Porn Fashions: Obscenely Tasteless Apparel from 1980s Adult Magazines

A few years back we introduced you to porn fashions. Well, that was so much fun, I thought it was high time we go for another round.  I have done the dirty work for you, slaving away poring through stacks of sleazy adult magazines to bring you more porn fashions – specifically from the 1980s (and a few from the early 90s). It was a tough job, but somebody had to do it. You’re welcome.

- Flashbak

Sex-doll brothels? Tacky, yes, but better than the human version

In a world where sex sells, women are often treated as though they are commodities. 

There were sustained protests before France banned prostitution, in 2016, with a version of the sex buyer law pioneered in Sweden. A group of notable prostitution enthusiasts, calling themselves the “343 salauds (scumbags)”, thought it would help if they launched a campaign called “Touche pas à ma pute”, translated, according to taste, as “hands off my whore/hooker”.

After what were, presumably, two miserably pute-starved years for the salauds, who included Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s lawyer, it emerges that they will, after all, have recourse to silicone alternatives, in a new sex-doll brothel. Councillors and some feminist groups had asked the council of Paris to close down Xdolls, in line with anti-prostitution law – and because it demeans women.

But having investigated the flat hiring out silicone female dummies, for €89 (£78) an hour, the council has found – how could it not? – that the dolls being dolls, the establishment could not be a brothel, and was therefore legal.

- The Guardian

WEIRD MUSEUMS FROM AROUND THE WORLD

Museum of Bad Art, USA

The art on display is so bad that it actually ended up being worthy of a whole museum. The exhibition may also be viewed when it’s traveling around the world. There are also books written on bad art that you can buy. Sometimes bad is, actually, good.

- Sigmaxion

An Austrian Artist Was Sentenced to Jail for His Provocative Illustrations, But He Didn’t Give Up Drawing the Truth

Gerhard Haderer is a famous Austrian artist who began his career as an illustrator for advertising agencies. In 1985, when he got tired of doing commercial projects, Haderer decided to dedicate himself to satiric illustration. For more than 30 years, he has drawn thousands of honest caricatures. In 2005, he was sentenced to 6 months in jail for blasphemy after writing his book, The Life of Jesus. But that didn’t stop Haderer from continuing to be creative. On the contrary, the 67-year-old Austrian artist continued to draw the modern world with all sincerity and fearlessness. He also continues to bring attention to acute political and social issues in the monthly comic book, MOFF which is published by Scherz & Schund Fabrik.

Bright Side has put together some of the strongest Gerhard Haderer works just for you. It’s clear that Haderer approached all of his work with great skill and bravery, and wasn’t afraid to show everything as it really is.


- Bright Side

Why Denmark dominates the World Happiness Report rankings year after year

The new World Happiness Report again ranks Denmark among the top three happiest of 155 countries surveyed – a distinction that the country has earned for seven consecutive years.

- The Conversation

New Banksy Artworks Keep Popping Up All Over New York City, And Here’s What People Found So Far

Known for his satirical style and political remarks, Banksy never misses an opportunity to make a statement. Murals of this iconic graffiti artist have been popping up all around New York City for a while now, and 2018 is no exception.

- Bored Panda

Mindhunter is Netflix’s most binge-worthy show yet

I watched the Netflix series Mindhunter over the course of one week, and I think I could’ve watched it in a single sitting if I had no other obligations or basic needs to fulfill. The compelling 10-episode series unfolds like a movie, rather than a collection of distinct episodes, making each episode’s end credits feel like a brief glitch rather than a suggestion to stop watching and save it for next time.

- The Verge

135 Amazing Facts for People Who Like Amazing Facts

3. Amelia Earhart and Eleanor Roosevelt once sneaked out of a White House event, commandeered an airplane, and went on a joyride to Baltimore.

- Mental Floss

When It Comes to Love, Is Three (or More) a Crowd?

Cultures around the world fear unrequited love. One strategy to avoid the pain of rejection might be to spread your love around—but does that work?

Passionate love between two people is a pervasive human theme. Humans as a species may not be sexually monogamous, but they do seem to be emotionally monogamous; it is very difficult to passionately love two people at the same time. In the end, it seems to me, everyone who desires being in love discovers, for better or worse, that it’s a two-person job.

- Sapiens

Stephen Hawking, one of the world’s greatest minds, was an inspiration for atheists

Stephen Hawking was one of the greatest minds on earth. After dying at the age 76, as fellow physicist Neil deGrasse Tyson said, “his passing has left an intellectual vacuum in his wake.”

There was one point where religious advocates tried to use a quote from A Brief History Of Time to suggest his belief in God: “It would be the ultimate triumph of human reason – for then we should know the mind of God.” However, if it wasn’t clear to people that he was an atheist, in his 2010 book The Grand Design he clarified that it was a metaphorical comment. He later told El Mundo in no uncertain terms: “What I meant by ‘we would know the mind of God’ is, we would know everything that God would know, if there were a God. Which there isn’t. I’m an atheist.”

- Quartz

Être possédé par ses possessions

Après la méditation, le nettoyage du microbiote et le jeûne, la tendance d’épuration continue à déferler sur un Occident repentant aux dépotoirs gavés, et dont la devise tenait sur un t-shirt fabriqué en Chine : Shop till you drop ! Même les Chinois ne veulent plus de nos déchets, c’est dire.

Les artistes ont toujours devancé le troupeau dans ce domaine, car le mouvement d’ascétisme matériel englobe à la fois la spiritualité, l’écologie, les finances personnelles, la liberté pure et simple, le refus d’être esclave. On assiste de mille manières à un réel quin toé, pied de nez à un système qui n’a de cesse de nous rentrer la « croissance » dans la gorge et le PIB par l’autre extrémité, tout en jugulant avec un taux d’endettement de 170 %. Nous croulons sous nos bébelles.

- Le Devoir

The Man Who Knew Too Little

At first, the experiment didn’t have a name. Right after the election, Erik Hagerman decided he’d take a break from reading about the hoopla of politics. Donald Trump’s victory shook him. Badly. And so Mr. Hagerman developed his own eccentric experiment, one that was part silent protest, part coping mechanism, part extreme self-care plan. He swore that he would avoid learning about anything that happened to America after Nov. 8, 2016. “It was draconian and complete,” he said. “It’s not like I wanted to just steer away from Trump or shift the conversation. It was like I was a vampire and any photon of Trump would turn me to dust.”

It takes meticulous planning to find boredom. Mr. Hagerman commits as hard as a method actor, and his self-imposed regimen — white-noise tapes at the coffee shop, awkward scolding of friends, a ban on social media — has reshaped much of his life.

- NY Times

The Future of Leisure

It is past time we rediscover the lost art of leisure. Doing so, however, will also mean teaching people how to find fulfillment in their free time.

Over the past few years, publications, consulting companies, and think tanks have been wringing their hands with increasing urgency over the “the future of work.” Politico Magazine recently dedicated an issue to it, whereas Quartz has dedicated an entire vertical. McKinsey and Co. routinely releases new reports about it. Even Nature has published a series of essays on the topic. For two years running, The Atlantic has convened an annual “Future of Work Summit,” and it has now been joined by The New York Times, which hosted a swanky “New Work Summit” at a Ritz Carlton in California last month. It would seem that we have the future of work covered. The future of leisure? Not so much.

- Democracy

A ghost island in the middle of the Indian Ocean

Ross Island, an abandoned British settlement in the remote Andaman archipelago, is being taken over by its rightful owner: nature.

Situated in the Bay of Bengal, India’s Andaman and Nicobar Islands are an isolated group of 572 tropical islands, of which only 38 are currently inhabited. Nautically located closer to South East Asia than India, they are known for stunning beaches, thriving marine life, rich coral reefs and largely undisturbed primary forests. But beyond the idyllic views lie a dark past.

- BBC

How to Become Less Afraid of Death

Death, in the view of many theorists, is a good thing, at least for a society that aspires to be creative. When you’re on the clock, you accomplish more. Cultural anthropologist Ernest Becker, author of The Denial of Death, called mortality “a mainspring of human activity.” If you want to invent a light bulb or paint a Mona Lisa, you’d best get started, because checkout time is coming.

- Time

BURNING OUT: WHAT REALLY HAPPENS INSIDE A CREMATORIUM

Rosehill Cemetery in Linden, New Jersey, is awash in small-town trappings: tree-lined roads, rolling lawns, and street signs at every corner. On this Wednesday midsummer morning, the familiar routine of loss plays out across the acres. A yellow taxi waits at the end of a row of graves for someone paying their respects. Men and women clad in church clothes line up their cars along the curb and make their way to a grave site. A backhoe digs out some earth, another spot for another resident.

This is the textbook way we treat our dead. Someone passes, they’re buried, a headstone marks their place out among the rows in the borough of the departed. But today I’m bound for a different part of the cemetery, one fewer people see—though that fact is rapidly changing.

- Popular Mechanics

What Happens When a Married Woman Goes on Tinder? It started as an experiment. What I found made me want more

On a recent evening, I was having drinks with a male friend — a single and actively-looking-for-a-long-term-relationship friend — when he asked me why there seemed to be so many married women on Tinder. According to him, they appeared on the app, boldly describing themselves as “married” or “in an open marriage.” Were they actively looking for sex, he wondered? Did they just want to flirt?

- The Cut

«M.I.L.F.»: Manifeste de la femme-mère désirante

« Ça a été une belle leçon d’humilité et un rappel à l’ordre quant à la façon de dresser le portrait de femmes qui sont défavorisées économiquement, mais qui ne sont pas épaisses pour autant. Écoute, je me suis inscrite à des groupes BDSM sur Facebook. Des préposées aux bénéficiaires qui participent à des lundis d’orgies, ça te brasse les préjugés que t’as sur la vie sexuelle des gens. »

Les phrases que prononce Marjolaine Beauchamp pendant qu’elle fume une cigarette et vous raconte sa vie ressemblent parfois, lumineusement, à certains de ses poèmes. « J’ai eu le goût de partir vite, j’ai planté des arbres, j’ai menti dans mes CV, je n’ai jamais voyagé super loin, mais je me suis promenée en criss », débite-t-elle par exemple à propos des années de bourlingue de la fin de son adolescence, alors qu’il lui fallait quitter, comme on fuit une maison en feu, son Buckingham natal. Ne suffirait-il pas de placer des sauts de ligne entre chacune des parties de cette citation pour obtenir une page digne de son plus récent recueil, Fourrer le feu (L’Écrou, 2016) ?

- Le Devoir