The Media

Conserva-pervs

FOX News is running more footage of bikini girls. And I'm not talking about their usual semi-cross-eyed cast of blonde anchors.

When I first moved (permanently) to Pennsylvania after college, I worked at a local radio station and was constantly told how "conservative" Reading and Berks County was (and still is). My first call-in talk show combined comedy and politics, but I had to filter everything I said through this prism of "conservative Berks," which meant remaining family-oriented and even-handed.

What struck me as inexplicably bizarre, however, was the fact that almost every township in Berks had at least one or two of those creepy brothel-ish handjob "massage" parlors. No massage, actually, just handjobs. Guys would go in, pay a fee, get a handjob, and leave. Cops were constantly busting them, but the parlors never really went away. At the same time, there are more porn stores here than Walmarts.

Yet Berks County was (and is) very conservative. And FOX News is all about family values and conservative politics. What does all of this tell us about right wing repression and perversion?