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The Jackass phenomenon
By: Blanche Poubelle
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If Miss Poubelle told you that she recently saw a film in which men torture each other with electric shocks, drink piss, and shove things up their asses, would you imagine that she
had rented a gay SM video? If so, you'd be wrong. Instead, she just saw the movie
Jackass, which is one of the top-grossing (in every sense) films currently showing in the United States. |
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Nov '02
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Pendulous organs
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Miss Poubelle began to wonder about the expression
well hung. Where does this phrase come from? The connection of meaning between
the penis and hanging is fairly obvious, but the history of this idiom is rather interesting. |
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Oct '02
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British beach balls
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Last month's column found Blanche on a nude beach in Mykonos, chatting with her British friends Ffiona, Sebastian, Nigel, and Gareth about the many uses of
bollocks in British English. As she pointed out there,
bollocks refers literally to the testicles. It's related to the word
balls, which is the common American English equivalent. But far from being restricted
to anatomy, the British word has gone on to take several additional meanings. And the vacationing Brits were happy to clue Miss Poubelle in on the mysteries of British
bollocks. |
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Sep '02
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British Bollocks
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Miss Poubelle was lucky enough to spend a few days on the fabulous island of Mykonos this summer. The town is gorgeous, with cubist white build- ings piled on top of each other like sugar cubes, and narrow, pedestrian walkways leading through them to the bustling harbor. |
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Aug '02
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Merkins 'R' Us
By: Blanche Poubelle
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The Oxford English Dictionary contains some mysterious and perplexing words, and one that has always puzzled Miss Poubelle is the word
merkin. The dictionary defines it as 'a pubic wig' and dates it to the 18th century,
but otherwise gives us no details of where the word comes from or how it has been used. |
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Jul '02
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The Tyranny of the Eyes
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Miss Poubelle's friend Sig was invited to a J/O party in Rochester a number of years ago. The party was being held on the second floor of a duplex, and apart from a candle in the
kitchen the place was completely black. The organizers, in an inspired bit of party planning, had decided that since it was October, a Halloween black-out J/O party would be just the thing. |
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Jun '02
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Battle of the lovebots
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Realistic sex dolls are in their infancy, but it's already possible to imagine some of the legal controversies that may surround them. They will no doubt be judged indecent and made
illegal in Utah. |
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May '02
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The man gap
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Miss Poubelle met another one last week. An intelligent, well-educated, attractive woman in her late thirties with no prospect of marriage or children. Although she wanted both, she had pretty much given up hope and was
resigned to spending the rest of her life alone. |
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Apr '02
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Intersexual rights now!
By: Blanche Poubelle
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What does it mean to be transgendered? At one end of the spectrum are heterosexual, anatomical males who are drawn to wear women's clothing. In the middle are those who are transitioning from one gender to
another, perhaps through surgical means. And finally, there are those born with genitals which are not obviously male or female. |
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Mar '02
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Suburban teabagging party
By: Blanche Poubelle
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The latest scandal to hit Miss Poubelle's local paper is the
teabagging scandal at Averill Park High School. |
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Feb '02
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Bathhouse Rules
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Miss Poubelle does not know how long there have been gay bathhouses. The idea of a bathhouse itself, is of course, quite old. In an era in which few people had facilities for bathing at home, there were public bathhouses in
many places and many times. And in some countries, such as Japan and Turkey, public bathhouses continue as a place for pleasurable relaxation even now that they are not strictly necessary for cleanliness. |
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Jan '02
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Fingering Machismo
By: Blanche Poubelle
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How many genders can a society have? Just two? Well, in Tonga they've got three, thank you very much. And if you think that sounds good, just read on. |
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Dec '01
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Dyke mullet blues
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Miss Poubelle's friend Miki needed a shoulder to cry on. "I hate my hair and I'm going to kick somebody's ass." After half a box of Kleenex, the following story unfolded... |
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Nov '01
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Oedipal Etymology
By: Blanche Poubelle
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The first taboo was the incest taboo. In every human society, it's generally forbidden for children to have sex with their parents. The consequences of violating the taboo are dramatized in the story of Oedipus, who marries his mother and then blinds himself in horror when he discovers what he's done. So it shouldn't surprise us to learn that calling someone a
motherfucker is an insult. |
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Oct '01
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Gettin' Jiggy
By: Blanche Poubelle
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In the seventies, there was a popular bumper sticker that said, "What if they had a war and nobody came?" Miss Poubelle's question for the month is the linguistic equivalent-- What if there were a popular new word,
and nobody knew what it meant? |
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Sep '01
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Whole lot of shagging goin' on...
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Though Miss Poubelle did not have high expectations for
Bridget Jones's Diary, she had to confess that the movie was a delightful bit of fluff. And it was an additional pleasure to hear Renee Zellweger's surprisingly good
British accent as she discussed the hazards of a single woman in London looking for a good
shag. |
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Aug '01
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The politics of pissing
By: Blanche Poubelle
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On a recent trip to Berlin, Miss Poubelle stayed in a lovely apartment in the heart of the gay neighborhood around Nollendorfplatz. She was surprised, however, to go to the bathroom and
discover a sticker on the toilet seat. |
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Jul '01
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We're liberated!
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Gay and lesbian liberation took a big step forward this year when the Netherlands became the first country to allow full-fledged same-sex marriage. Many other countries have come close, offering domestic partnerships and other legal arrangements that approximate marriage, but the Netherlands was the first to offer real marriage for gay and lesbian couples. |
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Jun '01
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Oystering
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Given the seemingly endless human imagination for sexuality in every conceivable variety, the idea that there might still be a few unnamed sex acts would have struck Miss Poubelle as implausible till recently. And then she
heard about oystering. |
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May '01
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Gay and Lesbian bodhisattvas
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Many of us are fortunate enough to have achieved the dream-- we live lives that are openly gay. We have found lovers and networks of gay friends, and we don't live in fear of exposure on the job, rejection from our families,
or violence on the street. That is a remarkable achievement of the gay rights movement-- one that was scarcely imaginable thirty years ago. |
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Apr '01
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Sailors & Showers
By: Blanche Poubelle
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Miss Poubelle's local YMCA hosts a summer camp for kids, and for part of the day they go swimming in our pool. So, for several weeks, Miss Poubelle would show up to workout and encounter a locker room full of ten-year old boys who needed to change out of
their wet swimsuits. |
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