VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Reuters) - A Canadian man who claims he was discriminated against as a pagan who practices a form of sadomasochism will get to take his complaint to a human rights tribunal.

An appeals court rejected a bid by Vancouver police on Tuesday to block a hearing on whether Peter Hayes’ rights were violated when an officer refused to grant him the permit he needed to get a chauffeur’s job.

Hayes complained to British Columbia’s Human Rights Tribunal that he was discriminated against because he is a pagan who practices a “BDSM lifestyle” and deserves protection under the human rights code, based on sexual orientation.

BDSM refers to bondage, discipline and submission and sadism and masochism, according to the court documents.

Police went to the courts, arguing the tribunal and a lower court judge erred in agreeing to hear Hayes’ complaint because the laws designed to protect the sexual orientation of gays and lesbians did not extend to protecting types of sexual practices.

A B.C. Court of Appeal panel ruled unanimously that the police motion was premature since the tribunal’s hearing was to decide what, if any, sexual practices deserved legal protection, and even the tribunal’s chairwoman was unsure if the human rights code did that.

“How can the tribunal determine if BDSM falls within the meaning of ’sexual orientation’ if it does not have a full understanding of what BDSM means?” Justice Anne Rowles wrote for the three-judge panel.

(Reporting Allan Dowd, Editing by Rob Wilson)

***Lady Velvets thoughts: Well at least she died happy!***

CBC News

A Quebec man may face criminal charges after a woman died while they were having sadomasochistic sex.

The 39-year-old woman died Saturday night in a home in Saint-Bruno-de-Montarville on Montreal’s South Shore, police said.

She went into cardiac arrest while engaging in “out of the ordinary” sexual practices using “very particular” accessories, said Longueuil police agent Martin Simard.

When police arrived at the residence on Sommet-Trinité Street, the man was trying to resuscitate the woman, but she died, Simard said.

Police say they found torture devices in the homes, but would not give specifics.

The man was arrested and questioned but released without charge, police said.

Investigators are waiting for the autopsy report to determine if he’ll be charged with criminal negligence causing death.

Come back and visit Lady Velvet at her site at: www.ladyvelvetnoir.com

**Lady V’s Thought: And to think, there are tons of us PSO’s out there just WAITING for people like him to call!  And it’s LEGAL!**

Tokyo - A lonely Japanese man has been arrested for allegedly calling directory assistance thousands of times because he liked to be scolded by female operators, police and reports said on Wednesday.

Takahiro Fujinuma - who is 37, single and unemployed - reportedly would whisper “darling” as he tried to start a conversation and then pleaded with operators not to hang up.

He was arrested Tuesday in Tokyo on charges of obstructing the business of service operator NTT Solco, part of telecom giant Nippon Telegraph and Telephone.

He placed 2 600 calls to directory help - reached in Japan by dialling 104 - between early June and mid-November, a police spokesperson said.

But Japanese media said he is suspected of starting his habit in 2004 and calling 104 more than 10 000 times.

He reportedly told police that he was lonely and grew to enjoy annoying the operators.

“I would go into ecstasy when a lady scolded me,” he said, as quoted by Jiji Press.

Telephone operators - who in Japan are almost always women - nicknamed him the “don’t-hang-up-man”.

His calls usually came late and sometimes exceeded 200 times a night, Jiji Press said.

KINKY CLUBGOER IS CHOKED NEAR DEATH

By RICHARD WILNER, LARRY CELONA and LUKAS I. ALPERT

S&M MISHAP: Police seize bags ID’d as leather straps from The Nutcracker Suite sex club, but they did not arrest dominatrix Taki Noriko.

February 9, 2008 — A leather-loving submissive was clinging to life yesterday after a freak accident at a Midtown bondage club cut off oxygen to his brain, law-enforcement sources said.

A dominatrix at The Nutcracker Suite on East 33rd Street called 911 at about 1:30 a.m. after finding the hooded man turning blue in a dungeon room as he hung by his arms.

He was also wearing nipple clamps, a dog collar and women’s high-heeled shoes, and his hands were cuffed behind his back, sources said.

The man was rushed to St. Vincent’s Hospital, where he was put on a respirator, sources said. It was believed he had suffered brain damage due to lack of oxygen.

In keeping with the secretive nature of the S&M scene, the man was carrying no identification and only signed the name “Roger” in the pain palace’s guest registry. But sources said he was a regular at the club.

Cops were using his MetroCard to try to track his movements and identify him.

His particular fetish was to have himself trussed up and left alone. The mistress he was working with, Taki Noriko, 30, of Williamsburg, told police that she elevated him just enough to cause discomfort but that his feet were still on the floor.

“It was an accident,” Noriko told The Post.

She said that she checked on him every 20 minutes. At first, he was fine, but when she went in a second time, she found that his foot had slipped out of the shoe and was turning blue.

Police took Noriko, several other whip-toting mistresses and the club’s manager in for questioning, but no charges were filed. One woman was arrested on an outstanding and unrelated warrant.

Cops removed several bags of evidence from the club, including one labeled “1 [one] black leather restraint.”

While S&M activities are not illegal, the state penal code seems to leave open the possibility that those involved could be charged with assault - or even manslaughter if the man were to die - if a grand jury were to rule they acted recklessly.

The club, which is tucked away in a suite in a nondescript Midtown office building near the Empire State Building, has operated for more than a decade and is a well-known masochist mecca among devotees of the bondage scene.

The erotic emporium was once featured in a 15-minute documentary called “Paradise Bound,” which screened at the Sundance Festival in 1996.

“It’s a lot more common than you think. It’s lawyers, doctors, athletes, everybody,” co-owner Robert Fluty said in the film.

Fluty could not be reached for comment, and messages left on the club’s voice mail were not returned.

On its Web site, the club lists candle-wax dripping, electrostimulation, bondage, role play and flogging among its services. Sessions cost $185 dollars an hour and are by appointment only.

Rooms are thematic and feature floor-to-ceiling mirrors, bondage beds and trusses.

One room, called The Inquisition Lair, features a leather-strap cage and a St. Andrew’s Cross.

Another called “The Clinic,” is described as “the ultimate for medical role play.”

Additional reporting by Philip Messing, Rebecca Rosenberg and John Mazor

From bondage to swinging, private sex club caters to those ‘who like it kinky’

By ANN MARIE MCQUEEN — Sun Media

The Ottawa Sun

Miss Jenn has a motto for all the straight-up sex-loving vanillas out there: It’s only kinky the first time.

It’s not her only motto. This fem-domme — kind of like a dominatrix, though not professional — has loads.

The bottom line, for Miss Jenn and her counterparts in Ottawa’s thriving alternative sex subculture, is that the concept of kinky is entirely relative.

I meet Miss Jenn — who until recently was a dental office receptionist who was fired after running the dungeon at Ottawa’s first-ever Sexapalooza show last month — at Breathless, the city’s alternative community centre and private club.

No secret location: It’s at 318 Lisgar St., just above Venus Envy.

It’s all legal now, with the 2005 Supreme Court of Canada ruling that clubs allowing group sex on premises don’t harm society and shouldn’t be considered criminal.

Miss Jenn is dressed in shiny black to oversee the night’s festivities: A BDSM (an abbreviation for bondage, discipline, dominance and submission, sadism and masochism) pure play party.

ATTRACTS ALL TYPES

An assortment of the club’s 300 members pay a $30 annual fee, along with a per-party charge, to come here on varying nights. Some whip each other to welts, others have multi-member orgies on mattresses laid out on the floor. One man just shows up in a diaper, drinks a couple of beers, and leaves. There are vampires and goths. Something called blood play. A growing number of participants from the gay and lesbian community.

And, of course, the swingers.

As for who goes, you’d be surprised.

“I have lawyers, I have teachers, I have men and women from the (Parliament) Hill. I have men and women who work in the private sector, a lot of people who work for (the City of) Ottawa, bus drivers, EMTs, just everything,” says Miss Jenn. “But then I have a lot of people who work in retail jobs, regular schmos who like it kinky.”

Miss Jenn, a 40-year-old divorced mom of two, definitely took the long way to Breathless.

She was one of four children who grew up on a farm in southwestern Ontario. Though she was the sole kid at her school to wear fishnets and a dog collar, she only stumbled on a kindred world of bondage and domination six years ago.

Frustrated with her sex life, she’d taken an extramarital lover who pointed her to a local group. An encounter in a chatroom introduced her to the first man she would utterly dominate: That included a tattoo and 24/7 contract of submission and service.

READY TO PLAY

“I thought I was the only freak,” she says. “I didn’t know there were other people that liked to be tied down or tie people down or put them in dog collars or humiliate them.”

Breathless is quiet by day. The front section is a no-sex, no-play social area. There are usually snacks laid out there. A row of windows onto the street are blacked out. The back half features futons and bunk beds. There are plastic sheets underneath the fabric ones. Containers with sterile wipes dot various tables.

Miss Jenn supplies the latex condoms, the lubricant, rubber dams and gloves.

There are wooden crosses and bondage tables, ready for that night’s BDSM party.

Before we meet, a man wanders in off the street asking about becoming a member. He’ll have a few hurdles to jump before that happens. Miss Jenn will have to like the look of him, and he’ll need to attend a couple of no-sex social events for her to get a feel for whether he’s going to fit in.

There are rules, too. Lots of them. There is no room for someone who can’t say no, or accept hearing it graciously.

There’s no gawking and members must sit on towels if bare or thong-assed. No naming names in public and no loud confessions outside the club about what goes on inside it. Near the end of our interview, Miss Jenn offers to flog me with a tassled, whip-like device.

I am tempted for a second, just to say I did, but ultimately pass.

Then I duck out into the daylight, hours before the party inside begins.

 by bus driver who told him: ‘No dogs allowed’

By CHRIS BROOKE - More by this author » Last updated at 20:12pm on 22nd January 2008
Given that she describes herself as a human pet – and is happy to walk around on a lead – Tasha Maltby is used to odd looks and even odder remarks.But nothing had prepared her for the reaction of the bus driver who allegedly told the self-styled Goth and her boyfriend: “We don’t let freaks and dogs like you on.”

Miss Maltby and her fiance Dani Graves were so angered they have complained to the bus company of being “victimised”.

Scroll down for more…

Going walkies: Dani Graves and girlfriend Tasha Maltby were allegedly barred from a bus

“It is definitely discrimination, almost like a hate crime,” 19-year-old Miss Maltby said yesterday.

The music technology student had this defence of her lifestyle.

“I am a pet, I generally act animal like and I lead a really easy life,” she said.

“I don’t cook or clean and I don’t go anywhere without Dani. It might seem strange but it makes us both happy. It’s my culture and my choice. It isn’t hurting anyone.”

The bus driver, however, has obviously not been listening.

He has repeatedly refused to allow Mr Graves, 25, and his “pet” on to his bus in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire.

Last month, with Miss Maltby on a leash as usual, the couple tried to board a bus at the bus station.

The driver, who was off duty, was standing near the door.

Mr Graves alleged: “He shoved me off the bus. He called us freaks and he called Tasha a dog.

“He said, ‘We don’t let freaks and dogs like you on’.

“He basically grabbed my T-shirt and slammed me backwards.

“I got a bit angry and called him a fascist pig.”

In a separate incident, police were called when the driver, who has not been named, refused to allow other passengers on board after the couple ignored his orders and sat down.

The couple, who live on benefits in a council house and plan to start a family, have been friends for years.

They started going out together in July and became engaged in November.

Paul Adcock, of bus company Arriva Yorkshire, said: “We take any allegations of discrimination seriously.

“Mr Graves has already contacted us directly and as soon as our investigation has concluded we will inform him of the outcome.”

Stephen Bates
Saturday November 24, 2007
The Guardian

A model poses during Erotica 07 at London’s Olympia. Photograph: Martin Godwin/Guardian

If it wasn’t for her see-through black fishnet top, miniskirt and boots, Margaret, taking an afternoon coffee with her husband of 25 years, Rowan, could have been in any tea shoppe in her home town in Sussex, instead of at Erotica 07, the annual exhibition for fetishists, swingers and fantasists at Olympia in west London.Eyes straying to the thigh boots and PVC outfits on the stall across the way from the coffee stand, Rowan said confidentially: “We like dressing up erotic-like at home, but it’s not the sort of thing you could wear out in the street.”

If you stray into west London this weekend you may see many such couples - portly middle-aged men in sensible windcheaters, anoraks and leather trousers, plump middle-aged women in very short skirts and very high boots, their bosoms cantilevered upwards at full elevation. They’ll probably be holding hands, chastely.

Erotica, going now for 10 years, claims to be the world’s largest lifestyle show “for freethinking adults who are comfortable with their sexuality”.

Last year they had 82,000 visitors in three days, 60% of them women.

“We’ve got a bigger footfall than the Ideal Home Exhibition,” said Sam Espensen, handling the show’s PR. “We’re selling stuff you don’t find on your high street. Attitudes are changing and people are spending more on their sex lives. We did a survey and 52% of 18- to 24-year-olds spend £25 or less a year, mainly on condoms, whereas the over-55s - well, that’s a £1bn market.

“The average person coming here spends £250: it’s almost like a Christmas treat to themselves. You come here and you’ve got your burlesques and your performance artists and your sex toys and your hardcore DVDs - something for everyone.”

Indeed there is: extreme footwear, bondage tape and lubricants, fetish whips from Russia, the Pocket Rocket remote control vibrator, the Monkey Spanker, even marshmallow willies selling at £2 each.

One thigh-boot salesman was explaining earnestly to a customer: “We go to size 16 in all our shoes.”

And there are seminars: sessions on erotic sensual play, pain and pleasure and the UK fetish scene, plus masterclasses in sex toys: “know how to choose them, how to use them.”

And shows. The star this year is a burlesque performer called Dita Von Teese - which may not be her real name - who used to be married to the rocker Marilyn Manson. Dita doesn’t perform in public very often, but she’s doing three appearances a day this weekend. She was half an hour late for her press call - the lighting, or the photographer was not right, or something - and then emerged in a grey fur wrap, silver spangly dress, stockings as wrinkled as Norah Batty’s, her face white, her lips red and her eyes enigmatic, bored and expressionless. She struck one pose and then another and then marched off, throwing a glance over her shoulder.

“It’s very expensive but you have to be here,” said Stuart Inglis, director of Adult World, which has seven shops stretching from London to Rhyl. “Twenty-five years ago when we started it used to be all middle-aged businessmen, but now its 50/50 women and men.

“Our Naughty Janet saucy range goes very well and so does the Sex Rabbit. You see, these days it’s all boxed up, looking very stylish.”

Maybe it was the sunlight streaming in through the ironwork tracery of Olympia, shining on the sex aids and rubber nurses’ costumes - Walter Bagehot said you shouldn’t let sunshine in on magic, though he was thinking of Queen Victoria - but Erotica 07 was about as exciting as cold blancmange. The organisers had laid on a special foreplay session masterclass for the press, but, in time-honoured fashion, the Guardian made its excuses and left.