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ADVICE! For Deleted Commenters! Sady the Starfucker Edition

You know, reader, I have not done one of these in a while. The mean anonymous comments have mostly been boring! And I like to dish out my friendly advice to people who are, at the very least, entertaining or innovative in their comment hate. Today, however, ADVICE FOR DELETED COMMENTERS returns! For, of all deleted comments, my favorites are those in which the commenter tries to make it clear that he or she is only insulting me for my own good. I got one of those today! And, believe me: it is epic.

It begins:

One thing even a casual reader will notice is that, Sady is great at tooting her own horn! Yes! She constantly links to her OTHER writings at MORE IMPORTANT websites!

Reader: the post to which Anonymous Angry Commenter #419 (sorry, dudes: if you won't leave your names, I'll have to start numbering you) is responding is entitled "My Raging Narcissism Will Destroy Us All." A joke, of the self-deprecating variety! In that post I also made jokes about how unqualified I was to represent feminism, and about the fact that the interview in question hadn't gotten much traffic.

Let us be clear on this: in a post in which I did nothing but make fun of and/or get down on myself, someone left a comment about what a cocky, self-promoting bitch I am. Apparently, I'm not sufficiently convinced that I and my writing are shit; also, I do the decent thing, which is to try and drive traffic toward sites that are driving traffic toward me, and to let my readers know about the other stuff I am up to. I just don't hate myself enough, is the problem! Fortunately, AAC #419, in the tradition of AACs everywhere, is here to help.

And what do her readers get HERE .. fake interviews with some compatriots instead of original thoughts... reviews of 4 yearold movies! Wow!

Ha ha, yes. Tiger Beatdown, heartless commercial enterprise that it is, is devoted solely to producing marketable posts in order to obtain an optimal number of pageviews; content, style, and principle are irrelevant in my merciless quest for market domination. It is like The Huffington Post, but with fewer naked boobs! (NOTE TO SELF: INCLUDE MORE NAKED BOOBS.) Which is why, last week, I made the ruthlessly commercial decision to stop everything in order to write long, joke-free essays about some obscure movies and tell you about my feelings on a ten-year-old rape case.

You know, some day I'd like to have a "personal blog" where I can write whatever the hell I want, often in direct contradiction to the received wisdom about what makes a commercially viable blog post (short, witty, timely, and controversial are the goals; also, it helps if there are click-through links, polls, and - if possible - naked boobs). But, alas! My days are spent maintaining the corporate media giant that is Tiger Beatdown!

One MIGHT start thinking, well 'tiger beatdown', which sounds like a 60s fanmag to Fabian and Rydell...

Hmm, you're right. "Tiger Beatdown" does sound A LOT like the name of a fan magazine. What an unfortunate and unintended coincidence! Oh, if only I had the on-target pop culture sense of Anonymous Angry Commenter #419.

is just an 'experiment'.. an add on to see if Sady can make it in the world of fem-blogging... hence her slavering delight when Melissa McEwen featured her .

Here we come to my favorite part of the comment: the part where AAC #419 drops any pretense at criticism and just goes straight to the conspiracy theory. The miraculous thing about all this is that AAC #419 is exactly right! Yes, it's true: since being openly, vocally feminist, and taking a hard line on feminist issues, is one of the best - if not the best - methods by which to ensure mainstream acceptance and popularity in our culture, I devised a cunning ruse. I pretended to be feminist, and spent several hours of each and every day researching, thinking about, and writing about feminism, in order to obtain the UNLIMITED FAME AND FORTUNE that I believe to be my birthright.

In truth, of course, feminism could not be less important to me. I mean, women! Who cares? Am I right, fellas? "Sady Doyle," that interminable ranter-on about the ladybusiness, is nothing more than a construct, an elaborate fiction meant to ensure my success. In reality, I am dogged anti-choice advocate and Ohio state Representative John Boehner.

I do apologize, however, for getting excited when Melissa McEwan asked me to do a guest post. As we all know, the appropriate response to learning that someone whose work you have long respected apparently respects your work as well is to retire to one's bedroom and weep for several hours. Afterward, one must mortify one's flesh to atone for the deadly sin of Pride. I recommend hair shirts, or a nice long round of whipping.

but wait ... favoring better gigs for more exposure? Relying on more famous friends? That sounds like the very patriarchy we're all supposed to be fighting! YES! Sady doesnt put her A team material on 'tiger meltdown'.. she has bigger designs.. she wants to MAKE it as a writer .. oh theres patriarchy again ! HIERARCHY!

AIEEEEEEE! My dark secret has been revealed! Yes, if you rearrange the letters in "Tiger Beatdown," they spell VOLDEMOR... wait, WHAT?

That's your problem with me? The fact that I've published elsewhere? The fact that I have friendly relationships with other people who publish? That's it? What the unloving everholy fuck are you thinking?

Oh, wait. I know what you're thinking. I know, because I used to think it too. Because, you see, for as long as I have been writing, I have had people in my life encouraging me to start pitching publications and make a go of the writing. And I said, "no." I said, "I could never do that." I said, "I'm not good enough."

I said this for a variety of reasons, but one of the chief ones, I think, is that I'm a woman. (That is, when I am not Ohio state Representative John Boehner.) Women aren't supposed to like themselves: they're not supposed to like the way they look, they're not supposed to like what they need or how they feel, and they're definitely not supposed to be ambitious in any way or to believe in themselves to the extent that they can pursue the careers of their choice. Writing - which is, basically, the act of conveying what you think, in the belief that other people will want to hear it - is a particularly unladylike act.

But it's OK as long as I don't seem proud of it, right, AAC? It's OK as long as I don't betray the massively unwomanly confidence necessary to talk to people and basically be like, "I think my writing is good enough to appear in your publication." It's OK as long as I'm obscure, unpaid, not valued. That's what purity looks like: doing hours of work for no compensation and never betraying any indication that you're proud of what you do or believe it to be in any way exceptional.

Fuck that. The problem you have, AAC, is not that I'm "patriarchal" or "hierarchical." That's some self-serving bullshit you're ladling out to excuse tearing another woman down in a supremely patriarchal way. The problem, actually, is that you think I don't know my place. The problem, actually, is that I respect myself and other people respect me and I don't feel like pretending that I'm unworthy of respect, not any more.

The thing is, I still do participate in patriarchy, though not in the way you imagine. Since this blog has been getting more traffic, since I've been getting published in places I admire, I've been freaking out, having panic attacks, getting down on myself, telling myself I can't do it or won't do it or don't deserve to do it.

AAC #419, you changed all that. I realize that devaluing myself is a radically un-feminist step, given that my culture already devalues me. I'm a writer. I'm actually a pretty good writer. I'm going to work as hard as I can to write the best stuff that I can, and sometimes I might get compensated to write that work, and you are just going to have to sit there and fucking deal. And occasionally accuse me of PATRIARCHY! when you get really upset.

I do apologize for not putting any "A team" material on the blog, however. To make up for that, here is a picture of Mr. T:

dont post this.

WHOOPS.

I just think you are diluting what talents you have trying to be too many things. I have faults too. But I dont blog them with 40 links to other places.

That's apparently true, AAC. Of course, since you aren't brave enough to leave your name or a trackback, I can't verify that you don't blog your faults; however, you seem to be content with expressing those faults - which are, in order, a tenuous grasp on basic writing skills, deep stupidity, and a belief that women can best serve the feminist cause by hating themselves and/or living in refrigerator boxes underneath the train station - in anonymous comments on other people's blogs. A noble calling!

See! Love ya Sady! Really!

Ha ha, love you too, AAC! Tell you what: why don't you focus on learning to write above a third-grade level? Then maybe you can start publishing, and I can be your very own Famous Friend.

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IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT: My Dark Plan Reaches Its Zenith; Also, Megan Fox

Friends, as we all know, my goals in life are to blog my faults with 40 links to other places. Also, to fit in some feminism around the edges! And I believe that one of the more important feminist issues today is Megan Fox.

I am serious about that, actually! The press coverage of Megan Fox really, really bothers me, because it is sexist! Which is why I wrote a piece about her for The Frisky. It begins:

Ladies, gentlemen: “Transformers” is not a movie about acting.

I know! It came as a surprise to me, too: I had always believed that “Transformers” aspired to be a sensitive exploration of the human psyche. As it turns out, however, it’s a movie about giant robots fighting each other.

So, no: “Transformers” is many things, but it is not a movie about acting. However, when its star Megan Fox said as much in an interview with Entertainment Weekly, it set off a firestorm of controversy, most of which can be summed up in the title of a post on the blog Zelda Lily (“Feminism in a Bra”): “Megan Fox Is An Ungrateful Bitch.”

Say, would you like to read the rest of what I have to say about Megan Fox? Good! Because you can read it now, on The Frisky.

PATRIARCHY! Oh, I know.

--

EDIT: About the one Megan Fox hate blog I mentioned: some folks I used to follow when I had a Tiger Beatdown Tumblr have been reblogged there. Which: I don't know what that means. Things can circulate anywhere and everywhere on Tumblr, because of how it's designed - things get reblogged every which way and eventually some feminist's statement winds up getting reblogged by a dude who wants Megan Fox to be gang raped or I end up reblogging Boner Party, or whatever. I tended to only follow people who were smart and incisive, which I would imagine precludes them from enjoying random anonymous celebrity-hate blogs about how someone is a "ho" or should "shut her trap" on the Internets, and I imagine a lot of folks would be appalled by the connection. So I don't know what the connection is; I imagine the person who writes this is just trolling Tumblr and other sources for material. HOWEVER. If you are secretly submitting tips to or (God forbid) editing a Megan Fox hate blog: um, I dunno? That's fucked up? But I did some research, like, joining Tumblr again so that I could see notes, and Tumblr searches and Google searches to see if anyone had written an entry on another blog that was like, "I also started a blog about hating Megan Fox because I am awful and full of hate and here is its URL," and nothing came up. If you are embarrassed by association with the hate-blog, I am sorry.

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Tiger Beatdown PRESENTS: The Caitlin Flanagan Experience! Featuring Sandra Tsing Loh, and Depression.

You know, friends, I get tips sometimes! I do not write about all of these tips, for I am lazy. HOWEVER, when I receive a message entitled "Tiger Beatdown Emergency," and it mentions a live! Multi-media! Interview! With Caitlin Flanagan! Well, I pay attention.

Yes, it's true: you, the listener, for no money at all, can go to this very web page and listen to Sandra Tsing Loh (who wrote about leaving her marriage because she didn't like it any more) speaking with Caitlin Flanagan (who writes about how you should never leave your marriage, EVER) about, well: marriage, I guess. MARRIAGE: A Terrible, Soul-Draining Experience From Which You Must Escape, or a Terrible, Soul-Draining Experience From Which There Is No Escape? Such is the topic of discussion. I have this wild suspicion that maybe there are some people who like being married, but this is not newsworthy. Crazy fringe-dwelling marriage-likers!

Anyway, Sandra Tsing Loh seems like a nice lady. I liked her essay OK! (Personally, I like any lady who writes the line "my dearest childhood wish was not just that my parents would divorce, but also that my raging father would burst into flames.") Sadly, given that Sandra Tsing Loh seems fairly even-handed and level-headed throughout, she cannot be the draw here. No! The real draw is the crazy anti-feminist carnival ride that is listening to Caitlin Flanagan speak! Join me, as I work through the checklist of potential "YIKES" moments presented to the listener here.

1) CAITLIN FLANAGAN SUGGESTING THAT EQUALITY KILLS BONERS: Check! Actually, Tsing Loh takes the lead on this one, suggesting that men have been "feminized" by, um, not being giant babies and learning the skills necessary to feed themselves and not live in their own filth? It is a weird moment. But I liked the essay! Nevertheless, Caitlin Flanagan is the one who really runs with it, as she is nothing if not concerned about the fate of the poor, helpless boners. She attributes the vitality and well-being of the boners in her marriage to the fact that her husband "cannot boil water" and is not burdened with the hard, thankless labor of making dinner or cleaning the house or whatever. The person burdened with this hard, thankless labor is Caitlin Flanagan, and she loves it! Or maybe she doesn't, but it doesn't matter, because she wrote that essay about how you should put out for your husband whether or not you want to! Or MAYBE, just MAYBE, none of it matters at all, because Caitlin Flanagan and her husband can hire professional domestic help if they want to, and have done so in the past! In conclusion: vote Yes on Boners! Boners! Hooray!

2) CAITLIN FLANAGAN FOREGOING RATIONAL ARGUMENT IN FAVOR OF TALKING ABOUT HOW HER DAD ALSO HAD SOME BONERS: This comes in pretty early on, actually. She is supposed to be talking about how marriage is awesome and you should stay in your marriage if it is not awesome and what she does instead of this is to tell this marvelous story about how her grandpa used to say the phrase "before you were a glimmer in your father's eye" (a phrase no-one else's grandpa has ever used! I'm sure) and how she eventually realized that this meant her dad used to get boners, with her mom, and oh God don't take me back to the Alec Baldwin sexy Dad place, Caitlin Flanagan, pleeeeeeeeeeeeassse.

3) CAITLIN FLANAGAN SUGGESTING THAT MARRIAGE IS "FOR THE CHILDREN," WHO WILL TOTALLY BENEFIT FROM LIVING WITH TWO PEOPLE WHO HATE EACH OTHER. Did you know that, if children are not raised by their biological parents, they will fail at life? Such are the prophecies of Caitlin Flanagan. This explains why Tiger Beatdown, a blog written by a lady whose mom has been divorced two times and married three times, is basically entirely composed of entries about how I am trading sex for heroin in bus stations with men whom I call "Daddy." Oh, no, wait, none of that is true! In fact, I know very few people who have spontaneously exploded due to the fact that their parents divorced! I do know people who think fondly about how great their lives would have been if their parents would have gotten divorced instead of fighting all the damn time and being crazy. But this is in direct contradiction to the high-brow ponderings of Caitlin Flanagan, who has found the Platonic model of marriage in "Jon & Kate Plus Eight" (WHAT) and writes things like "Jon and Kate Gosselin's marriage was an enterprise dedicated not to making themselves happy but to taking care of the cavalcade of children they had produced... laboring at something more significant than their own pleasure." Ah, culture!

4) CAITLIN FLANAGAN NAME-CHECKING TERRIBLE POTENTIALLY LETHAL ILLNESS THAT NO-ONE CAN SAY ANYTHING ABOUT NO MATTER HOW GROSS HER MEANS FOR NAME-CHECKING IT MAY BE BECAUSE IT MEANS WE DON'T CARE ABOUT HER CANCER: Check! As you may know, Caitlin Flanagan likes to talk and write - a lot - about how she had cancer, and her husband took care of her when she had the cancer, because she was an appropriately submissive wife. The alternative, of course, is that you are not an appropriately submissive wife, and you still get cancer, and your husband wraps you up in a burlap sack and drops you down the well like a sack of kittens. True story! Or, it might not be a true story, but you cannot question this, unless you love cancer and don't care about Caitlin Flanagan. Shut your traps, cancer-lovers!

5) CAITLIN FLANAGAN DEFENDING MARRIAGE IN SUCH A WAY THAT THE LISTENER CONCLUDES HE OR SHE WOULD PREFER LIFELONG CHASTITY OR PERHAPS HAVING HER EYEBALLS GNAWED OUT OF HER SKULL BY RATS: Check, check, and check, my friends. Hey, remember this line? "There probably aren't many people whose idea of 24-hour-a-day good times consists of being yoked to the same romantic partner, through bouts of stomach flu and depression, financial setbacks and emotional upsets, until after many a long decade, one or the other eventually dies." Ha ha, YIKES! Yep, that's pretty much the Flanagan program, and it is on display here. Thank you, Caitlin Flanagan, for steering us away from traditional values by praising traditional values. Again.

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IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT: My Knowledge of Genesis is Limited, But I Am An Expert on LOVE

Hey! Want to hear something crazy? I got to to a guest post on Shakesville, WOO. Do you want to hear something that is EQUALLY CRAZY? I am now a love advice counselor, who gives love advice, which is based on the timeless and always applicable lessons of Cinema! I assume this is going to go well, given that I know everything and whatnot. Behold, the opening paragraphs of my post!

You know, friends, being allowed to do a guest post at Shakesville is an honor. An honor of which I, specifically, plan to prove myself unworthy! How will I do this, you ask? Why, by revealing my new career to you! My new career is: DR. SADY, THE LOVE DOCTOR, WHO GIVES LOVE ADVICE, WITH HER Ph.D IN LOVE.

"But Sady," you are saying. "You do not actually have a doctorate in the Love Sciences! You are completely unqualified for this position!" This, sadly, is true. I only have a Master's! Oh, okay, that is not true either, actually. But I have watched a lot of movies.

Specifically, I have watched romantic comedies. These cinematic documents, or "texts," have unlocked to me many of the true secrets of Love. Also, they are made "for women," which I assume means they cannot be sexist! Truly, the major film studios of Hollywood always have the best interests of the ladies at heart, as we can learn from Sex and the City: The Motion Picture, and its forthcoming sequel, Sex and the City: Marriage Marriage Shopping Marriage Babies.

I know, I know. You are dying for love advice! Also, you want to know whether I can tell the difference between Peter Gabriel and Phil Collins (SPOILER: I cannot). But to do that, you will have to click on this link! So that is what you should do. RIGHT NOW, before it is too late for Love!

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What Message Will You Send With Your Twilight Tattoo?

Bad news, everybody: you might be a girl. And, as a girl, you are required to love Twilight. Don't know why! It just works that way, I guess. So, as a girl, and therefore a Twilight fan, I am assuming that you are planning your very first Twilight tattoo.

But wait! Consider! A Twilight tattoo has many ramifications. I mean, besides the fact that everyone is going to look at it for the rest of your life and be like, "huh, so that's what you spent a couple hundred bucks on, huh?" Your Twilight tattoo should express the essence of who you are, and what you want out of life and/or sparkly vampires with outmoded attitudes toward gender.

Fortunately for you, Geekologie has provided a handy gallery of Twilight tattoos! (It has also provided many comments you should not read, and proof of the fact that when something geeky is associated with girls everyone in the world can feel free to make fun of it and talk about how terrible it is, whereas when something geeky is associated primarily with guys it is a renowned cultural institution and/or Star Wars.) Here, we examine the leading contenders, to see which one captures the precise nature of your Twilight love.

This is a tattoo that says, "ask me about my extensive collection of free-verse poems featuring the word 'darkness.'"


This is a tattoo that says, "I will be wearing a turtleneck for every single day of my summer internship."


This is a tattoo that says, "since I assume you will be watching me while I sleep, I've provided you with extensive reading material."

This is a tattoo that says, "why do people keep buying me copies of Codependent No More?"


And finally, this is a Twilight tattoo that says, "basically, I have given up."

So, what will your Twilight tattoo say about you? Only you can decide! Well, you and everyone else who sees the words "R-PATT 4EVER" tattooed on your neck, I guess.

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SETH ROGEN IS OUTRAGED, Some More

Yes, it's true: Seth Rogen feels NOTHING BUT OUTRAGE! Because people just won't stop calling him a SEXIST! I mean, I imagine it hurts to be subject to such unfounded criticism; it's not like he's starred in and/or improvised much of the dialogue for a series of movies in which women are either Crazy Drunk Sluts or caretaking mechanisms for men, or like he starred in that one movie with the wacky rape scene, or like he wouldn't stop doing promotional interviews in which he praised the wacky rape scene, or like he wrote the screenplay for that one movie about how menstruating vaginas are terrible and you should get girls incapacitatingly drunk so as to fuck them and in which THE CHARACTER WHO FREAKED OUT ABOUT THE VAGINAS AND WAS MOST CREEPILY INTO THE GETTING-GIRLS-DRUNK PLAN WAS NAMED "SETH" AND WAS ORIGINALLY SUPPOSED TO BE PLAYED BY ROGEN HIMSELF, or... no, wait. Sources have confirmed that this is exactly what Seth Rogen has done. Because he is a sexist, probably.

Anyway, behold the terrible OUTRAGE of Rogen, via Vulture! Oh, and also, there is BONUS JUDD APATOW. Because Judd Apatow, when not defending himself from charges of sexism, likes to participate in the sexism of his friends. Because Judd Apatow is apparently that wormy little dude who is totally socially appropriate and non-sexist until he's in the company of bigger dudes who have his back and will help him get away with it. Because look at this shit:

Judd Apatow kept his criticism polite, explaining that she was "probably was doing six hours of interviews and kissing everyone's ass, and then just got tired and slipped a little bit." Luckily, however, Apatow brought his furry avatar, Seth Rogen, along to say what he was really thinking.

"I didn’t slip and I was doing fucking interviews all day too," said Rogen. "I didn't say shit!" Then he sarcastically praised Heigl's The Ugly Truth: "That [movie] looks like it really puts women on a pedestal in a beautiful way." Apatow joined in a little: "I hear there's a scene where she's wearing underwear with a vibrator in it, so I'd have to see if that was uplifting for women."

Apatow continued, "I feel sad that she hasn't learned the lesson of her journey yet ... [You'd think] at some point I'll get a call saying 'Sorry, I was tired ... ' and then the call never comes."

Yes, Apatow feels sorry for her. Isn't it terrible that she hasn't learned not to say that things are sexist in public? I mean, it is not as if Judd Apatow would not accept an apology from her. Truly, if only she would see the error of her ways and crawl back to Judd Apatow and repent of being one of the many people to point out the overwhelming sexism of Judd Apatow movies, Judd Apatow would welcome her with open arms. Although he would not give her more work, because although he keeps insane codependent multiple-film relationships with pretty much every dude he has ever worked with, the women show up in one movie and then go away forever unless he is married to them. Which is not sexist! NOT SEXIST AT ALL.

Anyway, it's Rogen, as always, who brings his typical not-sexist and illuminating commentary to the table, and thereby raises the bar for all of us:

"I gotta say, it’s not like we’re the only people she said some batshit crazy things about. That’s kind of her bag now."

Hey, remember when Rogen responded to the creators of Entourage (again: what?) and their accusations of misogyny by saying that they were "morons" and "assholes"? Note how this differs when the accuser is a woman. If a guy says it, it's an insult, and must be responded to in an appropriately macho manner. If a girl says it, it's beneath contempt. It invites pity. It just means that she's insane. Because it's not like women, being targets of misogyny, would know what it looks like or anything. No, they're just hysterical, the poor little things.

Thank God for Seth Rogen, disproving his own misogyny once and for all.


(PS: To folks who are asking me about "The Ugly Truth": Yes, I saw it. Yes, it's terrible. Hopefully you will hear what I have to say about it next week.)

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Sexist Beatdown: Ejaculations of Surprise Edition!

Why, hello there! I hope you have pleasant plans for the weekend. Me, I have to take my mother and brother out on the town. They will ask, "what precisely is it you do all day, Sady?" And I will say, "today, I posted a chat about whether or not you should let dudes ejaculate in your vagina. OR ELSEWHERE ON YOUR PERSON."

Yep! Science agrees, apparently, that pulling out is a "reliable" form of birth control. Tracy Quan believes this to be some BS - BS, perhaps, that will maybe result in you getting The Deadly Crotch Rot or an accidental fetus from when the dude in question "forgets" to utilize this cutting-edge birth control method! Meanwhile Jessica Grose thinks Tracy Quan needs to chill and give folks a little more credit.

Of course, this means that it is time for a Sexist Beatdown. Join us, as the incisive and funny Amanda Hess of Washington City Paper's The Sexist and I discuss the cutting-edge sperm-placement technologies of the modern age!

ILLUSTRATION: Oh, sure, he LOOKS cute and cuddly.

AMANDA: 9:23 a.m. is a great time to talk about the ups and downs of not ejaculating into vaginas.

SADY: yes. personally, when i heard that not ejaculating into vaginas was a "reliable" form of birth control, i had my suspicions! i was like: apparently all of the dudes i have argued with about birth control have become scientists! who knew?

AMANDA: published in the renowned peer-reviewed journal of medicine, Maxim.

SADY: right. it strikes me as some flawed science, is what i am saying! for, even if withdrawal is a semi-effective method of "birth control," it strikes me as a highly ineffective method of Not Getting Various Diseases Such As The Herp Control. which i think is what Tracy Quan is saying, which is good common sense.

AMANDA: of course, but at the same time, real scientists who are not your ex-boyfriends have worked very hard to come up with dozens of methods of birth control that also don't prevent STDs

SADY: fair enough! the scientists, they do these things! i suppose i am a person who likes a certain modicum of control over these situations. and withdrawal as birth control, TO ME, relies on your partner having (a) really good timing, and (b) a solid commitment to not getting distracted or losing track of whatever he is supposed to be doing, during a moment that (AS I UNDERSTAND IT) can be kind of distracting! (I AM REFERRING TO THE MALE ORGASM. In case my incredible tastefulness and subtlety are working against me.)

AMANDA: this is a point that Quan made as well, and I agree that for a lot of people withdraw would not be a good option for this reason. But all forms of birth control come with a degree of human error, or in some cases, shit ripping inside your vagina error. say you're a couple who doesn't want to use condoms. and the woman takes her birth control pills, but the man, like you, can't trust her---for whatever reason---to take them at the same time every day. maybe she forgets sometimes!

SADY: fair enough!

AMANDA: he might not want to rely on her, either. and so if you forget a birth control pill, or a condom breaks, or you ejaculate into a vagina, you know, you can take emergency contraception as well. one of the interesting things to me about this study---and i'm just going to assume the study is accurate for argument, because i don't know anything about methodology with these things. is that it placed withdrawl slightly below condoms, right? and still, most of the response has been, 'there's no way this could ever work, this is some frat dude conspiracy.' and so perhaps what this study reveals isn't that withdrawl is a very good option, but rather that we have a bit too much faith in condoms

SADY: a fascinating point! and i agree, some of this may have to do with the fact that, as long as i've been alive, anyway, Birth Control has been less important to the discussion than Safe Sex. and most of the sex ed i have ever received has been like, "USE CONDOMS, also there are other methods but seriously just USE CONDOMS." and i'm still a fan of the condom, because it is cheap and does not require a prescription and has a lower failure rate and higher disease protection rate than other things! the withdrawal method, to me, requires what is (in many or most circumstances) a perhaps unrealistically high level of trust for one's makeout partner. but maybe this just has to do with the fact that i have been culturally conditioned to trust other people less than i trust the Trojan corporation.

AMANDA: of course. and the method is really counter-intuitive, because pulling out is something that irresponsible 15 year old boys are supposed to do, when really it's something that would be more appropriate for, say, mutually monogamous STD-free old people.

SADY: right. it is odd for me that something which is the centerpiece of much heterosexual porn is now a meaningful expression of committed monogamous trust. NEXT UP: how having sex on a bus can keep you from getting cancer!

AMANDA: hhahaha. yeah. i heard if you put a donut on it and then seductively bite it off it lowers the risk of kidney failure, or something

SADY: WOW. a doughnut, you say! i guess i've been doing it all wrong with the bagels.

AMANDA: i'm with the critics of Quan with this one, though - something that PEOPLE DO turning out to be less sexually risky than we thought is probably a good thing. she says a bit of anxiety is good, but i actually have a lot of that! and so reducing that is probably a good thing for a lot of people. maybe not for Quan, but it's not like we're getting rid of condoms! The Trojan lobby (sponsored by Tiger Beatdown) would never allow that.

SADY: true enough. i guess i am just concerned with the fact that there is already pressure on girls to be the "cool" ones who don't "make" the dude use condoms. i do not know why i think that the sort of dudes who apply that pressure are all going to show up with scientific studies and go through a careful risk-benefit analysis! yet i do. in conclusion: withdrawal is totally fine, if you want to do that and are reasonable about it, and not fine if you do not. CONTROVERSY!

AMANDA: agreed. DON'T LET HIM NOT EJACULATE IN YOUR VAGINA IF YOU DON'T WANT HIM TO NOT DO THAT, KIDS.

SADY: there, problem solved. everybody does what they want to do. the real winner? the paper towel industry. hurrah!

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IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT: "The Ugly Truth" Is, Indeed, Ugly

Here is a thing I was writing in e-mails to everybody late last week: I seriously never thought I would see a movie more offensive to all of my many delicate sensibilities than Observe & Report! But I did. I saw that movie. And then I wrote about it, for Comment is Free:

Anyone who goes to the movies looking for sexism has her work cut out for her. Most movies are directed by men. The vast majority of top studio executives are men. Male demographics are prized. And, maybe because of the above-mentioned facts about who is producing and creating movies, most movies tend to focus on male experiences and male heroes, while movies made "for women" tend to be tossed-off, patronising and terrible. It's more challenging, actually, to look for movies that aren't sexist.

Nevertheless, when every single review of a movie mentions its misogyny, I pay attention. Particularly when it comes from a screenplay written by three ladies, and when one of those very few female studio executives – Amy Pascal, of Sony Pictures Entertainment – was responsible for green-lighting it.

This was why I ended up going out to a theatre in Queens, New York, in the middle of the day, to see The Ugly Truth, the beautiful, terrible brainchild of screenwriters Nicole Eastman, Karen McCullah Lutz and Kirsten Smith. Readers: If there is any experience more humiliating for a girl than uttering the phrase "One for The Ugly Truth, please," I haven't had it yet. As I took the ticket, I realised that to any outside observer, this would appear to be the absolute worst-case scenario for my life.

Oh, it is long and it is angry. Read it, please, that my suffering may not be in vain.

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How Not To Be Called A Racist: Several Easy Pointers From Sally Quinn

You know what? God bless The Awl. I do not have the patience to read the entire Internet (I just have a Google alert set up for words like "sexism!" And the phrase "more women than men," because typically when that phrase shows up it is gonna be good) but they do, and they find things there, and typically those things are pretty special.

Like, for example, this! In which noted white person Sally Quinn promises "The Ugly, Honest Truth About Race In America." Hurrah! A white person is here to tell us what is up! And she makes it through several entire paragraphs before landing on this:

What nobody will say publicly, for fear of being called a racist

BAM.

Now: here is how this works. Let's say there is a brutal system of privilege - really, pick your brutal system! I'm going to say Race, today - that continually privileges the experiences, comforts, and lives of some people (let's say, White People!) over others. Let's say that these privileges are so very intrinsic to the way we live that most people have trouble even recognizing that they exist. Let's say, thirdly, that there has been continual pushback, over the course of centuries, on the behalf of folks who have noticed that the privilege exists, and have been working to identify and analyze the dynamics of it. And let's say, finally, that we live in the Year of Our Lord 2009, and this business has been going on for at least a couple hundred years and the progress we have made is: now, when someone is being a racist, you can say that. Even though you will probably be called "angry" and a "fringe-dweller" and be marginalized for your godless Communist views, at least you can say the word "racist" because people have some vague idea as to what it means.

What does this mean? It means, of course, that we have GONE TOO FAR! The forces of PC censorship are upon us, suppressing our rights! Or, at least, they are suppressing our rights if we are privileged people; if we are not, our rights are being suppressed in many other creative ways. For example, we could be Henry Louis Gates, Jr., who was arrested in his own home and then got angry and then was penalized and blamed for not "cooperating." But, whatever! Back to the White People! Who, like Sally Quinn, WILL NOT BE SILENCED about the Gates thing. The fact that you might get called a racist for being all racist-like is sheer tyranny, and she will not put up with it. And so she, like many before her, has cast herself as a fearless truth-teller, willing to point out that there are things people simply will not say for fear of being called racist. Such as racist things! Or:

[Gates] is notorious, especially among many of his colleagues (black and white) at Harvard, for being short-tempered and arrogant. I have had personal dealings with him in which his behavior was not honorable.

WOW. We have "short-tempered," we have "arrogant," we have various unspecified sources who don't like him, we have various unspecified incidents in which Sally Quinn, Noted White Person and Non-Racist, was not pleased with him... can we work the word "uppity" into this sentence, Sally? No? Okay, then. Good try.

Gosh, we've certainly learned a lot from Sally Quinn today about not being called racists! Let's run down the list:

1. DON'T POSIT "BEING CALLED OUT FOR YOUR RACISM" AS WORSE THAN ACTUALLY BEING THE TARGET OF RACISM. It makes you look like a total whiner! And also, a racist.
2. DON'T SAY THAT THE TEXTBOOK RACIST THING WE ARE TALKING ABOUT WAS PROBABLY THE BLACK DUDE'S FAULT. If possible, you should also try not to supply vague anecdotal data about how nobody likes him because of how "arrogant" he is! This is because it is racist, and people might say so.

My goodness! So much information! And in such a short space, too. Are there any other common blunders that may result in being called racist that you would like to share, Sally?

in response to the Gates & Crowley incident, many of my white friends and colleagues have been discussing reverse discrimination.

BAM.

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News Flash: Christina Hendricks Is An Articulate Person. And Has Jugs.

I am on the record as someone who watches Mad Men compulsively. I am also on the record as someone who does not get the crazy fetishization of Joan and/or Christina Hendricks. In fact, I am annoyed by it, mostly because the public discussion around Joan tends to take one of three forms: (1) OMG BOOBIES, (2) wow, she is just super fat and I must be really open-minded for liking her OMG BOOBIES, or (3) see? Women could get ahead in the 1960s! By being sexy! In related news, BOOBIES, OMG.

Also, Peggy is better. Sorry! She just is.

Anyway, imagine my surprise at discovering that, when interviewers are not focusing specifically and entirely on the culturally significant breasts of Christina Hendricks, she has interesting things to say! Behold, from this recent piece in New York Magazine:

“What’s astounding is when people say things like, ‘Well, you know that episode where Joan sort of got raped?’ Or they say rape and use quotation marks with their fingers,” says Hendricks. “I’m like, ‘What is that you are doing? Joan got raped!’ It illustrates how similar people are today, because we’re still questioning whether it’s a rape. It’s almost like, ‘Why didn’t you just say bad date?’ ”

Whoa hey! A solid point! About how Joan's rape would not have been recognized as such in 1962 (because her rapist was the dude to whom she was engaged) and, honestly, many people still have trouble calling such incidents "rape" now!

The interview concludes with Christina Hendricks answering a question about her breasts.

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The Continuance Of Sexism In Our Enlightened Post-Feminist Era, Featuring Synonyms for Breasts

It's weird, right? Because the second wave accomplished all its goals, and then feminism died in the '90s because Camille Paglia killed it, and now we can all stop bitching and enjoy our totally level playing field because sexism doesn't exist and if it does it is subtle and insignificant and not a real problem and we can gain power by manipulating men with our sex appeal so it all evens out. And yet, sometimes, I still get the feeling that something is up!

Anyway, I went to the liquor store last night.


Huh.

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The Continuance of Sexism and Racism In Our Enlightened Post-Feminist, Post-Racial Era, Featuring More Grabbing

So! I have this problem with hipsters sometimes. I try not to share it, because I can be kind of mean (SHOCKER), and I know some folks who have been tagged with the "hipster" label. And that is fine if you are not too invested in it. But here is this argument I keep having, and in the interests of fairness I will present both sides:

PLAYER 1: The thing is, there's nothing wrong with feeling superior to people because you have good taste!
PLAYER 2: Actually, maybe there is, because that means your sense of self is based on the stuff you buy.
PLAYER 1: Ah, but the entire culture is special in various ways, thus legitimating the sense of superiority!
PLAYER 2: How? Where does the "superiority" come from? Is it superiority of morals, of politics, of principle?
PLAYER 1: Sure! Why not?
PLAYER 2: Actually, Isaac Brock may have raped someone, "hipster racism" is so universally acknowledged as to be a catchphrase, and the class dynamics of "ironically" appropriating Poor White People or Poor Black People stuff whilst laughing about how awful it is are really troubling. And I've met a fuckload of misogynist hipsters. Also.
PLAYER 1: The thing is, there's nothing wrong with feeling superior to people because you have good taste!
PLAYER 2: Fair enough, I guess. I am not wearing a Nickelback shirt right now.
PLAYER 1: Ha ha, Nickelback. They suck!
PLAYER 2: They seriously do!

Anyway, I used to live right next to a Diesel store when that was happening! Here is a Diesel ad, via Racialicious.


Oh, here's another one. Why the heck not!


One of these things is not like the others, yall.

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Mommy's All Right, Daddy's All Right: Or, Why "Hipster Racism" Was Invented By Your Drunk Grandpa

You know what I love? Comments. I love them! Thanks to comments, and thanks specifically to a comment by favorite person Snobographer (SNOBOGRAPHERRRRRR), I finally think I may have pinned down what bothers me about "ironic" racism and sexism and what have you. Here is what bothers me about "ironic" racism and sexism and what have you: it's just. So. Fucking. Bougie.

Yes, that's right! My crankiness about the young people has turned out to be, in fact, merely another example of my crankiness about the moral codes of the white middle class! Which makes sense, given that the hipster thing is, in and of itself, a pretty white, middle-class phenomenon. This was the entire point of Stuff White People Like, right? This is not a new point that I am making! But, to explain how it ties into hip racism and sexism, I invite you to go on a journey with me. A journey many of you may have taken before. A journey to your white, middle-class parents' house for Thanksgiving.

(Don't have white, middle-class parents? No worries! This is a journey of education.)

Okay, so the first thing that happens at your white, middle-class parents' house is that some gay dudes have moved in next door. Everyone is making a big show of how tolerant they are! But then, somebody - let's say your mom - leans over to you, and lowers her voice, and says something really, really fucktacular about The Gays. And you gasp, and you go, "Mother! That's not OK!" And she looks at you, all wounded and indignant, and says, "honey, I am not a homophobe."

Welcome to the bougie dynamic. Prejudices are thought of as nasty and tasteless and unrefined and bad, and of course all of us white middle-class people aspire to taste and refinement, and also to having a whole lot of smooth jazz CDs, and so we imagine that racism and sexism and homophobia and the like are only engaged in by dirty poor people, also known as White Trash. (See, also: white people being dismayed by black male sexism and homophobia.) This is another thing pointed out by lots of people, like Barbara Ehrenreich and such! At a certain point, the privilege and prejudice of the middle class got projected onto the working class, because it was an undesirable characteristic and we love attributing those to poor people. So, no, we middle-class folk are not prejudiced! We just, um, say prejudiced things a lot?

Now, join us, as we go on another journey: a journey out for drinks with some white, middle-class hipsters! They are also cultured; you can tell, because they don't have any smooth jazz CDs. They are also totally not like their parents, and they want you to realize and appreciate this very important fact. And yet, at some point, during the drinks, somebody says something really fucktacular about The Gays. It is puzzling to you, because he is not actually lowering his voice, as his parents and yours would do; he is raising his voice and smiling and is clearly very proud of this thing he has said. He seems to feel it is quite iconoclastic and bold, this thing about The Gays he is saying! And yet, if you call him out on it, he will look at you all wounded and indignant and say, "look, I am not a homophobe."

Forget it, Jake; it's Bougie-Town. VICE-esque racism and sexism, and the hipster "rebellion" from middle-class mores, consists only of raising one's voice rather than lowering it when behaving like a jackass. Because it's cool, right? We're all cool? Cool because we think of prejudice as problematic, not on moral grounds, but on grounds of taste - and have innoculated ourselves against charges of prejudice by making sure our tastes are appropriately classy. Cool because we think saying aloud what our parents would whisper qualifies as "rebellious," rather than "the same old shit cranked up to 11."

Oh, and also, if you really lay into your friend, he'll misuse the word "ironic" and tell you that you can't take a joke. Which is not so much a cool young person thing as a thing your grandpa does after he's had a couple and has started calling you a Commie, but whatever.

So, for the record, here is some irredeemably crass titillation, beloved only by those with a deplorable lack of education, refinement or taste:


Here is something that it is totally cool to jerk off to:



Here is a woman who only plays hollow, personality-free fantasy sex objects, and whom we must all deplore for that reason:



Here is a woman who only plays hollow, personality-free fantasy sex objects, and is your imaginary girlfriend:

Here is an ad that grosses you out with its overly obvious, porn-inflected sexuality and its choice to cast a living model as an inanimate object:

Here is an ad that is full of sexy fun times:

I trust you begin to see the problem. Bad news, though: to remedy this, we would actually have to adopt a system of aesthetics that values content over cultural positioning, and a system of rebellion that values resistance to power over nihilistic, self-indulgent acceptance of it. And that is just so out of style.

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What's Your Tucker Max Personality Type?

Hey, you know what I love? Quizzes! Like the ones you get on the Facebook from your former co-workers and such. What's Your Meyers-Briggs Personality Type? What Kind Of Kisser Are You? If You Were A Sandwich, Would You Have Mustard On You? Love those things! Which is why I never do them and have not been on Facebook for several months.

You know what I've never done, though? Designed a personality quiz. Luckily for me, my future husband Tucker Max has just released his new movie trailer. For "I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell!"

(Why is Tucker Max my future husband, you ask? Why, because I cannot think of him without kind of wanting to throw up or cry! There is not a man on this Earth who inspires me to more revulsion, and having watched several romantic comedies, including "The Ugly Truth," I now know that this means we are going to fall in love and be together forever.)

Anyway, here's my boyfriend's trailer!



Okay! Done throwing things at the computer monitor? Super! It's time for my awesome new personality quiz: Which Woman From The "I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell" Trailer Are You?

1) DO YOU TALK TO TURTLES? If you answered Yes, you are That Lady Who Talks To Turtles! You are crazy and stupid, like a woman would be. Also, you appear to be the only non-white person in the entire universe.

2) ARE YOU NOT A REAL PERSON? If you answered Yes, you are That Fat Girl Over There! You are a barrel full of laughs at your own expense, like all women, but especially fat ones. Also, it's okay to talk about killing you because you don't give Tucker Max a boner.

3) ARE YOU A CLINGING, CASTRATING HARPY WHO DOESN'T WANT YOUR BOYFRIEND TO EVER HAVE ANY AWESOME FUN WITH HIS BROS? If you answered Yes, you are The Girlfriend Who Yells Into The Phone! You are a very busy lady, as you were last seen yelling into the phone at Bradley Cooper in "The Hangover" trailer (OH HAI I THINK YOU MADE THE SAME MOVIE TWICE GUYS YOU MAYBE WANNA LOOK INTO THAT) and are currently scheduled to appear in several Judd Apatow movies. You are no fun, because you are a woman.

4) ARE YOU 98% OF THE WOMEN IN THIS TRAILER? If you answered Yes, you are a stripper! You probably don't have any lines. You do have boobies, though! Boobies that are presented for the delectation of Tucker Max and his awesome bro-band, because you are a woman.

5) ARE YOU FULL OF SELF-LOATHING AND GIGGLES? If you answered Yes, you are The Lady Who Makes Out With Tucker Max! You also do not have any lines, because you are basically a prop to show that Tucker Max can put his penis into a real live vagina if he wants to, because you are a woman.

6) ARE YOU KIND OF GROSSED OUT BY THE SIGHT OF SOMEONE MAKING OUT WITH TUCKER MAX, AND DO YOU EXPRESS THIS BY ACTING LIKE MARGARET DUMONT IN A MARX BROTHERS MOVIE? You are Gertrude. You're next!

7) DO YOU FIND THAT NONE OF THE ABOVE DESCRIPTIONS ARE AT ALL RELEVANT TO YOU, YOUR LIFE, OR YOUR PERSONALITY? Take it again! This is a professionally made movie, by professionals, who got paid to provide you with their professional film. It is not as if one can become a professional director or screenwriter if one has absolutely no functioning knowledge of what women are like and relies on obnoxious stereotype instead of insight or creativity! So, seriously, take the quiz again, because the only other option is that you are Tucker Max. And nobody wants that. Not even me. His lover.

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Annals of Fashion, or: Your Raging Narcissism Will Destroy Us All

Oh, Google Alerts. Whatever would I do without you? Live a life less full of outrage and yelling, most likely. However! Had I not Alerts from the Google, I would never see headlines like the following. And I think we can all agree that would be a loss:

Crisis pushes men to therapy, women to handbags

Blammo! Yes, the men, poor dears (we all know that they are THE MORE AFFECTED BY THIS RECESSION, right? Right) are quite literally going insane due to the dark economic times that are upon us. Whereas women, as I believe Judith Butler once said, be shopping!

Do you know what is fun about this article? What is fun about this article is that it provides just about no supporting evidence that men are seeking therapy in greater numbers! What it does provide is some quotes from a "gender marketing expert" (oh, goody) named Diana Jaffe about the tortured male psyche and the fact that a man's very sanity depends on having a big fancy job, like so:

"Women are also worried about their jobs, but not to the extent that they feel their mere existence is being threatened...Many male managers are suffering from a huge loss of status, many feel under an enormous amount of pressure or are suffering from burnout. They just don't have the resources to think about buying luxury goods and prefer to go to a life coach," [Jaffe] said.

Also, there is this, from a dude who has some job relating to handbags:

"Men are more affected psychologically by the crisis than women. A bag can be bought on impulse, whereas a jewelry or watch purchase is not."

Actually, the bags being discussed in the piece are Hermes bags, which (a) cost more than just about anybody could afford without careful financial planning and saving up over a period of time, and (b) actually require you to register on an extensive waiting list in some cases, so "impulse" is pretty much exactly the opposite of what these purchases would be for many or most folks.

But, whatever. Let's talk about how women are buying more luxury goods than men! (Or just more handbags? Because we all know how the men were with their fancy handbags before the crisis, am I right, ladies?) And not how it is driving those men LITERALLY OUT OF THEIR MINDS WITH DESPAIR, or whatever, since the article seems not to prove that this is actually happening. Let's talk about the relationship women have to shopping: why we be shopping as often as we do.

Because we're ladies! And it's our job, basically! There are several entire industries devoted to convincing us that (a) our worth lies in how attractive we are, and (b) in order to be attractive, we need to buy stuff. LOTS of stuff. If you are a lady, you seriously need to be pretty and sexy and cute, because otherwise nobody will care about you. And, obviously, you can't do that in what you're wearing now. What are you wearing now? Yeah, that is terrible. Buy something else!

But here is the problem: if you actually buy into these things, and support these industries, then we get to talk about how frivolous and superficial and silly you are. Stupid woman! You are out buying handbags while the men are tightening their belts and crying noble tears over the economic future of our nation! Need we any further proof that you are of a lesser order?

Now, begone from my sight, empty-headed female! And take your butt-ugly shoes with you. Gladiator sandals are just so painfully last summer.

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META-POST: Do I Really Want To Hurt You? Do I Really Want To Make You Cry?

You know: it's been a weird week. A week in which I have been required to defend my murderously insensitive stances on a variety of topics, including Zooey Deschanel, divorce, and dead kittens. And, following the advice of some close personal friends, all of whom are probably sick of having conversations that begin with me stating, "THAT'S IT! I'M QUITTING THE INTERNET," I have decided that it is time to address matters. With shouting!

For starters, you may not be aware of this, but you are reading a blog called Tiger Beatdown. When I look up "Tiger Beatdown" on the Google, I often come across lines such as, "Tiger Beatdown is fucking venomous." And that is from a positive review. The less positive reviews tend to use the word "cunt" a lot. Which is to say: I have a sharp tone. If you don't watch out, you might cut yourself. Whoops.

Is this incompatible with maintaining a safe space? I would argue that it is not! Because here is the subject of this blog: structural oppressions and privileges. Lady issues more often than not, but also issues relating to race, class, sexuality, and transness. I want people to come here and see that stuff subverted and resisted, not reinforced. I maintain a "safe" space in that I don't want anyone to be devalued on the basis of what they are.

As for who they are: well, that's different. Each and every one of us is a special and unique snowflake, and some snowflakes happen to be more obnoxious and tiresome than others. This blog is about structural oppressions and privileges, yes. But here is what it is not about: your parents' relationship, your pet cat, your favorite movie stars, or your personal awesomeness in general. The blog also isn't about my personal awesomeness in general - if it were, the posts would be called things like, "Will I Put On Pants Today? Sources Say No!" - so this does not mean that I don't like you. I like pretty much every single person I've spoken with on or through this blog! I feel very lucky to have the readers that I do! But that's not what the blog itself is about.

What does this mean? It means that, if I fuck up on covering structural issues - if I say something that is racist, or sexist, or anti-trans, or anti-queer - you can and should call me out. If I say that Cheerios are the best breakfast cereal, and you prefer Frosted Mini-Wheats, and you feel tempted to write a multi-part screed on how I just don't care about people who love Frosted Mini-Wheats and, you know, you don't see enough coverage of Fruit Loops either... well, have you considered NOT doing that? You should. You really, really should.

I know, I know. HARSH. And this gets particularly sticky when we are talking about things that are close to people's hearts - like their pet cats, or their parents' relationship. I do, in fact, have compassion for people who are extremely sensitive about those things. And I want to tell you why I have this genuine compassion by telling you a little about myself.

Throughout my early twenties, I was a very fucked-up individual.* This is because I was dealing with a variety of things: several incidences of sexual assault, a relationship with a fairly toxic dynamic (which I played a big part in creating, being fucked-up and all), my abusive dad (who FAKED HIS OWN DEATH, basically, in the middle of my junior year of college: literally, there were two months during which we actually thought he had actually died, and then he showed up, and it's a long fucking story). It reached a peak somewhere in the middle of that junior year, wherein I literally would not stop talking about how horrible my life was, maybe just to be heard, maybe to get empathy, but probably just to get pity. Like, I took all of these non-fiction writing courses and EVERY SINGLE ASSIGNMENT turned into me writing some hyperbolic J.T. LeRoy shit about something awful that had happened to me and then we'd get to the "workshop" portion where everyone would read it and look at me with these "YIKES" faces and, basically, just focus on the grammar, because what else do you say?

I will tell you what else you say. Because, on the last day of junior year, this other woman with a very sharp tone noticed me about to launch into yet another story about how awful my life was, and she said this:

"You do know that everyone else goes through hard times too, don't you?"

And she also said this:

"I'm really tired of being held hostage to your personal breakdown."

This is an unflattering story, in case you haven't noticed! It is a story in which I am the villain! But I get the sense that a lot of people might be in the same place I was, years ago, and that is why I need to speak to you about this. Focus on the issues: sure, fine, great. The issues are often about people being hurt, so noting the existence of pain isn't taboo either. But, for the love of God, do not try to turn this public forum into a referendum on whether or not your pain matters. Because, basically, that is also a referendum on whether or not you matter. And you have to decide that question for yourself. Some woman you've never met who runs a blog can't answer that question for you. Nor can you resolve it by hosting a My Life Sucks party on the Internet, derailing an entire conversation to talk about whether or not you have worth as a person and how much pain you're in and doing that passive-aggressive codependent bullshit wherein if people don't immediately weigh in to talk about how much they pity you they're all terrible monsters so they'd better do it RIGHT AWAY. You can get all the pity in the world, but at the end of the day, it matters fuck-all, because you still feel like shit. All that matters is where you stand with yourself. And if you don't get that: let me tell you, you will be chasing the pity forever. You will always want more. There are just not enough people in the world to love and support and care about you, there's not enough attention, there's not enough praise, there's not enough consideration, ever, because deciding that you matter is your fucking job and everything else that is offered to you just gets sucked into the black hole that's where your self-respect should be and almost instantly disappears.

So, yeah. I get that your life might be tough right now. But don't make me the person who's supposed to fix it. Because I'm just writing about ladybusiness.

And, on a ladybusiness-related note: have you noticed that it's pretty infantilizing, this stuff? I mean, we've been demanding the right to be treated like adults, proclaiming our strength, clamoring about how we want to be full participants in society and democracy, for over a hundred years. But here's the thing: democracy means one person, one voice. It means everyone gets to participate equally, everyone gets to be heard, no-one is privileged based on what they are and no-one is denied access because of what they are. It's a noble goal. But "one person, one voice" does not ever mean that all of the voices are going to agree with you. You can lay out your arguments, you can discuss, you can converse, but making it all about your personal pain at being challenged or disagreed with: well, shit, if you can't handle that, why did you get out of bed this morning? You're not a child. Don't ask people to treat you like one. Because people can pat you on the head and treat you like a special little princess and continually protect your fragile being, but when the time comes to go to war, to stand up, to be a force to be reckoned with, you're going to be completely unequipped.

The world is fucked, kids. You know it. You've seen it. If you are basically anyone other than a thin able-bodied white dude who likes the ladies and makes truckloads of cash, a substantial portion of the world is convinced that you just do not matter. Wishing aloud that the world catered more specifically to your personal wishes and desires... well, that's not how it works. It's missing the point, actually. Because the point is not, and never has been, you. The point is everybody. So you get up every morning, and you put on your armor, and you make things change.

*UPDATE: An e-mail from a reader suggests that this post may be insensitive to people with depression or other forms of mental illness. Some of the behavior that I am describing is, in fact, common to people who are depressed. Here is the official Tiger Beatdown position on this: if you are depressed, or think you might be depressed, please go to the doctor. Seriously. If I could possess your body for 24 hours and drive you there and get you the prescription or the referral or whatever it's going to take for you to treat your potentially lethal illness, I would do that. But I cannot! Which is good, since I cannot actually drive and would wreck your car! So that is - as I said above - your job! It is really super self-destructive to seek help via derailing Internet conversations: it not only puts people in the position of having to provide help they're neither trained to provide nor capable of providing, it can - if used as a substitute for real treatment - actually endanger your health still further. People have, historically, tried a lot of substitutes for medical treatment of depression - Jesus, beer, Livejournal - and really, they don't ever work out well. So don't try to make this blog one of them.

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And Amanda Hess Is Out Of Town This Week: ROISSY Makes It Big

Friends: let us go back in time. A time when I also fought with people about my blog! Or, to be more precise, a time when I fought with a person about my blog. That person was my gentleman caller, and he was basically the only person who read it, and the fight was about the fact that he could not for the life of him see why I had written a post about noted doucheblogger Roissy in DC.

Why give him the attention, was the question? Why notice him? Why care? It only made him more popular! And so my vast network of findings about Roissy and the men who read him - links to a blog by an adult man about how he only dated teenage girls, endless comments about when it was okay to abuse a woman (answers: before sex, during sex, after sex, if she has ever had sex before, if she will not have sex with you), blog entries by Roissy himself about how he had to be "careful" with certain women so that they wouldn't "accuse him" of rape - which, you know, made it sound A WHOLE LOT as if he might have ACTUALLY RAPED SOMEONE: these went unreported. Because I agreed. Really, who wants to give Roissy more legitimacy? Who wants to acknowledge that he exists?

Say, you know who wants to give Roissy attention this week? Lots of people! Because a man who kept a blog about how women were monsters because they wouldn't sleep with him eventually, in a stunning twist, ended up shooting a whole lot of women, and himself. And Roissy, basically, approved:

When men kill women, the underlying reason is almost always an unfulfilled psychosexual need. This goes for spree shooters, rapists, and serial killers... celibacy is walking death and anything is justified in avoiding that miserable fate.

There you have it, ladies: fuck or die.

Here is someone who never stopped covering Roissy: Amanda Hess of The Sexist! And, a week before Roissy's murder-approval post went up, she covered a post on his blog entitled "Shady Character Game." Which is, basically, about how women like murderers, and you should pretend to be one so that they'll fuck.

With the right props and an inscrutable demeanor, you can take advantage of women’s instincts to be attracted to violent, unpredictable, enigmatic men. What’s that you say? Hot babes don’t go for criminals, thugs, or cold-blooded soulkillers? Keep telling yourself that.

If your lying eyes aren’t enough to convince you of the depraved nature of women’s desire, take it from the commenters at Roissy who have every incentive to prove me wrong... Do you want a woman eating out of your palm? Make her think you’ve killed people!

Is it unpredictable that someone who buys into this kind of thinking - about how women owe men sex, about how women are worthless except for their ability to provide sex, about how force and cruelty can get you sex because women are "depraved" and only go for men who can hurt them - decided not to "pretend," and actually just killed people? No. No, it's not. Because the entire Game line, the entire Pick-Up Artist culture, is based on the idea that men are nothing unless they fuck, and women exist solely and entirely for the purpose of being fucked, and women matter so little that lying to them, coercing them into sex, or hurting them emotionally (or physically, apparently, in some cases) are actually good, desirable behaviors - behaviors women like, whether or not they'll admit it, the lying whores - because they result in men getting to fuck and therefore feel powerful.

Of course some women got killed. Of course women get sexually assaulted. We can pretend that it's "fringe" behavior, and yeah, maybe some people on the extreme fringes of that fringe will take it to a level where everyone can agree that it's gone "too far" - like, for example, mass murder - but it's not. It's a bestselling book, and it's a series on VH1, and it is totally acceptable within a misogynist culture. We only notice that something is up when there are bodies on the floor.

So, basically, if anyone ever asks you why you're paying attention to this stuff, why you're giving it so much focus, why it matters - why you talk about publicity-based monsters like Paul Janka or Tucker Max or Mystery or Roissy in DC, when that only makes them stronger - I have a suggestion for how to explain it to them. Tell them you're afraid for your life.

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Today, In Unsubstantiated Rumors: Lady Gaga's Ladybits

So, we all know about my weird thing with Lady GaGa right? Like, basically I think she is an undercover performance artist attempting to decode the whole "sexy pop star" thing and its implications re: gender and sexuality and also sort of taking the piss with the whole sexy pop star thing whilst wearing corsets with exploding breast cups and disco ball dresses and what-have-you and singing songs about the disco sticks and the bluffing of muffins and I love her. Embarrassing, but true!

So, here is something else going on with Lady Gaga: there is a video of her ladybits circulating the Internet. Some people claim that they appear to be the ladybits of an intersex lady! I have seen the video, though I'm not embedding it here (although it is at the link, because it is everywhere) because it is gross and ties into the whole fetishization of trans and intersex folks and also the whole "DECEPTIVE TRANNY" meme where it is somehow your business to know exactly what is happening in the underpants of everyone around you. But, yes, there is a video of Lady Gaga's ladybusiness on the Internet. And here is a quote attributed to Lady Gaga "about" her ladybits, and it runs like this:

"It’s not something that I’m ashamed of, just isn’t something that I go around telling everyone. Yes. I have both male and female genitalia, but I consider myself a female. It’s just a little bit of a penis and really doesn’t interfere much with my life. The reason I haven’t talked about it is that it’s not a big deal to me. Like come on. It’s not like we all go around talking about our vags. I think this is a great opportunity to make other multiple gendered people feel more comfortable with their bodies. I’m sexy, I’m hot. I have both a poon and a peener. Big f*cking deal."

If were true, and Lady Gaga had said it: good job, Lady. This would be a very lovely thing to say, were you the first intersex pop star to be publicly outed as such, and it would quite possibly make me love her whole postmodern Sexy Lady Pop Star Sexiness project even more.

Oh, too bad it was all made up, though! The quote is from a "satire" site, apparently. And why a perfectly reasonable statement about being cool with your ladybits and your intersexness is "satire," I have no idea, but here's my first guess: the world hates intersex and trans people.

Oh, and here's the reaction on Bossip:

Not that anyone wanted to before but are any dudes still trying to chop this down now that she’s the one with the axe?

Sex as an act of force? The idea that trans and intersex people are inherently unfuckable? Oh, hurrah! And the commenters file suit, contributing perceptive thoughts such as, "That’s just plain ol’ nasty….a dick & a pussy yet she say she is bi…I don’t get it," and, "Why are people staying “she?” Isn’t there a proper pronoun for hermaphrodite?" (Someone else weighs in with INTERSEX SENSITIVITY TRAINING, instructing "Yes, it’s she/he or it.") And, of course, there are the requisite promises to throw away her CDs.

So, yeah. It will always puzzle me when cisgendered people don't see how the marginalization and oppression of trans people affects them. Because the fact is that there are a ton of trans people in the world, and you don't necessarily know who they are, and they're not required to tell you. But when people get a case of the Deceptive Tranny Fever, nothing - not decency, not tolerance, not basic fact-checking, not even Google - will get in their way.

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Hip To Be Square: Part Two In a No-Doubt Ongoing Series

Say, does anyone remember when the trailer for The Hangover was released a few months ago? All the pop culture trailer reviewers were like, "oh my, this looks like the best!" Okay, yes. So, does anyone remember when the trailer for I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell was released last week? All the pop culture trailer reviewers were like, "oh, no, it feels like someone pooped directly into my eyeball!"

Okay. So, hey, has anyone noticed that they are basically the same trailer?

Weird, right? You can't attribute the different critical reactions to changing tastes, since they're only being released a few months apart. Nor can you attribute it to one movie being ripped off from the other, since they were probably being made at roughly the same time. I know that, last week, I did this fun little thought experiment where I compared mainstream frat-dude misogyny (DEPLORABLE!) to cute hip fashionable pseudo-indie misogyny (IRONIC!) and it turned out that they were basically the same thing and the differing reactions to them were attributable only to a phenomenon scientists refer to as "bullshit," but let's not jump to conclusions. Let's puzzle out the vastly differing critical reactions to these no-doubt vastly different trailers step by step, with this handy checklist:

1) BACHELOR PARTY: Check!
2) BAND OF BROS: Check!
3) CASTRATING HARPY WHO DOESN'T WANT HER BOYFRIEND TO EVER HAVE ANY FUN EVER, AND THEREFORE EXPRESSES RESERVATIONS RE: BACHELOR PARTY WITH BAND OF BROS: Check.
4) CASTRATING HARPY WHO SCREAMS INTO THE PHONE ABOUT WHEREABOUTS OF HER BOYFRIEND: Check.
5) STRIPPERS AS PUNCHLINES: Check, indeed! (Andy from The Office gets married to one! You can hear him scream the comedy-gold line "I married a whore" in a different version of the trailer; presumably later he gets down with her on the basis that she is not a castrating harpy.)
6) CONFRONTATION WITH POLICE: Check, again! It is getting pretty tiresome running down the list, actually. Oh, but:
7) HILARIOUS FACIAL INJURY: Check, and:
8) PRESENCE OF BELOVED "INDIE" COMEDIAN (WHATEVER THE FUCK THAT MEANS) THAT ENSURES PEOPLE WILL GO SOFT ON THE WHOLE THING EVEN THOUGH SAID BELOVED INDIE COMEDIAN IS BASICALLY SIGNING UP TO BECOME WILL FERRELL (SOME OF US REFER TO THIS AS "SELLING OUT"): No! Sadly, I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell lacks this crucial element. Also, Tucker Max is beloved by gross sexist "frat boys" as opposed to gross sexist indie dudes (THOSE DON'T EXIST! INDIE DUDES ARE ALWAYS TOTES SENSITIVE AND COOL AND UNCONVENTIONAL, ha ha, J/K), so that's a strike against it. This movie looks terrible. Fire away, everybody!

So, there you have it. Zach Galifianakis is basically a pair of gold hologram leggings. Glad I could help you puzzle this one out.

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