US Sex Sells News

A federal judge has ruled against an eastern Missouri town's unconstitutional efforts to ban an adult-themed store from operating there.

Pevely council were excessive in their opposition to Pure Pleasure Boutique which opened in a building zoned for commercial use about two years ago. The city denied the store a business license and other permits and issued almost daily citations, an accumulation of fines that now exceed $100,000.

Luke Lirot, attorney for the boutique owners explained: 

The city did everything they could to try and prevent that business from opening. The city wouldn't even hook up the sewer. They used a fiberglass outhouse in the parking lot.

The Florida owners of this store, and a small chain of Pure Pleasure Megacenter stores in Florida, Illinois and Missouri filed a lawsuit in January 2011. The Pevely store is a toned-down version of the Megacenter stores that doesn't sell pornography. It sells items such as lingerie, lubricants, novelties and marital aids.

In a ruling issued Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Henry Edward Autry said the city violated the First Amendment rights of the store operators: In this case, the evidence is clear and undisputed .  His ruling orders Pevely to grant Pure Pleasure Boutique a business license, building permits and sign permits, as well as hook up sewer and water lines.

A decision on whether damages will be awarded is still pending.

If you were looking to catch a little XXX entertainment in Philadelphia, hopefully you weren't planning on going to The Forum, the adult cinema has closed. No word on when it closed or why, but The Forum is currently not open for business.

According to city real estate records, the building has not been sold. Its owners were cited in October for doing interior structural work without the appropriate permit and report indicates that the first floor seating had been removed.

Universal Studios has filed a copyright lawsuit against a porn production company, accusing it of lifting language, characters and plot from the best-selling erotic book trilogy Fifty Shades of Grey for its own adult films and sex toys.

The suit was filed jointly by Universal and EL James's British company which owns the copyright to the novels.

The lawsuit said that Los Angeles-based based Smash Pictures had produced a movie called Fifty Shades of Grey: a XXX Adaptation which lifted:

exact dialogue, characters, events, story, and style from the 'Fifty Shades' trilogy.

The first XXX adaptation is not a parody, and it does not comment on, criticize, or ridicule the originals. It is a rip-off, plain and simple.

The lawsuit seeks an injunction, unspecified damages, and profits from sales of the movies, which its says are trademark and copyright infringements.

Female porn stars are psychologically as healthy or healthier than other women, according to a new study, which challenges feminist driven views about women in the adult entertainment business.

Adult entertainers were found to have higher self-esteem, a better quality of life and body image, and to be more positive, with greater levels of spirituality. They also had higher levels of sexual satisfaction and, perhaps unsurprisingly, many more partners than other women.

The American researchers, who report their findings in the Journal of Sex Research, said they found no evidence to support the damaged goods hypothesis that actresses involved in the porn industry come from desperate backgrounds and are less psychologically healthy compared with typical women. They said:

Some descriptions of actresses in pornography have included attributes such as drug addiction, homelessness, poverty, desperation and being victims of sexual abuse. Some have made extreme assertions, such as claiming that all women in pornography were sexually abused as children. Stereotypes of those involved in adult entertainment have been used to support or condemn the industry and to justify political views on pornography, although the actual characteristics of actresses are unknown because no study on this group of women has been conducted.

The psychologists compared data taken from 177 adult entertainment actresses with a sample of women matched for age, marital status and other factors. The actresses, all of whom had been paid to work on at least one X-rated movie, ranged in age from 18 to 50, with an average career in the industry of 3.5 years.

One of the main claims by commentators on the industry has been that actresses have frequently experienced sexual abuse in childhood, but the results show no statistically significant difference between the two groups of women.

The study also shows that the actresses sleep better and have more energy. On the negative side, industry workers had a history of more drug and alcohol use, and problems possibly linked to sensation-seeking personalities.

The study was undertaken by researchers at Shippensburg University, Texas Woman's University and the Adult Industry Medical Healthcare Foundation.

In the wake of a newly approved measure requiring adult-film actors to wear condoms in Los Angeles County, producers and others in the pornography business are vowing to flee the area.

The countywide ballot initiative known as Measure B passed with 56% of the vote on Tuesday, despite critics dismissing it as unenforceable and major news outlets like the Los Angeles Times saying it will likely stymie county government and bring little benefit to performers.

Vivid Entertainment Group, the largest producer and distributor of pornographic films in Los Angeles, has already stated its intention to flee the county if the new law is put into place, telling Variety that it plans to move to another county within the state.

The adult-film business generates about $1 billion in Los Angeles County every year, accounting for about 8% of all the adult films shot in the entire world.

Measure B passed with the help of an aggressive campaign by the AIDS Healthcare Foundation.

Adult-film producers, however, have long maintained that their performers are at lower risk of STDs than the general population, due to the fact that actors are tested monthly for HIV, gonorrhea, chlamydia and syphilis.

Before it can take effect, Measure B still has to be approved and adopted by local municipalities within Los Angeles County.

The Erotic Networks parent company New Frontier Media has struck a $33 million deal to be acquired by Larry Flynt's LFP Broadcasting, which distributes Hustler TV in cable and satellite TV homes.

New Frontier said that its board is recommending that shareholders approve the offer from Flynt. If the deal is approved, the U.S. adult programming business will be dominated by two key players--Flynt's LFP Broadcasting and Luxembourg-based Manwin Enterprises, which closed a deal to buy Playboy TV parent Playboy Enterprises last year.

Strip club cover charges and payments for lap dances aren't exempt from state taxes because they don't promote artistic performances in local communities, the New York State Court of Appeals has ruled.

The appeals court ruled, 4-3, that Latham, N.Y.'s Nite Moves strip club didn't qualify for the state's tax exemption for dramatic or musical arts performances because performances at the club didn't fall in line with the Legislature's evident purpose of the tax break.

The majority judges explained:

In this case, petitioner claims, and the dissent agrees, that the Legislature intended to give the adult entertainment business a tax break because the exotic stage and couch dances that are featured at the premises qualify as musical arts performances, rather than as more generalized amusement or entertainment activities that fall within the broad sweep of the tax.

Update: Possible Appeal

27th October  2012. See article from news.gather.com

The attorney of Nite Moves, Andrew McCullough, says he might file a petition with the highest court in the land to see what they have to say about it, since he thinks it's common sense that girls dancing for customers in a juice bar warrants the artistic expression tax discount.

The adult entertainment industry overwhelmingly favors re-electing Barack Obama to a second term as president, according to the results of a new industry poll conducted by media organization XBIZ.

Of the 339 respondents, 68% say Obama, while only 13% favor Romney. Another 14% would like to see someone else in the White House, while 5% responded I don't care.

Aside from economic considerations affecting voters' decisions in November, the issue of federal obscenity prosecutions figures to be a major factor for adult film producers. According to the notorious pro-censorship organization Morality in Media, Mitt Romney earlier this year, along with other Republican candidates at the time, offered assurances that if elected, they would direct the U.S. Department of Justice to prosecute porn producers for obscenity violations.

...Read the full article