12/14/2006
News: Matthew McConaughey, Circumcision, Alabama Sex Sting
2006 is Britain's warmest year since records began: "All of the 10 warmest years in Britain have occurred in the past 18 years, except the fourth hottest, when in 1949 the year's mean temperature reached 10.62C."
Matthew McConaughey appears in public wearing shirt.
Circumcision cuts risk of infection by HIV in half: "Previous research has suggested that circumcision is beneficial, but the new trial is 'definitive,' according to Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, which cosponsored the study with the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. 'It's not a magic bullet,' said Dr. Kevin De Cock, director of the World Health Organization's department of HIV/AIDS, but it has the potential to prevent 'many hundreds of thousands and perhaps millions of infections over coming years.'"
David Geffen offers $2 billion for the L.A. Times. Paper continues to seek offers...
Acquitted Huntsville, Alabama man speaks out about sex sting in public park: "For months I lived a nightmare that I hoped to wake up from, but I didn't wake up from it. I did not and have not ever gone there for the purpose for sexual contact," he said. "My family and those people who know me know that I could not do and did not do those things I was charged with. People are going to believe what they want to believe. There is no anger in my heart for anyone. There is forgiveness in my heart, okay. I think he was wrong. I know he was wrong. And a jury of 12 people decided he was wrong."
Spoof video superintendent Richard Mitchell, who this fall in an extraordinary lapse of judgment posted a remixed video of rookie teacher interviews on a school district website, has filed a sexual orientation discrimination complaint with Chicago's Cook County, claiming he wasn't fired because of the video, but because a school board member encouraged others to conspire against him because he's gay.
STUDY: Gay marriage would mean an additional $100 million in yearly revenue for businesses in New Jersey.
Read My Mind: Pet Shop Boy fan Brandon Flowers sends next single to the duo for remix.
A Ford Mustang...station wagon?
Posted 2:30 PM EST by Andy Towle in AIDS/HIV, Alabama, Brandon Flowers, Chicago, David Geffen, Education, Gay Marriage, Global Warming, Great Britain, Los Angeles, Matthew McConaughey, New Jersey, News, Pet Shop Boys | Permalink
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Sounds like a cut penis is a healthy penis.
Posted by: gay is the new straight | Dec 14, 2006 2:39:33 PM
Matthew McConnaughey is the sexiest man on the face of the earth. Except of course for Matt Damon when he's doing an impression of McConnaughey.
Posted by: peterparker | Dec 14, 2006 2:46:04 PM
That is the hottest picture of matthew ever taken in the history of hot pictures of Mathew. He should send that photographer a bottle of champagne and a dozen roses - then come over to my place and....
Posted by: Marco | Dec 14, 2006 2:57:54 PM
I've never understood this thing with undercover officers trying to seduce guys at cruising spots, just to arrest them when they make a move. I don't think we have this kind of thing anywhere in Continental Europe.
Do they send attractive female officers to places where lots of straight guys hang out as well?
Posted by: borut | Dec 14, 2006 3:00:56 PM
Okay, I'll say it.
Kevin De Cock.
Posted by: nuflux | Dec 14, 2006 3:08:11 PM
Thanks just the same, but I am quite attached to my foreskin. Buy condoms - which should be worn in any case.
Posted by: Jeff | Dec 14, 2006 3:19:39 PM
Just want to point out that the study only looked at heterosexual transmission of HIV. Circumcision probably won't have an impact on HIV incidence in the U.S. or Europe.
Posted by: Rob | Dec 14, 2006 3:34:41 PM
"Circumcision probably won't have an impact on HIV incidence in the U.S. or Europe." Because in the Western World only gays have HIV?
Posted by: EireKev | Dec 14, 2006 3:42:02 PM
1. Matthew is sex on legs. I've had the pleasure of seeing him in personal several times and he is a STUD. I would do very bad dirty things to that man.
2. Uncut cocks are twice as hot.
3. I hope David Geffen is able to buy the LA Times. That paper needs a jolt. No one in LA reads it, they all read the NY Times.
Posted by: HUGO | Dec 14, 2006 3:46:31 PM
Stories like this just send out signals to the less educated that if you're circumcised it's ok to have unsafe sex...and yes, some people are that stupid.
A more detailed report I read goes on to say this is actually more beneficial in heterosexual sex and that circumcision does not eliminate the risk of contracting HIV, the same report made little mention of homosexuals. Since I have no intention of diving into a vagina unprotected or otherwise, I'll just keep having gay sex with a condom on, works just fine for me.
Bottom line is weather you're cut or uncut if you're practicing unsafe sex you're playing Russian roulette with your life, the only real prevention is either abstinence or condoms armed with a big dose of knowledge and common sense. I think that message needs to be enforced more than some procedure which in the long run only really benefits the medical profession..once again.
Posted by: Matt | Dec 14, 2006 3:57:29 PM
I find it troubling that these studies never include a discussion of the human rights factor of circumcising males without their consent.
And for the record, I could prove that a rooster crowing causes the sun to come up if that was the result I set out to achieve.
Posted by: Zeke | Dec 14, 2006 4:05:14 PM
$2 billion?? Is he crazy?
Posted by: Anon | Dec 14, 2006 4:08:55 PM
Mitchell was fired because he was an idiot. I don't think there's any judgment in that.
Posted by: KJ | Dec 14, 2006 4:13:40 PM
I wonder if everyone would be rushing to chop off womens' labias if they found that this other form of genital mutilation also cut the infection rate...
Posted by: Lano | Dec 14, 2006 4:14:32 PM
Eirekev, what I wrote was quoted from one of the study's authors in a WebMD article. In the Western world HIV incidence is primarily spread through homosexual sex, and circumcision likely will not have an impact.
Posted by: Rob | Dec 14, 2006 4:21:01 PM
I am glad my boyfriend and I are cut, but to each is own
Posted by: ro | Dec 14, 2006 4:37:54 PM
Anon...no, he's rich and wants the power associated with owning a newspaper. I for one hope he succeeds in his bid for ownership.
Posted by: peterparker | Dec 14, 2006 4:41:47 PM
The circumcision study is totally FLAWED!!!!due to 3 variables they do not account for.
1- Tribal practice of polygamous marriage = tribal culture does not circumcise. Circumcised african males more than likely western influenced christian/ catholic non -polygamous marriage practitioners which lowers aids risk...NOT the actual circumcision or not being circumcised
2- Tribal practice of marrying dead brothers wife (see also polygamy) which if husband died of AIDS then wife most likely has AIDS and will pass on to now married to brother who would be uncircumcised.
3- Tribal cultural practice of believing having sex with a clean virgin will cure diseases which only spreads AIDS the more.....Circumcised african males are more likely to have been educated in western influenced schools and thus not holding to such backwards and dangerous thinking.
3-HUGE variables blow the whole study out of the water. It is not the circumcision that is slowing down the spread of AIDS in africa it is the tribal culture that is speeding up the spread of HIV in africa.
DO not believe this crap study
Posted by: jimmyboyo | Dec 14, 2006 4:53:03 PM
PS
Circumcising tribal practitioners yet not educating them about certain cultural practices that spread AIDS will still spread AIDS quickly.
EDUCATION is what will slow down the spread of AIDS in Africa.
It is also not helpful that the catholic missionaries dealing with these tribal cultures tell them that condoms will send them to hell.
I am flabbergasted that this TOTAL CRAP study ever passed peer review.
Posted by: jimmyboyo | Dec 14, 2006 5:02:42 PM
RO, I appreciate your feelings but I suspect that your preference is more a result of growing up in a country and culture where “cut” is heavily promoted as natural, normal and preferable whereas “uncut” is degraded as unnatural, abnormal, unattractive, unclean and disgusting.
By the way, studies have shown that circumcised females in cultures where such butchery is common, are happy with their mutilated state and would definitely do the same to their daughters.
An excellent anthropological, rather than philosophical or xenophobic, study of ritual genital cutting (male and female) can be found at:
http://www.drabruzzi.com/circumcision.htm
I would encourage everyone to check it out.
Warning: It contains some disturbing pictures.
I am not against circumcision, I simply believe that every MAN should be able to make the choice to be circumcised or not.
I believe in “My body, my choice” but I think it should apply to males every bit as much as it does to females.
Posted by: Zeke | Dec 14, 2006 5:07:27 PM
Circumcision is not nearly in the same class as female genital mutilation. Female gential mutilation, as currently practiced in some African cultures is done with the intent of controlling female sexuality for the purposes of maintaining women's "virginal purity" for men. In other words, it's part of a system of patriarchal domination in which women are seen as sexual objects for men.
It also damages the functioning of the female anatomy and is typically practiced under unsanitary conditions that lead to bleeding and infection.
Circumcision, if performed under sanitary conditions, does not mutilate or damage the penis. You may aesthetically view a circumcised penis as "damaged" but in terms of functioning it is not damaged.
The vast majority of circumcisions are safe. Only a small proportion are botched or lead to infection or other problems.
As for the study itself, the authors state this is not a "cure-all." Nobody is saying that African men who get circumcised don't have to use condoms or reduce partners. But the study found that circumcision reduced the likelihood of transmission by half. Given that people are dying in African of AIDS in record numbers, if you can promote a practice that could lead to a 50% reduction in HIV transmission, you would a fool to not do it.
For what it's worth, an increasing number of adult African men are volunteering for circumcision. What do they know that you don't know?
Posted by: LightningLad | Dec 14, 2006 5:26:20 PM
Lightninglad, read the study at the link I provided earlier. Much of what you just said, as much as we've heard it over and over, is simply not true.
Posted by: Zeke | Dec 14, 2006 5:37:57 PM
Mitchell is going to have a tough case to prove. It's easy to understand how he might be fired for making public video that made fun of job interviewers. That was not only stupid but unethical.
Posted by: noah | Dec 14, 2006 5:37:59 PM
Lightninglad, here it is again, in case you missed it:
http://www.drabruzzi.com/circumcision.htm
Posted by: Zeke | Dec 14, 2006 5:40:28 PM
And for clarification, when I used the word "MAN" above it was intended to mean, as opposed to "child" or "infant" rather than as opposed to "woman".
Posted by: Zeke | Dec 14, 2006 5:45:21 PM