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kottke.org posts about NSFW

Deaf People Show Us How to Swear in Sign Language

From a series The Cut did called Deaf People Tell, a group of deaf people teach us how to swear and say bad words in sign language. I really liked the one for “bullshit”. Probably NSFW.


All the F*cking Books You See at the Bookstore

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

book cover with the word 'f*ck' in the title

See also Why Are There So Many F**king Best-sellers Right Now With F**k in the Title?, What the F*ck Is Up With All These Sweary F*cking Book Titles?, and What Is With All of the Self-Help Books With Swear Words in the Title?


3-Way (Not Calling)

This is NSFW and pretty funny. 3-Way (Not Calling) is a short film about one couple’s attempt to spice things up in the bedroom with another person and how it goes slightly wrong and also slightly right. (via film school rejects)


Never Happened

Never Happened is a short sci-fi film by Mark Slutsky about a pair of colleagues who have a fling on a business trip. Worth watching…a snack-sized Black Mirror. NSFW. (via df)


Erasing the nipple from Instagram

Note: if you’re browsing at work, there are photos below that are probably NSFW even though they are artistic and making a political point. The project itself suggests that the idea of NSFW is dumb, which makes me uncomfortable about calling it out like this, but you know, pragmatism…not everyone can afford to have a conversation with their boss about why viewing art during the workday is a good idea.

Posting photos of full frontal nudity on Instagram is against their terms of service.1 No nipples, no pubic hair and certainly no vaginas or penises. Butts are ok though because…I dunno, everyone has one? For a project entitled Busts, model and photographer Sasha Frolova took inspiration from Instagram removing one of her photos and took portraits of women and seamlessly erased their nipples.

Sasha Frolova

Sasha Frolova

The photo taken down from Instagram was the catalyst for this series. It was a black and white self-portrait I took exhausted in the bath after a panic attack at age 16. Releasing it was a coming to terms with the fact that I no longer feel so unstable. Because of that, having it removed was particularly violating. But more than anything though I was offended that all it takes is a pizza emoji over my discreetly revealed nipples to make the image appropriate. Is the implication then that a woman, simply in her own existence, and anatomy is inappropriate, vulgar?

If the goal of Instagram’s policy is to “protect” people from images of sexuality, Frolova’s project shows that they haven’t quite succeeded.2

  1. Meanwhile, you can find porn of every kind on Twitter.โ†ฉ

  2. Also OK according to Instagram’s policies are photographs of male nipples, full frontal female nudity with nipples, public hair, and vaginas scratched out, female nipples behind see through clothing, and explicit illustrations of sex (for instance), all of which can be sexual in nature.โ†ฉ


A Prank Time!

This animation is super-freaky and somewhat NSFW and you should just watch it. Also: and that’s why you always leave a note. (via @gavinpurcell)


Comedians Sitting on Vibrators Getting Coffee

This is really NSFW but also really ROFL: Comedy Central’s Not Safe with Nikki Glaser took Jerry Seinfeld’s Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee and mixed it with Clayton Cubitt’s Hysterical Literature project to create the magical Comedians Sitting on Vibrators Getting Coffee. I laughed at this until I was red in the face.


A brief history of swearing in movies

Swearing in Hollywood movies was banned from the 1930s until 1968. And even then it took two more years for a movie (MASH) to use the word “fuck”. NSFW if you’ve got your fucking sound turned up.


Liquid columns of falling animated people

This is a bunch of animated naked people falling into two precise columns. Mesmerizing. Perhaps a little NSFW? And throw some headphones on…the sound, while subtle, is essential.

See also that video โ€” you remember the one โ€” of a bunch of computer-generated people being mowed down by a rotating bar.


The Nice Guys

Am I crazy or does this 70s crime comedy starring Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling actually look good? I mean, it likely won’t be that good, but entertaining this pleasant fiction will make us happy until next May, when we’ll know for sure. FYI: this is a “red band” trailer, so NSFW and all that.


Hanging in the Woods

[This is NSFW.] Artist Hilde Krohn Huse needed a minute or two of film of herself hanging naked upside down from a tree branch for a project she was working on. But when the rope tightened around her ankle too much, things went a little wrong.

My first thought was, “OK, you’ve fucked up, Hilde, but let’s try to get you out of this so nobody needs to know.” I hauled myself up, hand over hand, until I was swinging horizontally, just below the branch, and tried to yank my foot free.

It was hopeless. Righting myself, I put my free foot back on the ground to rest for a moment, then tried again, pulling myself up and fighting, puppet-like, against my bonds. My left foot, taking my weight in the lowest noose, started to spasm and I knew my strength wouldn’t hold out. But my pride was still uppermost โ€” the idea of having to draw the attention of others to my humiliating plight still seemed unthinkable. I was losing strength, but full of adrenaline, my face dragging along the woodland floor, leaving me spitting twigs.

As any good artist would, Huse turned her ordeal into an art piece in the form of the 11 minutes of video shot before her camera shut off:


Hysterical Literature

Photographer Clayton Cubitt started a project in 2012 called Hysterical Literature. In each of the project’s resulting videos, a female participant is filmed from the waist up reading a story of her choosing while she is stimulated to orgasm with a vibrator by Cubitt’s partner, Katie James. His first subject was adult film star Stoya; her thoughts on the experience are here.

Vanity Fair recently sent writer Tony Bentley to participate in an HL session. Her reading choice? The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James.

With Katie now in position under the table, takeoff is imminent and the stakes are high: the sessions are a one-shot deal, no retakes, and no editing of the footage after the fact. It was not lost on me that a perfect triangulation between Clayton (auteur, cameraman), Katie (Hitachi artist), and me (the canvas) was in play, and it mirrored my internal mixture of curiosity, exhilaration, and stage fright. I couldn’t help wondering if this adventure qualified as having a threesome with two strangers. But soon enough such intellectualizing sexualizing was rendered naught.

“Rolling,” says Clayton, and everything instantly disappeared except the book in my hands and the words on the page. The world was out and I was on.

By the time I’d read two pages, I was struggling mightily to keep my countenance. “She spent half her time in thinking of beauty, bravery and mag-nan-nnn-im-im-ity…”

There’s no nudity in the videos, but you might still find them NSFW.


“I Googled how to be a porn star”

Miriam Weeks was in the news last year as the Duke freshmen who performed in pornographic movies as Belle Knox. In this five-part documentary video series, Weeks discusses her decision to work in the porn industry and how it has affected her life.

I’m 18 years old, and I travel across the country having sex with people on camera, and every dollar I make goes to tuition. I’ve built a name for myself. I’m building a brand. I love the porn industry. It makes me feel like a strong independent woman. It’s given me back my sense of self.

Probably NSFW, although all the nudity appears to be blurred.


Hysterical Literature explores women, sex, and aging

hysterical-literature.jpg

You may have seen artist Clayton Cubitt’s NSFW Hysterical Literature project. On YouTube, the videos have been viewed nearly 50 million times. The recipe is simple: a woman, a book, and a Hitachi Magic Wand. In the latest installment, Janet, who’s in her early sixties, reads Ralph Waldo Emerson. It’s a lovely meditation on women, sexuality, and age. The project is also on view at MASS MoCA’s Bibliothecaphilia show.


The Book of Mormon Missionary Positions

Sometimes religion and a bit of wordplay come together to make something clever. So it is with Neil DaCosta’s project, The Book of Mormon Missionary Positions, a collection of photos depicting two fully clothed Mormon Missionaries in various sexual positions, as in the Kama Sutra.

Mormon Missionary Position

NSFW, I guess…I felt a bit sheepish scrolling through that page at the office even though everyone is fully clothed. (via a photo editor)


Everybody sexts

Jenna Wortham talked to a bunch of people about intimate texts they send and concludes that Everybody Sexts.

I think that everybody sexts. Not everyone sends nude photos, of course, for a variety of reasons. But many people I’ve talked to define a sext as anything sent with sexual intent, be it a suggestive Gchat exchange, a racy photo, a suggestive Snapchat, or even those aqua-blue droplets of sweat emoji.

I asked people I knew โ€” and many I didn’t โ€” to talk to me about sexts and the stories behind them, the risks, perceived and real, and why they did it, knowing that they could be shared beyond their control. Lastly, I asked them to share a nude that they had sent to someone. And so many people did, without hesitation, or requiring anything in exchange. I was floored by their openness, and the expanse of human emotions and experiences on display. What I discovered, mainly, is that sexting - like anything else done on our phones - was mostly just meant to be fun, for fun, grown folks doing what grown folks do.

NSFW.


The Milgram experiment in real life

You don’t know what you would do unless you’re in that situation.

That’s Philip Zimbardo’s1 introduction to this fascinating and deeply disturbing video, depicting a real-world instance of Stanley Milgram’s experiment on obedience to authority figures2. In the video, you see a McDonald’s manager take a phone call from a man pretending to be a police officer. The caller orders the manager to strip search an employee. And then much much worse.

The video is NSFW and if you’re sensitive to descriptions and depictions of sexual abuse, you may want to skip it. And lest you think this was an isolated incident featuring exceptionally weak-minded people, the same caller was alleged to have made several other calls resulting in similar behavior. (via mr)

  1. Zimbardo conducted the notorious Stanford prison experiment in 1971.โ†ฉ

  2. Milgram’s experiment focused on a person in authority ordering someone to deliver (fake) electric shocks to a third person. Some participants continued to deliver the shocks as ordered even when the person being shocked yelled in pain and complained of a heart condition.โ†ฉ


Help wanted

[We’re all adults here (or reasonably mature humans anyway) so I rarely feel the need to warn you about what you might be getting yourself into, link-wise, but this article is REALLY disturbing in spots. If you have young children especially, you might want to take a pass on this. -jason]

From Luke Malone on Medium, a story about a support group of pedophiles who haven’t and don’t want to act on those impulses, You’re 16. You’re a Pedophile. You Don’t Want to Hurt Anyone. What Do You Do Now?

Anecdotal evidence suggests that most pedophiles first notice an attraction toward children when they themselves are between 11 and 16, mirroring that of any other sexual awakening. It can be a confusing time for any of us, but imagine realizing that you’re attracted to little kids. How do these young men and women negotiate that with no viable role models or support network? There is no It Gets Better for pedophiles. Are they all fated to end up as child molesters? Or is it possible for them to live a life without hurting children at all?

You may have heard a version of Malone’s story on This American Life earlier this year. Over at The Awl, Choire Sicha talked with Malone about his reporting of the story and how it came about.

People would eventually find out what I was working on, and the questions would come thick and fast: How did you find them? How can you stomach it? Why are you defending pedophiles? It was really telling about a person if they asked that last one. I get it, pedophiles get a bad rap and in many cases rightly so. But I found myself trying to convince people that there are plenty who don’t want to act and really want help not acting on their attractions. Which, side bar, would be a big ask of anyone. Imagine if you were told at 16 that you could never have sex in a way that was appealing to you, Okay, thanks, bye! There’s obviously a reason for that, but it makes no sense not to help them out. Anyway, most of my friends got it but a few were like, “Okay, but at the end of the day you have to put the kids first.” I would reply that talk of preventive therapy was putting both teenage pedophiles, who are essentially kids themselves by the way, and their potential victims first. It’s win win. But they’d think about it for a minute and reply, “Yeah, I get it, but we have to put the children first.” It was all very Helen Lovejoy.


The sex Olympics

I needed a good laugh this week and this news report from The Onion about how the Olympic Village in Sochi was built with the athletes’ sexual activities in mind was an LOL machine. NSFW.

Apparently Tinder is all the rage in the Olympic Village this year…those athletes need to work through the 100,000 condoms they’ve been provided.


Classic paintings brought to life by subtle motion

Rino Stefano Tagliafierro took more than 100 paintings (from the likes of Reubens, Caravaggio, Rembrandt, and Vermeer) and set them in motion to music to form a slow motion oil painted dreamland.

Lots of boobs, butts, penises, and even the occasional hint of sexual gesture in this one โ€” the motion sometimes fills in the blanks on all of those frolicking nymph-type paintings, making them seem to modern eyes even more sexist and outdated than the static paintings. There are some definite porny moments, is what I’m saying. So yeah, probably NSFW.

And for those looking to supplement their GIF collections, this page contains links to an animated GIF for each painting represented in the video. (via digg)


David Bowie’s Love is Lost (Hello Steve Reich Mix by James Murphy)

James Murphy (LCD Soundsystem) remixed David Bowie’s Love is Lost in the style of minimal music composer Steve Reich. Here’s the video for it by Barnaby Roper:

The video is NSFW, although most of the NS-ness is of the watching scrambled Cinemax on your uncle’s cable in 1985 variety (aka datamoshing).


Aerial nude photography

From New Zealand photographer John Crawford, a series called Aerial Nudes.

Aerial Nudes

Technically not safe for work but your coworkers would need to be sitting at your desk with a magnifying glass to be offended so… (via @coudal)


Playboy Bunny manual

Here’s a Playboy Bunny employee manual from 1969.

Bunnies must allow enough time before going to their assigned rooms to report to the Bunny Mother for appearance inspection. The Bunnies’ hair, nails, shoes, makeup and costume must be “Bunny-perfect” and no Bunny is permitted to begin working unless appearance specifications are met. Demerits may be issued for carelessness in this regard. When the Bunny reports to her scheduled room, the Room Director, too, will note her appearance and suggest improvements if necessary.

NSFW if having “PLAYBOY BUNNY” on your screen in huge pink letters is not safe in your workplace.


I read Playboy.com for the Miles Davis articles

From 1962, Alex Haley interviews Miles Davis for Playboy magazine.

Why is it that people just have to have so much to say about me? It bugs me because I’m not that important. Some critic that didn’t have nothing else to do started this crap about I don’t announce numbers, I don’t look at the audience, I don’t bow or talk to people, I walk off the stage, and all that.

Look, man, all I am is a trumpet player. I only can do one thing โ€” play my horn โ€” and that’s what’s at the bottom of the whole mess. I ain’t no entertainer, and ain’t trying to be one. I am one thing, a musician. Most of what’s said about me is lies in the first place. Everything I do, I got a reason.

The article is SFW but the ads are NSFW…here’s a completely SFW version.


Trailer for Fincher’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Larsson? Fincher? Reznor? Rooney Mara’s brief NSFW nipple flash? What’s not to like?

I was skeptical about this (and The Social Network) but lesson learned: never doubt David Fincher.


Movies scenes + Cee-Lo’s Fuck You

The Dallas Observer has collected a few clips from movies where the music has been replaced by Cee-Lo’s Fuck You. The Dirty Dancing one is probably the best:

I wonder how the slow-dance scene at the end of Rushmore would work. Or the Enchantment Under the Sea Dance in Back to the Future. Audio NSFW. (via @erikmal)


Fuck You by Cee-Lo

Great song by Cee-Lo, who you may know as one half of Gnarls Barkley.

NSFW in both the visual and audio departments for extensive use of the phrase “fuck you”.

I love Anil’s comment that the video is “a little bit Tobias, and a little bit Sasha”. And indeed the typeface in the video is Champion Gothic, designed by Tobias Frere-Jones’ partner, Jonathan Hoefler.


A 2 Live Crew cover video (sorta)

I have no idea who the singer is or what this music video is about, but I kinda can’t stop watching it.

And hey, look, an informative YouTube comment:

I’m gonna take a stab at interpreting the plot of this video. The child is dying and as some sort of make a wish type thing he’s wants to be a warlord, have an entourage if hot ladies and meet 2 live crew (which I’m guessing the police man and business man have set up, with 4 stand-ins but they are nervous about him realizing its not actually them) … but he buys it, and when he fulfills the three wishes cosmic energy leaves his body and all that glorious trippy shit happens at the end.

NSFW if looking at a live version of 2 Live Crew’s As Nasty As They Wanna Be album cover is frowned upon in your place of employ.


A new kind of beauty

Photographer Phillip Toledano explores the concept of human beauty at a time when people, through surgery and drugs, are able to re-make themselves.

Perhaps we are creating a new kind of beauty. An amalgam of surgery, art, and popular culture? And if so, are the results the vanguard of human induced evolution?

NSFW.


Chatroulette

I spent about 30 minutes on Friday night on Chatroulette (very NSFW). You push the start button and you’re instantly in a video chat with some random person. During my session, the average “chat” lasted about 5 seconds and I observed several people drinking malt liquor, two girls making out, many many guys who disconnected as soon as they saw I wasn’t female, several girls who disconnected after seeing my face (but not before I caught the looks of disgust on theirs), 3 couples having sex, and 11 erect penises. In a Malkovichian moment, I was even connected to myself once…and then the other me quickly disconnected. In short, Chatroulette is pretty much the best site going on the internet right now.

Sam Anderson has a nice article in New York magazine about Chatroulette.