Book Club: “The Stars Change” by Mary Anne Mohanraj

April 17, 2018 by Godless Perverts

The Godless Perverts Book Club has been on a bit of a hiatus, but we’re proud to announce that we’re making a comeback this month with Mary Anne Mohanraj’s critically-acclaimed science-fiction novel, The Stars Change.

Comprised of interlinked short stories, The Stars Change is set on a university planet as a war between “pure humans” and genetically-modified humods and aliens looms. At the University of All Worlds, members of all three groups live, work, have sex, and marry together. Most want to just get on with their lives, but when the alien ghetto is attacked, everyone has to decide where they stand.

The first story in the book, “The Night Air,” is available to read on the author’s website, and the book itself is available for purchase in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats.

If you’d like more information about the book, Tor.com has a thoughtful review that’s worth reading:

This uniquely intimate focus is also what I very much enjoyed about the book. Mohanraj takes us through a series of erotic and personal encounters, weaving together a larger-than-its-individual-parts story from those. And the characters are as varied in that sense as one might hope: there are straight couples, young and old couples, groups, gender of various and sundry types, queers, arranged marriages as well as affairs, single people, and all of the small and large loves you might think possible between those combinations. (The particular focus on showing older people as sensual and erotically charged is something that stood out to me as a positive and rare representation, by the way—we don’t see enough older characters, particularly in SF, given intimate personal lives.)

The rich sense of culture and how sexuality (and ideas about it) vary throughout different cultures is also a strong point of the book. The brief scenes with aliens—such as the butterfly-esque man who decides that, as he can’t go back to his family to allow them to consume his body for sustenance, he will commit suicide by flying in the storm—broaden the spectrum of possibility in terms of erotic and personal connection as well. The three-gender group that Narita takes in after the initial bombing of the Warren, too, are given a culturally different sense of family and sex than the humans they interact with.

We recommend that if at all possible, you buy the book from our hosts, Borderlands Books. Other options include:

Godless Perverts Social Club — Game Night!

March 6, 2018 by Godless Perverts

Godless Perverts is having another game night on Tuesday, March 6! 7-9 pm. Our game nights are big fun, and they’re becoming some of our most well-attended events. We play games that are easy to learn and easy to drop in and out of — so please join us! All kinks, genders, and orientations (or lack thereof) are welcome.

Wicked Grounds has a huge stash of games including Fluxx, Slash, Gloom, Snake Oil, Cards Against Humanity,¹ and much, much more. Feel free to bring your own games if you’re not sure that Wicked Grounds has a copy of your favorite.

So please join us at Wicked Grounds, the kink cafe and boutique, at 289 8th Street at Folsom in San Francisco (near Civic Center BART). 7-9 pm. Admission is free: if you can’t afford cafe prices, Wicked Grounds customers have bought coffee and tea for you, just ask for your beverage to be paid “from the wall.” Wicked Grounds has beverages, light snacks, full meals, and milkshakes made of literal awesome sauce. We meet at Wicked Grounds on the first Tuesday of every month, for topical discussions, general chat sessions, or game nights.

Godless Perverts: Our Policies on Building Safer Spaces

All orientations, genders, and kinks (or lack thereof) are welcome. Community is one of the reasons we started Godless Perverts. There are few enough places to land when you decide that you’re an atheist; far fewer if you’re also LGBT, queer, kinky, poly, trans, or are just interested in sexuality. And the sex-positive/ alt-sex/ whatever- you- want- to- call- it community isn’t always the most welcoming place for non-believers. Godless Perverts is committed to feminism, diversity, inclusivity, and social justice. We seek to create safe and welcoming environments for all non-believers and believing allies who are respectful of the mission, and are committed to taking positive action to achieve this.

Godless Perverts presents and promotes a positive view of sexuality without religion, by and for sex-positive atheists, agnostics, humanists, and other non-believers, through performance events, panel discussions, social gatherings, media productions, and other appropriate outlets. Our events and media productions present depictions, explorations, and celebrations of godless sexualities — including positive, traumatic, and complex experiences — focusing on the intersections of sexuality with atheism, materialism, skepticism, and science, as well as critical, questioning, mocking, or blasphemous views of sex and religion.

If you decide to play CAH, please be cautious; it can be a really hard game between people who don’t know each other and aren’t familiar with each others’ limits and triggers. ↩

DATE CHANGE! Godless Perverts Book Club: The Technology of Orgasm

November 17, 2017 by Godless Perverts

DATE CHANGE! This event is now on Friday, Nov. 17!

Godless Perverts Book Club is reading The Technology of Orgasm: “Hysteria,” the Vibrator, and Women’s Sexual Satisfaction by Rachel P. Maines. Friday, November 17, at Borderlands Cafe in SF. All orientations, genders, and kinks (or lack thereof) are welcome. Please join us!

From the time of Hippocrates until the 1920s, massaging female patients to orgasm was a staple of medical practice among Western physicians in the treatment of “hysteria,” an ailment once considered both common and chronic in women. Doctors loathed this time-consuming procedure and for centuries relied on midwives. Later, they substituted the efficiency of mechanical devices, including the electric vibrator, invented in the 1880s. In The Technology of Orgasm, Rachel Maines offers readers a stimulating, surprising, and often humorous account of hysteria and its treatment throughout the ages, focusing on the development, use, and fall into disrepute of the vibrator as a legitimate medical device.

The Godless Perverts Book Club is at Borderlands Cafe, 870 Valencia St. in San Francisco. That’s on Valencia at 20th: it’s near the 24th and Mission BART, and it’s close to the parking garage on 21st and Bartlett between Valencia and Mission. Friday, November 17, 6:00 to 8:00 pm. It’s free: we ask that you buy food and/or drink to support the cafe if you can — and tip the cafe staff generously — but we understand that cafe prices are prohibitive for some people, so please don’t let that stop you from attending. We will be meeting at a large table in the back of the cafe.

Godless Perverts is committed to feminism, diversity, inclusivity, and social justice. We seek to create safe and welcoming environments for all non-believers and believing allies who are respectful of the mission, and are committed to taking positive action to achieve this. Please let the moderators or other people in charge of any event know if you encounter harassment, racism, misogyny, transphobia, or other problems at our events.

Godless Perverts Social Club — Game Night!

November 7, 2017 by Greta Christina

Godless Perverts is having another game night on Tuesday, November 7! 7-9 pm. Our game nights are big fun, and they’re becoming some of our most well-attended events. We play games that are easy to learn and easy to drop in and out of — so please join us! All kinks, genders, and orientations (or lack thereof) are welcome.

Godless Perverts: Our Policies on Building Safer Spaces

If you decide to play CAH, please be cautious; it can be a really hard game between people who don’t know each other and aren’t familiar with each others’ limits and triggers. ↩

Godless Perverts Social Club — Game Night!

September 5, 2017 by Greta Christina

Godless Perverts is having another game night on Tuesday, September 5! 7-9 pm. Our game nights are big fun, and they’re becoming some of our most well-attended events. We play games that are easy to learn and easy to drop in and out of — so please join us! All kinks, genders, and orientations (or lack thereof) are welcome.

Godless Perverts: Our Policies on Building Safer Spaces

If you decide to play CAH, please be cautious; it can be a really hard game between people who don’t know each other and aren’t familiar with each others’ limits and triggers. ↩

The Impurity Ball Ring Toss Game

August 2, 2017 by Greta Christina

We’re getting very excited for the Impurity Ball, a benefit for the Center for Sex and Culture and Godless Perverts on August 5. It isn’t just a dance party — it’s an events extravaganza, a bit like a school fair. We’ll have ten-minute dating, debaptisms, prom photos, and an impurity supply station courtesy of Wicked Grounds. And we’re very excited about what we’re sure will be one of our most popular activities: the Impure Ring Toss game.

Many thanks to Vixen Creations, who provided several of the, er, supplies for this game.

The Impurity Ball is at the Center for Sex and Culture, 1349 Mission St. in San Francisco (near 9th Street, close to the Civic Center BART). Saturday, August 5, 7-10 pm. Suggested donation $10-$30: no-one turned away for lack of funds. RSVP on Facebook or Meetup (RSVPs appreciated but not necessary). All proceeds to benefit the Center for Sex and Culture and Godless Perverts. Hope to see you there!

Impurity Ball Art!

August 1, 2017 by Godless Perverts

Ember has been busy making art and decorations for the upcoming Impurity Ball — a dance party and events extravaganza spoofing purity balls and celebrating sexual freedom, and a benefit for the Center for Sex and Culture and Godless Perverts. Saturday Aug. 5!

We’re going to have an Impurity Ring Toss game:

Debaptisms:

An Introverts’ Lounge:

And a station for prom photos!

For the Prom Photo station, we’ll have some props for you to use to take the naughty prom photo of your dreams — including these nifty little Valentine candy heart signs, with a variety of smutty, kinky, romantic, and/or political messages.

What is Purity Culture??

July 24, 2017 by Ember Atwell

Godless Perverts’ upcoming Impurity Ball is a parody of “Purity Balls” staged by conservative evangelical Christians. A Purity Ball is a formal event involving classical music, little girls doing ballet in front of giant crosses, and fathers vowing to protect their daughters’ chastity until they marry. In contrast, an Impurity Ball is a celebration of sexual freedom. It includes dancing, cheesy prom photos, and the opportunity to stand under a canopy made of riding crops and pledge to be a conscientious hedonist.

I’m biased, but I think we’ve got the better agenda.

[Read more…]

About Ember Atwell

Godless Perverts Social Club: Sexual and Gender Rights in the Trump Regime

February 7, 2017 by Greta Christina

We’re having a Godless Perverts Social Club on Tuesday, February 7, at Wicked Grounds, 289 8th St. in San Francisco (near Civic Center BART), 7-9 pm. Our discussion topic for this evening: Sexual and Gender Rights in the Trump Regime.

Under the Trump regime and with a Republican-controlled Congress, sexual and gender rights will be under attack. Legal protections could be removed, not only for LGBT people, but for anyone in any sexual relationship outside opposite-sex marriage. And the recent rise in hate crimes targets sexual minorities as well as people of color, Muslims, Jewish people, and others. What threats do we have to be concerned about? How is the false panic over religious freedom being used in these attacks? And how can we take action to protect ourselves and each other, and to fight back?

The Social Club is free, and all orientations, genders, and kinks (or lack thereof) are welcome. Wicked Grounds has beverages, light snacks, full meals, and amazing milkshakes: please support the cafe if you can. If you can’t afford cafe prices, Wicked Grounds customers have bought you coffee or tea: just ask for your beverage to paid for “from the wall.”

Community is one of the reasons we started Godless Perverts. There are few enough places to land when you decide that you’re an atheist; far fewer if you’re also LGBT, queer, kinky, poly, trans, or are just interested in sexuality. And the sex-positive/ alt-sex/ whatever- you- want- to- call- it community isn’t always the most welcoming place for non-believers. So please join us! Hang out with other nonbelievers and chat about sex, sexuality, gender, atheism, religion, science, social justice, pop culture, and more.

If you want to be notified about all our Godless Perverts events, sign up for our email mailing list, follow us on Twitter at @GodlessPerverts, or follow us on Facebook. You can also sign up for the Bay Area Atheists/ Agnostics/ Humanists/ Freethinkers/ Skeptics Meetup page, and be notified of all sorts of godless Bay Area events — including many Godless Perverts events. And of course, you can always visit our Website to find out what we’re up to, godlessperverts.com. Hope to see you soon!

Godless Perverts Holiday Fun Time – Benefit for St. James Infirmary! NOW AT CENTER FOR SEX AND CULTURE!

December 10, 2016 by Greta Christina

LOCATION CHANGE! The Godless Perverts Holiday Fun Time party is now at the Center for Sex and Culture, 1349 Mission St. in San Francisco, between 9th and 10th Streets, near the Civic Center BART station.

Godless Perverts is throwing our annual Holiday Fun Time party on Saturday, December 10, 8-11 pm! Who says the holidays are only for the believers? Just as families don’t stop giving presents after the kids realize that Santa is a fake, the godless can have a great time during the holidays even without any gods, deities, angels, or spirits watching over them. And Godless Perverts Holiday Fun Time is just the place to do it! It’s at the Center for Sex and Culture, 1349 Mission St. in San Francisco, between 9th and 10th Streets, near the Civic Center BART station. (Yes, the location has changed! This is the new, correct location.) And this year, we’re making it a fundraiser for St. James Infirmary, the health clinic for sex workers in San Francisco!

We’ll have:

Festive food and drink! It’s a potluck: we’ll provide food, but we’d love to add your holiday treats to the buffet.
Adorably ridiculous icebreaker games!
Atheist holiday songs, celebrating the improper, twisted, and just plain silly!
Door prizes, including books and DVDs that are godless, pervy, or both!

And this year, Donna will be doing debaptisms! In fact, she’ll undo any religious initiation ceremony you like. Baptisms, confirmations, Bar or Bat Mitzvahs, Wiccanings — you name it, she’ll undo it! Donna is a fully certified Humanist celebrant, so when you’re debaptised, you stay that way.

Blasphemous costumes, sexy costumes, awesome combinations of the above, and other festive garb are encouraged, but by no means required.

This year’s party is a benefit for St. James Infirmary. St. James is a unique healthcare resource, even in San Francisco. Founded by and for sex workers, they provide free, compassionate and nonjudgmental healthcare and social services for current and former sex workers of all genders and sexual orientations. We wholeheartedly support the organization, and we want to help them out. So all donations collected at the party will go directly to St. James Infirmary.

We’re asking for donations of $10-$20 at the door — but please just donate what you can, whether that’s less than $10, or more than $20. (We’re also collecting funds now to cover the costs of throwing the party — please help make it happen if you can!)

Godless Perverts Holiday Fun Time is at the Center for Sex and Culture, 1349 Mission St. in San Francisco, between 9th and 10th Streets, near the Civic Center BART station. (Please note the new, correct location!) Saturday, December 10, 8:00 to 11:00 pm. We hope to see you there!