What's scarier than the phrase "Cosmo investigates?" I'll tell you: "grey-rape."
Alongside their beauty tips, Man Manual and fashion spreads, Cosmo is taking on "grey rape." What's grey-rape? It's a product of hook-up culture (natch, because rape didn't happen until feminists got all pissed off about it), and it's a special kind of rape that is only kind-of sort-of rape, because the rapist might have known the rapee, or something, and she was drunk, and, oh well, it's all so GREY. The article is in Cosmo's "Tips and Moves" section, along with "The Secret To Getting Any Guy," "His Favorite Time To Have Sex" and "PDA Moves He's Actually Okay With." So, once you've figured out how to make every man on earth happy, you can learn what to do if one of them kind of accidentally rapes you!
If crapping on online dating is like shooting fish in a barrel (and it is), deconstructing a Psychology Today article is like taking an Uzi to a goldfish bowl. PT is where evolutionary psychology meets self-promoting pseudo-academics with something to shill. Mockery is just too easy. But that doesn't mean it's not fun.
A couple days ago on the mag's site, Some Lady who is a trainer, consultant and "keynote speaker" (that's a full-time job?) turned her chair around and got real about how ladies are really good listeners, because ladies are really good listeners. Writes Audrey Nelson:
Listening is a part of the female job description and the key component
in facilitating interpersonal relationships. The famous horse
behavioral expert Monty Roberts' has made observations of an alpha mare
meting out discipline
to a herd of wild mustangs. He noticed that the mare, when confronting
a renegade and abusive young stallion colt, held one ear forward and
one back, as if she'd divided her attention. The ear facing backward
was aimed at the rest of the herd and especially at a young foal this
colt had just kicked. The forward ear was trained on the "bad boy"
colt. I believe this is analogous to the split or double ear we observe
among women.
That's right: because female horses do a thing, female humans do a thing! God, I love science.
If you don't want to read the whole wordy mess, let me summarize in advance: there was once a time when ALL WOMEN EVERYWHERE never had premarital sex and only wanted to have marriage and then babies with upstanding men, AND IT WAS AWESOME AND DEFINITELY ACTUALLY HAPPENED. But then THE STEAMING VAGINA-CLAD ANTICHRIST feminism came along and wrenched this fairy tale out of the tiny, shaking hands of REAL WOMEN EVERYWHERE and turned them into SLUTS AND WHORES who will KIND OF WILLINGLY sleep with ANYTHING WITH A DICK because once, we read this post on Lemondrop about Tucker Max. And while women are certainly VICTIMS, the real victims are MEN, who women oppress with their NON-STOP LEG-SPREADING! This article is REAL and BELIEVABLE because it was written by a woman who KNOWS BETTER than all other women, and by "knows better," we mean IS NOT SLUTTY LIKE THOSE POOR DUMB SLUTS. Also, women are sluts. Did we mention the part about slutty women?
The worshipful celebrity profile has been a staple of magazine journalism since the dawn of glossy--heck, probably before. And while these things are always already horrible in their mere concept, some are worse than others. A 2007 Esquire profile of Angelina Jolie comes to mind. But the March 2010 issue of Vanity Fair has taken the genre to a whole new level. After reading this whirlwind profile of nine Hollywood "It Girls," though surely author Evgenia Peretz would prefer the term "ingenues," a reader could be forgiven for wondering if any of these women might be the second coming of the Virgin Herself.
Have you heard of, for example, Abbie Cornish? I haven't, but now I'm going to run out and rent all her films because clearly kittens, rainbows and unicorns look to her for inspiration:
The Cupid's-bow lips, the downy-soft cheeks, the button nose: 27-year-old Abbie Cornish has those Ivory-soap-girl features we're so familiar with, and yet hers is a face it's hard to stop staring at--testament to the intelligence, vulnerability, and sensuality she brings to her characters. Her breakthrough for American audiences came with fellow Australian Heath Ledger, as a junkie in 2006's Candy, free-falling from invincible heroin highs to soul-seizing anguish. Kimberly Peirce's Stop-Loss saw her fleeing the law with Ryan Phillippe's character. (Enter some real-life drama: Phillippe, then the husband of Reese Witherspoon, would soon become her boyfriend.) She may have been her loveliest in Jane Campion's Bright Star, playing John Keats's muse, the flirty and forthright Fanny Brawne.
Swoooooon! The whole thing is borderline hilarious in its unabashed hyper-fawning. Peretz, are you joking? If you are joking, this is the best joke ever. If you're not joking, I'll make it into a joke for you. Behind the cut, I've created our own Heartless Doll Vanity Fair Mad Lib so that you, too, can insert yourself into the awed gaze of VF.
Finally, the day has come: the day when you find out where diet-, exercise- and crappy sex tips-obsessed magazines Men's Health and Women's Health think you should be living based on your gender. Like the Austin American-Statesman's Pat LeBlanc, I am having a bit of a WTF moment. I mean, she's not having a WTF moment because she works for a family newspaper, but this bitch right here is having a what-the-fuck moment. Apparently my fair city of Austin is better to live in for men than for women. Writes LeBlanc:
The editors factored in 35 criteria when making their lists. Among them? Air quality, employment, life expectancy and commute times. They also looked at death rates from more than a half dozen causes, obesity rates and the ratio of single women to single men (and vice versa).
The best part about these lists is arguing about why they're wrong.
While it's #7 on the best cities for men list, Austin didn't make the cut for best cities for women. This is my sad face.
Since you people can't get enough of the Gosselin family news, here's more fluffy snackage for your gossip hole: according to Us, Kate's having an affair with the family's bodyguard! The family has a bodyguard!? That's a whole other post. Sure, the kids need to be protected, but it sounds like the biggest threat to their well being might be their own parents.
"Kate Gosselin stepped out with her bodyguard Steve Neild in Maryland Tuesday night -- as Us Weekly exclusively reveals they have in "inseparable" relationship that causes friends -- and even
her husband, Jon -- to wonder if they're having an affair. "He threatened to hire a private investigator," a family source informed by Jon tells the new issue of Us..."
The phrase "stepping out" is so vague as to render the charges of cheating practically meaningless, but then again, meaningless accusations are what keep Us and the other celeburags in business.
The weirdest part are the photos, wherein Kate looks more like Victoria Beckham than the frazzled mother of multiples she plays on her "reality" show. Maybe channeling Lady Becks means she's gonna get a new haircut. That thing is getting stanky.
I suspect many middle-aged women 'round the world will be getting a surprise when this month's Oprah magazine lands in their boxes. (YSWIDT? That was tacky.) No, Oprah hasn't lost/gained fifty pounds (again)--that's just par for the course these days. Instead, the mag endeavors to answer the age-old question: "Why are women leaving men for other women?" And I thought my mom read O for the sensible fashion tips and practical advice on living better.
Anyway, the question of why women are chosing women isn't really an age-old question. It's quite a new question, and the answer is complicated. (I know I had to tell you that, right?) Instead of starting with the shifting gender role discussion and scientific research that sheds some light on why women are going gay later in life, the article starts with an anecdote about a lady who simply appears to have gotten tired of her whiny husband, divorced him, and then met a hot lesbian. Why do women leave men for women? Because they like the ladies, dar. Oh, but it's complicated.
Of course, this perceived increase in mid-life lesbianism is just that--perceived. And honestly, O, did you just say that because Cynthia Nixon left a man for a woman, she may have inspired others to do so? Oh, yes you did:
That said, of the recent high-profile cases, it's Cynthia Nixon's
down-to-earth attitude that may have blazed a trail for many women. In
1998, when Sex and the City debuted on HBO, she was settled in
a long-term relationship with Danny Mozes, an English professor, with
whom she had two children. They hadn't gotten married: "I was wary of
it and felt like it was potentially a trap, so I steered clear of it,"
Nixon said in an interview with London's Daily Mirror. In 2004, after ending her 15-year relationship with Mozes, Nixon began seeing Christine Marinoni ...
The article goes on to weave together some recent research on the fluidity of female sexuality with cute tales of newly lesbian couples that make me want to hit up my nearest gay bar, stat. Who knew that all I had to do was like ladies, and my romantic problems would be solved?
I'm going to speculate real hard, here. I'm going to guess that somebody on the editorial (it's really hard not to type that word without quotation marks) staff at Ok! recently got a little drunk. With her girlfriends. And maybe recently made out with one of them. And maybe now needs validation or scare tactics to explain or erase her behavior. 'Cause there's a whole lotta girl-on-girl hate action in Ok! today, and I need to think that it's not only because rag mags are trying to rot our brains from the outside in.
First up, Ok! seizes on a Kelly Clarkson interview with Entertainment Tonight wherein Clarkson talks about how she's not gay. Um, yeah?
"No!" she tells Entertainment Tonight
in an interview airing tonight when asked if she goes for girls. "I
went to Europe and it was in the press everywhere and I was like, 'I
don't get it, was I sleepwalking and kissed a girl and there's a
picture or something?' Just because I'm single and don't date a lot,
that doesn't make me a lesbian."
Hot damn! Because you know what does make a lesbian? A girl liking girls. Which Clarkson does not. So, until Kelly Clarkson likes girls and decides to tell us about it on her own sweet time, there probably won't be a whole lot of reason to ask her about it. Honestly.
But even more terrifying to Ok! than a potentially lesbian Kelly Clarkson is the thought that lesbian kisses could get shitty television shows canceled! They've got the rundown in their "Kiss of Death" photo gallery. News hook: a girl-on-girl kiss on Desperate Housewives. Fake content: how Dirt, The O.C., Scrubs and Roseanne were all canceled after lesbian kisses. Except Roseanne was canceled three seasons after its lesbian kiss. So, you stretch that in whatever direction it'll go, Ok!. By the way, you look hot in those jeans. Mmm.
I'm sure OK! and People and WhatTheFeckEverYayStarsWooCelebritiesYay! will be back on the Jessica Simpson: fat or not? bandwagon here pretty soon, but for now they're concerned with letting you know that they know about parenting. No, it's not more on "Octomom," (though they do have that) it's all about celebs and their spawn smackdowns!
Instead of reading the worthless drivel, play our occasional behind-the-jump game: match the parenting rule with the celebrity!
Rules: 1. Be nice, neat and tidy! 2. Be respectful towards your elders. 3. Write thank-you letters. 4. Brush your teeth. 5. No huge parties!
Celebs: A Reese Witherspoon B Brooke Shields C Michelle Obama D Victoria Beckham E Jennie Garth
Number of Heartless Doll bloggers who love the Harper's Index: at least 1. There is one great gift given to me by all the handsome, pseudo-intellectual hipster boys I've dated over the years: Harper's, that uber-snobby collection of literati-friendly cultural meanderings. And now the Harper's Index is even more lovable: it's searchable!
Initially recommended search tags include "American women." And some surprising facts turn up, listed by date:
On my daily troll through the world of celebrity trash rags, I often wonder if I'm making the wrong decisions about what to tell our fine readers about celebrity news. What if Miley Cyrus is not the most important story of the day, but I like her hair? Or maybe I want to talk about Patrick Swayze's impending death, but what does that have to do with feminism? Today, then, I focus on the truly vital things that the celebrity trash rags are telling me the only way they can: through the text advertising on their websites.
one flat stomach rule diet seen on Rachael Ray remove stretch marks -- obey
my flat tummy rule one skinny stomach rule--I BSN Degree
I cut down six pounds end spinal stenosis now! seen on NBC
2 rules to a flat stomach--crazy diet rule registered nurses
There are 89.8 million single people in the United States--according to a 2006 U.S. census press release, that is, 41 percent of us. And there are probably more who are divorced, widowed, etc., who don't consider themselves properly "single." More than half of the single folks are women. So, like, everybody you know right?
Singles are supposedly the target demo for Singular Magazine, a publication for, well, I'll just let them say it:
"In a society that still tries to tell us individuals must be married to be happy, successful and "complete," Singular Communications is breaking the mold. They have created a vibrant community where unmarried adults in Los Angeles can come together and celebrate the benefits and positive aspects of the single lifestyle. It's a fresh new view of what it means to be single in Los Angeles."
I'm not sure people in L.A. have felt an oppressive need to be married since divorce was invented, but I'll take their word for it. The magazine itself seems to have a sense of humor, or is at least okay with borrowing Amy Sedaris', since she's their holiday cover girl. Singular also has a rather tasteless sense of luxury, according to MediaPost's "Magazine Rack," from which I heard of this single-positive pub. Oh, to be loaded and single and to have gone this long without a magazine!
The mag's online ads, at least, try to fight the (married) power: on the Singular site I found a link to an eBay listing (?) for the Singelringen! It's a little Swede-made ring that advertises your singlehood to the (hopefully interested) world. Why do they only come in blue? I hardly ever wear blue. Or go to Sweden.
The New York City I used to live in is and was nothing like the New York City of New York magazine, where disposable income runs rampant and designer clothing diarrhea is a serious epidemic. My NYC bore no resemblance to Carrie Bradshaw's playground or the Gossip Girl landscape. Which is probably why I did love Sex and the City and the Sunday Styles section so very much. In the Big Apple, escapism is never far away, especially when your apartment is the size of a Kleenex box.
Still, I remain miffed at New York's Live Cheap: Without Giving Up Much feature this month. Given the New York demographic, I didn't expect all of it to apply to me. So imagine my surprise when just about all of it applied to me. No, not in that I could take the advice for my own life. But in that everything it touts doing to save money ... I'm already doing because that's the way us poor folk roll.
Ladies and gentlemen of New York City, if the "Live Cheap" prescription seems impossible, please allow me to offer some words of encouragement if you're going to be taking a step down on the recession ladder to join me and, oh, the rest of the planet.
Drink at dive bars: Not only will this not kill you, it is also unlikely to upset your delicate New York drink palette. Say the words "Bud Light" and down that thing, fast. Think of it as drink camping. It's only temporary, and it. is. going. to. be. fun. dammit.
Embrace low fashion: This means shopping at J. Crew and Zara. Shit. I wish I could shop at J. Crew and Zara.
Have "frugal fun": Here, they advise you to go see Mark Kozelek instead of AC/DC. I don't call this having "frugal fun." I call this "listening to good music."
Recycle your romances: Since it's too expensive to date and impress new people, you should just keep getting back together with your exes. I'm pretty sure me and my man o' the hour are on version 6.0 now. I used to think that just meant we had issues, but now I know we're just recession-proof. Call up somebody in that lil' black book and join us!
Settle in front of the fire with a glass of zinf', a box of chocolates and your favorite Pottery Barn blanket, ladies! People has released its sexiest men of 2008, and the steam is on!
... is what I would write if I wrote press releases for People magazine. But since I write snark for Heartless Doll, we'll be doing things a little differently. Here now, I give you: what People's "Sexiest Men Alive" for 2008 will be doing in five years.
1. Hugh Jackman - Starring alongside a hot young Aussie starlet in AUSTRALIA II: New Zealand before going to live in the wilderness for six months to prepare for Wolverine: The Untold Story.
2. Daniel Craig - Dividing his time between the next Bond flick, Magnum of Penis, and the wacky BBC sitcom showing his softer side, Oh, Daniel!
3. Jon Hamm - Starring in the seventh season of Mad Men, where they discover a time machine and start creating ads for the year 2360.
Here's an incongruous visual for you: ballerinas and bars. Images of tutus and Bud Light don't exactly go main dans main, do they? Of course, leave it to New York City to figure out a way to combine them.
Actually, I'm talking about bailarinas, Hispanic and Central American dancers who work in dance clubs and get paid by the dance. And okay, it's not me talking about them, it's New York magazine. In "Two Bucks A Dance," Debbie Nathan slices a piece of life for us:
"Rosa is a bailarina. For a couple of dollars per song, she dances with strangers in a bailarina bar. It’s a job held by many immigrant women in Spanish-speaking New York, filling a need created by many immigrant men. The man on the phone is typical of her clients. He’s in his twenties, doesn’t speak English, and immigrated to the United States by himself—no mother, no girlfriend, no wife. He works six days a week at a restaurant and sends his money back home to Ecuador. Most of all, he’s lonely."
But a couple of bucks a dance can turn into hundreds of dollars a night in paid companionship--no sex implied. In fact, most of the guys just seem to want a pretty girl to pal around with. Who could blame them? Strange country, strange language, strange white women gadding around in Carrie Bradshaw heels. I'd take a couple of minutes with a bailarina, for sure.
Bonus: all the clients aren't immigrant men. Some are Orthodox Jews. They call them pinguinitos because of their black-and-white clothing. I call that just about the cutest thing I've ever heard.
The Heartless Dolls are Andrea, Kathleen, Kiala, Merritt, Nicki and a hifalutin array of notable guest contributors from around the web. We dig pop culture and ladythings.
The New York City I used to live in is and was nothing like the New York City of New York magazine, where disposable income runs rampant and designer clothing diarrhea is a serious epidemic. My NYC bore no resemblance to Carrie Bradshaw's playground or the Gossip Girl landscape. Which is probably why I did love Sex and the City and the Sunday Styles section so very much. In the Big Apple, escapism is never far away, especially when your apartment is the size of a Kleenex box.
Settle in front of the fire with a glass of zinf', a box of chocolates and your favorite Pottery Barn blanket, ladies! People has released its sexiest men of 2008, and the steam is on!
Here's an incongruous visual for you: ballerinas and bars. Images of tutus and Bud Light don't exactly go main dans main, do they? Of course, leave it to New York City to figure out a way to combine them.
