In defense of the sanctimonious women's studies set || First feminist blog on the internet

Category: Vanity

Five Reasons I Love Cosmo

1. It is like The Onion, for feminists. Through some strange machination of the Hearst Publishing company, as of last year, I have started getting Cosmo delivered straight to my mail box. Each month I gain at least an hour of entertainment from the articles and sex tips. It’s kind of like a sexually charged Where’s Waldo, where I find myself hunting for ever more ridiculous “knowledge” about the male mind.

Like when to give your boyfriend an ultimatum. (According to the September issue of Cosmo, it’s when you’ve been in a serious, monogamous relationship for a year. Four or five moths is too soon.)

Or the health articles – I recently spotted an article titled “When Your Nipples Act Weird.”

2. It reminds me of Clueless. I fucking adore that movie, and when I read Cosmo, I totally feel like I’m talking to Cher Horowitz.

3. The Sex Tips. Just when I think they can’t get any crazier, they do. I wonder if the people who think these up are sadists. Check out these gems (handily complied by Cosmo EIC Kate White in her book You On Top: Smart, Sexy Skills Every Woman Needs to Set the World on Fire):

* When fondling your man’s penis, slip a hair scrunchy around the base of it. The tight scrunchy combined with your touch creates an amazing sensation.

*Using a bit of lube, make two fists around the shaft of his penis and twist in opposite directions.

*Mak[e] a tight ring with your thumb and forefinger around the base of his penis, for[m] a second ring around the head, and then g[o] up with one hand and down with the other.

*Tak[e] him in your mouth and then swir[l] your tongue around like a pencil sharpener.

*Take a strand of fake pearls or other beads and, holding each end, pull it back and forth around the shaft of his penis.

*Take a sip of hot water – as hot as you can stand – before going down on him, and then, keeping your mouth closed, swish it all around his penis.

*Chill a bunch of marbles in the fridge. Toss them on the bed and make him lie on them while you straddle him.

*Slip a glazed doughnut around his penis and nibble it off.

4. The indignation when people insinuate Cosmo is ridiculous. After that last sex tip, Kate White notes:

In his book I Am Charlotte Simmons, novelist Tom Wolfe mocked our write up of this move. But perhaps he was just jealous no one had ever tried it on him.

Ooooh! In your face, Tom Wolfe! Now you have to write another novel with a fresh comeback.

5. They put the word “Va-jay-jay” on the cover of a national magazine.

Okay, okay – that’s not fully fair to Cosmo. The truth is Cosmopolitan is an easy target for feminist ire. It seems to represent the worst parts of women’s magazines, with their obsession with a tight ass, perfect hair, catching a man, and then fucking him senseless until he submits and gives you a rock. (That should be the Cosmo tagline – Do it for the ring!) The articles are shallow, the subjects tepid, the covers airbrushed to within an inch of their life.

Even the search bar on the Cosmo site reminds us of the main interests of the Cosmo demographic:

Try: bikinis | boyfriends | cocktails | shoes | relationships

And yet…

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I’m Too Young For This

Within a two minute conversation: Ethan just informed me that his bus driver told all the kids on the bus that she posted a poem on Facebook. WHY?

He also says, in reaction to a Buffy episode, that he believes that frat houses are just like “government or Congress” in that they are secret societies bound by pledges of brotherhood.

Ow, it hurts.

Quarter-Life Crisis Time

So I’m 25 today, and I finished the New York Bar Exam on Wednesday (yay!). I’ve been working on destroying my liver since 4:30 on Wednesday, but today is extra-special, so I’m celebrating by going to my favorite steakhouse for a porterhouse and some red wine (when your boyfriend asks you what you want for your birthday and you respond, “A steak and a blowjob,” you know he’s a keeper when he books lunch at Peter Luger).

And then on Tuesday I’m leaving for Southeast Asia for five weeks. I’ll be popping in to put up some posts and say hi, and I’m hoping I’ll have time to post a bit before I leave. But for the most part, the regular Feministers and the guest-bloggers will be holding the place down. So enjoy!

I would also love any SE Asia travel tips that you all have. I’m starting in Bangkok, then going up to Chiang Mai, then down the Mekong into Laos and staying in Luang Prabang for a few days, then Hanoi and the surrounding area, then to Cambodia (Angkor and Phnom Penh), then back to Thailand and down to the islands. Any suggestions of what to see, where to eat (and what to eat), where to stay, where to go (especially which islands to hit up), etc would be very welcome.

I’ll put up a few posts tomorrow before I depart. And I’m also heading out to get myself a new camera this afternoon, so I’ll be sure to post travel photos. Be good to the guest-bloggers while I’m gone.

Friday Random Ten – The Delicious Meme-alicious Edition

Now featuring FRT, Guilty Pleasures, Music I’m Not-Ironically Into, and Friday Cat Blogging, all in one single post! Warning: this post is very heavy on video, ego-stroking, and bad taste.

Friday Random Ten
Because if it’s Friday somewhere, we might as well.

1) Tanya Stephens – Man Fi Rule
2) Whale – Hobo Humpin Slobo Babe (I should have saved this one for the Guilty Pleasures list. For shame.)
3) Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – The Mercy Seat (Acoustic)
4) The Meteors – Who Do You Love? (See guilty pleasures list, No. 1)
5) The Cramps – Human Fly
6) The Chameleons UK – I’ll Remember
7) Daniel Johnston – Love Not Dead
8) The Howling Hex – Teenage Doors
9) Jens Lekman – Do You Remember the Riots?
10) Chromeo – Way Too Much

I’m just excited I get two days off in a row this week.

Balloon JesusGuilty Pleasures: I have a second hard drive dedicated to 100% legitimately downloaded, non-pirated music, which means that approximately 5/6ths of my computer is dedicated to crappy music I found online. I also use this second hard drive to store stupid pictures that I can whip out later on my website, but somehow never manage to remember when they’re most astute. I’ve been sitting on the one to the right for years.

Now thanks to Jill, I can expose you to the crap I hide from others — even though Jill’s list embarrasses me. Ashley Simpson? Eve 6? Damn, girl. Meanwhile Physioprof’s looks like a regular mixed CD at my house.

1) A lot of people poo on a wide spectrum of cover songs because they think any music that is so blatantly referential is shoddy and masturbatory at best. I, on the other hand, like to find a bit of irony and dignity in a well done cover song. I download and keep every unusual cover I’ve ever come across which saddles me with travesties like The Yeti Girls covering ELO (Don’t Bring Me Down) and a bored cabaret version of Blur’s Boys and Girls, and even Tim Curry doing a reggae version of the Beatles’ I Will. This obsession also gives me two cover songs by one band that I will defend to the death if given the opportunity, one the best and one the worst of my entire collecton: the Butthole Surfers singing Summer in the City (the worst; Lovin’ Spoonful cover) and Butthole Surfers’ Hurdy Gurdy Man (the best; Donovan cover):


I will not defend the video.

2) Duran Duran – Rio
Did I mention this is my ringtone?

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Welcome to Jill Filipovic’s Den of Antifeminist Vice. No lipstick, no stilettos, no service.


Image stolen from that other original Fake Pretty Feminist.

It’s true; you’ve all been duped. Unless you were just here for the titties in the first place, in which case, welcome!

(I know I shouldn’t respond to these things either, but this one was just too good).

So in the spirit of running an anti-feminist vice den, and in the spirit of this fabulous vice-ridden post, there’s some hot dudely vice action below the fold. Probably not safe for work.

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Guilty Pleasures

Julian has tagged me with a meme: The five most embarrassing tracks on my iPod. His are pretty great/horrendous (I too remember feeling like a super-hardcore 7th grader for loving “NIN,” and I too went to several “DMB” concerts). But here’s the thing: I have tons of embarrassing music on my iPod, but the most embarrassing of the embarrassing comes from this dude who I’m currently hanging out with who has the worst taste in music possibly ever (he’s pretty sweet in just about every way, but looking at his iTunes makes me want to weep). So he may or may not have sent me songs not only by Hilary Duff, but also by JoJo and Jordin Sparks. Yeah. I also may or may not have put both songs on repeat and muted my computer so that it would look like I listened to both of them when I haven’t.

Anyway, I think the point of the meme is to illustrate your own crappy taste in music. And I certainly have that in spades. So here are the top 5 horrible songs that I have voluntarily added to my iPod:

1. Ashlee Simpson – I Didn’t Steal Your Boyfriend
And this isn’t the only A.Simp song I have on my list. What can I say? She’s great for the gym. And I secretly kind of love her video for Outta My Head.

2. Nick Cannon – Gigolo
I’m a little unclear as to why I ever bought this song, but apparently at some point I liked it.

3. Eve6 – Here’s to the Night
This one is embarrassing in that I-genuinely-find-it-touching vein — which is way worse, in my opinion, than just liking crappy to 40 because it’s candy.

4. Jewel – Have a Little Faith in Me
I think I must have been in The Bad Place when I downloaded this song. But it’s just so deliciously sad…

5. Jodeci – Freak’n You
Oh yeah. It was between this and “Feelin’ on Your Booty” by R.Kelly for position #5; but I think the Jodeci tune is less famously-bad, and therefore more truly-bad.

I tag: The current Feministe guest-bloggers; the ultimate Insufferable Music Snob; and Mr. Hussey.

Clinton Fights On

No doubt Clinton’s relatively new vocalization in favor of reproductive health rights has something to do with her massive campaign debt*, but I don’t care. I’ll take it.

Today Clinton made two gutsy press releases via blog in order to take a stand against the Bush administration’s latest attempt** to put common forms of contraception like birth control pills and IUDs in the same category as abortion.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is poised to put in place new barriers to accessing common forms of contraception like birth control pills, emergency contraception and IUDs by labeling them “abortion.” These proposed regulations set to be released next week will allow healthcare providers to refuse to provide contraception to women who need it. We can’t let them get away with this underhanded move to undermine women’s health and that’s why I am sounding the alarm.

These rules pose a serious threat to providers and uninsured and low-income Americans seeking care. They could prevent providers of federally-funded family planning services, like Medicaid and Title X, from guaranteeing their patients access to the full range of comprehensive family planning services. They’ll also build significant barriers to counseling, education, contraception and preventive health services for those who need it most: low-income and uninsured women and men.

The regulations could even invalidate state laws that currently ensure access to contraception for many Americans. In fact, they describe New York and California’s laws requiring prescription drug insurance plans to provide coverage for contraceptives as part of “the problem.” These rules would even interfere with New York State law that ensures survivors of sexual assault and rape receive emergency contraception in hospital emergency rooms.

The only thing abortive about birth control is that it messes with God’s will, God’s will to permanently relieve me from cat litter duty. Because God has nothing better to do.

On the other hand, you, dear reader, with a few flicks of your delicate wrist, can join Sen. Clinton’s call to action here.

And in related reading, Marcella wrote about another offense by the Bush administration earlier this week in which they want special protection for anti-abortion and anti-contraceptive medical providers who refuse treatment to patients. Senators Hillary Clinton and Patty Murray jointly released a statement in protest on this proposal as well.

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* To be fair, Clinton’s record on reproductive rights is as good as, if not better than, Obama’s, but I can’t recall her being this outspoken on the issues in recent history.
** Some of Bush’s recent attempts of wrestling media glory away from Obama and McCain appear to be pretty transparent attempts at reclaiming his legacy. It’s way better for the future of his vainglorious presidential library if he can be remembered as an evangelical, lady-killing rock star by his base, instead of being remembered as the man who wiped his ass on the Constitution, abandoned thousands of citizens in crisis, abused the good faith and young bodies of his troops, and waged an unnecessary war to avenge the name of his father.