I caught the following story on NPR’s All Things Considered (RealAudio stream) last night:

New York is known for its vibrant nightlife, yet in many bars and restaurants it’s illegal to dance. Now, a law professor is challenging the “Cabaret Laws,” claiming they violate a dancer’s right of free expression. The city says dancing by patrons is not a protected right — and can prove it. (link added)

This was a big surprise to me, and a bigger surprise to learn that it’s not just some blue law. It turns out that bar owners get fined thousands of dollars for allowing people to dance, or even “move rhythmically” to music. Surprisingly, there are only 316 places to legally dance in Manhattan.

Amusingly — in that circle of life sort of way — Lynne Taylor-Corbett, choreographer for Footloose, is among the challengers. She can’t believe the fact that the city she claims to have given birth to break dancing and hip hop should restrict dance only to bars that have a cabaret license. The license is the result of 1926 ordinance that decried jazz clubs for their “wild strangers” and “foolish natives,” according to the story.

The suit is being handled by NYU Law professor Paul Chevigny, an occasional tap dancer who gained standing on these matters by successfully challenging an earlier law that blocked many forms of live music in 1988. That doesn’t mean the city is rolling over on this. They’re fighting back, and all parties are looking to see how the courts answer the city’s motion to dismiss.

tags: blue laws, cabaret, cabaret license, dance, dancing, first ammendment, foolish natives, footloose, free expression, free speech, jazz clubs, law, legal challenge, license, lynne taylor-corbett, manhattan, new york, new york city, new york new york, newyork, ny ny, nyc, nyny, paul chevigny, rights, wild strangers

The Video Bulb is a “lipstick-sized tube” that plugs in to your TV’s RCA jack and plays Bitman videos.

GadgetMadness explains what Bitman is:

Bitman is the creation of Japanese Art Performer “Meiwa Denki” and was an 8-bit electronic stick figure who would dance, pose, etc.

The VideoBulb sounds interesting enough, but I think I could get into the reseller as much as the GadgetMadness writer did:

I went to Zakka Shop & Space the last time I was in NYC, and literally wanted everything in the store. Once you step inside it feels like you have traveled through a dimension warp into a store that might exist in the anime Appleseed or Lain…they even have Japanese vending machines! If you are in NYC it is definitely worth stopping by.

Back to the Bitman Video Bulb, the author imagines the following:

“Hello, Best Buy?”

“Yes?”

“There is a dancing person on my TV. The sound is normal, but no matter what channel I put it on I see a dancing guy.”

“Um, what? Is this a joke?”

“No, I’m serious!”

tags: bitman, bitman video bulb, bitman videobulb, gadget, gadget shop, japan, new york, new york city, nyc, video bulb, video-bulb, videobulb, zakka shop & space, zakka, zakka shop

The New York Metro reports that the sex industry is expecting a 20 to 50 percent uptick in business while the Republicans are in town for the Republican National Convention this week. Mary, a stripper at Ten’s Cabaret speaks from experience. She worked the 2000 RNC in Philadelphia and expects the strip clubs in NYC to be “really crowded” during the convention, adding, “the girls have been talking about it literally since June.”

Like many sex workers in Manhattan, Mistress Natasha is anticipating a dramatic upswing in business late this month as 5,000 delegates — and an entourage of 45,000 others — arrive for four days of work and play.

According to Mistress Natasha, a dominatrix in a midtown dungeon, “it always surprises me how many of my clients are not just Republicans but Bush supporters. I think, You wanted me to force you down to your knees when you’re in a pink tutu, but you support Bush?”

Conventions of all sorts and political affiliations seem to be a boon for the sex industry, but it seems the RNC will be a goldmine:

As the sex workers tell it, the consensus is that Republicans demand more outrageous acts. Mistress Natasha estimates that her clients are half Democrat, half Republican, but says, “Republicans are way freakier, probably because they’re way more repressed. They can’t be kinky with their wives.” She thinks it’s the submissive tendencies that create the conservative political identity. [...] “I believe that well before they knew whether they were going to be a Democrat or a Republican, they knew they wanted to be tied up and beaten.”

Eve, [a] sometime escort, says conservatives “are really interested in receiving anal sex or being spanked, or fetish or role play. I’ve often found that people who lead a more liberal life have already done all that or it’s not something they’re so fascinated with.”

republican, republicans, republican national convention, nyc, sex, sex workers, dom, domination, kinky, kink, new york, new york city, presidential election, rnc