Week in Sex: Franco Makes a Sex Tape and The Relationship Between Oral Sex and Cancer

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-Gui8umrDk?wmode=transparent]

I'm starting to think I should have named this week's post, the "Week of the Sex Tape" as almost every day my google alerts were filled with the mentioning of some celebrities interaction with this particular art form. In my exhibition,Action: Sex and the Moving Image, I proposed that celebrities are actually the new "stars" of porn. With so many people involved in the adult film industry, it is impossible for each and everyone to be on the A list, but so often we still apply this title. While there are several names that are well known within the industry as well as in the mainstream, such as Sasha Grey, it never escapes media headlines when a celebrity sex tape emerges. This week James Franco was at the top of this list. In a Newsweek article featuring some of the Oscar nominated actors for this year, Franco was quoted as saying, the following:

"Anybody who has made a home sex tape knows what feels best doesn't always look best," Franco said. "I remember when I was 19 doing that, and then watching it back and thinking, 'Oh, that looks horrible. So you have a lot of respect for those actors in pornography, because they are really not just doing it, they're really selling it!"

In this same week another celebrity sex tape appeared featuring Kendra Wilkinson, a former Playmate, girlfriend to Hugh Hefner and a star of the Girls Next Door. This new sex tape features her in girl on girl scenes, and it shot by her ex boyfriend, Justin Frye, who she was featured to be having sex with in her first released sex tape, Kendra Exposed. It is reported that the original sex tape was the most downloaded porn in history. With each new tape surfacing, Kim Kardashian described to Piers Morgan: “There’s this, you know, embarrassment and shame and so much that comes along with it. I think that I was so lucky to find a boyfriend at that time in Reggie – we were together for four years – and that was something that he really helped me through. He picked me up when I couldn’t pick myself up. That’s what my family was for as well. So, I feel like I’ve dealt with it and now I move on from it.”

To read the full Newsweek article, featuring Franco's porn comment in addition to the list of these celebrities favorite sex films: http://www.newsweek.com/2011/01/23/the-new-star-power.html# To read more about Kim Kardashian's thoughts on her sex tape: http://earsucker.com/2011/01/29/kim-kardashian-talks-about-leaked-sex-tape-again/
To read about Kendra Wilkinson's Sex Tape: http://entertainment.blogs.foxnews.com/2011/01/28/kendra-has-new-sex-tape-and-this-ones-with-a-girl/

Oral sex and cancer

In the last few decades oral sex has become an increasingly common sexual act. It was reported in 2002 by the CDC or Center for Disease Control and Prevention "90 percent of males and 88 percent of females aged 25 to 44 reported ever having oral sex with a partner of the opposite sex." It is also more common for an individual to have had more sexual partners than in the past, which increases the risk of exposure to various sexually transmitted infections. One particular STI of concern is HPV or the human papillomavirus, which is present in over 20 million Americans, according to the Mayo Clinic.

HPV has been linked to ovarian cancer and based on a 2007 study in the New England Journal of Medicine and a 2010 study in Sweden, there may be some correlation between an increase in certain types of oropharyngeal cancers, specifically cancer of the throat and base of tongue. "In the study, having six or more oral sex partners over a lifetime was associated with a 3.4 times higher risk for oropharyngeal cancer -- cancers of the base of the tongue, back of the throat or tonsils. Having 26 or more vaginal-sex partners tripled the risk."

To read more: http://health.usnews.com/health-news/family-health/cancer/articles/2011/01/25...