THE DAILY TRAVESTY | The Difference Between Nude & Nude, Things
THE DAILY TRAVESTY for January 31, 2000
    Volume 1, Issue 20
 
The Hell Law says that Hell is reserved exclusively for them that believe in it.  Further, the lowest rung in Hell is reserved for them that believe in it on the supposition that they'll go there if they don't.
                --HBT; The Gospel According the Fred, 3:1
 
WITH THE INTENT TO SEXUALLY AROUSE  Part 1 of 4
Copyright © 2000 David Steinberg

The Difference Between Nude and Nude

The city of Erie, Pennsylvania, is unhappy about its strip clubs.  Of course, Erie is not alone in this regard.  Lots of municipalities are unhappy about their strip clubs, ranging from small towns in Iowa to the Big Apple itself.  If you're of a mind to keep track of such things, you'll discover that there is a complicated, unceasing game of cat-and-mouse litigation being played out in every corner of this grand nation of ours, all about what to do about the long-standing national pastime of enjoying nude and semi-nude erotic entertainment. Public erotic entertainment is, as it has been for some 200 years, a substantial industry offering what is at once a pleasurable erotic staple to millions of Americans, and a cause of virulent upset and anger to millions of others.

According to one industry source, there are some 3000 strip and lap-dancing clubs nationwide, most of which have people who would love to shut them down.  Sometimes these oppositional efforts involve the imposition of impossibly strict zoning requirements on erotic clubs, requirements that restrict them to a few, usually highly marginal, parts of town.  Sometimes the regulatory efforts focus on what dancers may do while they're on-stage, how they interact with customers, or what they wear.

Laws of various kinds are continuously being passed, and continuously being challenged in court. Arguments emphasizing freedom of expression are weighed against arguments that defend society's right to regulate what it considers lewd and obscene behavior.  Over and over and over again.

Since these battles are fought in the peculiarly choreographed circumstances of various courts of law, the issue often comes down to that annoying legal need to draw a definable, if highly convoluted, line between whatever "improper" behavior some law wants to prohibit and the more "proper" forms of behavior it wants to leave alone.

Now, try to think about this from the point of view of the people who get so upset by things like nude erotic dancing that they want to find ways to make it illegal in their town or neighborhood.  How would you go about legally defining what makes one dance movement artfully sensual but another morally repugnant?  What is it about displaying one part of the human body that makes that act morally, aesthetically, or psychologically different from displaying another part of the anatomy?  Is there something objectionable about revealing or intentionally drawing attention to a part of the body in a particular way?  Is it the part of the body that's at issue, or the nature of the attention being called to it?  Can an erotic dancer touch her (or, more rarely, his) body -- clothed or unclothed -- in any way she likes, or are some forms of touch categorically different from others?  Can a dancer have physical contact with members of the audience?  Where can she touch them, and in what way?  If a dancer touches the shoulder of someone in the audience, is that in itself some kind of sexual act?  What if she touches his arm? His chest?  His knee?  His thigh? What if she leans up against him?  Rubs against him?  The nuances are infinite.

Hundreds of court cases rise and fall on hairs split as finely as these.  Ultimately, if the parties concerned have the will and the money to pursue all the available channels of appeal, it becomes up the nine men and women who sit on the Court of Courts in Washington, D.C. to say what is permissible and what is not. (Remember that when you vote next November....)
 
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IF YOU LIKE IT, BY GOD, REPRINT IT.
 

THINGS by Tucker

 
THINGS THAT ARE FUNNY
 
people who write tracts, pamphlets and essays with names such as "The Truth About God"-- and then copyright them.
 
THINGS THAT ARE PITIFUL
 
a suburbanite without her SUV
 
THINGS THAT WIN THE AWARD FOR SLASHING AND BURNING THE RAINFOREST TO CREATE PASTURE FOR BEEF COWS
 
McDonald's (now you can eat a cow and an endangered species at the same time!)
 
THINGS OVERHEARD AT A VIGIL FOR ANTI-GAY HATE CRIMES
 
"People are good.  People are works of God... That's why we're going to catch those
snot-nosed punks-- I mean, 'works of God.'"
 
I want you I want you so bad babe I want you I want you so bad it's driving me mad it's driving me mad... she's so... HEAVY
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