Menu Close

Thinking pop culture

Displaying 1 - 10 of 184 articles

When masturbation on screen isn’t maligned

In this space recently, I wrote about the mad and bad masturbation portrayals so common on screen. In the days following, Hot Octopuss – a London-based sex toy retailer – posted a response, identifying…

Mr. Mercedes, Masturbation and Madness

2017 has been a pretty excellent year for TV adaptations of books. Without pause, I’d enthusiastically recommend a Summertime binge on Strike, I Love Dick, Big Little Lies (which I wrote about here), The…

#MeToo and Modern Consciousness-Raising

I’m often unenthused, to put it mildly, about social media campaigns. I’ve expressed my… reservations… about #WISH and #DoItInADress previously. While invariably well-intentioned, such campaigns often…

Unpacking sexually transmitted ethics

In a recent interview with an online publication, I used the term “sexually transmitted ethics”. I wasn’t referencing published work, and yet, while the phrase mightn’t have a scholarly history, I don’t…

The Delusions of Christmas Past

September 21 and it’s started already. No, not the ever-earlier encroach of Christmas. (My view on that particular “lament” is that if consumers really cared, they’d vote with their wallets and force stores…

Islam and the fine line of academic freedom

I’m in my seventeenth year of working at the University of Melbourne: at 37-years-old, that’s a fair chunk of my life in the one place. This isn’t a love letter to my employer, nevertheless there are lots…