RICK CASTRO BY THE DAY

RICK CASTRO- MASTER & SLAVE 2014

RICK CASTRO- MASTER & SLAVE CU 2014
BIO

SLEEP- OBEY- YOU'RE-A- SLAVE

THE "SLAVE AUCTION" OF 1976

Los Angeles: Forty years ago on April 10, 1976, the Los Angeles Police Department stages a massive raid on a leather-community fundraiser at the Mark IV Baths. The event offered consenting SM enthusiasts who agreed to be auctioned for role-playing as slaves, with proceeds from the winning bids going to the Los Angeles Gay Community Services Center and other gay charities. 

Deploying helicopters, buses and dozens of cops — and bringing along television news crews — the LAPD invaded the gathering. Nearly 400 people were detained and 42 were arrested, including John Embry, the publisher of the leather magazine Drummer, and the first "Mr. Drummer" title-holder, Val Martin, who served as auctioneer. The police released public statements claiming they had halted an actual slave auction and describing the participants as dangerous perverts.

Val Martin later recalled, "We repeated many times what the [playful and charitable] purpose of the auction was. They made us lay on the ground, hands on our necks. They treated us like animals.... They were taking pictures, calling us names."

Ultimately, the district attorney charged only four of the participants, changing the violation from "slave dealing" to "prostitution." All received fines and community service. The homophobia displayed by the LAPD drew strong condemnation from gay leaders and the gay media — and the ACLU later dubbed the raid "one of the more blatant landmarks in the history of police paranoia with regards to the gay community."

Located at 4424 Melrose Ave. in Los Angeles, the structure that housed the Mark IV is extant — and now serves as a gay men's sex club named FLEXspas Los Angeles (flex baths).

AMERICAN SLAVERY

ENVISIONING EMANCIPATION

These are the never-before-seen faces of slavery and Emancipation, revealing families' lives before and after they were freed.

The images themselves played a key part in allowing the men, women and children freedom - being distributed through the northern states as propaganda during the push for abolition, and employed by former slaves to showcase their new images.

More than 150 of the photographs feature in a new book, Envisioning Emancipation, which has been published to coincide with the 150th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 on January 1.

Following the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, the use of photography evolved - eventually being used by black men and women to show off their new, postslavery looks and to portray their hopes of freedom.

Subsequently, the book, which was published earlier this month, shows how photography was central in the war against slavery, racism and segregation

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MY PUPPY

AWWW... HE'S VERY PLAYFUL!

THE HOUSE OF ARIEL CASTRO

really good doco about the amanda berry/gina dejesus/michelle knight kidnappings
 by ariel castro, (no relation).
leave it to the brits and the BBC to do a complete coverage and story that american media only touched upon.

FORTUNE AND MEN'S EYES

Fortune and Men's Eyes is a 1967 play and 1971 film by John Herbert about a young man's experience in prison, exploring themes of homosexuality and sexual slavery. The title comes from William Shakespeare's Sonnet 29 which begins with the line "When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes". It has been translated into forty languages and produced in over a hundred countries. It is the most published Canadian play, and won the Floyd S. Chalmers Canadian Play Award.

In 1969 the play was produced and directed by Sal Mineo at the Coronet Theatre in Los Angeles. Don Johnson played the lead role of Smitty, a young man sentenced to six months in prison for marijuana possession, who eventually becomes the sexual subordinate of another inmate, Rocky. Michael Greer played the role of Queenie, Smitty's cellmate. This production garnered more critical approval.

Although the play~ Fortune and Men's Eyes~ gathered positive reviews in Los Angeles, it was panned during its New York run, and its expanded prison rape scene was criticized as excessive and gratuitous. This backfired on Sal Mineo and his career never recovered.

In the 1971 film, directed by Harvey Hart, Wendell Burton played Smitty, Michael Greer reprised his role as Queenie, and Zooey Hall played Rocky. It was filmed in Quebec, Canada.