wither in the light

Larry Flynt is alive and well, and still pissing people off left and right. His website, however, is surprisingly inoffensive (well, perhaps 'not obscene' is a better description than 'inoffensive'), safe for work, and politically aware:

"I've been accused by some readers of favoring the political Left in HUSTLER. I don't believe that's true; I simply take aim at assholes when I see them, and these days, there seems to be a lot of them on the Right. But since it's assholes I despise, it really doesn't matter to me what side of the political fence they sit on. Gephardt and Lieberman are assholes too, for my money."

Flynt is a pretty complex guy, sure to offend everyone on some issue or another; some people will be offended by everything about him. The last time I heard anything about him was when the Oliver Stone film was out... until yesterday's interview in the Independent, which was as heretical as I'd expect it to be:

At 40,000ft, the editor of Hustler looked down the cabin and had a vision of "a guy with sandals on, and an old man with a beard. I took it to be them," says Flynt, referring to God and Saint Paul.

Deeply affected by the appearance of his distinguished fellow-passengers, he began making changes to his magazine. The cartoon strip "Chester the Molester" became "Chester the Protector - Guardian of Young Girls". Hustler, Flynt promised, "will no longer demean women."

If you take a look at the "Asian" section of the Hustler website (you might begin with "Noy", a young woman who explains how surprised and thankful she was to discover that US servicemen have larger penises than the humble Vietnamese) you'll notice there's been something of a rethink on this front.

"What happened to fighting for Jesus?"

"What happened was, I went to a psychiatrist. And he diagnosed me as being bipolar."

"And that's why you saw God?"

"Right. If only all of those born-again converts would take a little lithium, like I did, they'd be fine."

Some part of me has great respect for anyone who is so unflinchingly obdurate in his heresy.