The health impact is clear: As Human Rights Watch reported,"Police use of condoms as evidence of prostitution has the same effect everywhere: despite millions of dollars spent on promoting and distributing condoms as an effective method of HIV prevention, groups most at risk of infection ... are afraid to carry them and therefore engage in sex without protection as a result of police harassment." What's more, "Outreach workers and businesses are unable to distribute condoms freely and without fear of harassment as well."

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Normally it'd be the type of all-sorts-of-exploitative piece I'd barely roll my eyes at before moving along -- but it's the advice she's offering in particular that deserves a second look, if only because it's so pedestrian, and so misguided.

Her teaching? Have lots of sex with your husband.

To Dakin's credit, she acknowledges that there are "obviously other factors" to infidelity, but she argues that, as the Sun paraphrases, it most often "simply comes down to not giving their men enough sex." She also falls back on some classic gender stereotypes: "Men are sexual creatures -- unlike a lot of women, they can separate the act of sex from love," she said. (I will take a moment here to give Dakin the benefit of the doubt: It's hard to know where her advice ends and the Sun's sensationalist editorializing begins; I've contacted her but have yet to hear back.)

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As Melissa Gira Grant explained in the Atlantic last year, "By managing dancers like employees but putting them on the books as independent contractors, club owners get out of paying dancers the benefits they're legally entitled to, which could include worker's compensation, unemployment, and health insurance if they qualify." It also allows club owners to charge dancers "stage fees" and require tip-sharing.

So this development in Kansas -- along with several similar settlements and rulings around the country -- are great, right? Yay for labor rights!

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Most surfaces in this Alameda, Calif., bungalow bear crystals and lit candles. It feels like being in a womb: In the kitchen, a stove is on with the door cracked open and next to the massage table a faux fireplace blazes. After nearly an hour of working her body over, Ben's hand slides between Becky's legs and he begins walking her through a guided meditation on her ideal man. "Imagine seeing him for the first time," he says. "You lock eyes from across the room." After a lengthy narrative buildup, he says, "His lips gently touch yours. Your knees melt out from under you." Ben, a tall all-American sort with ice-blue eyes, moves his fingers to her clitoris, "Let your pleasure spread, down your legs, all the way up to your boobs." As Becky's moans deepen, he announces, "K, I'm going inside."

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In a new report, the company has determined that “in order for a prostitute to earn as much as a Sugar Baby, she would need to put in 25x the effort, and put herself at a serious risk of personal safety and mental and physical health,” according to a press release. Seeking Arrangements makes the following calculations: “The average Sugar Baby dates one to three men annually, receiving an average yearly allowance of approximately $36,000. If a prostitute makes on average $250 per transaction, she would have to have sex with presumably 100 men, performing over 144 sexual transactions.”

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On the floor of the club, a small-boned brunette with flawless golden skin and a ponytail sat on a guy’s lap, and then led him to the VIP lap dancing area. I wondered if my candy heart tattoos were too edgy for Vegas. So far, the three fanciest strip clubs hired Trixie while I fumed on a bar stool, wondering how I’d become so unemployable. After all, I was blonde. I had big boobs. I was tan.

When Trixie appeared again, she lit a Menthol and tossed her lighter into a glass ashtray. She looked at me like she had a horrible secret to tell.

“My hair too short?” I unclipped a rhinestone barrette and shook my stiff curls loose.

“Nope.”

“Tattoos?”

“Nuh-uh.” She exhaled a minty cloud above my head. “There’s something puffy going on.” She pointed at my legs.

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Racist language to remain in Alabama Constitution -- but perhaps with good reason:

Alabama voted against a measure to remove references to segregation in its state Constitution, which includes the line, “separate schools shall be provided for white and colored children.” Amendment 4 would have removed the racist language, but, its opponents argued, it carried with it a series of other, largely tax-based contentions. As the New York Times reported in advance of the vote:

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On Tuesday Californians will vote on whether genetically modified food sold in supermarkets will have to be labeled. In an effort to defeat the ballot measure, food and agribusiness giants including Monsanto, Nestle, Dupont and Pepsico have together spent over  $45 million, the Guardian reported Monday.

Although supported by anti-GM and anti-Monsanto activists, Proposition 37 only goes some way to inform Californians about the genetically modified foods on the market. The measure does not cover restaurants and does not require GM labels on meat from animals fed GM corn. However, many pundits believe that if Proposition 37 passes in California, it will lead to national mandatory GM label requirements.

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My relationship with Vanessa came at the tail end of a time in my life when sex felt more like theater, when I thought living meant merely saying yes to everything. I didn’t know anything about power or intimacy or trust, even though I played with these concepts continuously, recklessly, in private homes and sex clubs, with strangers I met online, and old friendships I needlessly complicated. Fear was something I thought I could talk myself out of, if only I had the right words. I knew so many words at that time, but I didn’t know what any of them really meant.

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Writing in the Guardian Wednesday, writer and sex worker advocate Melissa Gira Grant points out the dangerous but all too common conflation of the terms "trafficking" and "sex work" present in Proposition 35 and anti-trafficking efforts in general. Gira Grant explains that, at the expense of many victims of coerced labor, the bill only defines "trafficking" as involving the sexual exploitation of women and children. She writes:

This schism over who gets to define trafficking is about to come to a head for California voters in the form of Proposition 35, which, if passed this November, will set higher criminal penalties and fines for those who commit what the authors of the bill define as sex-trafficking, as opposed to labor trafficking. It will also force those convicted of "trafficking" to register as sex offenders and submit to lifelong internet monitoring – whether or not sex or the internet were involved in their case.

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Previously known as “Six Sessions” and before that as “The Surrogate,” this movie was a breakout hit at Sundance back in January, largely because of the brave and commanding performances of John Hawkes and Helen Hunt. It’s based, as they say, on a true story, though one should always be leery of that. Hawkes plays Mark O’Brien, a poet and journalist who has been severely disabled by childhood polio but decides, at age 36, that he wants to lose his virginity – after a whole lifetime, as he puts it, when people have only touched his body when they had to, in order to bathe or dress him. Hunt plays Cheryl Cohen Green, the professional sex surrogate – yes, that’s different from a prostitute, as she calmly explains -- whose job is to help him accomplish that goal.

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In recent years, measures have been introduced in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Texas, Illinois and, most recently, California to apply special taxes to strip clubs -- specifically to fund sexual assault services. Now, even if you aren't inclined to view erotic entertainment as the source of all evil, this might seem an appropriate aim -- who wants to argue against additional support for rape survivors? It would seem even more so when you consider politicians' and activists' repeated claims of solid scientific evidence showing a link between strip clubs -- specifically those that sell alcohol -- and sexual violence.

That is, until you look at the alleged proof.

The key study advocates point to is one commissioned by the Texas Legislature in 2009. But that very report states, "no study has authoritatively linked alcohol, sexually oriented business, and the perpetration of sexual violence." What's more, when I talked to Bruce Kellison, director of the Bureau of Business Research at the University of Texas at Austin, and one of the authors of the report, about the alleged link between strip clubs and sexual assault, he said, "That's not really what our study was trying to do."

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“It’s more like ‘Daddy Day Care,’” I usually quip. And while that's meant to be a joke, there’s also some truth to it. I spend a good amount of my work time offering support and advice to men in their 30s and 40s who are just coming out of the closet. Surprised? I was too, at first. But then I thought, where else are these guys going to catch up on two decades of sexual and social experience? Until someone comes out with “Gay for Dummies,” the next best thing is a trained professional.

A few years ago, for example, a charming man from Vancouver hired me every night for a week while he was in Las Vegas for a conference. By the time he went home we'd checked off every item on his wish list, and he was finally comfortable lying naked with another man. It was strangely gratifying to help a guy learn the ropes.

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The landmark decision taken Monday, decided that the dangerous work of prostitution could be made more safe if it occurred under one roof with security staff, reported the Globe and Mail.

The Appeals Court of Ontario said that some of the country's anti-prostitution laws were unconstitutional as they restricted the prostitute's ability to protect themselves -- a ruling already made by a lower court in 2010 but appealed by the provincial and federal governments.

The court also said that it would re-model the law against pimps, which prohibits living off the work of others by adding "in circumstances of exploitation," reported PostMedia News.

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I was a Craigslist call girl. James was my first. I had gotten the idea from a friend. “There are ads,” she said, “placed by men, looking for” -- she raised an eyebrow -- “company.”

That night I got online. It was just as she’d described: SWM seeks non pro, GFE, a little fun. FS. DATY. BBBJ. A lady that speaks GREEK, possibly, a road of possibilities, a chance encounter, no strings attached. For 200 roses, 300 reasons, a generous donation, a happy ending. You can start any day that you like.

On the now-shuttered adult services section of Craigslist -- to the left and below where you’d rent an apartment or sell a couch -- you could find ads, written in their own coded language, from men and women and everything in between, all of them after one thing: the simple exchange of money for sex.

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I was in ninth grade when I first started having sexual relationships. I was lying, sneaking out of the house, drinking several times a week. I did well in school and went to classes but I was in search of something -- an empty feeling I tried to fill up with alcohol and drugs and parties. It wasn't just about my father leaving. I'd been sexually molested when I was 6. I lost the closest boy I knew in high school when he accidentally shot himself at 17. By college I was picking up men in bars, going home with them in a blackout. I'd been used so many times I started to be like: I don't care. These guys are the ones who are being used.

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OK, so it isn’t the sexiest case ever made for the legalization of prostitution, but it is one of the more intelligent, measured and comprehensive looks at alternatives to criminalizing the trade. Instead of the usual polarizing rhetoric about how sex work is inherently empowering or debasing, the George Washington University sociology professor takes the more practical approach of investigating how to best reduce harm within the industry, specifically within the U.S. His research takes him everywhere from Las Vegas to Frankfurt in search of the best and most realistic policy aims. Ultimately, he recommends a two-track approach stateside, where street prostitution, which he dubs a "social problem," is treated dramatically differently from indoor prostitution involving consenting adults.

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"In the dead of night, alone at home, the loneliness sometimes becomes unbearable," writes one man. "There aren't many places to go in the middle of the night, and most of those choices don't necessarily ensure any kind of reasonable human interaction." Another man explains, "Nobody talks to me, nobody cares what I say. I'm a 24-year-old drone who wastes his days sitting at a computer reviewing spreadsheets that don't really matter," he says. "I just want to talk to someone who cares, and $1 every 3 minutes is a lot less than $250 an hour for a therapist."

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