I read about this on the front page of Saturday's New York Post and couldn't resist taking the bait. Alisha Smith (aka Alisha Spark) a lawyer in the state Attorney General's Office was relieved of her duties-for which she earns $78,825 annually-and placed on unpaid leave after the Post inquired about her...
But let's not go there-yet. Let's do it in the opposite order for no doubt many will write her off as a flake once they hear what she does on her time off so let me start by elaborating on her day job first, where she has achieved a pretty impressive resume I think you'll agree Consider that just 3 years ago she was lauded by then AG Andrew Cuomo for her role in obtaining a $4 billion settlement from Bank of America and others in a securities-fraud case. I do this as with this in mind it will be harder to dismiss her out of hand as a flake and not take her seriously.
I mean a lawyer in the NY State Attorney General's Office, $78,825 a year, and she brought justice BAC and other malfeasants which earned her praise from Andrew Cuomo himself-the current Governor of NY.
Ok so what salacious detail did the New York Post reveal which led to her demise? Turns out in her second job she is a dominatrix that performs at S&M events for pay.
"Alisha Smith, 36, who dresses demurely as a buttoned-down persecutor, turns up the heat when she becomes perky persecutor "Alisha Spark," a nom de dom she uses when she performs at S&M events for pay, according to a fetish source."
"They pay her to go to the events. She dominates people. restrains them and whips them, " the fetish source said.
You see why I preferred to pre-establish her professional credentials? If you can believe the sources-not the fetish sources now, but sources that know about the AG Office's decision-say that she was not punished for her personal pleasure but more to do with the possiblity that she profited from it. These sources cited a standing executive order in the Attonrey General's office that requires employees to "obtain prior approval from the [Employment Conduct Committee] before engaging in any outside pursuit... from which more than $1,000 will be received or is anticipated to be received. "
So it has nothing to do with her pleasure just that she may have profited from it? Why do I have a hard time buying that one. Sure, all she had to do was get a meeting with the Employment Conduct Committee and they would have signed off on her dominatrix events as Alisha Spark. If she were a teacher it would be easier for them they could cite a "morals clause."
Sorry, I think it has everything with those who made the call think this kinky lifestyle of hers is weird and off putting and it is precisely the pleasure they imagine she derived from it which bother them the most which is why she must lose her pay-she-in Zizekan terms-already has achieved to much excess jouissance.
In all seriousness I think this is a case for the ACLU: do you honestly thing that if she made $1000 for teaching Bible studies this would be the result? You would have to convince me that everyone who earns any money on the side faces such stiff punishment.
Finally I must take issue with one sentence from the Post.
"Alisha Smith, 36, who dresses demurely as a buttoned-down persecutor, turns up the heat when she becomes perky persecutor "Alisha Spark,"
Couldn't you in fact argue that her role as a dominatrix was not a departure from her role as a high powered lawyer in the Attorney General's Office? Arguably in her day to day role she is already is a dominant powerful one, almost as if has a need to extend it over into her personal life.
Really she intrigues me as she clearly doesn't need the money so her being a dominatrix is clearly something for her own personal pleasure. Actually male masochists-who derive pleasure from being dominated by a woman-are very common but the reciprocal position-women who themselves(not just for a job that pays well, or at the pleasure of a male masochist)do this are believed to be much rarer. Indeed to get into sexual psychology-a debate that goes back to people like Theodor Reik and of course Freud-it has often been argued that female sadism-sexual pleasure in being dominant or inflicting pain doesn't exist.
Lacan-Zizek have one of the types of analysands-the other 2 being neurotics(the most common, most people are neurotics) and psychotics who Lacan believed can't be treated: Ted Bundy, Charles Manson, Jeffrey Dahmer, etc-being the male masochist.
If nothing else Alisha Smith-aka Alisha Spark-along with her friend and fellow dominatrix Edythe Maa-aka Jade Vixen-would seem to prove empirical proof to an old theoretical debate: female sadism does exist.
For the latest please see http://www.39online.com/entertainment/onlinedish/kiah-online-dish-lawyer-punished-for-dominatrix-gig-story,0,6569475.story
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