A woman in Louisiana is poisoning men by making them smell "cologne samples." Must have been Axe body spray. • Olympics audience restrictions! Lip gloss, fountain pens, and sunscreen are limited. Do they want the spectators to get melanoma? • Rich people can afford full-time nannies, but 80% of nannies don't have health insurance. From what I remember, all of Fran Vine's doctor/therapy needs were covered! • A 77-year-old grandmother pinned down a rabid fox after it attacked her, resulting in surgery and four days rest at the hospital. • An 18-year-old woman attacked her boyfriend with a toilet seat after she found him smoking crack in their bathroom. • An award-winning program in England for female prisoners who were victims of abuse at home has been shut down by the government. • Spinach Artichoke Chicken Lean Pockets have been recalled after the company received consumer complaints of grossness. • Post-menopausal hormones to alleviate painful sex do not help a significant amount of sufferers. •

Since then, Lee has spent all her time advocating for prostitutes, and after meeting hundreds of teen prostitutes on the streets of Hollywood, she shifted her attention towards those under-aged hookers who were most in need of help. According to Kimberly Sevcik writing for Good, "Children who had formerly been locked up in detention centers were instead living on the streets, with no one to provide for them. If they turned to prostitution, as many did, they were no longer eligible to live in a foster home. 'They were falling between the cracks,' says Lee. 'There were no social services available to them.'"

So Lee founded Children of the Night in 1979, first as a drop in center, and then with large grants from Hugh Hefner and Johnny Carson, among others, she turned COTN into the full-fledged shelter it is today. And as a living situation, it's more Oprah than Oliver. At Children of the Night's homestead in Los Angeles, "All of [the former prostitutes'] needs are met, and many of their desires as well. They are flown into Los Angeles from all over the country, and delivered to the shelter in a cab. Upon their arrival, kids are assigned a semi-private bedroom, and issued either a CD player or a DVD player…[They are] also enrolled in school, which is right on-site, and fully accredited. …Residents at COTN get haircuts and manicures at high-end salons that volunteer their services. They attend workshops, where professionals drop in to teach them photography, yoga, meditation, acting, screenwriting, and dance."

Though Lee spends a lot of time fund raising (part of the reason that COTN is so nice is that it is privately funded), she's still at COTN headquarters four days a week. When Sevcik asked Lee what role she plays for the kids, Lee replied tersely, "I'm their mom…[and] their dad." Sevcik also adds that Lee's manner is not airy-fairy. "She is a fast-talking, no-nonsense, Type-A blonde, with an uncanny knack for procuring money and attention for her efforts…he is bracingly unsentimental, and she doesn’t have much patience for those who aren’t. 'Ooey-gooey,' she calls them. She jokes with the girls, she listens to their problems, she offers advice and encouragement—but her style is direct and matter-of-fact."

So to conclude, Lois Lee gets the Jezebel Medal of Honor for the following: advocating for the prosecution of Johns and Pimps as opposed to underage prostitutes who have been screwed by the system; being unafraid to fight the man at the tender age of 27; starting her own truly wonderful charity; and finally, having a no-bullshit, can-do 'tude while she did all of the above.

All-The-Way House [Good Magazine]

It occurs to me that frequently in these columns, there is a moment where, finally alone and generally late into the night of a long day, I find myself reduced to tears by some list of knocks and slights. Perhaps this only means I need a new device; I don’t think of myself as such a sad sack figure as all that. But this week, actually the night after my spirit-crushing turn as a volunteer clotheshorse for a designer who most definitely could have afforded to pay me, my sadness metastasized not into tears, but into a rage-inflected political platform that just might transform my industry.

Well, OK, first I cried. Then I thought: models should unionize to work for better conditions and rates of pay.

It’s a common misconception that modeling is easy, safe and highly lucrative — the reality is that the girls with the million-dollar campaigns are so rare I wouldn’t believe they actually existed if I didn’t see them at night clubs during fashion week. Most models I know are lucky if they are working at all; between agency commissions (70% in Paris, 50% in Milan, 20% in New York), travel expenses, and rent in the various pricey cities in which we are required to live, your eventual wages come so garnished I’ve known plenty of models who can’t always afford food. Even the girls who are lucky enough to work every day are doing well if they break even, and can sneak off to Germany or Los Angeles or Hong Kong and make a quick buck shooting catalog jobs every once in a while.

And safe? Once I was staying with a girl from Seattle in a shitty one-bedroom (total number of models: six! Minimum in rent our agency would’ve made from the shitty one-bedroom that month, assuming a consistent model population: $5400!). We were both on option for the same editorial (daily rate: $150 and lunch). She got the job.

She returned home nine hours later, hair and body painted silver. The magazine was doing a “green” issue; this eco-conscious theme was enacted in, variously, shots in which the poor Seattle girl had a tulip plant placed in her mouth, shots in which she had to lie on top of a scratchy 8 ft. hedgerow while the photographer shot from a crane, and shots in which she closed her eyes and shards of broken glass were applied to her face. They put dirt in her mouth and glass on her eyelids and painted her silver from head to toe. My roommate showered twice and vomited once that night.

Models have incredibly short-lived careers, and our collective youth, third-world origins, and the instability of the market we work in makes our bargaining positions, individually, weak. For every 15-year-old wunderkind who stalks 40 runways a season and books $100,000 perfume campaigns for college money, there are at least a hundred girls who turn 25 with a few grand in bank at best, realize their careers are over, and that they never graduated high school.

It’s also no wonder given how close many models are to insolvency that there are areas where modeling shades into prostitution; modeling sort of prepares you — trains you, even — to see your income in your own body. And also to hang around with plenty of creepy, older, rich dudes. A + B can = C. The BBC did an exposé in 2000 that caught Milanese businessmen on hidden camera trying to buy sex from models as young as 13 in night clubs, and uncovered evidence of agency bookers acting as procurers and drug dealers. In the furor that ensued, Gérard Marie and Xavier Moreau, two top executives at the Elite agency, lost their jobs. The industry promised a clean-up. There was talk of “standards,” of girls younger than 17 being accompanied by chaperones at all times, of blacklisting clients who used or promoted drugs.

Gérard Marie — who was filmed soliciting a reporter who he thought was a model for sex — is currently back at the helm of Elite Paris. I do not know if the man who explained his desire to sleep with underaged models thusly: “We are men, we have our needs” has reformed. I do know that such episodes of revolving-door contrition and forgiveness fill me with disgust, and that one of the biggest tasks of any models’ union would be to keep its membership safe.

A union would also offer, obviously, the benefits of collective bargaining. The overwhelming counterweight of the fashion business class’s wealth give models an unacceptably weak negotiating position. A union could help insure models’ best long-term interests are served by their jobs — a union could argue for retirement benefits, and, in the USA, health insurance coverage. A union could mandate that sufficient time be given for models under 16 to attend school, without setting back their careers. A union could also serve as a voice for models’ interests in the ongoing debate over what is perhaps our biggest immediate health issue — the slightly-underweight physique we are required to maintain. A union could protest and shame under- and non-paying clients, a union could mandate that appropriate food be available at every job, and a union could ensure that conditions on the job site always meet safety standards, so nobody has to pose covered in broken glass or eat dirt ever again.

The obvious counterpoint to modeling is, of course, acting. The Screen Actors’ Guild does an admirable job of representing the interests of a workforce that is dispersed over a vast geography, and which enjoys short-term contract-based employment, when it gets employment at all. It’s ironic that one of the reasons commercial modeling — catalogs, television ads and their ilk — is so rewarding when compared with high-fashion modeling — magazine editorials, runway, etc — is because of SAG’s vigilance; commercial castings in Los Angeles are not infrequently stated union jobs. And even the ones that are non-union are pretty highly paid. I have friends who are only able to work full-time in Paris because they have commercials still airing in the U.S., and receive the appropriate checks quarterly.

Individually, we are weak, and wealthy white men manage to make an awful lot of cash off our bodies and labor. Collectively, we could hold the industry we work in to a higher standard, and perhaps even change the nature of fashion itself. I imagine the union would have an awful lot to say, for instance, about those clients who put “NO ETHNICS” on their casting notices, and those agencies who fail to notice, or care, that certain of their charges have eating disorders.

Of course there are plenty of reasons to doubt any of this will come to pass. The economy is especially dreadful right now; any moves to unionize would be viewed as a threat by the class that controls the fashion capital. Besides, every year there’s a new raft of 14-year-olds from countries with economies far shittier than ours, and these 14-year-olds are all six feet tall and very, very hungry. And, through no fault of their own, they exercise a huge deflationary force on the modeling labor market. But it occurred to me, as I was working that presentation for that designer who amuses herself by collecting Picasso, that the reason she was paying the security guards at the event and not me was because the security guards have a union. And I don’t.

I want to at least try my best to change that.

E-mail Tatiana at Tatiana.Anymodel@gmail.com

Earlier: Welcome To America, Models! Tatiana Can't Wait For The Extra Competition. It Was Almost Getting Too Easy.

Related:

Model Bosses Quit After BBC Exposé [BBC]
Girls Interrupted [NY Mag]

And why did he think he'd be the one to ruin the marriage? "As a travel writer, I live an easy, pampered life. And like many without real cares, I am not unfamiliar with the urge to drive the happy bus off the side of the mountain just to see what happens," Sachs writes. "Complicating this is that disease of the brain called chronic male horniness. I used to tell people that the world will never seem more teeming with beautiful, fascinating, fuckable people than on the sunny afternoon when you walk to the post office carrying a box full of your wedding invitations."

My problem with that statement is not that he thought about fucking other people — everyone with a pulse, regardless of how much in love they are, thinks about fucking other people — it's that he attributes it to chronic male horniness, as if women couldn't possibly understand what it's like to lust after strangers. The John's reasoning is identical to Sachs's. Even fucking Marilyn Monroe gets boring, he exclaims. Well you know what, Adam, getting boned by George Clooney probably loses its luster after a couple of years, too! The fact that I even need to point out that all humans, regardless of gender, have biological urges is completely ridiculous, but I guess I'm going to have to keep doing it until men take intellectual responsibility for their wandering Johnsons.

Divorce: The Ultimate Aphrodisiac [Men.Style.Com]
I've Seen Every Kind Of Hooker Going [Letters From Johns]

If you are selling your time, undivided attention, and the (unspoken) offer of sexual entertainment, you're an escort. If you're selling a specific sexual activity for a certain amount of money, you're a prostitute. If you won't have sex with the man you're dating unless he buys you an expensive dinner, you're a (relatively cheap) prostitute.

Guides To Call Girl Work Out [The Sun]
Related: The Internet Escort's Handbook

Perhaps those posts will lead Ms. Kirchner's mother to a deeper understanding of the oldest profession and her daughter's reasons for choosing it. But, says Morgan Winter on the Utne Reader's website, "There seems to be two basic motivations for writing about one's tenure as a hooker, neither educational. The prostitute either wants to glorify or vilify the industry and its consumers. Either of these seems simplistic and disingenuous. After all, not only are we talking about the oldest profession, we're also trying to understand arguably the most complicated physiological aspect of nature—sex—through books about themes that, if authored by anybody other than former prostitutes, would fall under the 'teen' section in the local library." Even with a more nuanced view of prostitution, I can't imagine any mother would be particularly thrilled to discover that her daughter was a hooker. I got an awkwardly scolding phone call from my mother when I wrote about foreskins. I can't even imagine what she'd say if I told her I touched them for a living!

Insanely Sane Conversation With My Mom [Bound, Not Gagged]
The True Stories Of O[Utne]

Related: Young Beauty Sells Her Body, Breaks Our Hearts
a href="http://gawker.com/5006394/diane-sawyer-rats-out-hooker-to-her-parents">Diane Sawyer Rats Out Hooker To Her Parents

Asian massage artists are not always Asian!
"I don't have time for a relationship right now...I like the Russian girls who barely speak English, and the cute Asian girls who giggle a lot. My job is so demanding and consuming that this is the only thing I do that completely relaxes me," says Princeton graduate Steven, 28.

Massage parlors are the new strip clubs!
Kevin, 29, a single NYSE trader, says that "a lot of traders go to these places. Massage parlors are the new strip clubs. Just last week, a bunch of us from work went to one for a bachelor party — in separate rooms of course. It's an alternative to a trip club, where you go and jut get frustrated. For the same amount of money, you can get some action."

Yes, massage parlor membership has its privileges, and if you keep coming back you can get serviced like a real-life john.
"Once you go a couple of times and become a regular, you can get whatever you want." A one-hour "bodywork" session starts with the guy removing all his clothes and taking a shower. ("This guarantees you're not a cop," Skip says.) This takes up the first 10 minutes. Then you give the girl cash, "usually $100," he says. "They'll also take credit cards but that eats up another five minutes" of the hour the customer is paying for. Then he gets a full body massage for another 20 minutes. While getting a "handy," Skip says, "you are allowed to touch the girl. If you want oral sex, you have to pay her another $50. If you want a "half and half" [oral sex plus intercourse], that's another $50.

Appearance-wise, massage artisans generally rank a "six or a seven."
Although the majority of these places boast "exotic massges by Japanese models," Steven says that "90 percent of them are run by Koreans" and admits that most of the girls are not exactly "model material." (Rather, he would rate the average massage girl as a "six or a seven.")

But don't be fooled; at the end of the ending, masseuses are really money grubbing whores like all women
"The only thing I hate about these places," he adds, "is that when you're done the girls shuffle you out real fast, like, 'Next'?"

Related: I Did It For Science: Happy Ending [Nerve]
I Want A...Happy Ending [Time Out New York]

Mindy continues, "These men who paid me thousands of dollars control their worlds. Everyone listens to them. And, at the same time, they are incredibly insecure people. Every man I've had as a regular client went through a period of several months where he just cried — and I still got paid."

Over at the Village Voice, anal sex enthusiast and noted sex writer Tristan Taormino only partially agrees with Mindy. In her "Pucker Up" column, Taormino interviews sex workers rights advocate and journalist Melissa Gira Grant, who says "Some men go to sex workers for closeness and intimacy—they want to cuddle, and that's what they are not getting at home. But for others, it's not emotionally therapeutic at all, it's the same as getting a deep sports massage."

Um, I don't want my boyfriend getting any "deep sports massages!!" Taormino argues that we "need to see sex workers as people performing needed sexual services in our society." Theoretically, I agree with her (and so do many others) — that a consenting adult who wants to sell their sexual services should be allowed to. But in practice prostitution seems like the ultimate in objectification, and most of the women who do it seem to be using it as a last monetary resort, not as a fulfillment of their own kinks. Should sexual healing be one of the benefits covered by your health insurance?

Your Sex Industry Questions Answered [New York Times]
In (Partial) Defense of Eliot Spitzer [Village Voice]

Earlier: Really, Eliot? You Interfaced With This?
Young Beauty Sells Her Body, Breaks Our Hearts
Tristan Taormino: Porn Is As Cerebral As It Is Visceral

Prostitution In America [ABC News]

Then they got addicted to the money and the lifestyle. And then one day, usually between the ages of 25 and 28, once they'd developed that knowing, experienced look that clients instinctively disliked, they found that themselves in a classic bind: they were addicted to high living but could no longer pay for it; they had no marketable skills; and years of late nights and lazy days had left them with no self-discipline.

Now, "marketable skills" is one way to put it. "Identity" might be another. The first, of course, is merely a phenomenon of one's worth to the economy, but what, if not one's worth to the economy, drives our senses of self in this country? Okay, maybe it doesn't drive mine or yours. It probably also doesn't define the identity of anyone driven to prostitution out of desperation — maybe drug addiction defines those women, or some larger struggle to support a family, or pay off student loans. But Ashley's? When did anyone challenge her to form a personality beyond "hot girl who wants to be famous"? Sure, she might have challenged herself. But, you know, you've already seen more than you wanted of her mom's tits. Ashley probably learned who she was by watching Cribs.

So maybe the bigger casualties — or maybe more precisely, the more criminally overlooked casualties — of prostitution may actually be the Ashley Alexandra Dupres of the world. Like the women of wealthy OPEC nations, their material wealth enslaves them...And then, it vanishes.

Maybe that's the silver lining to watching the whole Britney Spears flameout. Because for all its exposure, it tells, without the usual absurdist Celebreality house trappings, the story of all the college basketball phenoms who flamed out after burning through the last of their sneaker money, one-hit wonders, Hooters waitresses and pageant queens, old whores and anyone else who stands to lose it all when they lose their youth and the youthful greed that made them think that Louis Vuitton was a good investment in the first place.

I've Seen My Share Of Spitzers [Pajamas Media]

MOE: Okay, you know what? I thought we weren't going to be talking about Ashley Alexandra Dupre again but I think that's just what I'm about to advocate we do.
MEGAN: But briefly! Pretty please with sugar on top?
MOE: Okay, so first, the details. Ashley's former pimp Jason Itzler — is it weird that sort of rhymes with Spitzer? I guess not — has spoken and he's got nothing but love for the hottest girl he had. He met her at Hotel Gansevoort when she was 19 and working in the nightlife promotion cocktail waitress circuit. "She says, 'Hey, Jason ... I want to work for you.' When I caught my breath, I said, 'Do you know what I do?'" he claimed. "She's like, 'Yeah.' I said, 'Get over here.' " See, even then, he knew she'd be a star! Also, it sounds like those charges of abuse she leveled on her MySpace page might have been trumped-up; a neighbor says what really happened is that she crashed her stepdad's Porsche and wanted a new one, and when she couldn't get it she ran away. She grew up near the Jersey Shore, an area redolent of cultural capital, which explains how she was so "classy." She fucked Spitzer numerous times — she allegedly worked a six-day week! I-N-D-E-P-E-N-D-E-N-T! — but only figured out he was the governor somewhere near the Mayflower Hotel. I am currently writing a fictionalized account of how that went down.
MEGAN: Well, I mean, rich, skinny, nerdy white dudes that can't get laid are kind of a dime a dozen in D.C. I guess, and sometimes it is hard to tell politicians apart.
MOE: Apparently Silda is most upset over how young she was. Meanwhile, Ashley has a lot of opportunities to get rich now in even classier ways such as posing for Penthouse, just as I predicted yesterday.
MEGAN: But not Playboy, for some reason. Is that collusion? Antitrust! Antitrust!
MEGAN: Also, poor Silda. Really? The age is the bad part? Way to focus on what might actually be the least heinous part of the whole thing. News at 11: Men who cheat on their wives often fuck younger women.
MOE: No, Playboy apparently wants her too but I think Penthouse may be offering more money? Anyway my question is: at this point, would you rather be Ashley or Silda? And I'm saying, you know, I realize that is a stupid sounding question at this point. Ashley is pretty, whole life ahead of her, marriage not irreparably damaged etc. etc. But.
MEGAN: I wouldn't want to be a whore, much less a particularly famous one. Talk about someone who will probably never have a normal intimate relationship after this... I guess I know from experience that I can survive being cheated on, I can survive getting an HIV test and having a legitimate cause for concern about the results thanks to someone I was intimate with fucking a whore and neglecting to mention it, and I can survive at least some level of public humiliation due to someone else's actions.
MOE: Right, I mean, it's clear right now that Silda is a terribly smart woman, who has experienced a lot of things, and she's had her kids, and she has her law degree, and she has her weird Baptist NASCAR-loving roots and she has the sympathy of America and she definitely has an amazing body herself. It is also clear that, you know, by biology or circumstance, Ashley is not, you know, smart. And I know, like: what does that count for? But seriously, long term revenue generation prospects as a result of this fame look weighted to Silda right now.
MOE: Should we discuss Dina Matos McGreevey?
MEGAN: Silda's beautiful, smart, educated, has 3 daughters who likely love her and, God willing, is about to be wealthy and single. I'd rather be Silda.
MEGAN: Oh, Dina. The example of how not to handle it.
MOE: Cool. So because we'd still rather be Silda, it is not that terrible to still be obsessing over Ashley.
MEGAN: Well, I could stop obsessing over Ashley. We could obsess over Obama's super-cool mama instead.
MOE: Jessica's doing something on that for the 9:30. We had a discussion over how it's funny how normal and nuclear his own family is compared to how he grew up etc. etc.
MOE: Maybe we should finally talk about Michigan and Florida?
MOE: Pastor Jeremiah Wright?
MEGAN: Florida looks to be a ginormous fuck up again.
MOE: Earmarks?
MEGAN: Everyone does love them the earmarks.
MOE: New polls that place both Obama AND Hillary ahead of McCain?
MEGAN: Hooray for the Democrats winning no matter what only probably not because I'm a pessimist like that!
MOE: How, five years after we invaded them on this very basis there it is still looking like a giant fuckup that we ever linked Saddam Hussein to Al Qaeda?
9:10 AM
MEGAN: Well, a fuck up would mean we thought it and it wasn't true. It seems like the evidence is that is likely wasn't true but they said it anyway, right?
MOE: Oh sure. Be a cynic! So seriously, is there anything else to talk about? Do you think Rev. Jeremiah Wright's knack for speaking the truth etc. etc. will hurt Obama when it is inevitably linked to his no-flag-pin/no hand on heart during Pledge thingy?
9:15 AM
MEGAN: I mean, CNN and MSNBC have been practically showing that guy's speeches on a loop all morning. The dude's practically spitting crazy angry like something out of a super right wing evangelical church. The same people that were freaked out by the evangelical church stuff in Borat would, one would think, be freaked out by this.
MOE: Really? On my CNN they've just shown the inspiring story of that 300-pound woman turned triathlete.
MEGAN: Maybe it was just in the 8:00 hour? I switched because they stopped talking about anything new.
MOE: So...Peggy Noonan is going after McCain for not being enough of an ideologue — er, a philosopher to be president.
MOE:

Where Mr. McCain's friend says, "be disciplined," I'd say, "Get serious." What is the meaning of things? What is the guiding philosophy? Who has he read besides Hemingway? (And he's read him—he loves him to an almost scary degree.) Is there a little Burke in there? The Federalist papers? John Kenneth Galbraith?

*(This is not a criticism, people.)

Left: October 5, 2006. Right: November 7, 2006.

Left: November 17, 2006. Right, April 24, 2007.

Left: September 9, 2007. Right, December 1, 2007.

Left: December 4, 2007. Right: February 25, 2007.

Left: March 11, 2008. Right: March 12, 2008.

(Images via Getty)

But by all accounts, Silda and Eliot had a decent marriage before the deluge. Newsweek offers some alternative theories. Susannah Breslin, a writer who is soliciting "Letters from Johns" on an eponymous website writes about some of the letters she received, and most of the prostitute-frequenting married men she's talked to went to hookers because their wives no longer had sex with them or because they got their rocks off on the taboo of it all. "For some men, especially those who are seen as particularly moral or righteous in their public lives (think of all those fallen preachers)," Breslin notes, "Part of the appeal is the fact that it is illegal and a moral transgression in their eyes."

It could be an honest-to-goodness kink, or maybe it's Spitzer's biology! According to Newsweek, men who cheat are "sensation seekers" who have "lower levels of monoamine oxidase A," the chemical that regulates dopamine, the "pleasure" neurotransmitter. Also, the kind of person who is a politician is often incredibly egocentric. Says University of Washington political scientist John Gastil: "For high-profile offices... you have to have a kind of personality where you are very interested in yourself and your personal needs, as well as the needs of others... When the gratification of your desire for social change becomes the justification for so much of what you do in your career, it's not a leap to then say, 'Well, my other desires and needs are equally justified.' You come up with elaborate justifications. 'Hey, 23 hours day I'm working hard for the people of New York. Time for a little me time!'"

And Spitzer will have a ton of "me" time now that he's resigned. The oft-heard moral of this story — to me, at least — is be wary of anyone who goes around crowing about how moral and ethical they are. If Spitzer hadn't claimed to be such a paragon of virtue, the people of New York would probably be more forgiving. Look at former Providence mayor Buddy Cianci or former D.C. mayor Marion Barry. Both left office "disgraced" but returned after a couple years. People forgave them because they never expected them to be particularly moral in the first place. If Spitzer had been honest with himself about his true moral fiber, maybe we wouldn't have seen poor Silda's destroyed visage on our television screens yesterday. She — and we — would have known better.

Dear John [Newsweek]
His Cheating Brain [Newsweek]

Earlier: Enough About Eliot. What About The Hookers?

Standing by her husband's side during his press conference was her decision to make, and probably a tough one. But was it the right one? How would you deal with a life-shattering betrayal — when everyone is watching?

Silda (named after a Teutonic goddess) grew up in Concord, NC, attended Meredith, women's college in Raleigh, and went from there to Harvard Law. She met — and married — a fellow Harvard student named Peter Stamos; the marriage lasted 29 days. Later she joined prestigious NYC law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, billing 3,300 hours a year — more than nine hours a day, including weekends. She married Spitzer in 1987 and put her career on hold in 1994. They had two children by then (they currently have three daughters, 17, 15 and 13), which impacted her decision: "I felt very conflicted and emotional about leaving my job," she told Vogue last year. "It was not something I wanted to do, but I have never once doubted that it was the right decision for us. You don't want to give up your dreams, but you also have to confront the reality of your life. Ultimately, it was more important for me to have my family work."

Somewhere along the way, her focus shifted from career achievement to domestic accomplishment. Add that to standing next to her husband as he admits a breach of trust and you've got a recipe that leaves a bad taste in the mouths of many women. Writers from the L.A. Times interviewed females from different cities, and of different ages and walks of life. The reaction is the same: Women are ashamed of Silda. "I find it nauseating . . . phony and awful," Leah Schanzer, 38, tells the paper. Her friend Leslie Heller, 47, agrees. "It makes it seem like she's Susie Homemaker. She shouldn't be standing there, next to him." Says Linda Walters, 61: "She should've said, 'This is your fight. This is your battle. You stand there and get yourself out of it.'" "I'd have paraded in front of the microphone with a knife," says Cassandra Horton, 43.

Should a woman who has given up her career for her family stand by that family — including her husband — no matter what? It might make Silda look bad to face the press while holding her husband's hand, but would it look worse if she didn't? Is there bravery in standing by your man, as it were? Or, should Silda, as Dina Matos McGreevy — whose husband announced he was a "Gay American" — writes in today's New York Times, have made the decision to stand by herself and let the man in question face the cameras on his own?

NY First Lady's Charmed Life Slips Away [Breitbart]
Silda Spitzer, The Wife Who Gave Up Career To Back Politics And Ambition [Times]
Stand By Yourself [New York Times]
Gov.'s Wife: Brainy, Beautiful, Betrayed [CBS News]
Wife Puts Troubling Face On The Spitzer Scandal [L.A. Times]
Stay With Shpritzer, Smart Lady [NY Post]

Related: Poll: Would You Have Approved If Silda Spitzer Had Punched Eliot When They Were On That Stage? [Say Anything]

In reality, they say, most women who become hookers — even the "classier" breed of escort workers — "have been sexually abused as children, studies show. Incest sets young women up for prostitution — by letting them know what they're worth and what's expected of them. Other forces that channel women into escort prostitution are economic hardship and racism."

Media outlets are also scrambling to find real, live, former prostitutes for commentary, and by-and-large, the women found fit the "happy hooker" stereotype. Today, MSNBC published an interview with Natalie McLennan about her life as a call girl, and the "aspiring actress" makes prostitution sound like the logical extension of the Sex and the City lifestyle, Manolos and all. She describes a "nightmare" she used to have, and I swear to God, I think this actually happened to Carrie in front of Big in season 1:

I'd be walking into this gorgeous hotel like the St. Regis, and all of a sudden I would slip and fall in my four-inch Manolos, go tumbling across the carpet, and with me would go the contents of my purse, which were as follows: $100 bills, condoms, lube, and then make-up, cell phone and all the other girl things. It was that moment of mortification of my life being exposed for the world to see, because a girl's life is in her purse.

But what about these high profile men looking to pay for sex? According to Live Science, the power that goes along with being a politician lends itself to a sense of invincibility. Scott Reynolds, an assistant professor of business ethics at the University of Washington says that when men feel invincible they're "Willing to do more behaviors that are risky and we end up doing some things that aren't very smart."

Whatever the (soon-to-be-former) Governor's motivations, his transgressions have certainly opened up a dialogue about the state of prostitution in this country. Is it an inherently demeaning act for the women involved? Or is it, as Tracy Quan and Natalie McLennan seem to argue, just something lucrative to do when you're trying to make it in the big city? Whatever the answer, I imagine Eliot Spitzer, with his millions and his connections, will come out of this scandal in better shape than Kristen or any of the other members of the vaunted Emperor's Club. And according to the Wall Street Journal Spitzer's not the only super-richie getting his rocks off with a pro — 34% of males and 20% of women who own private jets have paid for sex. Getting sex for free is so nouveau riche!

The Myth Of The Victimless Crime [New York Times]
80G Addicted to Love Gov' [New York Post]
Q&A With A Call Girl[MSNBC]
A Call Girl's View Of The Spitzer Affair [Freakonomics]
Really Dangerous Liasons [New York Times]
Why Power And Prostitution Go Together [Live Science]
Why Is Prostitution Illegal? [Slate]

Earlier:
British Professor: Prostitution Is Not All Bubble Baths And Bordellos
Prostitution Prosecution

It's from that Congressional hearing of all those fatcat CEOs who made huge $$$$ while the subprime mortgage market melted down leading thousands of Americans to lose their homes, the very sort of fatcat CEOs Spitzer has made a career skewering. One of them, Angelo Mozilo, the CEO of Countrywide Financial, who got some sort of nine trillion dollar severance package, was called down to answer questions about why he asked the company to pay taxes on his wife's travel on the corporate jet. "It was an emotional time for me," he said. Awwwwww, and he wanted his wife to follow him around on his jet? I thought executives used hot journalists for those purposes. Anyway, so maybe all men are bad in some way. But they don't all cheat on their wives necessarily!

Spitzer Linked To Prostitution Ring [CNN]

But according to Professor Roger Matthews, the life of a prostitute is anything but glamorous. "It's abuse and a life of hell," Matthews, a professor of criminology at London's South Bank University tells the Guardian. Matthews has been studying street prostitution for almost two decades and has just published a book called Prostitution, Politics and Policy, outlining his arguments against so-called "liberal" approaches to the sex trade. The "liberal" approach, explalins the the Guardian, "is to think of the trade as simply another form of work, to be 'non-judgmental' in dealing with it, and to set up areas, such as 'tolerance zones', where women can work without fear of arrest."

Matthews disagrees with this viewpoint because he believes that it continues to encourage johns to buy sex and that prostitution, no matter what, is a lose/lose scenario for almost all the women involved. "The women involved in prostitution - particularly street prostitution - are not only among the most victimised group in society, but many of them are multiple victims. If the term 'victimisation' is to have any meaning, then those involved in prostitution must be prime candidates," he argues. He's even against brothels like the Bunny Ranch, because, "When governments are seen to be endorsing prostitution, it leads to a massive expansion of the trade, both legal and illegal." Adds Guardian writer Julie Bindel: "Women working in legal brothels in Nevada, for example, have spoken about how prostitution under such a regime feels like 'legalised rape', and that no laws can remove the stigma of selling sex."

So what does Matthews suggest governments do in order to help prostitutes? He wants to decriminalize prostitution for the women, make consequences worse for the johns, and fund programs to help women find jobs so they can leave hooking behind altogether. He also wants to start studying the men who pay for sex, about whom very little is known. ("The available research indicates that the motivation of many men is relatively low, and that in the vast majority of cases it would not take much to deter them from paying for sex," he says.) Regardless of the available research, I have a hard time believing that prostitution will disappear, no matter what kinds of legislation is passed. While decidedly unglamorous in its gritty reality, prostitution still retains that odd patina of glamor, and sometimes people [men and women alike] want no-strings-attached nookie. It ain't the oldest profession for nothing.

Whorehouses And American Nostalgia [Economist]
'It's Abuse And A Life Of Hell' [Guardian]

Boycott also notes that in a survey of 100 women arrested in London's red light district, 53 used heroin and 73 used crack. Almost half were homeless. In another study of 115 prostitutes, 81% had experienced some kind of violence. Half had been slapped, punched or kicked. The Secret Diary Of A Call Girlproducer Chrissy Skinns (!) admits, "It's a long way from murdered hookers in detective shows." This despite the fact that in London, prostitutes are 12 times more likely to be killed than ordinary women.

Boycott writes that even if women do get "rich" from prostituting themselves, the job will never be representative of any form of sexual equality.

How can anyone believe that imitating a stripper (or a hooker), a woman whose job is to initiate arousal in men, is going to make us either more liberated or more equal? Women today can do everything a man can do: run for President, serve in the Army, play football at an international level (the fact that we can also be mothers is the greatest added bonus). So why does this new generation seem so enthusiastic about stripping off for the delectation of men?

Sexuality is a wonderful thing, part of being human and in touch, but it is complex and shouldn't be treated lightly. Women have always deserved better than to be treated as objects of men's fantasy - today just as much as then.

Why do so many modern women think being a sex object is cool? [Daily Mail]
Earlier: Is Prostitution Glamorous? A Hooker And A Slut Weigh In

• Three cheers for 76-year old Ora Doris Anderson; the senior was thought to be dead after she went missing in the Oregonian mountains for two weeks but rescuers found her alive yesterday. Way to go, Grandma! [CNN]
  
• A Daily Mail writer has her panties in a wad over usually demure women being fond of topless sunbathing. We were laying out topless yesterday not because it was a way of letting out our inner whore but because white boobs look stupid. Besides, Sienna Miller does it and she's a trendsetter. [Daily Mail]
  
• Is breast-feeding the word of the day? Lactivists (heh) took their "nurse-out" national as protesters demonstrated at Applebee's restaurants in 30 states. It would be so much easier to just refuse to eat at Applebee's from here on out — their food is nasty anyway. [Kentucky.com]

• The UN has been meeting with women's rights activists from Iran. Um, they give us oil right? Okay, who gives a shit then. [Ms.]
• This news story is all in French but a reader translated it for us — seven French riot police are accused of raping prostitutes, blackmailing them into having sex for free. But seriously, they were just kidding! It was all a joke! That really is what one of the officers is using as his excuse. [France2.fr]
• A British police chief says the legal drinking age should be raised to 21 because of the rising booze-fueled rape occurences. Um, yeah, it's really worked for us here in the States. Now, where did we put our pepper spray? [Daily Mail]
• Side effects like muscle aches and hot flashes are causing women to stop taking cancer pills that prevent the disease from returning. Unfortunately, the possibility of death increases if the women don't take the pills for the recommended five years. [MSNBC]
• The Senate voted to lift restrictions on family planning aid to overseas organizations that performs abortions (Bush is expected to veto it anyway). Will the FBI come running into our home office if we dare say we wish he had been an abortion? [Let's find out! - Ed.] [LA Times]

• It's not looking too good for Republican folks in Washington. [Washington Post]

• But at least Jenna and Henry don't live in Iraq, where many women have been forced to sell their bodies in order to feed their kids. [CNN]
• And we know Jenna wants kids. Assuming she can have them. Let's hope she's not infertile. Because IVF could bring up some pretty big issues for her. [Salon]
• Also, we hope both she and Henry are prepared for the fact that they are not going to be having a ton of sex in the future. According to the Red Hot Mamas organization's Sex and Menopause Survey, over half of women report a decrease in sex drive during menopause, and 44% report suffering from vaginal atrophy—their vaginas just like, dry up and it hurts too much to have sex. Ugh. [Reuters]