The Weekend Newds 5/29/09

• According to Canadian journalist Sharlene Asam, the Internet has "sped up teens' sexual willingness and behavior."
• 7 out of 10 Spanish men say they have no problems getting naked.
• Facebook has reinstated graphic photos of a woman's mastectomy scars after initially calling the images "sexual and abusive."

  'I put these pictures out on Facebook to put a message out to women - check your breasts regularly and do not ever be ashamed of a mastectomy,' said Miss (Sharon) Adams, 45, yesterday. 'For Facebook to claim they were sexual and abusive was absurd. Facebook has online groups about sexual positions and some groups which are bordering on racist - but they ban this.'

• Schools across the country are imposing bans or restrictions on hugs due to fear of lawsuits over sexual harassment or improper touching.
• The rampant retouching of photographs in magazines which turns ordinary humans into something unknown in the natural world is causing a backlash.

  It now seems fresh, even exclamation-worthy, when a magazine presents an unvarnished image. Last month, for example, an issue of Life & Style took the unusual step of declaring that a cover photograph of Kim Kardashian was “100 percent unretouched,” as if it had done a great service to the cause of pseudo-celebrity journalism. And People, in its “100 Most Beautiful” issue this month, included images of 11 celebrities “wearing nothing but moisturizer.”

• A UK cable station is producing a "documentary" which "follows a Newcastle-based business building up to 'Naked Friday', a day when all of its workers will come to work nude."
• Noting that "there's never a bad reason for celebrating the human body", Las Vegas City Life explores all the opportunities for non-sexual clothes-free activities in the Nevada/Arizona area.
• Unbelievably, prison officials, prosecutors, judges and attorneys in Texas are gearing up for a big investigation over a photograph of a woman exposing her breast which was sent to convicted killer Robert Fratta.

  “It’s a class C misdemeanor to distribute obscene material to someone in a correctional facility,” District Attorney spokeswoman Donna Hawkins said. “Any violation of the law will be investigated, although no charges are likely to be filed before the conclusion of the trial.”

• A Malaysian editorial calls for a heavy penalty for "unhealthy activities" after a Danish production company taped a reality series on one of the islands off Johor where some participants were nude. Apparently an apology and the firing of the director were insufficient.
• Some Australian men streaked through Sydney wearing special "nude suits" to promote a cell phone company.
• Public interest law professor John Banzhaf has weighed in on the teen sexting issue.

  Anti-child-pornography laws were designed to protect children, including teens, from coercion and other forms of exploitations by adults, and adults involved in or encouraging sexting by teens may reasonable be punished, just as they would be if they participated or encouraged teens to play strip poker, says Banzhaf. But when a teen voluntarily sends racy pictures of herself to an equally-willing teen of about the same age, the basis for prosecution - coercion, exploitation, or other wrongful conduct by an adult - is no longer present, so punishing participating teens for exhibiting themselves to others in emails may be no more justified that punishing them for exhibiting themselves to each other when skinny dipping or playing strip poker in private among only other consenting teens.

• More news here on the "naturist walk" in Bracebridge, Ontario, Canada. Details are still sketchy, apparently FCN had nothing to do with it.
• Topless coffee shop owner Donald Crabtree says that the female employee accused of being outside the establishment with no top on actually had her breasts covered with her hands and arms. Charges are unlikely to be filed, but the Vassalboro town meeting on June 8 should be interesting, since a nudity ordinance will be considered.
• The Vassalboro coffee shop is cited as a reason for another town in Maine to enact preventative ordinances against adult businesses. Waterville planning board member Erik Thomas said "To me, it's better to be proactive about these things."
• The UK Advertising Standards Authority has approved the image of a bare-breasted woman in a brochure, saying, "we concluded the images were not so provocative as to present a risk to teenagers or be unsuitable for the target audience."
• Officials in Hamilton Township, New Jersey, are planning to auction off the site of the former Sunshine Park nudist resort because revenues are down. Residents would rather see the land cleaned up and left au naturel.
• You've heard of "Banned in Boston", but how about "Censored in Chicago"?