Egyptian Expert on Islamic Law Malika Zarrar Blasts Fatwas

In an interview with the Egyptian Al-Faraeen TV, Malika Zarrar, an Egyptian expert on Islamic law, sounded off on various fatwas dealing with sexual practices that she called "shameful," and blasted several prominent Islamic scholars for their rulings.

In the interview, which aired on April 16, 2010, Zarrar said that a Saudi Islamic scholar who had described the black-eyed virgins of Paradise in explicit sexual terms "should be executed" because "this amounts to challenging Allah." On a ruling by Mufti of Egypt Ali Gum'a permitting hymen reconstruction on wedding anniversaries, she said: "Don't deal with trivial things. Instead of undergoing surgery, she can use that crap they sell for 15 Egyptian pounds... Honorable Mufti, if you've got spare time on your hands, I'll find you something to do." On a recent ruling by Islamic scholar Yousuf Al-Qaradhawi permitting a woman to kiss her husband's genitals and vice versa, she said: "What is this audacity? There is no shame left!"

Saudi Islamic Scholar Who Described the Virgins of Paradise in Sexual Terms "Should Be Executed"

TV host: "Today, we will talk about a Saudi Islamic scholar, who appeared on TV. This was a very strange event, which I will recap briefly. This was a televised lecture by a Saudi Islamic scholar, in which he described the black-eyed virgins of Paradise in explicit sexual terms. The sheikh described the life of comfort that Allah awards Muslim men in Paradise and the 70 black-eyed virgins who would fall all over him. The sheikh described the beauty of these virgins and their sexual drive: 'One would place her lips on his, another would lay her cheek against his, and a third would place her breasts on his chest.' [...]

"Is this description of the virgins accurate, or is it exaggerated?"

Malika Zarrar: "This amounts to challenging Allah. I have one question. Where is the Saudi Authority for Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice?! Where are all the Islamic scholars of Saudi Arabia?! They let such a person make a mockery of the Book of Allah? [...] He should be executed."

TV host: "You are calling for him to be executed?"

Malika Zarrar: "Yes. I am addressing the Saudi king. What is this? The authority for prevention of Vice only knows how to catch girls without veils. Where are they now?! They should send me to Saudi Arabia." [...]

If Your Husband Is a Pervert, "You Should Divorce Him... [and] Take Him to Court"

Caller: "My problem is that my husband is a very strange man. He's not normal. He asks very bizarre things of me. He asked me to be together with him and his other wife. He put a lot of pressure on me. My problem is that I have nobody. Where would I go with my two children? I have nobody. My father is dead."

TV host: "How long have you been married?"

Caller: "I'm his second wife. We've been married three and a half years."

TV host: "During all that time, he has acted normally in bed, or has he asked bizarre things of you?"

Caller: "It happened a year ago, and I said okay once or twice."

TV host: "Twice?"

Caller: "Yes. The problem is that then he asked me to do something else. The other wife has no problem with this. She goes along with it. She does whatever he tells her to do. He wanted to watch me and her having sex."

TV host: "How old is he?"

Caller: "He's putting pressure on me, and threatening to divorce me. I don't have anybody. I haven't seen the world. He's the only man I've known."

[...]

Malika Zarrar: "Divorce is inevitable in this case, because he is a pervert. The Islamic scholars and jurisprudents concur that if during sex, a woman cannot avoid being watched, touched, or heard – she must refrain from having sex."

TV host: "This has nothing to do with obedience to the husband, right?"

Malika Zarrar: "What obedience? They are making fun of us. They took this business of obedience from Justinian, and they incorporated it in the French law of Napoleon Bonaparte. That law was abolished, but we cling to it with our teeth, because there is no clear ruling on this in Islamic law. There is no such thing as obedience to a human being while defying Allah."

TV host: "I agree, but what should she do? Should she divorce him?"

Malika Zarrar: "You should divorce him, but that's not all. You should take him to court, and I call upon the judiciary in Egypt and the judges not to rely upon the letter of the law. Even in the US, where they know nothing about Islam, matrimonial life is bound by the constitution."

TV host: "Why don't you say that the man is mentally ill and could be cured?"

Malika Zarrar: He can go get cured at his family's place or in a mental asylum. He can go to hell and take the other wife with him. What they are doing is a deliberate sin. Sexual relations between a man and a woman is a form of worship."

TV host: "We will continue to discuss the topic, but we have some phone calls."

Malika Zarrar: "What's happening in Egypt, man?"

TV host: "What do you mean?"

Malika Zarrar: "What are these catastrophes we are hearing about? I heard that those accused of wife-swapping got off scot-free."

TV host: "What?"

Malika Zarrar: "They got off scot-free because there is no law on this."

TV host: "The case of the veiled teacher? They were found innocent?"

Malika Zarrar: "That's right. There's no law on this. They left the courthouse all smug." [...]

Against Hymen Reconstruction Surgery: "They Should Use that Artificial Hymen Crap from China"

TV host: "Last week, it was said on a TV show that the female religious instructors focus so much on the hymen that high-school girls are driven to engage in lesbian relations with their peers. They think it is better for them to have perverted sexual relations – even with guys – than to have their hymen torn. Do you think that your exaggerated focus on the hymen has led to girls resorting to anal sex..."

Malika Zarrar: "Ahmad, you were in high school, just like me, and you could see for yourself. When did we ever talk about such things? By the way, you deserve the Egyptian State Prize or a Nobel Prize for raising topics that interest people. You remember the days when we would talk and they would cut us off the air..."[...]

TV host: "Let's talk about a peculiar fatwa that was discussed five years ago. We discussed it again two years ago and then again last week. The Mufti of Egypt permitted hymen reconstruction on wedding anniversaries. We are not talking about Valentine's Day or the Sham Al-Nasim holiday, but about the wedding anniversary that each couple celebrates. What is your view on this?"

Malika Zarrar: "Whose ruling was this?"

TV host: "The Mufti of Egypt, Dr. Ali Gum'a, said that this is allowed if it makes the couple happy."

Malika Zarrar: "By God, Dr. Ali Gum'a, don't deal with trivial things. Instead of undergoing surgery, she can use that crap they sell for 15 Egyptian pounds... How much does it cost now? 25 Egyptian pounds..."

TV host: "By 'crap' you are referring to the Chinese-made artificial hymen?"

Malika Zarrar: "Yes. Honorable Mufti, if you've got spare time on your hands, I'll find you something to do. [...]

"A woman should do whatever she decides. She doesn't need Dr. Ali Gom'a to adjust his turban and issue a fatwa."

TV host: "70,000 fatwas were issued by Dar Al-Iftaa. What's the problem with this fatwa?"

Malika Zarrar: "It's permitted. Anything is permitted except undergoing surgery."

TV host: "How can you reconstruct the hymen without surgery?"

Malika Zarrar: "There's an alternative – that rubbish they're bringing from China. That crap."[...]

On Fatwa Permitting Kissing Spouse's Genitals: "There Is No Shame Left!"

TV host: "Recently, Dr. Yousuf Al-Qaradhawi said that the jurisprudents had ruled that a woman may kiss her husband's genitals and vice versa. But if it is done for the purpose of ejaculation, this is detestable. Do you agree with Sheikh Al-Qaradhawi that this is permissible, or not?"

Malika Zarrar: "Agree?! What is this audacity? There is no shame left!"

TV host: "Forget about the shame for a moment – is it allowed or not?"

Malika Zarrar: "What did he say?"

TV host: "He said it was permitted."

Malika Zarrar: "Then let him bear the responsibility."

TV host: "So you think it's forbidden?"

Malika Zarrar: "Let him bear the responsibility. What is this?!"

TV host: "What do you think, Dr. Malika? Is it forbidden?"

Malika Zarrar: "Anything that goes beyond the boundaries of shame... If you have no shame, do whatever you like."

TV host: "Forbidden, then."

Sex education debate heats up in Philippines

A new sex education campaign in Philippine schools has sparked widespread debate in Asia's bedrock of Catholicism, where the high birth rate is blamed for desperate poverty.

The United Nations-backed programme, which is being piloted this month in primary and high schools, aims to promote safe sex, limit the spread of HIV-AIDS and prevent unwanted pregnancies.

However, the Catholic Church and powerful conservative crusaders have struck back with a high-profile campaign to shut down the project, saying it breaks the nation's religion-based moral codes.

"Sex education in schools is not the answer to our population problem and poverty," Eric Manalang, head of the conservative political party Ang Kapatiran (The Brotherhood), told AFP on Monday.

"It promotes promiscuity among children... it does not promote the proper values that we want our children to receive in schools and we believe sex education should strictly remain a family affair."

Manalang said his party and church had filed a petition in court on Monday requesting an injunction to stop the programme.

He said the chances of the legal bid succeeding were high with the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines, as well as various parent groups, supporting the fight.

Their legal bid claims the programme impinges on parents' constitutional right to educate their children based on their religious beliefs.

"Issues that are not for children should not be taught in schools," the bishops' conference said in a statement.

While Ang Kapatiran is only a small political party, conservative religious forces led by the Church hold a lot of sway in the Philippines, where more than 80 percent of the nation's 90-million people are Catholic.

The bishops last year succeeded in blocking a proposed law in parliament that would have made it easier for the public to access state-funded contraceptives.

Nevertheless, the education department has so far held firm.

It says the programme is aimed at curbing a population growth rate of over two percent, among the highest in Asia, and does not promote out-of-marriage sex.

The scheme covers topics such as reproductive systems and cycles, hygiene, pre-marital sex, teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases, according to the education department.

Education Secretary Mona Valisno said the teaching modules were designed by professionals, including psychologists, who made sure the discussions would be educational.

"Sex education will be integrated in other subjects such as science and they are designed to be scientific and informative," she said.

"They are not designed to titillate prurient interests."

The United Nations has become embroiled in the controversy because it partly funded the project, and issued a statement last week rejecting the Church's position.

Manalang hit out at the United Nations Population Fund, the body involved in the project, saying it was interfering with internal Philippine issues.

But the fund's Philippine director, Suneeta Mukherjee, said opponents of the programme had nothing to fear.

"We are not encouraging people, or children, to have sexual relationships, we are only helping students handle their sexuality as part of the process of growing up," Mukherjee told AFP.

"Children at this age are very sensitive and must be taught by people in authority."

She pointed out that HIV was on the rise among young Filipinos, and many of the nation's poor -- a third of the population lives on less than a dollar a day -- did not have access to sound education on sexual matters.

"We just want the children to make responsible decisions," Mukherjee said.

Lady Gaga Wears A Thong, Two Guns And Little Else On ‘Rolling Stone’

Lady Gaga is (literally) using her sex appeal as a weapon on the cover of Rolling Stone’s double summer issue, sporting nothing more than two machine guns, a few strips of fabric, and a whole lot of Photoshop. Seriously, that overly airbrushed derriere looks like it belongs in the Lady Gaga comic book, not on an actual human being. Are you digging this photo, little monsters, or do you prefer Gaga’s previous bubblicious RS cover where she looks downright modest in comparison?

The 50 Best Raunchy Teen Comedies Of All Time

Today is the official first day of summer, which means toes are out, twos are out, and we’re out trying to find chicks who won’t run away just because we’re walking down the street with our joints out. What? You expected class and civility from a bunch of heathens who learned the birds and the bees from raunchy teen sex comedies? Here at Complex, we swell (with pride) at our extensive knowledge of the genre that gives hormone-crazed dudes like us coming-of-age stories that simply couldn’t be told without DD-list actresses bouncing up and down or going (gulp) full frontal.

OK, they may not be Citizen Kane or Ghandi, and some of them have downright absurd premises for the payoff, but we can count with our fingers at least five reasons every guy should be up on his teen sex comedies (when our dominant hand isn’t otherwise occupied). For your viewing pleasure, as summer really starts to heat up, Complex put together a list of the 50 best raunchy teen comedies. Get up on them and you may get a few ideas for how to get up on some other things…

50. Revenge of the Nerds 2: Nerds in Paradise
Year: 1987

After a lifetime of involuntary virginity, everyone's favorite nerds could be never be happy with a single round of sticking...it to their jock rivals. Throw in a road trip, an enlightening stay at HOTel cORAL esSEX, and more elaborate hijinx…and you've got a sequel worthy of the Tri-Lamb brothers. (Tri-Lamb? Don't mind if I do, said the Scotsman!)

LaBarbera: Obama 'Gays Down' Fatherhood with Pro-Homosexual Father's Day Proclamation

MEDIA ADVISORY, June 21 /Christian Newswire/ -- Americans For Truth About Homosexuality (AFTAH) President Peter LaBarbera today condemned President Barack Obama for "gaying down" the noble institution of fatherhood by extolling "nurturing families" with "two fathers" in his Father's Day proclamation yesterday.

Obama proclaimed:

Nurturing families come in many forms, and children may be raised by a father and mother, a single father, two fathers, a step father, a grandfather, or caring guardian.

"If an adult man chooses to embrace homosexuality, that's one thing. But two men imposing their homosexual lifestyle on an innocent, impressionable child -- thus intentionally denying that child a mother -- is something quite different. Shame on Obama for 'gaying down' the noble institution of fatherhood to appease his homosexual activist supporters."

Obama is the most pro-homosexual-agenda president in American history, and is currently working to subvert both the legal ban on open homosexuals serving in the military, and the Defense of Marriage Act, which affirms traditional marriage in federal law.

"Who can deny the notorious promiscuity that is rampant in the gay male subculture – and which often continues even after two homosexual men adopt a child," LaBarbera said. "Witness gay parenting's poster-boy, Dan Savage, a sex-advice columnist and author of The Kid: What Happened When My Boyfriend And I Decided to Go Get Pregnant. Savage promotes 'non-monogamy' as an alternative to marital fidelity -- and admits that he his 'husband' twice engaged in sexual 'three-ways' even after they adopted a baby boy. (One wonders who babysat 'the kid' during their homosexual sex romp.)"

Such is the extent of tolerated outside sex in male homosexual relationships that their "negotiated" rules for "nonexclusivity" are studied by academics. "The gay community's normative acceptance of casual sex, anonymous sex and nonmonogamy in couple relationships represents a dramatic departure from heterocentric norms and values," wrote researchers Johnson and Keren in 1996.

"As a gay therapist who has seen hundreds of male couples in a vast range of unconventional, loving, and sustaining relationship configurations -- including monogamy, nonmonogamy, three-partner relationships and more -- I have grown to respect the fluidity and customized relationship forms that can work well for gay men (and potentially for all people)," wrote homosexual therapist Michael Shernoff in 2006.

But even if two homosexual men keep their disordered relationship "faithful," homosexual parenting would not be worthy of celebration, LaBarbera said: "It is wrong to force children into a situation where they have two men modeling immoral behavior -- condemned by God and all major religions -- as the most important role models in their lives."

"Gay parenting is a selfish social experiment whose long-term effect on children has not yet been determined -- biased homosexual-authored studies notwithstanding," he said. "We know that dad-and-mom-led homes are the best for children. That is the timeless brand of fatherhood that Obama should be promoting."

Mallika Sherawat to Act with Salma Hayek?

Bollywood turned Hollywood starlet Mallika Sherawat made some noise at the Cannes film festival. The actress hosted a party at the India pavilion which industry folks such as acclaimed Bollywood producer Subhash Ghai attended. She also did a promo performance for her film Hisss on the roof top of the Majestic hotel during the festival and debut the film at the famous event.

Sherawat has been rubbing shoulders with the who's who of Hollywood and it turns out that she got to know actress Salma Hayek at the festival. Sources say that Hayek was impressed with Sherawat's performance in her film Hisss and is interested in doing a movie with her. The project is about women around the world dealing with abuse. Sherawat is suppose to play the lead in it. Mallika's camp said that nothing is official yet however they will let the public know when it is. Mallika has already acted in Hollywood films, The Myth' with Jackie Chan, Hisss and Love Barack. Can this be another one to add to her list?

Sherawat is definitely making a name for herself in the west being called Bollywood's most famous sex symbol by hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons and hanging out with American artist such as R&B sensation Usher who she has tweeted about.

Prior to acting in the west Mallika was known for her Bollywood film's Kwashish and Murder. In both films Mallika Sherawat played the role of a sexy female, causing the media to nickname her "Bollywood Bombshell" and "The Sex Queen of Bollywood."

Sherawat continued to choose roles which required her to play up her status of a sex symbol. Her status as a sexy actress spread throughout India and the world. She became the first Indian actress offered to pose for Playboy; she turned it down.

Then in 2006, Mallika decided that she wanted to show the world that she was more than just a pretty face. She wanted to prove that she could be a serious actress as well. Her amazing performance in Pyaar Ke Side Effects won her rave reviews from critics and fans alike.

In 2007 Mallika Sherawat added yet another accomplishment to her long list of achievements; she became the highest paid actress in Bollywood history. She was paid Rs. 1.5 crores for her ten minute cameo appearance in Aap Ka Suroor.

Now she is making waves in the US and her track record shows us that her career in Hollywood is on the rise.

Silence on the transgender issue

Gallup Pakistan find 60% of Pakistanis would not like to be friends with a transgender person.

A recent report by Gallup Pakistan on the attitudes of Pakistanis uncovered that 55% of the population believes transgendered persons should have a special quota in educational institutes and offices, while at the same time, 60% would not like to be friends with them.

The Express Tribune ran a similar online poll as a follow-up to the report with the question:

“Would you be friends with a transgender person?”

The result at the closing of the poll was an even 50 per cent in favour of befriending a transgender person, and 50 per cent against. Keeping in mind the Tribune’s audience, it is still interesting to note that the Gallup survey was not far off target.

While the poll result may be disappointing in itself, what is perhaps worthy of highlighting is the reversal of the general trend we have seen online, with regards to comments on the news report the web team filed.

For once, the ‘silent majority’ which opinion makers often cite as waiting in the wings to build a more progressive Pakistan stepped forward to lead the debate. To cite a few:

Dr Adnan:

Our people are far too intolerant about the LGBT society. I think they have the right to Study, Health Care, Jobs etc so they can earn themselves a honest living, instead of involving themselves in Sex Trade, Begging etc.

Amjad Salim:

our society is highly intolerant,prejudiced and bigoted.We are afraid of what is different & we all want to conform to the traditional,stereotyped images when it comes to religion,gender etc.

Ateek:

We have decided that unisex are obliged to beg or be sex workers or to dance in the weddings and being treated so coldly, we have decided and allocated the role status and freedoms of Qadyanis that they have to sign and take oaths anyway and so do we have to prove that we are not them, this society is at the lowest point of moral deprivity and we must realize and accept that, but we wont.

Nina:

They also are Allah’s creation and we should treat them with love and respect.

In fact, the story did not receive even one derogatory/inflammatory remark meriting moderation.Taking a positive leap of faith, it seems our society has evolved to the point where the 50/50 attitude on the transgender issue is tipping in favour of a more progressive frame of mind – one which, through increased exposure in the media is silencing the voice of those who would assign job quotas to fellow human beings but refuse to befriend them in the workplace.

Woman can stay free during sex-abuse appeals

BATTLE CREEK— A Calhoun County woman will remain free on bond while lawyers try to persuade the Michigan Supreme Court to get involved in a sex-abuse conviction that fell apart because of new evidence.

A judge in Battle Creek erased Lorinda Swain’s 2002 conviction and granted a new trial in a case involving her adopted son. But the state appeals court reversed the decision two weeks ago.

A judge today said Swain can remain free while she appeals to the Michigan Supreme Court. The prosecutor wanted her in jail.

Swain is being helped by the Innocence Clinic at University of Michigan law school. The alleged victim has recanted, and new witnesses have raised other doubts.

A question for the Supreme Court is whether Swain has run out of appeals.

Watch: Miley Cyrus 2010 MuchMusic Video Awards Performance Videos

TORONTO, Canada — Miley Cyrus rocked the stage Sunday night at the 2010 MuchMusic Video Awards with a pair of sex-charged performances.

The 17-year-old pop star turned plenty of heads as she belted out "Party in the U.S.A." in a revealing black leotard. She also performed a tribal-themed version of her new single "Can't Be Tamed" in a skin-tight white outfit. Cyrus recently opened up about the criticism directed at her over her sometimes racy attire, insisting that she's "not trying to be slutty."

"I'm really comfortable with my body, I work really hard to be fit and to know that I can wear whatever makes me most comfortable," she told the Associated Press. "I feel more comfortable dressing with a little less, which is just how I've always been."

"Now I'm able to do that a little more freely and, also, I've just grown up to be this way too. It's not like this was me five years ago. It's me now, presently."

Cyrus also said she's looking forward to embracing her sex appeal once her Hannah Montana days come to an end later this year.

"When you're 11, the word you would use to describe someone is definitely not sexy, and as you get older I think you grow into that," she explained. "And I think I've done that but that's not my schtick. That's not what I'm trying to do to sell records. I want people to buy my record because of my music."

Was Miley Cyrus dressed inappropriately for a 17-year-old during her performances at the 2010 MuchMusic Video Awards? Click here to vote in our watercooler poll.

UN human rights chief praises Iceland for legalizing same-sex marriage

Iceland deserves credit for eliminating barriers to same-sex marriage, which will become legal in the Nordic country this weekend, the United Nations human rights chief says.

Navi Pillay, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, wrapped up her official visit to Iceland with a statement on Friday commending Iceland “for the significant progress it has achieved through recent legislation removing legal impediments to same-sex marriages.”

Iceland will become the ninth country to legalize same-sex marriage following legislation that passed the country’s parliament earlier this month. Same-sex marriage is already legal in Belgium, Canada, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, South Africa, Spain and Sweden, as well as in some areas of the United States and Mexico.

In her statement Ms. Pillay also praised Iceland for strengthening the independence of its judiciary and freedom of expression, and she welcomed efforts to set up an independent human rights institution.

During her visit – the first ever trip to Iceland by a UN human rights chief – Ms. Pillay met Foreign Minister Össur Skarphédinsson, Justice and Human Rights Minister Ragna Árnadóttir and other senior Government officials, as well as representatives of civil society and academia. She also addressed the University of Iceland in the capital, Reykjavik.

Lesbians get real on the Real L Word – Latest way to support homosexuality? Or sex and vulgarism again?

The reality television has touched the heights of heat-o-meter with its brand new show “The Real L Word”. The spin-off of the showtime drama series “The L Word” that ruled the TV from 2004-2009 featuring a group of lesbians in an overt way the first time ever on TV, thebrand new reality show is all vowed to send even hotter vibes.

As MSNBC reports, the reality series is the first lesbian-themed TV reality show to be aired on a mainstream US cable channel. Though the lesbians featuring in the original Showtime drama were actually homosexuals, the brand new show is rawer and coarser for the fact that it is a reality show and would feature the girls in an open and unhidden way. Nothing would be scripted and everything will be in front of the camera for the viewers to watch!

A show full of sex between same gender and a bunch of sizzling ladies salivating for each other is certainly to create a controversy or the other. In a society where homosexuality is still a taboo at certain nations, the show would startle the television viewers leaving them no choice but to criticize the same.

But aren’t we a bit skeptic while commenting on homosexuality? Why can’t we actually accept gays or lesbians in our society like any other couple? Same sex is no excuse when the nod of two adults in a romantic and physical relationship is all that matters.

Hope “The Real L Word” breaks the ice and helps the viewers to stretch their minds broader and to realize that there is no harm loving your same sex!

Well, turning a blind eye to the sexual angle, hope the brand new reality show does a makeover in the society!

HIV+ Swedish Doctor Jailed for Unprotected Sex

A HIV-positive physician has been jailed in Sweden for having unprotected sex with two men although he allegedly knew of his own positive status, reported English-language Swedish news site The Local on June 10.

The physician, who was not named in the article, was convicted of reckless endangerment and sentenced to a ten-month term. He was also required to pay one of the men with whom he had unprotected sex about $3,500. Two other charges--aggravated assault and a charge stemming from one of the two men testing HIV positive--were thrown out, because it could be proven that the defendant had been the one to transmit the virus to the HIV positive victim. The other victim tested HIV negative.

The story said that the ruling would be appealed by the victims’ lawyer, who insisted that, "There can be no other person that has infected my client. But we have to obtain a supplementary investigation to prove this."

Similar stories have unfolded in the United States, where thirty-two states have laws on the books criminalizing unprotected sexual behavior in which one partner knows that he or she is HIV positive and fails to inform the other person. Such a case took place in Florida earlier this year, when Olympic medallist equestrian Darren Chiacchia was charged for not disclosing his HIV status to his male partner. When the other man discovered that Chiaccia was HIV positive, he went to the police.

Chiacchia was charged in January of this year; he entered a not guilty plea in February. The case was scheduled to come to trial this month. Under a 1997 Florida law, Chiacchia could face a 30-year sentence. The former boyfriend, who remained unnamed in media accounts, had tested negative prior to August of last year. The men had been dating since February of 2009; the relationship ended last June.

In some instances of criminal charges involving assault or sexual assault, a person’s HIV+ status can leave that person liable to additional charges of "assault with a deadly weapon," the weapon being HIV. In one case, a HIV+ man named Phillipe Padieu was charged last year in McKenney, Texas on six counts of aggravated sexual assault with a deadly weapon after having sex with half a dozen women; Padieu was found guilty and sentenced to a cumulative total of 250 years. And in Gatesville, David Castillo, the DA for Coryell County, says that he will try a suspect believed to be HIV positive on similar charges after the suspect allegedly sexually assaulted a 16-year-old boy. "You can fire a gun at someone and miss, and it’s still aggravated assault with a deadly weapon," Castillo told the press, explaining that he would issue the charges even if the alleged victim tested HIV negative.

But advocates for people living with HIV disagree about the application of the law in these cases. "HIV should not be an aggravating factor unless there’s some evidence that he intended to do some harm and did some harm," said the executive director of the Center for HIV Law and Policy, Catherine Hanssens. "Criminal law in every state is adequate to deal with it," added Hanssens. "But to treat it as evidence of guilt and a deadly weapon wasn’t appropriate in 1985, and it isn’t appropriate now. To refer to HIV as a deadly weapon in 2010 speaks of just unforgivable ignorance."

Worldwide, the question of whether sexually active people with HIV should be face criminal charges if they knowingly expose others to the disease has been thorny. In Uganda, a proposed bill to punish gays with life imprisonment or worse stipulates that the penalty will be capital punishment for HIV-positive men who have sex with other men. In New Zealand, an Auckland man was charged with having sex with a number of partners after being diagnosed as HIV-positive; half of his sexual partners reportedly tested positive after their encounters. The suspect killed himself in his jail cell last May.

That case was similar to that of a 49-year-old Australian man, Michael John Neal, who was convicted in 2008 of deliberately trying to transmit HIV to others. Evidence presented to the court over the course of Neal’s trial included the claim that the accused had convened sex parties where the intent was to infect HIV-negative people. The court was also told that as part of the attempt to spread the virus, Neal sported a piercing on his genitalia.

In 2008, a Dutch court convicted two men, identified only as Peter M. and Hans J., of attempting to spread HIV by injecting their victims with tainted blood at sex parties. The men reportedly drugged their victims before injecting them with infected blood, although the court found that that allegation could not be proven. All fourteen victims tested positive for HIV, but the court also noted that it could not be conclusively proven that their infections stemmed from the injections. Nonetheless, Peter M.--who also was convicted on a rape charge--was sentenced to nine years, and Hans J. to five years.

In the United States, a 22-year-old drifter was among the first to be tried and sentenced for spreading HIV. The young man, Nushawn J. Williams, received a sentence in 1999 of 4 to 12 years after investigators learned that he had bartered sex for drugs, despite knowing that he was HIV positive.

In Canada, a thief menaced police with a hypodermic needle he claimed contained HIV; similarly, an American suspect reportedly robbed several establishments earlier this year, armed with a hypodermic needle that he claimed contained HIV.

But in at least one instance, a gay man who was attacked and beaten on a Chicago train was able to fend off his assailants by claiming to be HIV positive. Earlier this year, Daniel Hauff intervened when three men began to harass a young gay passenger. The three then began to hurl anti-gay epithets at Hauff and to beat him. Hauff managed to repel the attackers by telling them that he was HIV positive and smearing his own blood on them. Hauff is, in actuality, HIV-negative.

Inferior Blood

If it's OK to reject blood from gay men, what about blacks?

From 1977 to the present, have you had sexual contact with another male, even once? You'll have to answer that question, word for word, on a donor form if you want to give blood in this country. The form, authorized by the Food and Drug Administration and reaffirmed 10 days ago by an FDA advisory panel, offers three possible answers: "yes," "no," or "I am female." If you check "yes," you're done. You're forbidden to donate blood.

Why? Because, as the FDA explains, men who have had sex with men—known in the blood world as MSM—"are, as a group, at increased risk for HIV, hepatitis B and certain other infections." To protect blood recipients from this risk, your blood must be excluded.

Maybe you fooled around with a guy 30 years ago and have spent the rest of your life as a celibate priest. Maybe you've been in a faithful same-sex marriage for 40 years. Maybe you've passed an HIV test. It doesn't matter. You can't give blood, because you're in the wrong "group." On the other hand, if you're in the right group—heterosexuals—you can give blood despite dangerous behavior. If you had sex with a prostitute, an IV drug user, and an HIV-positive opposite-sex partner 13 months ago, you're good to go.
This kind of group-based screening is a long-standing practice in blood regulation. Over the years, we've prohibited donors on the basis of nationality as well as sexuality. There's nothing wrong with such categorical exclusions, according to the FDA, as long as they make the blood supply safer. But if that's true, why not screen donors by race?

The FDA bases its MSM policy on simple math. "Men who have had sex with men since 1977 have an HIV prevalence … 60 times higher than the general population," the agency observes. "Even taking into account that 75% of HIV infected men who have sex with men already know they are HIV positive and would be unlikely to donate blood," that leaves a population of MSM blood-donor applicants whose HIV prevalence is "over 15 fold higher than the general population."

So a 15-fold difference is good enough to warrant group exclusion. How about a nine-fold difference? According to the Centers for Disease Control, HIV prevalence is eight to nine times higher among blacks than among whites, and HIV incidence (the rate of new infections in a given year) is seven times higher. For black women, HIV prevalence is 18 times higher than for white women.

And these numbers understate the likely difference in risk to the blood supply. A recent CDC analysis of MSM in five cities found that while only 18 percent of the HIV-infected white men were unaware of their infections, 67 percent of the infected black men were unaware. If the awareness gap between blacks and whites overall is even half as great as it was among the men in this study—i.e., if blacks are twice as likely as whites to be unaware that they're infected, and therefore more likely to try to donate infected blood—then theoretically, black donors are just as risky as MSM donors.

Under FDA doctrine, even slight differences in average risk are sufficient to warrant group exclusions. The agency says its job is to "maximally protect" blood recipients. "Several scientific models show there would be a small but definite increased risk to people who receive blood transfusions if FDA's MSM policy were changed," it notes. Accordingly, "to err on the side of safety," MSM are excluded. A similar calculation, applied to blacks, would yield a similar result.

Is race a less legitimate basis for exclusion than sexual orientation is? Race is immutable, but plenty of evidence suggests that homosexuality is immutable, too. Technically, the MSM exclusion isn't a gay exclusion: You can be gay as long as you don't have sex with other men. A parallel policy, applied to race, would be that you can be black as long as you don't have sex with other blacks. After all, the No. 1 reason you're more likely to get infected by a gay man than by a straight one is the already high prevalence of HIV among gay men. The same is true of the higher infection risk among blacks.
Sounds crazy, right? But we already exclude blood on the basis of African origin. In 1983, the FDA ruled out donations from anyone who had lived in Haiti after 1977. Then it extended this prohibition to sub-Saharan Africa. Today, the Red Cross informs prospective donors that under FDA rules, "Persons who were born in or lived in Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, Niger and Nigeria since 1977 cannot be blood donors."

This isn't racial animus. It's just blunt math, based on the increased risk of a particular HIV type in these populations. The FDA has a similarly coarse rule against blood from anyone who has spent half a year in the United Kingdom, based on the threat of mad-cow disease. The problem isn't racism; it's the crudity of treating individuals according to group membership. Where does it end? When the FDA barred Haitian blood, Haitian groups asked why black Americans, whose HIV rate was higher than that of Haitians, weren't similarly excluded. It was a good question, and it was never answered.

We don't have to keep going down this road. Instead of rejecting people based on group membership, we can assess them as individuals. It's fine to ask them about factors known to affect the risk of infection: travel, promiscuity, condom use, drug abuse, piercings, tattoos, whatever. But the evaluation of these factors has to be more nuanced than a categorical exclusion. And the surest measure of each individual's risk is a blood test. Even the FDA concedes that "today's highly sensitive tests fail to detect less than one in a million HIV-infected donors."

In its latest recommendations, posted Friday, the FDA's advisory committee on blood suggests further research and acknowledges that current screening policy is "suboptimal in permitting some potentially high risk donations while preventing some potentially low risk donations." But since it's unclear which "alternative policy" would be better, the panel recommends that the "indefinite deferral for men who have had sex with another man even one time since 1977 not be changed at the present time."

So the gay blood ban will continue. And that's OK, according to the American Plasma Users Coalition, whose testimony strongly influenced the FDA committee. "By their very nature, blood donor screening and deferral criteria are discriminatory; however, they are justifiable when they provide increased protection to public health," the coalition argues. "Criteria for donor deferrals must put safety of the recipient first and be based on scientific and epidemiological evidence about large groups of people."

That kind of group judgment was popular in the 19th century. It may have been necessary in the worst epidemics of the 20th. But in the 21st, we can do better.

“Female Viagra” Sex Drug Not Yet Sexy Enough

An alleged sexytime wonderpill meant to stimulate flagging or absent libido in women has sadly gotten the big no-no from an FDA panel. The drug -- flibanserin, brewed in the test kitchens of German pharmacorp Boehringer Ingelheim -- was proven to increase the frequency of "sexually satisfying events," but not to actually increase desire itself. This is a problem in the drug approval process, since the concoction must nominally treat an actual diagnosable problem, namely "female sexual desire disorder." Of course, the broader market will be women looking to get a little extra gas in the tank, much like Viagra was ostensibly marketed for treating erectile dysfunction, while finding wide use among dudes who wanted 100% concrete boners. Not that there's anything wrong with (any of) that.

Long-term use of flibanserin was shown to potentially cause “dizziness, nausea and fatigue,” risk factors which contributed to its disapproval by the FDA panel. Small potatoes compared to Viagra’s documented potential for, say, blindness and heart attacks. In addition to further study, flibanserin certainly needs a better name. The only other contenders to the female-Viagra throne are Intrinsa (boring and vague, like Cialis, sounds like it could also be a midsize coupe but is actually a testosterone patch) and Libigel (not a bad name, also testosterone but this time in gel form, and you rub it on your arm—not your ladyflower—like arm-marmalade apparently).

But are we setting the bar too high? Can’t we at least start with more of those sexually satisfying events, at least? But no. Female sexual desire is a complicated and beautiful thing, and resolving any issues therein will require a sophisticated, comprehensive chemical solution. As opposed to male sexual issues, which are, as far as Viagra is concerned, strictly mechanical.

Sex and the single woman

ONE of the battles single women have to fight is the struggle with sex, and what role it will play, especially if coupling up is something they don't want, ever, or something they're not quite ready for. It's an issue for the woman who is single and Christian, where religion dictates that she remain sex free until marriage; for the woman who is single and not a Christian, but who believes in sex only in a committed relationship; and for the woman who is single, has no moral hang-ups about sex, but doesn't want to sleep around.

How do they deal with sex and being single?

Sex is such a common feature in movies, music videos and books today that not getting some form of 'action', forces abstainers to come across as an oddity.

This is the case for 39-year-old Andrea Johnson, who has not been with another man since separating from her husband in 2005. She yearns to experience that union between herself and another man again, but the conservative churchgoer has vowed never to engage in the act until she remarries.

"The Bible says that you should not commit adultery and fornication and sex out of marriage is wrong," she said. "So I have been living for four years without sex."

Her decision to abstain has been far from easy. "It is very difficult because your nature at times wants to take its course," she said, adding that she keeps herself busy so that she is not tempted.

But while Johnson's religious belief has been the primary reason for her decision, 21-year-old Natalee D has no such reservations about having sex with a guy outside of marriage, even though she is yet to experience that union between herself and another man.

The university student said her decision stems from a genuine need to hook up with someone who appreciates more than the physical aspect of her.

"It's not that I wouldn't do it, but it has to be with the right person. When I meet the right person, then I would actually give it up," she said. "You can't just give away something that's sacred to you just like that, it has to be with somebody that you care about in the end," she added.

For psychologist Dr Leachim Semaj, these women are making one of the best decisions ever.

"In the short term, there are a lot of positives to gain," he said. "Nobody can call their name, they are not in any mix-up and they don't get in all the emotional drama associated with the whole casual relationship scene. And clearly, they will be getting no sexually transmitted diseases."

He believes sex is a by-product of a positive and loving relationship although many have come to view it as something as common as breathing or having a drink.

"Once you separate sex like that, you now degrade it from what could possibly be the most powerful form of communication between two human beings," he said.

Given the current state of the Jamaican dating landscape where casual sex and not a relationship with substance is the order of the day, the psychologist said those who engage in casual flings usually live to regret it.

"People talk about sex as if it is an all powerful entity, but for many women what they end up getting out of it is a waste of their time," he said matter-of-factly.

While there is no doubt in her mind that her decision to abstain until marriage is best, Johnson yearns for the pleasure the act used to illicit in her when she was legal to enjoy it.

"Sex is the greatest thing on earth, it is not dirty," she said, before stating, "But you can't just get up and have sex just like that."

Twenty-two-year-old Anika Bell has no doubt that sex can be surreal if shared with the right person. But being a devout Christian, she has vowed that she will never give herself to anyone, besides her husband whom she is yet to meet.

"I don't put myself in a position to actually do it. There has been times when I came close, but I actually came to my senses," she said.

But what about the urges? This is the question that is often uppermost on the minds of those who have no sexual hang-ups. It is certainly a question Johnson has heard on many occasions and she is the first to admit that they do exist.

"I have good church friends and when the urges come upon me I call them and we chat and have a good laugh about it," she said.

Dr Semaj said these urges to engage in sex are but temporary and can be controlled. "We as human beings; we are not so deprived that sexual urges are so powerful that they would cause you to do all sorts of irrational things. A lot of our sexual responses are learnt," he said.

He further added that getting involved in other activities usually causes one to forget about these urges.

"Whether it is your schoolwork, whether it is your occupation, whether it is your profession, whether it is your own personal training, whatever it is, there are many other ways that you can use that urge and turn it into something creative," he said.

Sex and spirituality

Spiritual women have more sex (Getty Images)

New research has found that spirituality has a greater effect on the sex lives of young adults - especially women - than religion, impulsivity, or alcohol.

“I think people have been well aware of the role that religious and spiritual matters play in everyday life for a very long time,” said Jessica Burris, one of the study’s researchers at the University of Kentucky. “But in the research literature, the unique qualities of spirituality - apart from religiousness - are not usually considered.”

According to a research measure known as the Spiritual Transcendence Scale, those qualities are connectedness, universality and prayer fulfillment. But the data found that of the three, connectedness plays the largest role in spiritual sexuality and leads to more sex with more partners, often without the use of condoms.

“Believing one is intimately tied to other human beings and that interconnectedness and harmony are indispensable may lead one to believe sexual intimacy possesses a divine or transcendent quality in itself,” Burris writes. “In fact, ascribing sacred qualities to sex has been positively associated with positive affective reactions to sex, frequency of sex, and number of sexual partners among university students.”

The study’s participants indeed were university students; 353 undergraduates (61 per cent of whom were female) answered a questionnaire that asked them about their alcohol use, impulsivity, religiousness, spirituality, and sexual practices. The statements on spirituality, which were ranked by level of agreement, included “In the quiet of my prayers and/or meditations, I find a sense of wholeness,” and “Although individual people may be difficult, I feel an emotional bond with all of humanity.”

Who Do You Think You Are? BBC One, Sundays

Mark Smith shakes the family tree of Sarah Jessica Parker.

Over the years, many of my girly friends (and even some of my female friends too) have told me that I should watch Sex and the City, that it’s brilliant, that I’d love it; but for a long time I resisted, for two reasons. First, the contrary side of me means that the more someone goes on about how good a programme is, the more I try to avoid it, which has meant that I’ve missed out on a lot of programmes that are probably very good. The second reason was that from the glimpses I saw of it, usually over my shoulder on the way out of the room, it just looked profoundly irritating. Watching all those tall, thin, swaggering, cackling, fun-loving stiletto-women felt like being nagged from above for not having enough fun, for not being liberated enough. It was like being hacked at by a glittery axe.

I have to say that all this prejudice against Sex and the City probably infected my impressions of its stars too, particularly Sarah Jessica Parker, who plays Carrie. This was a programme pretending that clothes and bags and even sex have hidden depths, which they don’t (it’s just clothes, bags and sex), and so I assumed Sarah Jessica Parker felt that way too. I think this might have even crossed the minds of the makers of Parker’s episode of Who Do You Think You Are? (BBC One, Sunday, 9.15pm) because before the credits had even started, there was a clip of her telling us that she was nothing like Carrie.

To be fair, within minutes of the start, it was obvious Parker was right: she is nothing like Carrie. Carrie is obsessed with the trivial aspects of herself: mainly what she should wear and eat. Here, Parker was just as obsessed with herself but with a much healthier part of it: her past and how much of that past has made her present. “We’re mutts,” she said of her family. “A variable buffet of everything.” And then she admitted what all of this was really about: “We’ve been looking for an identity all our lives.”

Parker had thought that identity was partly German, but as the programme progressed she found out that her family is actually thoroughly American. As she leaned over the old records and her brow creased with interest (yes, creased - the woman hasn’t had botox, good on her) she started to uncover the story of an ancestor, John Hodge, who followed the rumours of gold in California and ended up travelling 23,000 miles to hack at rock with a pickaxe before dying a few weeks later, probably of cholera. This is one of the things Who Do You Think You Are? does so well: show how human beings used to have to struggle and fight and sweat on the edge of life and death, and how most of us just don’t have to do that any more. Maybe that’s why this programme works: those of us who don’t have to struggle crave some kind of connection with those who used to have to.

And then things got even more interesting because, as Parker dug deeper and found a relative called Esther Elwell, she discovered that her family might be made not just of good stuff but bad stuff too. Esther was at the centre of one of the witch trials in Salem, but the question was: could she have been an accuser? Eventually, the historical documents revealed the truth: Esther was a pointee rather than a pointer, and the even better news was she escaped when the trials were disbanded.

Even then, Parker felt a little guilty about her relative and the fact she escaped when so many didn’t. And that turned up another of the good things about Who Do You Think You Are?: it exposes the fact that’s it’s almost impossible to dig into a family tree without feeling some guilt or sadness, without uncovering the bad as well as the good. That might make Who Do You Think You Are? a melancholic programme, but that’s fine. There’s nothing wrong with a little bit of sadness.

Underbelly sex scenes too hot for TV, says Kim Hollingsworth

KIM Hollingsworth has revealed the real sex scenes shown in Underbelly: The Golden Mile were too hot for TV.

In her exclusive blog with Daily Telegraph readers, Hollingsworth said her portrayal in the show was not exaggerated and in fact, many more sensational events exist that the public don’t know about.

In a video interview, she told of how sex scenes were "toned down".

"Some were toned down, some were accurate," she said.

"It was what TV could take.

"Perhaps they (TV viewers) had never encountered the world before."

Hollingsworth worked as a prostitute in Sydney's seedy Kings Cross before pursuing her dream of working as a police officer.

But that dream was shattered after she became an informant who helped expose corrupt police officers at the Wood Royal Commission.

She has been portrayed by actress Emma Booth on the hit crime drama.

Sex education debate stirs up

MANILA - A NEW sex education campaign in Philippine schools has sparked widespread debate in Asia's bedrock of Catholicism, where the high birth rate is blamed for desperate poverty.

The United Nations-backed programme, which is being piloted this month in primary and high schools, aims to promote safe sex, limit the spread of HIV-Aids and prevent unwanted pregnancies.

However, the Catholic Church and powerful conservative crusaders have struck back with a high-profile campaign to shut down the project, saying it breaks the nation's religion-based moral codes. 'Sex education in schools is not the answer to our population problem and poverty,' Eric Manalang, head of the conservative political party Ang Kapatiran (The Brotherhood), told AFP on Monday.

'It promotes promiscuity among children... it does not promote the proper values that we want our children to receive in schools and we believe sex education should strictly remain a family affair.' Mr Manalang said his party and church had filed a petition in court on Monday requesting an injunction to stop the programme. He said the chances of the legal bid succeeding were high with the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines, as well as various parent groups, supporting the fight.

Their legal bid claims the programme impinges on parents' constitutional right to educate their children based on their religious beliefs. 'Issues that are not for children should not be taught in schools,' the bishops' conference said in a statement. While Ang Kapatiran is only a small political party, conservative religious forces led by the Church hold a lot of sway in the Philippines, where more than 80 per cent of the nation's 90-million people are Catholic. The bishops last year succeeded in blocking a proposed law in parliament that would have made it easier for the public to access state-funded contraceptives.

Nevertheless, the education department has so far held firm. It says the programme is aimed at curbing a population growth rate of over two per cent, among the highest in Asia, and does not promote out-of-marriage sex. The scheme covers topics such as reproductive systems and cycles, hygiene, pre-marital sex, teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases, according to the education department. Education Secretary Mona Valisno said the teaching modules were designed by professionals, including psychologists, who made sure the discussions would be educational.

Minister Orders for the Removal of Sex Scenes from New Movie

Related Stories Minister of information, John Tia has allegedly ordered for the removal of sex scenes in Gupado and Marhill production’s new movie,‘Trinity’, which is set to premiere at the Silverbird in Accra on Thursday July 1. This has however incurred the wrath of the movie’s director, Pascal Amanfo, who bitterly complained about the activities of the Censorship Board. According to him, if the board is really bent on censoring movies, it should do it holistically and not only zero down on sex in the movies. “I am not a mediocre African. I went to school and I am a very intelligent young man and I think when you see foreign movies, you see they put things there. You see SVN sometime L; which means strong language, violence, sex or nudity. Why have we taken only the sex and forgotten about the strong language and violence? There are a lot of movies there with bloody and gunshot scenes. Interestingly, children are allowed to watch those movies but then we criticize a girl in a movie who takes off her brassiere. I am not saying I support sex in movies but I am saying if we are going to do it then let’s do it holistically. We clap for bloody scenes, including armed robbery, but complain about romantic scenes. That is mediocre. We are being hypocrites because on our streets, even in Accra, Opera Square, there are pornographic movies from China that are being sold every day and nobody is saying anything,” he told BEATWAVES at the movie’s press screening last Monday. Pascal said he does not have a problem with sex in a movie if there is a story behind it. “I don’t know how many prostitutes make love with their customers under blanket. It does not make any sense. I will not shoot a scene if there is no story behind it, but if there is a sensible story behind the story, I will film it.” According to him, in Nigeria, when they are censoring a movie, it means they are classifying that movie. “Because of the way things are going, I think, if we really want to censor movies well, we should define what amounts to an explicit sex scene. And this has to be at a stakeholders’ conference. Secondly, after defining all that, we must now define classification. In Africa, we should look at who is an adult? Is it an 18-year-old, 21-year-old or 16-year-old? We have to define all that, then, we have to find account registration to parental guidance and all that, down to age limit. That is my problem. If we are really going to censor, let’s not just pick only sex. Let us understand this,” he intimated. The latest movie, which is about to stir up a controversy, is about a presidential candidate, Maccoy Yeboah, played by Kofi Adjorlolo, who is very close to clinching political power, yet has a looming charge of corruption and drug trafficking to be leveled against him. With the assistance of Naveda’s own husband, fellow Barrister Dan (Majid Michel), Macoy Yeboah frames Barrister Naveda Daniels for the murder of another lawyer, Val Ayew (Luckie Lawson). What transpired subsequently is what movie enthusiasts must see for themselves. Among the cast include Ekow Smith Asante, Kalsoum Sinare, Roseline Ngissah, Gavivina Tamakloe, Eddie Nartey and introducing five-year-old promising actress Imogen Hogg.

Sex and the City maker in bid talks with Shed Media

Time Warner has had a string of major successes
Time Warner, maker of Sex and the City, is in talks to buy the UK television production firm behind shows such as Supernanny.
Shed Media said that Time Warner subsidiary Warner Bros Entertainment was "working with certain members of Shed management" in the talks.
Shed, which also makes Who Do You Think You Are?, could be worth £75m, reports say Two firms recently ended talks to back a management buyout of Shed.
Observers say that the US media giant wants to add Shed to its London-based production business.
Its London business aims to tap into new markets following the global success of some of Time Warner's US shows, such as Gossip Girl.

Kristen Stewart: I'm Awesome at Sex!

By her own admission, Kristen Stewart is awkward in front of the press.

But there's one place where the actress says she's always been comfortable: IN BED!

In a new interview with Parade, Stewart was asked about Bella's embarrassment in a certain Eclipse scene. She replied:

“I guess a lot of girls... don’t need that lecture. I probably had that moment. I guess that everybody does. But I knew everything, from the word go. I was really mature, that way. So, I never really had ‘the talk.’ I didn’t need it."

Somewhere, Robert Pattinson is nodding in agreement. And his friends are offering him a steady stream of fist pounds.

As for understanding Bella, Stewart said both she and the character that has made her famous are similar in their straightforward approaches to life.

“I’ve always said that I’m not ashamed of anything that I say because I’m always being honest, even though you can definitely make mistakes. That’s Bella in a nutshell, so I can completely relate to her. I think it’s a good thing to be proud of who you are, no matter what."

Both Stewart's honesty and her willingness to admit a mistake were on display last month, as she compared the paparazzi to rapists, only to quickly back track and apologize for the word use. It was a mature handling of a difficult situation.

Former sex slave fights illegal trade

"Girls are taught only shame and ignorance about their bodies and men have their first sexual experience in brothels. Rape is the only thing they know." Photo: AFP

Somaly Mam emerged from a life of sex slavery in Cambodia to become a champion of women's rights and one of Time Magazine's 100 most influential people on the planet.

Abandoned by her parents, Mam was raped at 12, forced to marry at 14 and then sold into prostitution.

She suffered years of abuse before escaping with the help of a Medicin Sans Frontieres worker, whom she later married.

Kareena to play a sex worker in Sanjay's film

Bebo is set to play the role of a sex-worker in the film Heera Mandi by Sanjay Leela Bhansali. The project will start rolling after Sanjay will be done with his current project Guzaarish with Hrithik Roshan. Kareena Kapoor and Sanjay Leela Bansali were looking forward to work together from very long but due to personal and professional reasons their plans fell apart every time.

It is reported that once Kareena will return from the shoot of Agent Vijay from Morocco they would finalise the project. They have been trying to work together on a lot of projects one of them was Bijirao Mastain with actor Salman Khan but the plan was canceled after the flop story of the film Kyun ki. The other projects like Mahatma Gandhi's son also failed to reach the completion point.


Then movie Black with actor Amitabh Bacchan kept film maker Sanjay busy and on the other hand Kareena was upset about Karishma's break up with Abhishek Bachchan. But now, we hope to see them together very soon.

Mark McInnes denies new sex claims

Disgraced ... Mark McInnes. Source: The Australian

DISGRACED ex-David Jones chief Mark McInnes has vowed to defend new claims he mistreated a woman during the 2004 Spring Racing Carnival.

The retail boss, who resigned last week after a complaint of sexual harassment by a female staffer, has engaged lawyers to challenge the fresh allegations.

The woman, not named in the published story, said she was the partner of an invited guest when Mr McInnes allegedly "acted inappropriately".

Her email to the department store, received at noon, claimed she reported the incident to a DJs employee, John Warn, who has subsequently denied knowledge or record of the conversation six years ago.

A DJs spokeswoman told The Daily Telegraph that, while the department store was "extremely concerned about these allegations and treats them very seriously", the retailer did not hold any functions or events during the spring racing carnival in 2004.

It is understood David Jones did not sign its sponsorship deal with the Australian Jockey Club and Royal Randwick until 2006, which included hosting a corporate marquee during the autumn racing season.

"I categorically deny a new allegation about an event that has been alleged to have occurred at the David Jones marquee at the Royal Randwick races in 2004, six years ago," Mr McInnes said.

"It is simply not true and I have appointed Johnson Winter and Slattery to defend me in any court that such a matter could or would be tested."

Mr McInnes also denied he had flown out of Australia first class and has "not gone to the French Riviera and have no plans to attend a wedding in Portofino. These myths join the various others."

Kristy Fraser-Kirk, the publicist whose allegations prompted Mr McInnes to step down last week from his $4 million a year post, is yet to specify the nature of her complaint against him.

Meanwhile, retail academic Mark Ritson claimed DJ's rival Myer would be "over the moon" about the scandal and his departure would damage the store's brand value.

David Jones shares closed 2c down yesterday, to $4.47.

WARREN BEATTY'S CHILD WANTS A SEX-SWAP

HOLLYWOOD legend Warren Beatty’s daughter has changed her name to Stephen and wants a sex-swap op.

Beatty, 73, one of the movie industry’s most famous swordsmen, is said to be “crushed” by 18-year-old Kathlyn’s determination to become a real fella.

Warren, who has bedded 12,775 women “give or take”, tried to talk her out of the gender changing surgery.

But, Kathlyn is already calling herself Stephen Ira and goes to college every day dressed as a young man. Bonnie And Clyde star Warren’s wife, American Beauty star Annette Bening, 52, is finding the situation “heartbreaking” but is supporting her daughter as best she can.

A friend of the couple said: “Warren is beside himself. He and Annette have tried to deal with this over the years when their daughter was younger, but she’s determined to go ahead with the op.”

Kathlyn, a talented writer and poet, has told her parents that because she has turned 18 there are no longer legal obstacles to her undergoing the transformation.

She will follow in the footsteps of singer Cher’s 41-year-old lesbian daughter Chastity, who had the op to become a man and last month legally changed her name to Chaz.

Warren allegedly slept with a different woman every day for 35 years until marrying Annette in 1992.

They have four children: Kathlyn, Benjamin, 16, Isabel, 13, and Ella, 10.

Herbal sex boost poses risk: FDA

Magic Power Coffee contains ingredients similar to Viagra

A product called Magic Power Coffee, marketed for sexual enhancement, contains an ingredient that could lower blood pressure and should be avoided, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Samples purchased and analyzed by the FDA found the product contains hydroxythiohomosildenafil, a chemical similar to the active ingredient in Pfizer's blockbuster erectile dysfunction drug Viagra.

'Consumers may assume it is harmless and poses no health risk ... in fact, Magic Power Coffee can cause serious harm.'—Deborah Autor, U.S. Food and Drug Administration

Like Viagra, Magic Power Coffee can interact with other drugs and cause dangerously low blood pressure. That can cause the brain to be deprived of an adequate blood supply.

"Because the product is an instant coffee labelled as an 'all natural dietary supplement,' consumers may assume it is harmless and poses no health risk," said Deborah Autor, the director of the FDA's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, Office of Compliance.

"In fact, Magic Power Coffee can cause serious harm," she said.

Magic Power Coffee is sold on the internet and through multilevel marketing schemes. It sells for $6 to $8 per dose.

Horny goat weed claimed as active ingredient

According to the online Magic Power Coffee Club, the active ingredients are epimedium herb (also known as horny goat weed), goji berry and ginseng.

The only known study on horny goat weed was done by the departments of pharmacy and veterinary medicine at the University of Bologna in Italy in 2008. The research did not involve any human trials, but found that epimedium did contain a compound similar to Viagra.

'It is virtually impossible to predict possible risks' —Joe Schwarcz, McGill University

Joe Schwarcz of the office for science and society at McGill University in Montreal warns that "You never really know what you're getting," when it comes to commercial preparations using goat weed.

"Not knowing the exact composition of such products, it is virtually impossible to predict possible risks," Schwarcz wrote in an article on horny goat weed.

In its warning, the FDA says consumers shouldn't be taking chances. "Consumers who have Magic Power Coffee should stop using it immediately," states the FDA's warning.

Prelate to Noynoy: Stop sex education in schools

A Catholic bishop on Monday urged President-elect Benigno "Noynoy" Aquino III to stop the government's sex-education program in schools as soon as she assumes the presidency on June 30.

"Being a Christian, [Aquino should] do what is according to moral law, according to the dignity and rights of every Filipino," said Pampanga Archbishop Paciano Aniceto, chairman of the
Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines Commission on Family and Life, in an article posted Monday night on the CBCP news site.

The Department of Education (DepEd) will implement this school year its Adolescent
Reproductive Health program in 80 public and elementary and 79 high schools.

Aniceto reiterated parents have the sole responsibility of teaching their children about human sexuality. But in cases where parents are working abroad and their children are left behind, he said the burden of teaching sex education would fall with the relatives, parent-teacher associations, Church-based groups such as Couples for Christ and Catholic Women’s League, and parish-based youth organizations.


For her part, Human Life International-Asia executive director Dr. Ligaya Acosta criticized government for insisting that children need a course of instruction in sex education. She said sex education “is actually a course in systematic behavior modification, designed to change the child’s entire belief system."

She claimed there is a rapid escalating rate of teen pregnancy and an exploding Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) epidemic in nations where there is sex education and aggressive contraceptive use.

“The glaring truth is that researches around the world substantiate the fact that the more contraceptive programs are aimed at the young, the more pregnancies, abortions, promiscuity, sexually transmitted diseases, and cancer of the cervix results," she said. -

Lindsay Lohan unfazed by sex and nudity in Linda Lovelace role

Lindsay Lohan has come to the defence of the risque role she will be playing as porn performer Linda Lovelace, who gained international notoriety after her role in the 1972 film Deep Throat.

Lohan, 23, will be starring in Inferno, a drama/biopic that revolves around the late porn actress.

"I'm playing Linda Lovelace, who was the first globally recognised porn star," the Sydney Morning Herald quoted Lohan as saying excitedly.

"She became famous in the 1970s with her movie Deep Throat. We follow her through her ups and downs and show what really went on in her life," she said.

Naturally, given the subject, Inferno is expected to have a lot of sex scenes and nudity, but Lohan is least bothered about them.

"The way that Matthew [Wilder, the director] wants to shoot it is not vulgar," she claimed.

"It's not about the raw sex and the shots of her fully nude. It's more about getting into her psyche and seeing how scared she was. That's what I want to show most in the film," she said.

Education officials sued over sex education order

THE DEPARTMENT of Education (DepEd) is facing a class suit over an order to teach sex education in elementary and high school.

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A boy yawns inside a classroom in Manila, June 15. A class suit was filed Monday against Education officials for a memorandum that requires the teaching of sex education in elementary and high school.

Twenty-four petitioners led by Jo Aurea C. Imbong, defeated Ang Kapatiran senatorial candidate, yesterday filed the case against acting Education Secretary Mona D. Valisno and Undersecretary Ramon C. Bacani for the order that integrated sex education in the elementary and high school curricula.

The petitioners asked the court to issue a preliminary injunction or a temporary restraining order against the implementation of DepEd Memorandum 261, Series of 2005 and to "declare it null and void."

The petitioners said sex education is "unconstitutional" and "illegal" since it is funded and supervised by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), which adopted the definition of International Conference on Population and Development Programme of Action in reproductive health that include the right of people "to have a satisfying and safe sex life."

Entitled "Operationalization of the UNFPA-assisted project ‘Institutionalizing Adolescent Reproductive Health through Life-Skills Based Education,’" the order directed the teaching of sex education and reproductive health in both public and private schools.

"Is it appropriate and reasonable for these ‘satisfying and safe sex life,’ family planning, condoms, IUD (intrauterine device), contraceptive pills, and other devices to be taught to our grade school and high school pupils?" the petitioners said in their 28-page motion. "For what purpose? To entice them to get sexually oriented at an early age?" they added.

The case has been raffled off to Quezon City Regional Trial Court Presiding Judge Rosanna Fe Romero-Maglaya of Branch 88.

Ms. Imbong and the petitioners who claimed to be parents said the order violates Article II, Section 12 the Constitution which states the "sanctity of family life."

The petitioners noted that teaching sex education to the young will be dangerous given their "emotional immaturity and vulnerability."

They cited a 1988 survey in the United States that said abortion, acquired immunodeficiency syndrome and rape were the top issues that concern the youth. At that time, 70% of American students are taking up sex education, the petitioners said.

"In the United States, sex education has not only resulted in irreparable erosion of parental authority, it spread sexual immorality and delinquency among the youth," the petitioners added.

Earlier, Ms. Valisno said that sex education will be pilot-tested in 80 public elementary and 79 high schools nationwide this school year.

In a phone interview, she said the project is not yet "fully implemented."

Ms. Valisno said a dialogue is being held among parties, including the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines, whose representative is Ms. Imbong in her capacity as head of legal office. "I don’t know what is there to stop because we are still in the dialogue stage. We are not teaching the whole of it [curriculum] yet.