Kim, Kali, Kwan-yin, Kumari, Mary K (video)

Ashley Wells, Amber Larson, Dhr. Seven, Pfc. Sandoval, Wisdom Quarterly; Sonia Narang ("The World," PRI.org, 6-18-14); KFIam640.com; Christian Today; New York Daily News

The new Madonna and Child, Kim Kardashian and North West, June '14 (hiphollywood.com)

Holy cow! Kim Yin Kardashian is now a goddess deified by American artist Hannah Kunkle

Kim, Kwan Yin, the Virg Yin as manifestations of the Goddess (Hannah Kunkle/Splash/KFI)

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Kim as black as Kali, bad tan (guyism.com)

US artist Hannah Kunkle's digital paintings feature reality TV star Kim Kardashian (Mrs. Kanye West) as various religious icons.

They were featured in an exhibition entitled "The Passion of Kim Kardashian" that opened in Brooklyn. Kunkle, 23, admits she is "strangely fascinated" by Kardashian.

Kanye and Kim, the FUTURE couple

"It's art. It's supposed to be wild and, not offensive, but prying," she told a US newspaper after various religious leaders slammed her work.
 

Father Michael Perry of Our Lady of Refuge Church in Flatbush, Brooklyn told the New York Daily News the show was "dumb and stupid." Kardashian is also portrayed as the Hindu goddess Kali, Jesus the Christ, Catholic nuns, Joan of Arc, and a Satanic priestess [like Mary Kay but selling Khroma]. More

We've just about had it with Kardashian-West, just about, but the West needs goddesses, too

Kim Kardashian Satanic high priestess with her own altar (animalnewyork.com)

Satanic priestess: Kim drops in on Kanye at Bonnaroo 2014 in seductive top (Daily Mail)

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I'm still a young hybrid (M-C)

The artist explains why she did it: "I think she is almost a patron saint of pop culture," Kunkle told the Daily News.

"She's everywhere." And in an April 2014 interview, she went beyond statements of admiration: "Kim Kardashian is God," she told VICE.

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The Living Goddesses of Nepal

Sonia Narang (The World, PRI, 6-18-14); Amber Larson, Dhr. Seven (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Along a busy thoroughfare near Kathmandu, Nepal, a passageway leads into a large, open-air courtyard. In the back corner, there’s a modest home with a red sign outside that simply reads, “Living Goddess.”

 

Kumari blessing at festival (Sonia Narang)

A narrow wooden staircase leads up to the second floor, where the goddess spends much of her childhood. She’s called a Kumari (Ku Mary), and she’s [adored] by Nepali Hindus and Buddhists, who believe she's the [embodiment] of the Hindu goddess Durga [with the power to kills one's demons].
 
In Nepal, this centuries-old tradition of choosing a young girl as a goddess continues to this day. Now, people from around the world flock here to get a glimpse of her.


 

Are there Himalayan pools in Nepal?

I got to know the mother of this Kumari after several visits to her house.
 
Her name is Shobha Bhajracharya. She has a full, round face with a sweet smile.
 
I ask her how she felt when her daughter Samita was chosen to be a Kumari a few years ago. She laughs shyly.
 

Kumari is so cool! Choose me! I can morph.

“I felt both happy and sad,” she says.

“On one hand, I felt happy because when your daughter becomes god, having a god in the home is a delightful thing.

But [on the other hand] I also got scared because I wasn’t sure if we would be able to follow all the rules.” More

Who is the Buddhist Goddess Kwan Yin?
ReligionFacts.com; edited by Wisdom Quarterly

Goddess Kwan Yin buddha-to-be with a  thousand arms (chinatourguide.com)

 
Kwan Yin (also Kuan and Guan Yin) is the bodhisattva of compassion. [A bodhisattva is a person who has vowed to develop the perfections to become a buddha].

I wear white! Goddess power!

She venerated by East Asian Buddhists [particularly in the very Hindu-influenced Mahayana school, having morphed from the Hindu god Avalokitesvara].

Commonly known as the "Goddess of Mercy," Kwan Yin is also revered by Chinese Taoists as an Immortal. The name Kwan Yin is short for Kuan Shih Yin (Guan Shi Yin), which means "Observing the Sounds of the World [One Who Hears the Cries of the World]."

Braless in Paris, France (M-C)

In Japanese, she is called Kannon, or more formally Kanzeon; the spelling Kwannon, resulting from an obsolete system of romanization, is sometimes also seen. In Korea, she is called Kwan-um or Kwan-se-um. In Vietnamese, she is called Quan Âm or Quan Thế Âm Bồ Tát [Kwan Yin Bodhisattva].

Kuan Yin is the Chinese name for the bodhisattva Avalokitesvara. However, folk traditions in China and other East Asian countries have added many distinctive characteristics and legends [to the original Brahminical/Hindu legend]. Most notably, while Avalokitesvara can be depicted as either male or female, Kuan Yin is usually depicted as a young woman, whereas Avalokitesvara in other countries is usually depicted as a man.

My make up is optional! No, Kim!

Along with Buddhism, Kwan Yin's veneration was introduced into China as early as the 1st century CE, and reached Japan by way of Korea soon after Buddhism was first introduced into the country from the mid-7th century.
 
Representations of the bodhisattva in China prior to the Song Dynasty (960-1279) were masculine in appearance. Images which later displayed attributes of both genders are believed to be in accordance with the Lotus Sutra, where Avalokitesvara has the supernatural power of assuming any form required to relieve suffering and also has the power to grant children.
 

I don't git it! - I'm "Kim Yin" now. (PH)

Because this bodhisattva is considered the personification of compassion and kindness [more like Princess Diana of Wales or the original Goddess DIANA, who now appears in the form of the Hunger Games' Jennifer Lawrence], a mother-goddess and patron of mothers and seamen, the representation in China was further interpreted in an all female form around the 12th century. In the modern period, Kuan Yin is most often represented as a beautiful, white-robed woman... More

 

Kwan Yin in Theravada Buddhist Thailand, Wat Plai Laem, Ko Samui (sandrobisaro.com)

But I want to be the All-American Goddess! Notice me! I'm Lindsay "The Luóhàn" Lohan!

  
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SEX: lessons from the man with two PENISES

Ashley Wells, Pat Macpherson, Dhr. Seven, Wisdom Quarterly; Caroline Bankoff (NY Mag)

The way to approach any subject is with a modicum of grace, aplomb, and discretion.

 

Last night, Reddit rang in 2014 with an Ask Me Anything featuring a man with two fully functioning, almost evenly sized penises. 

 

The subject, who went by the screen name DoubleDickDude and posted a couple of obligatory (and deeply NSFW) photos [BRACE YOURSELF BEFORE CLICKING] as proof, sounds as confident as you'd expect a dude with two dicks to be (very).

We luv'd screwin y'all, but this ain't about us!

And because the mostly single-dick-having population of Reddit was exactly as curious about this guy's life as you'd expect them to be (very), the questions went on for hours.

 

First, the basics: DoubleDickDude's condition is "Diphallia, [and it is] not an absorbed twin. It's not genetic or inherited." 

(Needless to say, it is very rare.) He identifies as bisexual and is currently "in a committed relationship with a man and a woman" who, he later explained, were "a couple before they mutually started dating me." More

Woman living with two vaginas


Hazel Jones, 27, has a one-in-a-million medical condition which led to her being born with two fully-formed vaginas. She is so at ease with her body that she goes to sex clubs with her husband. She told ITV1's This Morning hosts Holly Willoughby and Phillip Schofield she was 18 when she was diagnosed with uterus didelphys.

Jones, of High Wycombe, Bucks, did not realize she was different until her periods started at 14. She said: "I told friends. They looked even more confused than me." She went to hospital four years later to learn the truth. She added: "I thought it was amazing."
 

Yin to yang: yonis, lingams are curious things

Jones told The Sun she and hubby Riki visited fetish clubs, explaining: "It shows how relaxed I am. My quirky condition does not make me shy or hold me back. In fact, it's something I celebrate."

"I have two holes, one to the left and one to the right," she explains. "They look like a little yin-yang symbol! The extra piece of flesh between them becomes more visible depending on how I position my body, and how turned on I am. Sometimes it's hidden by my labia. At other times, it stands proud by about a centimeter."

Her wombs "take turns" to have a period each month, and tampons didn't always work because sometimes she was inserting them into the wrong bleedin' vagina!"

The Internet Hates Women

Michel Martin (Tell Me More, NPR.org)

Porn and pop gossip aren't doing us any favors.

Anyone who posts something online runs the risk of getting negative feedback [from trolls]. But for some female writers, things are taken to an extreme level. Host Michel Martin talks with Amanda Hess about her article, "Why Women Aren't Welcome on the Internet." Writers Bridget Johnson and Mikki Kendall also discuss how they've handled the harassment and threats -- on and off line.

Amanda Hess (bio website Sex With Amanda Hess) in Pacific Standard magazine says: Women are subjected to a level of abuse that is, in fact, more pervasive and more vicious than that directed at men.

She says, in short, "We have been thinking about Internet harassment all wrong." And Amanda Hess is with us now from Southern California Public Radio (SCPR.org) in Pasadena. LISTEN (17:41)

Buddhism and Sex
Maurice O'Connell Walshe (Buddhist Publication Society)

The Buddha with knowledge and vision (Amrit Vismay/Oshodhara/flickr.com/WQ)

 
This is an age in which sexual matters are discussed with great openness. There are many who are puzzled to know what the Buddhist attitude towards sex is. And it is therefore to be hoped that the following guidelines may be found helpful towards an understanding.
 
It is, of course, true to say that Buddhism, in keeping with the principle of the Middle Way, would advocate neither extreme puritanism nor extreme permissiveness. But this, as a guiding principle without further specification, may not seem sufficiently helpful for most people.

• [NOTE: The "middle" in Middle Way is not a compromise, but seeing the deficiency in both extremes and avoiding them. This is clear when the Buddha declared that he found enlightenment after avoiding indulging in sensual extremes, which he had engaged in as a spoiled prince, and after avoiding indulging in severe austerities, which had had engaged in as a wandering ascetic searching for freedom from disappointment. See the Buddha's first sutra where he sets in motion the wheel of the Dharma by making this distinction.]

In the first place, we must distinguish between the rules undertaken by Buddhist monastics for their own conduct, and any guiding principles for ordinary lay Buddhists. More

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