February 12

Events

• Current events

• 1938 - JK who? Judy's still the queen of teens - Judy Blume, one of the most popular children's authors of her generation, was born on this date. Her books have often come under attack and been banned for their sexual content of the lives of teens. In Forever she depicted a sexual relationship between two teens in a fully positive light. With Then Again, Maybe I Won't she addressed the issue of wet dreams and in Deenie the subject of masturbation was addressed frankly. Millions of kids have gotten their first positive portrayal of sexuality from Blume, a fact that has caused rabid parents wanting to control - if not erase - the sexuality of their children to rise in protest. Blume has even been accused of encouraging victimization of kids at the hands of pedos with her work. her books have, in their own way, been an important step in the fight for kids to have control over their own sexuality.

• 1993 - You can't do that on television, can you? Cool! - Saturday Night Live ran a skit on this date called "Canteen Boy vs. Scoutmaster." It featured guest host Alec Baldwin as the Scoutmaster and regular Adam Sandler in his recurring role as Canteen Boy. In the skit, Canteen Boy, a character of indeterminate age, is the Scoutmaster's "assistant" who becomes the object of the Scoutmaster's sexual advances, including putting his tongue in Canteen Boy's ear while caressing his chest. The NBC switchboard handled over 300,000 angry phone calls that night alone, and the network lost 7 affiliates as a result of the sketch. A year later, when Baldwin hosted the show again, he and Sandler mocked the outcry be performing "Out of the Tent & Proud: A Politically-Correct Version of Canteen Boy." Baldwin's opening line is, "It's good to see you again, consenting bisexual canteenperson." So much for caving to anti-pedo hysteria.

• 1997 - Why not just poke out their eyes? - The Government of Ireland approved the drafting of legislation on this date that made it an offense to possess child pornography for personal use, punishable by up to three years in prison. All manifestations of child pornography - on the Internet, in films, videos, photographs, written or auditory forms, became criminal offenses with prison terms, on conviction, of three years to life. Producing, printing, publishing, exporting, importing, selling or distributing child pornography was also covered. No comment was made as to just how this was supposed to protect children from anything. I guess it was just assumed to be so.