The event will include a policy breakfast followed by panels and discussions addressing a slew of topics, including the intersections between government policy and lawmaking, sexual expression and sexual practices, among others.
Panelists include Angelina Spencer, Mark Kernes, Kenyon Farrow, Amber Hollibaugh, Lisa Weiner-Mahfuz, Lawrence Walters, Carmen Vasquez, RJ Thompson, Dr. Elizabeth Wood, Mia Mingus and others.
Adult industry attorney Lawrence Walters, who penned a portion of the State of Sexual Freedom Report titled “The Human Right to Sexual Expression,” also will be participating in the event.
Walters told XBIZ that he’s been involved with the Woodhull Freedom Foundation for years, but this is the first time he’s gotten involved as a writer and presenter.
“The Sexual Freedom Day event is important, to call attention to the evolving human right of sexual expression,” Walters said. “It takes tremendous effort to move the law in a particular direction, and events like this help shape public attitudes toward human sexuality, and remove the taboo otherwise typically associated with public discussion of sexual issues.”
In his portion of the report, Walters covers various sexual expressions and trends in modern society that he argues derive from natural human behavior, yet due to their sexual nature are automatically vilified and punishable in court.
Topics such as teen sexting, exhibition and voyeurism, S&M and fetish, as well as pornography are discussed with references to court cases in which defendants were prosecuted based on subjective ideas and double standards.
“I've worked on this piece for many months, and I hope it helps educate the public, and lawmakers, about the evolving human right to sexual expression,” Walters said. “Eventually, we hope the courts recognize this right as implicit in the Constitution, along with the right of privacy and sexual intimacy, that the Supreme Court discussed in the Lawrence v. Texas case, invalidating sodomy laws throughout the country.”
According to Woodhull Freedom Foundation, the State of Sexual Freedom report is meant to “provide a baseline discussion of where we (the U.S.) are politically and socially and what can be done to advance sexual freedom as a fundamental human right into the mainstream of American society in the next 20 years.”
“Events like this benefit society in general, but also the adult industry in particular,” Walters said. “The more accepting people become of human sexuality, the more freedom the industry will enjoy in the production and publication of erotic materials. I would personally prefer that jurors in my next obscenity case have attended the Sexual Freedom Day!”
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