'Love Ranch' Brothel Film Opens in Theatres Tomorrow

Dame Helen Mirren is returning to the big screen tomorrow week in “Love Ranch,” a movie that casts her as a madam of Nevada’s first legal brothel.

While the movie itself has been panned by a lot of critics, Mirren’s performance has been universally lauded as elevating the “soap opera” dialog into believability.

Frankly, I don’t care how awful the movie is or isn't. I love Dame Helen, and could care less what project she’s in. I also love any movie that focuses attention on legalized prostitution, something that I support more than whole-heartedly.

In addition, Dame Helen did a wonderful interview with New York Magazine, which appears below in its entirety, with a huge bonus: A photo series to promote the new movie that included two gorgeous shots of her naked in a bath tub; and two other artistic portraits. I have included them all here, which were taken by Juergen Teller, and appear in New York Magazine, Summer Guide. Dame Helen gets more beautiful with each passing year, a message that a lot of women (and men) need to learn: Real beauty is ageless.

So, sit back and enjoy a wonderful interview, or read it directly at the magazine’s website. Then, go to the theatre and support a wonderful actress, and a topic that also deserves to be supported.

Madam Helen
“I’m still the good girl who wants to be a bad girl…”
By Logan Hill

“All that getting sanctioned by authority, settling down and doing the right things—well, I can’t say it appeals much,” Helen Mirren once said to a reporter. “What I really fancy is getting a bit notorious …?”

It was 1974, and she was a 29-year-old actress teasing the journalist much as she would the press and audiences for the next 36 years. Mirren was then a rising star at the Royal Shakespeare Company—luridly dubbed “Stratford’s very own sex queen” by one paper. It was long before the authorities sanctioned her with a pile of awards (including an Oscar for The Queen), and before the Internet made her a viral phenom thanks to bodacious paparazzi shots of her cavorting in a bikini. At the age of 62. And guess what? She had it both ways: She got her notoriety and the fusty accolades.

“I am a little notorious,” Mirren remarks, still teasing. She says nearly everything with a mischievous twinkle, like a naughty teenager appending “?… in bed” to the end of every sentence. The actress, who turns 65 next month, is elegantly attired in pale rose and silver, her delicate hands (the nails tinted a matching pearlescent rose) constantly buttoning and unbuttoning her cardigan. It’s probably not meant flirtatiously, but with Mirren, every action can feel like a seduction. Perhaps it’s the small, black Native American tattoo on her left hand (the result, she says, of a wild, drunken night in Minnesota), her subtle finger to propriety. “It’s weird when your life becomes vintage, like a period movie,” she says half-seriously. “I’m getting less notorious as I get older. People forget that I ever was.”

Her latest role, not to mention the Juergen Teller photos attending this article, should help remind everyone. After a raft of prestigious parts and three Oscar nominations in the last decade, Mirren signed up to play Grace Botempo, the madam of a booming seventies Reno whorehouse in her husband Taylor Hackford’s film Love Ranch, opening June 30. (The film, based on Nevada’s real Mustang Ranch, is scripted and produced by New York contributing editor Mark Jacobson.) For years, Hackford, whom she married in 1997, has asked her to play smaller parts in his films. “And I said ‘Oh, for God’s sake! Of course I’m not going to do that!’?” says Mirren. “They were never interesting enough parts, and I wasn’t going to do it just because he was directing it.”

Interesting is probably underselling Grace. Diagnosed with cancer and frustrated with an epically sleazy husband (Joe Pesci), Mirren’s madam begins a hot love affair with a beefy boxer 30 years her junior, played with abundant smolder by Spanish newcomer Sergio Peris-Mencheta. “He’s got a fabulous big-animal thing in that sort of raw, brutish, ugly-beautiful way,” says Mirren, who shares a steamy, and, because it’s her, entirely plausible love scene with Peris-Mencheta. In addition, she makes dick jokes, stomps on the throat of a misbehaving prostitute, and presides over the brothel with such swagger that Pesci shouts, “Who do ya think you are, the queen of fuckin’ England?” Well, yes.

In another of her earliest interviews, Mirren was quoted as saying, “I’m a would-be rebel—the good girl who’d like to be a bad one.” She says she continues, at heart, to be the good Catholic schoolgirl named Ilyena Vasilievna Mironov, who grew up in Essex, England, with a Russian father and an English mother. “It’s true! I haven’t grown out of that, have I?” she says, laughing. “I’m still the good girl who wants to be a bad girl. But I’ll never make it as a bad girl … I’m not a prude or a moralist and I never have been, but I’m too fearful, too much of a wimp, really.” When her husband tried to convince her to spend a night at the Mustang Ranch, Mirren refused. “I said, ‘Read my lips: I’m not going to spend a night in a brothel.’?” In the end, she dispensed with research and simply took direction. “It’s amazing how quickly you get into dildos everywhere and pink-feather handcuffs. Within an hour you’re completely used to it.”

Mirren believes that brothels should be legalized because its safer for the sex workers. But she’s also loathe to romanticize working girls: “Susan Austin [the Mustang Ranch’s real madam] said you had to be tough, because maybe you do have 25 psychotic whores. A lot of them come from very dysfunctional backgrounds, and women together like that can be very dangerous.”

There’s the old joke about actors prostituting themselves for their work, but for Mirren, who’s revealed so much of herself (metaphorically and otherwise), and who has often spoken out about the way women get eaten up by the entertainment industry, it’s a complex metaphor. “The girls who work in the sex industry, they put themselves out of their bodies. An actor does sort of the opposite,” says Mirren, who talks about acting as giving every intimacy—emotional and physical—except actual intercourse. “People say ‘Oh, you play someone else.’ I’m always playing myself. You can only do it by going into yourself, in the deepest, most terrifying way. Not to say I haven’t ever prostituted myself quite often and happily. But in my heart it’s very serious.”

Mirren, who began as a devoted stage actress, schooled in Chekhov and Shakespeare, quickly learned to use her sexuality to her advantage. “Especially when you’re younger and you’re a female, you’re being judged physically as much as for everything else,” she says. “And when you’re a serious actress like I was … I’ve always taken it very seriously at that level.”

Of her scandalous early roles in 1969’s Age of Consent (when she stripped as the teenage muse of an older painter) or Gore Vidal and Bob Guccione’s nutty art-porn Caligula (1979), Mirren says she had a plan. “A lot of it is plain, old-fashioned practicality. I wanted to work,” she says. “When I did Caligula, for example, I hadn’t really done movies.” And besides, she adds, “I much prefer overt sexuality to sleazy, vulgar prurience.”

As Mirren explains it, she struggled to get a handle on her own sexuality in order to use its power to accomplish her ambitions. “The Playboy Mansion, coke, and the rise of all that—Guccione and Hefner always pushed it as liberation, but it didn’t seem like that to me,” she says. “That was women obeying the sexualized form created by men—though maybe we always do that, because we want to be attractive. But I was kind of a trailblazer because I demanded to do it my own way. I’d say, ‘I’m not having it put on me by someone else.’ I didn’t want to be the sort of puritanical good girl with a little white collar who says, ‘Don’t shag until you get married.’?”

Now, her reputation secure, Mirren’s enjoying the results of her efforts. “I’m thrilled young girls are claiming their sexuality for themselves,” she says. “I love bold women: Madonna and Scarlett Johansson—sexy and gorgeous, but not only that. And Miley Cyrus—fantastic! And Lady Gaga. I love the way she’s elevated pop to performance art, or dragged performance art down to pop, or maybe made a wonderful amalgam of the two.”

With her coy smile, Mirren looks like the conspiring queen who’s usurped the throne, securing the kingdom for her heirs: “My girls: Miley, Scarlett, Lady Gaga. My team … Yes.”

------

[Photo Above: In this film publicity image released by E1 Entertainment, from left, Niki J. Crawford portrays Tawny, Scout Taylor-Compton portrays Christina, Gina Gershon portrays Irene, Melora Walters portrays Janelle, Elise Neal portrays Alana, Emily Rios portrays Muneca, Bai Ling portrays Samantha and Helen Mirren portrays Grace Bontempo in a scene from "Love Ranch."]

Review
By Jake Coyle
(Note: Contains Spoilers!)

(Dame) Helen Mirren playing a Madame is such fitting casting that it's almost too much. For an actress who has made sexuality her life's subtext, it's as winking as Clint Eastwood playing a gun salesman or Dustin Hoffman a pool cleaner.

But Joe Pesci, who plays her husband and business partner, Charlie "Good Times" Bontempo, has the coyest line in "Love Ranch" — an allusion to Mirren's Oscar-winning performance in "The Queen."

"Who do ya think you are? The queen of ... England?" he asks, somehow restraining a look into the camera.

So the question is, what's an actress of Mirren's quality doing in "Love Ranch," a supermarket romance novel of a movie? The answer: a favor.

Mirren's husband, Taylor Hackford, directs "Love Ranch." It's the first time they've worked together since they met while making 1985's "White Nights." (Hackford has since directed "Devil's Advocate" and "Ray," his previous, Oscar-winning film.)

"Love Ranch" is loosely based on Joe and Sally Conforte, the famed brothel owners whose Mustang Ranch in Reno found national attention in the '70s. Joe Conforte brought heavyweight fighter Oscar Bonavena to the ranch, where Bonavena supposedly became involved with Sally and was eventually shot dead in 1976.

The film is written by magazine journalist Mark Jacobson, whose inflated article on gangster Frank Lucas was the basis for "American Gangster." Jacobson's script for "Love Ranch," set in the mid-'70s, centres on the romance that develops between Grace Bontempo (Mirren) and the visiting Argentine boxer Armando Bruza (newcomer Sergio Peris-Mencheta).

As Charlie, Pesci is only a step or two removed from "Casino" territory. Wearing a bolo tie and an inconsistent Southern accent, Pesci is trying to build their lucrative brothel into a larger enterprise. Calling everyone "sugar," he takes his turns with the ranch's girls, making no attempt to hide his infidelity.

Grace, weary from a lifetime running Nevada brothels, tells him: "I'm not the great visionary like you. I'm just down here with the nuts and bolts."

She keeps the books and the girls in order. In perhaps her finest scene, she quickly and ruthlessly settles a squabble between two prostitutes, flipping one to the ground with her cane and keeping her there with her boot on the girl's throat.

Grace keeps secret a cancer diagnosis (from the terribly named Dr. Smathers) that she has six months to live. But when the rugged, charismatic Armando arrives, Grace is reluctantly stirred, and the two soon begin — against Grace's nature — caring deeply for each other.

And this is where "Love Ranch" looses its footing most obviously. A movie with prostitutes, guns, boxing and Reno is crying out for the film noir treatment. Along with neon signs in the desert, give us some terse dialogue and some fatalism.

Instead, the dressing for "Love Ranch" is a soap opera romance.

With a Christian group and the IRS circling the brothel, Pesci — as always — seems ready to explode. You find yourself surprised that it takes the combustible actor as long as it does to let loose.

Wasted in thin bit parts are fine actors like Gina Gershon (as a prostitute), Bryan Cranston (as a dirty politician) and Wendell Pierce (as a representative for Muhammad Ali).

Mirren does her best with the soapy material, but the better recent reminder of her early sex-symbol "Caligula" days was her performance as Sofya Tolstoy in last year's "The Last Station." Who knew Russian lit was sexier than Reno pulp?

"Love Ranch," an E1 Entertainment and Aramid Entertainment Fund Limited release, is rated R for sexual content, pervasive language and some violence. Running time: 118 minutes. One and a half stars out of four.

— The Curator

Attractive People ONLY Admitted to Exclusive Dating Site

Few news accounts have equal parts disgusted and fascinated me as much as the following: the controversial dating service beautifulpeople.com has just launched a new fertility forum intended to give its beautiful members and non-members (or "ugly people") better odds of having good-looking children, according to the company.
BeautifulPeople.com’s, a dating site exclusively for attractive people (no uglies need or even may apply), most recent venture, is a "virtual sperm and egg bank for people who want to have beautiful babies." Or, "the Beautiful Baby Bank.")

The forum was launched last week and has already created a lot of interest – pro and con.

"Right or wrong, infertile couples highly value attractiveness in their donors," said Greg Hodge, the site's managing director. "It may not give us all a warm, fuzzy feeling inside but you can't argue the fact that parents want to secure every advantage for their child."

Though the dating site is only open to men and women who are voted attractive enough by other members of the site, he said the fertility forum will be available to anyone.

"Initially, we hesitated to widen the offering to non-beautiful people. But everyone – including ugly people – would like to bring good looking children in to the world, and we can't be selfish with our attractive gene pool," company founder Robert Hintze said in a statement.

Hodge said that over the years, BeautifulPeople.com, which has more than 600,000 members from 190 countries, has received repeated requests from fertility clinics to advertise on the site. He said they launched the fertility forum to help address the shortage of sperm and egg donors in the United Kingdom and help potential parents more easily find good-looking donors.

But he emphasized that the company has no financial interest in the new site. It's meant to be a forum for discussion and a way to match beautiful people with those who want their genes, he said. The site directs members to information about fertility clinics and the appropriate protocol to follow.

"It's political, it's contentious, it's polarizing. We certainly don't want to be profiting from it," he said.

But profit or not, critics say the site isn't just ethically questionable, it's an affront to other human beings.

"It's just terribly insulting. It trivializes our values. It trivializes human sexuality. It's just another example of the superficiality and consumerism that I think is running rampant in our society," said Dr. Daniel Sulmasy, a bioethicist at the University of Chicago.

He said that while attraction has played a role in human mating for thousands of years, sites like this make it falsely seem as though the only attribute that matters is a person's looks. He also said that it approaches Aldous Huxley's scenario in "Brave New World," in which people are engineered for certain characteristics.

"It's another step in turning children into products rather than persons," he said.

And Sulmasy asked about what happens when things go wrong.

"This is genetics. It's still a lottery when you're picking somebody's sperm," he said. "The beauty may not come through in the genetics...What are the parents supposed to do then? Turn it in?"

Other detractors worried that BeautifulPeople's new forum would give people a way to circumvent safeguards intended to protect the adults and the child.

"If they are going to be a matchmaker between people who need donations and people who want to be donors, I'm concerned that the medical and psychological protections will not be in place for either party," said Corey Whelan, program director for the American Fertility Association.

Though the site said it would direct would-be donors and recipients to clinics and the proper protocol, she said the forum still "opens up a can of worms" as people could potentially bypass medical tests, psychological screenings and other legal requirements.

She also said that while people do consider attractiveness when choosing a sperm or egg donor, she emphasized that many other factors also come into play.

"[Fertility] centers are really trying to give a broad-based profile of what this person is and certainly looks are part of that, but so is health, so is family, so are interests," she said. "When people are looking at the profiles of potential donors, they are looking for someone with qualities that resonate with them."

There will always be people who weigh attractiveness over other attributes, she said, but that's not the vast majority of people.

"We don't create our families that way," Whelan said. "When people are looking to create their family they [consider] much, much more than looks."

Soooooooooo, had enough reality? May I suggest...a side little trip...into the Twilight Zone! In particular, an episode from 1964 entitled, “Number 12 Looks Just Like You.”

Creator Rod Serling introduces the episode: “Given the chance, what young girl wouldn't happily exchange a plain face for a lovely one? What girl could refuse the opportunity to be beautiful? For want of a better estimate, let’s call this the year 2000. At any rate, imagine a time in the future when science has developed a means to give everyone the face and body he dreams of. It may not happen tomorrow, but it happens now in the Twilight Zone.”

In this instance, the young girl is Marilyn Cuberle who must decide whether to undergo "The Transformation," which happens to everyone at the age of 19 (either by convention or by law; it isn't made clear). Their bodies are reshaped, making them beautiful, and immune to any kind of disease or unhappiness.

She has been looking through a catalog of sorts of bodies to select, torn between Number 12 (her mother’s model) or Number 8, that of a friend.

“Am I homely?” she asks her mother, Lana.

“Not to me, you aren’t,” her mother replies.

(FYI: Everyone must wear name tags, since there are so many identical faces running around, otherwise you couldn’t tell them apart.)

Marilyn is still troubled, so she talks to her Uncle Rick, whose body form is Number 17 – the same model that her late father had selected.

“But, is that good being like everybody – isn’t that the same as being nobody?” she asks.

“Where are you getting these radical ideas?” asks Uncle Rick.

From her late father. “We talked about ‘real things,’ not just about sports or buying new clothes.”

“Is there anything wrong with talking about sports or buying new clothes?” Rick asked.

“Of course not, but Uncle Rick, there’s got to be more to life than just that.” she said.

Naturally, Marilyn is taken to the hospital for the operation, regardless of her misgivings. Her mother visits to ask which “model” woman she has selected. Marilyn doesn’t answer, but says she just remembered what her dad had said once: “When everyone is beautiful no one will be, because without ugliness there can be no beauty...Mother, don’t you understand, they don’t care whether you’re beautiful or not, they just want everyone to be the same,” she cries, as the doctor moves in.

Marilyn bolts, but ends up trying to hide – in the operating room. After the procedure, she’s thrilled with her new body, she’s chose model Number 8, just like her friend Valerie. The episodes ends as she’s admiring herself and the others in a mirror.

Rod Serling recites the epilog: “Portrait of a young lady in love – with herself. Improbable? Perhaps. But in an age of plastic surgery, body building and an infinity of cosmetics, let us hesitate to say impossible. These and other strange blessings may be waiting in the future which are after all is the Twilight Zone.”

And the very best part of this episode? The screenplay was written by John Tomerlin, adapted from the Charles Beaumont's story "The Beautiful People," which was first published in the September 1952 If maganzine!

This episode of the Twilight Zone’s original airdate was Jan. 24, 1964, The Twilight Zone - Season 5 (The Definitive Edition), Episode 17.

The great cast included:
Collin Wilcox as Marilyn Cuberle
Suzy Parker as Lana Cuberle, Eva, Doe, Grace, Jane, and Patient Number 12
Richard Long as Uncle Rick (Number 17), Dr. Rex, Sigmund Friend, Dr. Tom, Tad, and Jack
Pam Austin as Valerie, and Marilyn (after transformation) Number 8

— The Curator

Do Porn Sites Need .XXX Web Domain?

Internet porn sites may soon have the option to move off the ".com" main street of the Web to their very own adult-only domain: ".xxx." But industry experts say the adult world is divided over whether or not there is actually a need for a dedicated virtual red-light district.

The Internet Corp. for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), an international Internet oversight group, announced Friday that it would proceed with a proposal to register ".xxx," after rejecting the same application three years ago.

Peter Dengate Thrush, chairman of ICANN's board of directors, said that the board had previously rejected the .xxx proposal by ICM Registry, LLC because of disagreement over whether or not a community of adult content providers backed the proposal.

One of ICANN's application requirements is that a community sponsors each proposal, and he said, "There was doubt about the size and strength of the community. And the commitment to the process."

But after an outside panel reviewed ICANN's 2007 decision, its board ruled today to reverse its decision to block the .xxx suffix and proceed with the process.

Thrush said there are still several steps to complete before the .xxx domain is ready for use, but he added that if everything moves quickly, the process could be completed in six to eight months, though it could take longer.

Still, Stuart Lawley, president of ICM Registry, is confident that the .xxx domain will ultimately reach the Web. "I think there is almost zero chance of this not happening," he said, adding that the volume of requests to reserve Web addresses "is going up by the minute."

He said that as of Thursday he'd taken about 110,000 reservations, and overnight received 2,000 more. By the time the registry launches, he said he expects the number of registrations to reach 500,000.

According to his research, there are about 5 or 6 million adult sites on the Internet and, if all goes well, he said he could potentially capture 2 to 3 million of them over time.

Though Lawley charges $60 to register a .xxx site, rather that the the $10 charged for generic .com sites, he said he hopes to convince adult content providers that his domain names can draw more traffic.

He said the .xxx sites will adhere to a higher code of conduct in terms of dealing with customer data and keeping sites free of malicious content.

He also said there would be a benefit to families that want to block adult content from kids, as the .xxx domain ensures more effective filtering. The uncommon domain also decreases the chance of children or others just stumbling on to a pornographic site.

For adult content providers, that means "more customers visiting on a more regular basis and feeling more confident to spend money on those sites," he said. "Over a period of five or 10 years we hope it will become the preferred domain of choice for the adult industry."

But industry observers say owners of adult sites are split over whether or not the Internet change is a positive one.

"There are two different camps. The kind of business folks who look at every opportunity as a business opportunity and those who are very and protective of the potential 'ghettoization' of the industry," said Alec Helmy, president and publisher of XBiz, an adult industry news outlet.

He said some skeptics worry that creating a .xxx domain could make it possible for governments to require adult sites to use the dedicated suffix and then potentially block them all at will.

Others say adopting a .xxx domain in a .com world will make it harder for potential customers to find adult sites of interest.

"It's a hot topic on the various message boards," Helmy said. "The value proposition of the .xxx – is this something that the industry needs, or is it just some other way for another entity to make money?"

But even as the debate rages on, he said it appears that the big names in the industry are registering their names on the .xxx domain as a precautionary measure to protect their brands and future real estate.

"If you're Playboy I think you would want to register Playboy.xxx [before] some Joe Schmoe," he said.

Though he doesn't see .xxx replacing .com, he said that as the .xxx proposal progresses, he expects even critics to come on board.

"The way the media has covered the latest development is that this is on the way to being approved," he said. "If it does, I think a good proportion of those who are opponents would probably find one way or another to protect their brands by registering domain names. If you can't beat it, join it."

So, now’s your chance gang: Register a big-name porn site on the cheap at .xxx and sell it for mega bucks when it catches on and the real group wants to buy it to protect their brand. When the Internet first began to go global, a guy in his 30’s registered beer.com and sold it to a brewery for so much money that he was able to retire! Ah, porn and money, perfect together.

— The Curator

My Sex Life as a Disabled Woman

Almost always, sex is simply too much.

It’s too much expectation; too much pain; often just too much effort that leads to too much debilitating exhaustion; too much disappointment. I’m disabled you see, so it’s rare that sex isn’t too much. But it just as often brings too much joy; too much connection; too much divinity; too much glorious pleasure that leads to too much unbelievably soaring release. So, far too wonderful to lose. Thus, I will reach out to my partner with my broken, weakening body until I am just too, too, too totally unable to do so.

I LOVE sex. I believe and live a sex-positive life, having found a true connection with the Cosmic Creator through practicing Tantra in sexual unions. But, this has been a pretty tough year for me. I have Lupus, S.E., and it’s devastated a lot of my joints (I walk with two canes), and is now working on the ’ole noggin. I’m 53, but feel more like 93 a lot of time (and no, not the new 93 either!)

I’ve lived with the diagnosis a very long time, adjusting my sex life so that the positions required for success could be consistently met with a partner or during solo sex. Recently, that’s been more and more difficult. It may well be that I won’t be able to find a comfortable position at all some day – so I have to prepare for that horrible possibility.

You know, most disabled women and men never discuss their sex lives or sexual problems publicly or sadly, even in private. There is such an enormous layer of shame surrounding it, like it’s somehow our fault that our limbs won’t respond like a “normal,” able-bodied person. Like we’re filthy, unclean in the Biblical sense.

Recently, I looked through a bunch of free porn on the Internet. No, I’m not into it, although there’s nothing wrong with porn, and I actually surprised myself by finding some of it arousing. I had been looking for an image to copy and stylize for this blog when I ran into some very troubling information. It seems that if someone is in a wheelchair, or is otherwise visibly disabled and are depicted in porn, it is produced as “fetish sex.” FETISH SEX! In other words, not regular-people-porn. (I can’t believe I’m arguing we should be treated better by the porn industry, but I am.)

Here’s the dictionary definition of fetish: “The paraphilic focus in Fetishism involves the use of nonliving objects (the "fetish"). Among the more common fetish objects are women's underpants, bras, stockings, shoes, boots, or other wearing apparel. The person with Fetishism frequently masturbates while holding, rubbing, or smelling the fetish object or may ask the sexual partner to wear the object during their sexual encounters. Usually the fetish is required or strongly preferred for sexual excitement, and in its absence there may be erectile dysfunction in males…Usually the Paraphilia begins by adolescence, although the fetish may have been endowed with special significance earlier in childhood. Once established, Fetishism tends to be chronic.”

Obviously, fetish has also come to be used to denote any preference that has an erotic or sensual tinge to it, even if it isn’t part of a person’s traditional sex life. So someone who really loves shoes may describe themselves as having a shoe fetish. On the other hand, someone who likes to incorporate fur into their sex play may say they have fur fetish. Thus, someone who gets off by seeing someone in a wheelchair has a disabled-person fetish? Holy crap, as if life with a serious/fatal illness wasn’t rough enough already.

Everyone needs to feel good about themselves at least a little bit to be able to have sex, rotten self-esteem takes the steam out of the sizzle faster than anything else. So, when the porn industry throws us under the bus, too, it simply underscores just how the rest of society must see us, too.

I had already discovered that there are no sex aids for the disabled on the market – believe me, I’d looked everywhere. As a woman, a gadget that would help me reach would be great, or something to support my arms while I try to pleasure my partner, since my hands are unable to work long or well. Nothing, zip, nada. Soooooo, I have been forced to improvise, as I’m sure all other disabled people must, too.

In many ways, I’m lucky to be female since I don’t have to depend on holding an erection, which must be a nightmare for a lot of disabled guys. I’m also lucky because I orgasm easily and consistently – as long as the right areas can be comfortably reached, that is.

Does society really think we have no right to sex? That we are non-entities, sexless eunuchs who should stay in the background. We should know and keep our place. Above all, that we are not flesh and blood human beings with deep feelings, passionate desires, and strong sexual drives. Are you surprised to hear that we have just as many earthly needs as you have? That we have as much of a birthright to orgasm you. Or, does the real image of a disabled person deeply aroused or in full orgasm repulse you? Be brutally honest. The truth is it might even repulse you if you are disabled.

I assume that any erotica penned that involves a disabled person would be considered fetish sex, or even deviant sex. That’s too bad. We disabled know a lot about sex – we have to. We have to understand how our bodies, and yours, work to be able to have sex consistently and successfully. We know cool little – and sometimes big – tricks that you might really, really enjoy. We are also very patient, and are often forced to go nice and slow. We are generally sincerely considerate of your needs and pleasure, and very grateful for the kind, loving touches, kisses that we receive.

You see, when I have sex and the pleasure begins to build (inside or within my partner), I am no longer disabled. My body is no longer broken; I am suddenly floating free and unencumbered in the loving arms of endless, universal bliss. Is it any wonder that I do not – will not – give up this part of my life, and steadfastly refuse to apologize for it?

(FYI: The only really complete book on the subject that I've found helpful is
Ultimate Guide to Sex and Disability, by Miriam Kaufman, et. all.)

— The Curator

Gay Men STILL Banned From Donating Blood

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Advisory Committee on Blood Safety and Availability has decided to retain the policy that bans blood donation by any man who has had sex with a man at any time, even once, since 1977.

Incongruously, current policy allows people who have unsafe heterosexual sex with someone who has AIDS to donate blood after a one-year waiting period.

In a 9-6 vote, which took place last week, the committee cited a lack of research to support the notion that lifting the ban would not contaminate the blood supply.

Current HIV testing technology can identify a new infection with the virus within about 10 days of transmission.

The committee acknowledged that current policy permits "some potentially high-risk donations while preventing some potentially low-risk donations."

It called this state of affairs "suboptimal" and suggested more research into the matter."

This decision is outrageous, irresponsible and archaic," said Rea Carey, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. "We expect more out of this advisory committee and this administration than to uphold an unnecessarily discriminatory policy from another era."

She said all donors should be "screened appropriately and assessed based on actual behavioral risk independent of their sexual orientation."

The American Red Cross, the nation’s largest blood supplier, agrees.

"The American Red Cross is disappointed with the decision made by the (committee) not to recommend a change to the FDA policy of a lifetime deferral for men who have sex with other men," the organization said. "While the Red Cross is obligated by law to follow the guidelines set forth by the FDA, we also strongly support the use of rational, scientifically based deferral periods that are applied fairly and consistently among donors who engage in similar risk activities."

Though the committee voted to recommend against changing the current policy, the committee did recommend, among other actions, that quarantine release errors should be investigated. Depending on the results of such an investigation, this could lead to a future recommendation to reduce or eliminate the “deferral” of gay men and other men who have sex with men desiring to donate blood. Not much improvement, but a bit of a start.

While the increase the blood supply could receive by lifting the indefinite deferral was noted as “modest at best,” Dr. Frederick Axelrod, CEO of LifeStream, noted that there are other concerns with not changing the current policy at all.

Referring to college campuses and others canceling blood drives to express sympathy for and solidarity with the gay community, Axelrod said, “these issues...are coming up more frequently and the vocal nature of it is getting louder and louder.” Axelrod warned that if the policy is not changed “there could be an increased voice that’s going to push harder as it relates to this and then it’s going to affect the amount of blood that we can collect and then it’ll affect patients in a different way — not with an infectious disease, but not having enough blood and going back to shortages.”

Peter Sprigg of the Family Research Council, an anti-gay organization that has been accused of lobbying Congress in opposition of a resolution that would denounce Uganda’s “kill the gays” bill, spoke at the meeting in favor of maintaining the current policy. Despite his organization’s anti-gay stance, his statements to the committee were carefully crafted to contain no blatantly homophobic language. Also speaking at the meeting were Nathan Schaefer and Sean Cahill of Gay Men’s Health Crisis, as well as several HIV/AIDS organizations.

Schaefer made clear that his organization does not “necessarily think that anyone opposed to changing the current policy is motivated by homophobia,” but the possibility of homophobia represented in the policy is certainly present. Describing disparities in treatment, Schaefer gave the example that though any man who has had sex with another man since 1977 can never give blood, a man who has had sex with a known HIV+ woman more than 365 days ago can give blood.

HHS apparently kept no record of how members voted on the issue. A recording of the meeting is available on the department’s website, but due to low video quality and a camera shot that doesn’t include all members, not all votes are known. One vote in support of the current policy was cast by Anne Marie Finley, Vice President of Government Relations at Celgene Corporation, one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical corporations.

Back in the 80's when we didn't know much about HIV/AIDS and the homosexual community was largely ignored and/or widely discriminated against, HIV/AIDS was seen as the "Gay Disease." This was because, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, at that time most AIDS cases occurred among whites homosexual males. Soon thereafter AIDS began spreading through intravenous drug use as well as other transmission methods and that's when cases starting being identified in heterosexuals as well. Once the HIV/AIDS issue became an epidemic, the federal government got involved, "to protect the people."

In 1983 the Food and Drug Administration implemented rules against men who have had sex – even once – with another man since 1977, stating that they are forbidden from donating blood. The purpose of this rule was to prevent HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, from tainting the blood supply. Screening tests to identify HIV-positive blood had not been developed as of yet and so an all out ban seemed like an appropriate measure. Despite the fact that this is no longer the case as there are plenty of tests that can detect the virus, the ban was nonetheless retained. Thus, in 2010, gay males who have sex with other gay males cannot give blood, even if they don't have HIV/AIDS.

Of note: There are no other minority groups banned from giving blood, regardless of whether or not said minority group has a high HIV/AIDS infection rate or not. For example, if you are a gay woman, you can apparently give all the blood you want. That is because lesbians are not seen as a high-risk group for contracting HIV/AIDS as opposed to sexually active gay males. Though hundreds of thousands of woman have HIV/AIDS due to drug use or other methods of transmissions, the CDC still doesn't consider them to be a "high-risk" group because they are not likely to transmit HIV/AIDS through sexual intercourse (although it is possible).

Another example of this glaring hypocrisy is that despite gay males being labeled as a high risk group, according to the Center For Disease Control as of 2008, African American men and women were estimated to have an incidence rate that was 7 times as high as the incidence rate among white people...and yet there is no ban against black people giving blood.

In addition, various studies also show that heterosexual intercourse is the fastest-growing mode of HIV transmission in North America and the dominant mode of HIV transmission worldwide. It has been reported that HIV is rapidly showing up in heterosexual communities throughout North America. However, there is no ban on heterosexuals giving blood. It seems that the precautions taken against receiving tainted blood from sexually active homosexuals is not considered necessary for sexually active heterosexuals.

There is also a glaringly obvious problem here. For one, any person, gay or otherwise does not have to tell the truth about any of the above. All one has to say to give blood is, "I'm straight, monogamous and last time I checked, STD free." Then they take your blood and test it, just like everyone else. The dirty little secret in all of this is that homosexual men do give blood, when they choose to lie.

Sadly, it appears that the FDA is discriminating against a particular group of people based on their sexuality, rather than establishing real precautions to ensure that the country’s blood reserve is safe.

— The Curator

Anti-Rape Condom Has Teeth and Then Some!

A South African doctor is handing out an anti-rape condom to women during the World Cup in an effort to help women there combat sexual assaults in a country that has one of the highest rape rates in the world.

The device’s creator, Dr. Sonnet Ehlers (depicted above with the device) said the condom, called Rape-aXe, is similar to when a man catches his penis in a zipper.

"Rape-aXe will have the same effect, just worse," she says in the Q&A portion at the condom's website.

Ethers says the condom is completely safe for women, but will inflict serious pain on a male perpetrator, even more so if he tries to escape:

“It hurts, he cannot pee and walk when it’s on,” she told CNN yesterday. “If he tries to remove it, it will clasp even tighter...however, it doesn’t break the skin, and there’s no danger of fluid exposure.”

She said she sold her house and car to launch the project, which will enable her to hand out 30,000 free condoms during the World Cup, which wraps up July 11. After that, the anti-rape condoms will be available for $2 each.

South Africa has one of the highest rape rates in the world. A 2009 report by the nation's Medical Research Council found that 28 percent of men surveyed had raped a woman or girl, with one in 20 saying they had raped in the past year, according to Human Rights Watch.

It is also believed that 16 percent of the population is living with HIV.

In most African countries, rape convictions are uncommon. Affected women don't get immediate access to medical care, and DNA tests to provide evidence are too expensive.

"Women and girls who experience these violations are denied justice, factors that contribute to the normalization of rape and violence in South African society," Human Rights Watch says.

Women take drastic measures to prevent rape in South Africa, Ehlers said, with some wearing extra tight biker shorts and others inserting razor blades wrapped in sponges in their private parts.

Critics have accused her of developing a medieval device to fight rape.

"Yes, my device may be a medieval, but it's for a medieval deed that has been around for decades," she said. "I believe something's got to be done...and this will make some men rethink before they assault a woman."

Human Rights Watch also notes arrest and conviction rates for attackers are extremely low and the victims of sexual assault often face numerous obstacles in accessing health care.

She hopes the condom will be worn by women as a preventative measure. She said she’s talked to convicted rapists in jail to see if such a device would make them think twice about their actions, and she said some of them said it would:

“The ideal situation would be for a woman to wear this when she’s going out on some kind of blind date...or to an area she’s not comfortable with,” she said.

The condom is inserted into a woman the same way she'd use a tampon. It is a latex condom worn by females who feel in danger of being raped. The device features jagged rows of teeth-like hooks that will latch on to a man’s penis upon penetration When an attacker penetrates the woman, the condom attaches to his penis with barbs that are found inside the condom.

Rape-aXe causes the attacker discomfort. If a man tries to take the condom off, it will become even tighter. Once the spikes attach to a man’s penis, only a doctor can remove it, something Ethers hopes will be done by authorities upon arrest.

The company's website says while the condom won't prevent the attack, it can help prevent the spread of sexually transmitted infections, such as HIV, and unwanted pregnancies resulting from rape.

As well, because a doctor has to remove the condom, the hope is that authorities will catch more attackers.

Ehlers was on call one night four decades ago when a devastated rape victim walked in. Her eyes were lifeless; she was like a breathing corpse.

"She looked at me and said, 'If only I had teeth down there,'" recalled Ehlers, who was a 20-year-old medical researcher at the time. "I promised her I'd do something to help people like her one day." Forty years later, Rape-aXe was born.

"I consulted engineers, gynecologists and psychologists to help in the design and make sure it was safe," she said.

Her advice to men who don't want to be on the receiving end of Rape-aXe: "Don't put what belongs to you where it does not belong and you will never run into trouble."

But critics say the condom puts its women users in even more danger because instead of being able to run away and escape the perpetrator, he is stuck inside of the victim until authorities can be reached. Thus, women are even more vulnerable to the rapist trapped by the device, and remains so as he grapples with the reality of getting caught and convicted. That scenario could result in an even more violent outcome.

Critics add that this female condom is not a long-term solution.

It's also a form of "enslavement," said Victoria Kajja, a fellow for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the east African country of Uganda. "The fears surrounding the victim, the act of wearing the condom in anticipation of being assaulted all represent enslavement that no woman should be subjected to."

Kajja said the device constantly reminds women of their vulnerability.

"It not only presents the victim with a false sense of security, but psychological trauma," she added. "It also does not help with the psychological problems that manifest after assaults."

Various rights organizations that work in South Africa declined to comment, including Human Rights Watch and Care International.

This is one of those stories that is so far removed from my personal reality/experience that it’s impossible to comment on its pros and cons in an analytical way, so I am going to comment solely based on emotion. (I was repeatedly molested as a child, but I have never been raped, nor have I ever been threatened with rape.)

It is inconceivable to me that I would live somewhere that I would have to even consider inserting razor blades into my own vagina to protect me from being raped if I went outside to events. This condom with teeth beats the hell out of that.

It worries me that the vicious rapist would remain glued to me, intimately, or if freed would know he might be arrested because of the device. Might some guy who was willing to rape me, also be willing to kill me to prevent being arrested?

One critic said this is not a long-term solution. No damn kidding. But I say until that society ensures the safety of its female populace from sexual assault, women there have an undeniable right to protect themselves in any way they see fit.

Thanks to my dear friend, SurvivingSurvival for directing me to this important account.

— The Curator

Sex Pill for Women Nixed by Panel

Federal health experts found unanimously today that the first so-called “female viagra” sex pill did not show strong enough results to warrant approval.

Boehringer Ingelheim GmbH’s sex-drive drug flibanserin doesn’t provide enough benefits to outweigh its risks, according to a U.S. panel reviewing the first pill designed to boost women’s libidos.

As we reported on this blog last November, Boehringer Ingelheim's pink pill flibanserin was the latest drug industry offering to target women with low sex drive, a market potentially worth billions.

But members of the Food and Drug Administration's reproductive drugs panel meeting in Gaithersburg, Maryland voted today 11-0 that the drug's benefits did not outweigh side effects, including fatigue, depression and fainting spells. The advisory panel is comprised of a group of experts from outside the FDA.

Earlier, the same panel voted 10-1 that the drug isn’t effective. In fact, Flibanserin failed to increase sexual desire, as recorded by women in daily journals, in two company studies.

While the FDA usually follows its advisory panels’ recommendations, it isn’t required to do so. The FDA is expected to make its own decision on the drug in several months. The drug's proposed brand name is Girosa. It is not yet approved anywhere in the world.

Earlier this week, the FDA released a review of two studies that found the drug didn't have much impact on a woman's libido but did seem to slightly boost sexual satisfaction, according to published reports.

The drug's tolerability was "only moderate," FDA staff said. Nearly 15 percent of women who took the recommended flibanserin dose stopped doing so before the study ended due to possible side effects. Depression, fainting and fatigue were among the problems reported by women who took the drug.

Boehringer Ingelheim, in a document also posted to FDA's website Wednesday, explained that flibanserin is aimed at treating women who previously had a level of sexual desire that was satisfactory to them and lost that desire "in all situations and across significant levels of time." The company said women typically need to be distressed or upset by their loss of sexual desire."

Hypoactive Sexual-Desire Disorder (HSDD) is not simply due to stress or the result of fatigue, or of being a working mother with small children," the company said.

The company said women with HSDD currently have "extremely limited" treatment options and that flibanserin provides such an option. Boeringer Ingelheim said treatment with flibanserin resulted in women having "clinically relevant" improvements in sexual desire, sexual activity and sexual function.

Several medical trials, including a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, say that at least 40 percent of women suffer from varying degrees of sexual hypoactivity, though critics warn that drug companies have funded a number of these surveys.

An analysis of the two clinical trials published on the FDA's website note that both "failed to demonstrate a statistically significant improvement" in sexual desire, even though patients who took flibanserin had slightly more satisfying sexual relations with their partners than those who took a placebo.

"Neither study met the agreed-upon criteria for success in establishing the efficacy of flibanserin for the treatment of HSDD," the FDA added.

The two-year studies, measured by women's diary entries in the United States and Canada, found that women who took flibanserin reported an average 4.5 more satisfying sexual experiences per month, versus 3.7 for those who took a placebo.

The women – most of them married with a high education and good health apart from their decreased libido – had reported an average 2.8 satisfying experiences before taking the medicine.

Flibanserin belongs to a family of antidepressants that reduce the level of serotonin, which has an effect on mood and can put a damper on sexual desire.

The drug also controls the levels of dopamine and norepinephrine in the blood, substances that act on sexual desire, the pill's manufacturer said.

Sexual therapist Leonore Tiefer of the New York University School of Medicine and Albert Einstein College of Medicine expressed worries that commercializing the pill would disappoint many women.

According to Tiefer, one of the experts presenting their advice before the FDA, the emotional complexity of female sexuality and the types of problems that may arise usually are not linked to medical problems.

"Is there a small group of women who could benefit from medical intervention? Probably," she told The New York Times.

But she cautioned that "the much larger group of women without any medical reason for their sexual distress will inevitably be misinformed and misled into thinking that there is a pill that can get them the sex life they read about, the one they think everyone else is having."

The drug was discovered by accident — after it failed trials as an antidepressant. Originally, flibanserin was developed as an anti-depressant, but turned out to be a poor one. Questionnaires given to patients helped discover the drug possessed libido-boosting side effects, and many of the women who participated in the trial seemed reluctant to give back the drug.

One of the most interesting aspects of the drug is that it underscores the fundamental difference between the way sexual arousal works in men and women. The drug hoped to be marketed to women works on their brains, while male impotency pills such as Viagra, Eli Lilly's Cialis and Bayer's Levitra, widen blood vessels to increase the blood flow to the penis needed for an erection. These same male impotence pills, have failed to show notable aphrodisiac effects in women.

Paula Hall, of Relate, urges caution. "Female loss of libido is a big problem and it is not going away. It can cause problems within a relationship and affect self-esteem. This research is really quite exciting for women with loving partners whose loss of libido is a physical thing. But it is not going to fix a broken relationship or help with looking after the kids or cleaning the house," Hall said.

For some women AND men, reduced sexual interest or response may be "normal," doctors say.

Men’s Viagra was originally meant to be a treatment for high blood pressure, and the heart condition angina. As with the women in this study, men taking part in early trials of the drug realized it had an interesting and unexpected side effect: Erections! Arriving in 1998, the drug has since been prescribed for over 25-million men.

From the beginning, the new drug has proven controversial among sex researchers, with some arguing the pharmaceutical companies are exaggerating the number of women affected by low libidos, simply as a market expansion ploy by pushing a pill unable to deal with psychological issues responsible for putting someone off sex, e.g. poor body image, former abuse, or stress.

I find it even more interesting that the firestorm ‘erupting’ over this drug has far exceeded anything related to male impotency drugs. In fact, discussions focusing on the meaning of sexual desire were sadly, and noticeably missing when Viagra-type medications were on the horizon. It was the primarily the physical impact of those medications on patients that were discussed, not their psychological effects on users.

In 2003, a year after Boehringer researchers began the clinical trials, an article written by Ray Moynihan in the British Medical Journal called female sexual dysfunction, “the freshest, clearest example we have” of a disease created by pharmaceutical companies to make healthy people think they need medicine.

“This is for some an ideological battle,” said psychiatrist Michael Berner of the Freiburg University Clinic, who had patients in Boehringer’s studies. “One view is the multi-dimensional view you get from people like me. And then you have these people that say you should work only on relationship issues and that medication cannot have a place.”

Flibanserin is believed to work on the brain by putting “two feet on the brakes” to block the release of a chemical called serotonin, which regulates mood, appetite, sleep and memory. In time, the process should trigger the production of dopamine, a chemical that, among other jobs, helps stimulate desire. The drug differs from testosterone, a hormone that’s also been tested to reawaken women’s desire.

After as an initial period of hesitation about developing a sex pill, Boehringer officials decided to move forward. The company needs new drugs because it faces the loss of 1 billion euros ($1.5 billion) in annual revenue when two older medicines, Mirapex for Parkinson’s disease and Flomax to treat enlarged prostate, lose patent protection this year.

In my opinion, which I expressed last year, the company did a lot of pre-publicity for this drug, hoping that the worldwide conversation would impact the FDA panel’s decision, and to soften other markets – like in the U.K.

I can only hope that each and every country does its own studies, and acts in the best interest of women – not commerce.

— The Curator

Female Genital Cutting: Affecting Young Girls in America

Mutilating, cutting or even “nicking” female genitalia needs to be eliminated from our world, PERIOD, regardless of its religious connotation.

This blog has consistently brought information about this heinous practice to readers. This week, ABC News did a fascinating report focusing on AMERICAN girls facing this procedure. That’s right – girls in the U.S. not some distant country.

To ensure that all of the facts from this report are presented here, below is the account in its entirity, or read it at the ABC News website:

Many U.S. doctors faced with decision when asked to cut young girls

By Brinda Adhikari and Lara Salahi
—June 14, 2010

Female genital cutting (FGC) is a tradition that many assume to be affecting girls living only in Africa and Asia. But this rite of passage procedure is all too familiar for many women living in the U.S.

The practice of cutting encompasses all procedures involving partial or total removal of the external female genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs for non-medical reasons, according to the World Health Organization. In some countries, many of these girls will have their clitoris completely removed to deny them sexual pleasure. And at its most severe, some of them will have their vaginas sewn shut to preserve their virginity.

"It's worse than anything in this world," said one young woman living in America, known as Mary, who asked to conceal her real name for fear of retribution from her community.

Mary had the most radical form of cutting performed on her in her home country. Her clitoris was removed and her vagina was stitched together.

Another young woman, anonymously identified as Amy, told ABC News that if her parents found out she was speaking out about female genital cutting they would "literally" kill her.

Although the procedure has been officially banned in the U.S. since 1996, some parents who want to stay true to their traditions ask American doctors to cut their daughters, leaving many doctors with a complicated choice.

Female genital cutting, a ritual thousands of years old, is a tradition many mothers and fathers feel obligated to have their daughters undergo because, without it, they are deemed unworthy of marriage. It is a cultural practice, without religious basis or any medical benefits. In fact, studies show that women who have been through it may suffer a lifetime of devastating complications, from severe infections, to pain and bleeding, and even a higher risk of death during childbirth. Some women die from the procedure itself.

Each day in Africa and Asia, more than 8,000 girls between infancy and age 15 undergo female genital cutting, an estimated total of three million girls annually.

"Obviously [parents] don't use the word 'female genital mutilation,' said Terry Dunn, an obstretrician gynecologist in Denver, Colo. "What the mom of the patient says is, 'I want to have the procedure that makes my daughter like me.'" Many physicians who consider FGC a horrifying treatment of a girl suffer a dreadful dilemma. If they say no, the young patient may become one of tens of thousands of young girls taken back to their home countries, in a process known as 'vacation-cutting.' Once there, the girls are often cut using a broken glass or unsterilized razor blades, and, more often than not, without anesthesia. While FGC may be banned in the U.S., there is no law protecting girls from being taken overseas to have the procedure in another country.

The CDC estimates that between 150,000 to 200,000 girls in the United States are in danger of being taken overseas during their time off from school to undergo vacation cutting. In fact, Amy said her parents were pressuring her to return to their home country. Instead, Amy said, she ran away from home.

"If I went back, I would have been cut," said Amy.

Dilemma Doctors Face

According to Dr. Doug Diekema, a pediatrician at Seattle's Children's Hospital and former chairman of the American Academy of Pediatrics' bioethics committee, by refusing to cut girls in the U.S., many doctors may be putting these girls' lives in jeopardy.

"It's very easy to take the high road in cases like this," said Diekema. "But when you're dealing with religious or cultural beliefs, saying no sometimes is not sufficient for people and it will not necessarily eliminate the practice."

In fact, Diekema and a few of his colleagues put forth the idea that American doctors use a so-called ritual nick as an alternative , to keep parents from seeking more dangerous methods of cutting. And, based on Diekema's recommendation, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) released an official policy statement saying, "the ritual nick would not cause physical harm."

"The cut itself would be tiny, really just like a poke with a needle so that there might be a drop of blood," said Diekema.

But to many opponents of any form of procedure resembling the traditional female cutting, a ritual nick should not be acceptable as a substitute.

"What the AAP is in fact doing is 'wink, wink, nod, nod' in order to protect your patient from a possible worse form of [FGC], let's just spread her legs and nick her," said Taine Bien-Aime, president of the international human rights organization, Equality Now. "The reality is that what [that] statement does is perpetuate female genital mutilation. There is no other way around it."

But Diekema said that the proposed ritual nicking should not be considered a form of mutilation. "If you look up any definition of mutilation in the dictionary, it doesn't apply to this particular procedure," said Diekema.

Running Out of Options

For Mary, who has seen too many friends suffer through this, ritual nicking is not an acceptable compromise by doctors to keep parents from vacation cutting.

When asked by senior health and medical editor, Dr. Richard Besser, what pediatricians should do when faced with a family who wants to take their daughter back to their home country to undergo genital cutting, Mary said, "Call child services on them."

But, Dr. Nawal Nour, director of the African Women's Health Center at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, Mass., said it is important not to vilify the immigrant community.

"Blame is never the solution," said Nour. "Empower them, rather than let's cut them and hurt them."

The center, which exclusively helps immigrant women deal with the complications caused by FGC, educates women about the dangers of FGC to prevent cutting for future generations. Layla Guled, a Somali language interpreter, says parents often feel as though they don't have a choice. Moreover, she says, they have the best intentions.

"Our mothers are trying to do the right thing for us," said Guled. "But our generation is trying to fight it."

The AAP offered clarification to their initial policy statement, saying that while the ritual nick may be considered an option, the practice of cutting is still harmful to girls. But after questions by ABC News regarding ritual nicking recommendations, the AAP withdrew their policy statement completely, saying that it had caused too much confusion and controversy.

"I want to make it very clear that the American Academy of Pediatrics opposes any form of female genital cutting, and that would include the ritual nick," Dr. Judith Palfrey, president of the AAP, told ABC News.

Still, Diekema said he stands behind the idea of ritual nicking as an alternative to vacation cutting.

Yet so many U.S. doctors still face a terrible set of options. And while millions of young girls wait for some answer on their fate, some who speak publically about it say they are not giving up the fight.

"We have to change a whole culture," said Mary. "Maybe we can't change their generation but we can change our own generation. We know it's wrong. There's nothing right about this."

For Help

Female genital cutting (FGC) encompasses all procedures involving partial or total removal of the external female genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs for non-medical reasons, according to the World Health Organization. While the procedure seems like a tribal tradition undergone on other countries, many young women in the U.S. have undergone FGC.

For many girls who may have already undergone FGC or who are facing community pressure to undergo the procedure, there's help. Here are a few places to turn:

Equality Now: is an international human rights organization that advocates for the social welfare of girls and women.
Sanctuary for Families: is a non-profit organization based in New York that offers help for women seeking assistance regarding FGC.
Amercian Academy of Pediatrics: is an expert-based organization that offers medical information and policy statements on children's health, including young girls.
UNICEF: a part of the United Nations, advocates for children's rights and protection worldwide.
Tostan: is a nongovernmental organization dedicated to preserving African women's rights and to empowering African communities to abandon FGC.
Brigham and Women's Hospital: African Women's Health Center is a clinic committed to improving the health of refugee and immigrant women who have undergone FGC.

And a special suggestion from your Curator: The Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting Blog is dedicated to posting all news items from around the world related to this important topic. I search this blog frequently to find out what’s going on.

So far, there have been more than 350 comments at the ABC News site from readers. The comments are illuminating, some likening the practice to male circumcision. I find that argument off base. While I agree that circumcision should also be looked at critically, FGC is an attempt to lessen a woman’s sexuality, to make her the property of men in all ways – mind and body. That is hardly the goal of circumcision, which is not done to guarantee that the male baby is a virgin! In addition, FGC often makes women unable to climax or even experience sexual pleasure, while circumcision does not prevent men from enjoying sex. It is true that both procedures cause young people and infants pain. That alone should cause parents to pause and consider performing either procedure on their children. It is another thing all together if the procedures are done at the free choice of the “patient,” provided they are of an age to make such a decision about their body.

 — The Curator