Scanner : bdsm

"Battlestar Galactica": In Desperate Need of a Safeword?

Bryan Christian — Mon, 05 May 2008 20:25:00 GMT

Battlestar Galactica has always been a parade of self-sabotage. Not that we're gonna drop any spoilers for those of you who haven't seen it, but even a cursory knowledge of the show reveals that you got your hotshot pilot wrecking herself with booze and ill-advised hookups, the possibly-delusional scientist who's led to do things he might never even conceive of by the voices in his head, the self-medicating XO, the medicated and messianic President, the honorbound and existentially lonely Adamas... we could go on.

Still. Holy crap. Can you believe what they've been putting people through in the last few episodes? More to the point: can you believe what the characters have been putting themselves through? Like, if this were Gossip Girl, everyone would be cutting themselves or something. If you're caught up on the show, then click on through so we can discuss in more spoiler-friendly environs after the jump.

We're not complaining, you understand. We're still pretty much right with the show, and we're impressed with the degree to which its creators seem committed to playing through the endgame -- this is the final season -- as unsentimentally and, indeed, as cruelly as possible. But we are kind of wondering where all this self-destruction is going. Because just in the last couple weeks, we've had Starbuck making herself crazy and hinting at a reconciliation with Leoben, Tyrol edging steadily towards Travis Bickle-dom, Cally contemplating offing herself and then someone else taking care of it for her, Colonel Tigh getting a Number Six to pound the crap out of him and then (possibly) seduce him, the President burning off whatever legislative goodwill she'd presumably earned with the Quorum, and Gaius Baltar skirting with religious martyrdom. Oh, and then there's the entire Cylon race, which decided in the space of a single episode to cave in on itself. (And if somehow we didn't catch all that, we had that helpful scene where Tori got all kinky on Baltar, thus illustrating how she -- and by extension everyone -- has lost the distinction between pleaure and pain.)

So what do you guys think? Are they losing you with all the extra gravity or does the go-for-broke-ness of it all excite you? After three years of everyone fighting each other, is the lesson here that the most difficult battles are with ourselves? Or does it all seem a little forced, like they know they're gonna have to do something crazy in the final episodes -- let's say a Human/Cylon allegiance of some lasting sort -- and the first step towards that is breaking everyone down so they can start anew.

Oh: and when does one of those dumbass cult gals get jealous and try to cut Baltar?

Master Debating: Are Nazis The New Cylons?

Bryan Christian — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 20:43:00 GMT

You know, we're wondering if when they write the book on the erotic themes of our age, they're gonna say this is the year that Holocaust Smut broke wide. Pretty much all that's missing right now is La Lohan announcing she's remaking The Night Porter.

But maybe we should stick to what we actually got for now. First, there's the case of Formula One Racing director Max Mosley, who's under so much pressure to resign following revelations of his 5-hour, 5-hooker, Holocaust-themed freakfest that even NPR is talking about it. And things will probably not get any better now that the News of the World won a court case allowing them to air video of the encounter on their website. (Click here to view.) The most disturbing part? The shots of a naked Mosley sharing a post-coital cuppa with the faux prison guards. (Shudder!)

Then there's the release of Stalags, a documentary about the unsettling but intriguing crop of death camp-themed pulp novels that surfaced in Israel, of all places, following the war.

Ari Libsker’s documentary “Stalags” is named for these pocket-size books, which were written under American pseudonyms in a style that suggested translation. (They were in fact done in Hebrew by Israeli writers, some of whom appear on screen.) The film examines the rise and fall of this short-lived craze and the doors it opened for discussing the Holocaust, a previously hush-hush subject in Israel.

As we mentioned before, we don't really get the erotic appeal of the Nazi, but we have to say, it's looking more and more like this is starting to be a thing, right? With Blackbook and the Günter Grass scandal within the last couple years and Valkyrie soon to come? What do you guys think? Is there now a trend towards humanizing -- even eroticizing -- the Nazis, and if so, why? Is it simply another example of the brownshirtism/Neo-Nazism that occasionally rears its ugly head? An inevitable reaction to the whole "Greatest Generation"/Saving Private Ryan interest of a few years back? Or are we maybe on the edge of rethinking something about WWII and the army that lost it? And whatever the reason -- is it good or bad?

Have at it in the comments -- and remember: this can be a touchy subject, so please play nice or ve vill be vorced to use... discipline. (Well, we'll remove any truly offensive comments, anyway.)

Diane Von Furstenburg and CNN's Christiane Amanpour Into BDSM???

Bryan Christian — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 18:27:00 GMT

So, what do you guys make of this... professional respeck or something kinkier?

Christiane Amanpour sent Diane Von Furstenberg a note which read, "Congratulations! From one dominatrix to another" after Furstenberg won a fashion lifetime achievement award.

Yeah. We're going with "kinkier.". Ain't steered us wrong yet.

Scanner's Sex Boycott for New York Post Readers

Emily Farris — Thu, 14 Feb 2008 13:53:00 GMT

As we reported yesterday, The New York Post revealed the identity of a man who happened to choke while minding his own business at a BDSM club. The Post ran a series of stories about the man, his family and his profession and called his presence at the club his "shameful habit." When questioned about the ethics of revealing the man's name, a spokesperson for the paper shamelessly declared "The Post will happily name every adult caught in a dog collar."

We've never been big fans of The Post and its yellow journalism. This particular incident has sent us over the edge. We thought about calling for a boycott of The Post, but that wouldn't do much good. What would we do? Keep not buying The Post? Plus, we're going to go out on a limb and guess that a fair number of the people who get their news from The Post think it's probably okay to out someone like that. So, instead we're calling for a boycott of sex with people who read The New York Post.

That's right. If you believe that what The Post did was wrong, and you're sleeping with someone who reads that paper, or considering sleeping with someone who reads that paper, don't do it. We're all for sex, but we're also all for people having the right to practice whatever sexual fetishes they want to do freely (as long as they're not hurting anyone else, which this man clearly was not) without having their names and faces splashed on the front page of a New York City tabloid.

How long will a Post reader go without nookie before s/he finally makes the switch? And what kind of effect could this have on The Post's sales? We know it's already hurting for readership, that's why they shove free copies in everyone's faces. What would a sex boycott do to The Post?

All we want is for The Post to issue a front page apology to the man. Oh, and never pull that shit again. And even if they don't apologize because of our little boycott, do you really want to sleep with someone who gets his or her news from a source like The New York Post? We thought not.

[Previously on Scanner: "The Post will happily name any adult caught in a dog collar."]

"The Post will happily name every adult caught in a dog collar."

Emily Farris — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 18:44:00 GMT

A quote offered by The New York Post's spokesperson after the paper identified a 67-year-old man who choked at a BDSM club in New York. Not only did The Post name the man in an article, the editors felt the need to report every thing he was wearing (including a collar, nipple clamps, and high heels), and call his wife and former students for comment on the "incident."

Obviously, people—including us, Dan Savage, and the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom—are outraged. This man committed no crime and is not a public figure, yet The Post decided that they needed to "out" him for his sexual fetishes.

Oh, but wait, they misidentified the man in yesterday's paper, calling him Richard, not Robert. And after correcting the story, a Post reporter visited Robert in the hospital, and coaxed an "exclusive" interview out of him where he discussed what the paper called his "shameful habit." They splashed the story, and the man's picture, on the front page of today's paper.

Shame on The New York Post. Not that we ever read that crap for anything but gossip anyway.

[Portfolio: Sexual Vigilanteism at the 'New York Post']

[NOTE: Obviously, The Post ran their faces, we just blurred them out]