Sex & Journalism

 Silvio Berlusconi, for "Douchebag Of The Summer".  This puts him in good standings for the "Douchebag Of The Year" award. 

I have so many opinions on this mans behavior, none of them favorable.  I, for reasons I'm sure are obvious by now, am not condemning men who have mistresses, see escorts or enjoy sex.  I am, however, condemning sloppy, slimy, idiots who publicly humiliate their families, ruin their careers with their childish indiscretions, deny the fact that they've made a series of obvious tasteless, poor decisions and then sue those who out them for doing it.  I also deplore men in their 70's who sleep with teenage girls.  Instead of exhausting myself in detailed diatribe, I will simply post some links that will help you understand for yourself what is so reprehensible about this man, in case you haven't already caught the word.

Give them too much, and they think they can get away with anything... Arrogant cows just burn me. 

If you are hoping to make huge life mistakes, would like to lose your family, friends, reputation, career, respect and billions of dollars, if you would like to be infamous for squalid stupidity, or if you would like to greatly increase your chances of developing chlamydia and/or iligetimate children from barely legal Eastern European hookers, your lessons begin here:

Sleazy Silvio in the Chicago Tribune

Sleazy Silvio in Forbes

Sleazy Silvio in Reuters

Sleazy Silvio in MSNBC

Sleazy Silvio in Huffington Post

Sleazy Silvio in Times Online

Sleazy Silvio in Fox News

Sleazy Silvio in NY Times

It is most distressing that this leaves four more months in 2009 for someone to outdo Mr. Burlusconi in his running for the yearly title holder of this douchy award.

Raquel

Billionaires, babes, booze and books.  It’s not exactly a shocking combination, so why would Guy Laliberte be so sue happy now that a book has provided the public with information about his crazy, drug induced, star studded and hooker packed parties?  He threw these parties again and again.  Inviting "busloads of hookers" and packing his place with naughty celebrities and playful public figures, he wasn’t exactly discreet ... ever. There were no secrets about who was there and what the guests were doing.  Why is he pretending to be so surprised that someone put the information in print?  Guy, the partying, people pleasing Canadian is a once homeless, fire-breathing, street performer turned billionaire owner of the Cirque du Soleil.  Do you hear this description and think of a straight-laced man?  Neither do I.  I’m not sure why he thinks he ever had a clean and sparkly reputation or why he’s fighting to maintain this alleged reputation.

Dear Mr. Laliberte, you’re a Canadian vagabond circus performer turned bilionaire Forbes lister. While stranger things have happened, that's pretty unusual. You don't head a state,  a country, a religious movement or a monarchy.  You have stated before that you "do not believe in marriage",  so there is no pressure for you to be a "good family man".  You’re supposed to be crazy!  This “outing” of information that you never went to any previous length to protect is not going to suddenly ruin anything for you.  It’s only going to make you richer.  Allow yourself the liberty to be Guy Laliberte and embrace the lifestyle and reputation that comes with it.  And pleeease, next time you have one of these parties, invite me!  I have some lovely tricks of my own that I’m willing to share.

Sex, Drugs and Cirque du Soleil

Sex, Drugs and Acrobats

It's twisted like a prepubescent Chinese contortionist and I love it.

Raquel

In my hunt for sexuality in world news today, I came across a story of a woman I found intriguing.  It’s a story that is somewhat familiar, and yet so completely strange to me.  Actually, strange is not the word.  Abhorrent is a more appropriate term.  Aaliyah is a European model and mistress (although no model mistress). She is a pretty brunette who claims to date five men for a living, all married uber-millionaires or billionaires that provide her with a comfortable lifestyle and loads of expensive jewelry and cars.  My initial reaction to the story was “Good for her.”  A karate black belt who loves sex and traveling?  What’s not to like?  But then, as I scrolled down and really digested what I was reading, I increasingly became more nauseated.  "Naked Greed" is the title of the article and rightfully so.

I understand her lifestyle to an extent.  We've had similar past experiences.  Neither one of us have a reason to believe in marriage and neither of us want kids.  These days, with a very rare exception, I do not see clients.  There are a few men in the loop who I rely on to survive.  They are all married, and are the closest things to boyfriends that I have.  Like her, I have, in the past, received beautiful sparkling gifts and I have cared genuinely about two of the men I’ve known.  We have these things in common.  But this is where we end in similarity.

The money I receive goes to rent and tuition, books and bills.  I do not use my friends generosity on a flashy lifestyle.  Rodeo Drive is a walk away from me, but I don’t shop there.  The thing I seem to understand that she doesn’t yet, is that these men won’t always be there.  At some point, both they and their money are going to vanish.  What then will she have besides a collection of overpriced Italian bags and some diamond necklaces?  She expressed no goals, no plans for the future.  It’s possible that she has them, and the journalist intentionally left them out to make her appear much more superficial than she is, but based of the simple fact that she went through a laundry list of all her material possessions and their value, I am under the impression that she doesn’t think about much besides designers and labels.  I really want to believe that a sexy woman who appreciates “the finer things” can also be smart with the things she is blessed with.  I also want to believe that mistresses understand that theirs is a fleeting lifestyle and that that they must maximize what they’ve got while their being given it, which does NOT mean shopping sprees and 5 days a week of clubbing, but I read things like this and it gives me little hope.  She would have my utmost respect and admiration if I learned that she were starting a non-profit, or going after a graduate degree, trying to open her own boutique, was looking for a "real job" or was investing in… something, anything!  But this is not the case, and unfortunately, something I believe is a sad reality for a lot of women in her position.

I’m sure she looks lovely in Tiffany’s and French lingerie, and I completely understand how exciting it is to receive those things, but to brag about her gifts and their value, as opposed to explaining the kindness of the men who give them to her or the meaning behind the gifts is just disgusting.  If she said something about how, by having these things, she has become empowered, or has learned that she is valuable, or has developed a new confidence, or how she has been able to move forward in her life by the support of her male friends, I would be much more inclined to appreciate what she’s doing.  But that’s not what she’s interested in or what she cares about and I am truly saddened by her vacuousness.

As if that weren’t bad enough, she allows the journalists to use descriptions and photos of her boyfriends.  Mindblowing!  I’m sure the names have been changed, and the faces have been blurred, but the bodies, the settings the clothes are all identifiable.  The job descriptions, their locations, their estimated worth and the number of children they have are all seem to be true.  As a companion to gentlemen very similar to hers, I feel that is it my job to protect them.  No matter how angry I became with them, no matter how betrayed I may feel by them at times, I would under no circumstance put them in the public eye the way she did.  I pride myself in my loyalty to the men I associate with and I would never put their privacy and potentially life and career at stake in order to draw attention to myself.  I can only think that she was hoping to get some kind of book deal or television offer by sharing this information.  A multimillion dollar deal for something like this is completely unrealistic and highly unlikely. But even an offer like that would still not convince me to out Coconut or Fancy Pants or any of the other men I’ve known, even the ones I had no real emotional ties to.  I would sell my stories in a heartbeat, but not if it meant putting the characters in my stories in harms way.  My responsibility as mistress and a friend is to provide these men with several things.  One of the most important things I provide is trust.  They can trust that no matter what or when, their secrets will always remain safe with me.  I can not believe how selfish this woman has been to potentially endanger these men who did nothing but give to her.  What I wouldn’t give to be able to sit across from her and ask her if she have no heart and no consideration.  How can a woman bite the hand that feeds her?  If she’s mad at them and needs to vent, she should create a blog and type to her hearts content.  But expose them to the world is to potentially ruin life as they know it?  What exactly is running through this woman’s head?  She looks like the kind of girl who might have a soul, but her actions would say otherwise and I sympathize with the men she entertains.

Again, in all fairness, I understand that journalism is very biased and that there may well have been some message lost.  But I must also say that her complete lack of discretion in this article makes it difficult to believe that I could possibly be misconstruing the message that much.  Aaliyah is a woman who has been blessed with a nice lifestyle and the things it takes to attract the men who have provided her with it, but Aliyah has much to learn.  If she values what she has, then she should be more careful with it.  These blessings can go as easily as they come.  To practice such revolting indiscretion is a shame.

Naked Greed

Raquel