Thursday, March 14, 2013

Cosmocking: April '13!


Yellow cover!  Kim Kardashian!  I don't know what's going on with her... lower garment!  I think Cosmo's stylists are getting pretty desperate to make the 35,000-year-old concept of "wearing clothes" seem fresh and new every month!  Go ahead and trace a line from the center of Kim's cleavage to the center of her neck and explain what kind of skeletal structure that implies!  Also please note that her arms are different lengths!

(I think what's going on here is that they've Photoshopped away all creases and features on her neck, which makes the side of her neck look like the front.  And they posed her with both arms behind her so that her chest would stick out, but then her right arm looked wrong or wasn't visible, so they pasted on a replacement arm.  Which would explain the surreal way her hand is interacting with her thighs.)
"I loved reading 'Can Sex Make You Skinnier?'  The next time I had an intense carb craving, I marched right into my bedroom and pounced on my sleeping, unsuspecting boyfriend.  I'm thankful for my new weapon in battling bulge, and my boyfriend is too!  Thanks, Cosmo!"  --Sarah A., Nashville, Tenn.
I'm not, like, an expert in forensic writing analysis or anything, but I think Cosmo's letters page is fake.  Just a hunch here.

Also I would prefer to not eroticize "pouncing" on "unsuspecting" people, but if I point out every time Cosmo does that, we'll be here all day.
Four tiny bottles, each with a secret code name, sit on a shiny table in front of Kim Kardashian, awaiting inspection.  Inside the vial are versions of her latest fragrance, Glam, which is being tweaked to appeal to Japanese consumers. [...] She waves each test strip in front of her perfect, pert nose.  Opulence is too heavy for Asian tastes, she proclaims.  Sequins? Too soft.  "I don't even smell Glitzy any more," she says, before settling on her choice: Geisha Garden.
Kim Kardashian, cross-cultural marketing genius.
Within hookup culture on college campuses, dating is one of the most radical, nonconformist things you can do.
Oh, for fuck's sake.  Yes, young people have casual sex.  No, the entire population between ages 16 and 26 is not subsumed into this boogeyman "hookup culture" where they're all like "what is this Earth thing you call 'love'?"  I would really like the media to get over this particular obsession already and move on to telling us that eating caramel leads to Satanism, or something.
Because our ancestors spoke with their bodies rather than language, we learn more from gestures than words when first meeting someone.  If he's facing you directly, you have his full attention.
I don't think we needed to invoke grunting cavemen to explain the concept of "people look at things they're interested in."

...I would also like to explain to Cosmo that all language is produced by the body.
Make him feel like a piece of meat: "It's a huge turn-on to hear a woman objectify me," 30-year-old Christopher says.  "It seems simple, but it's so powerful."  Take his words to heart and don't be afraid to tell your guy everything you like about his body or what he does that drives you crazy.  He'll be obsessed.
That's not what objectification means.  That's not making him feel like a piece of meat.  That's just sexual compliments.  Yeah, sure, it's easy to say "I don't know what those ladies are complaining about, you can objectify me anytime" if you think it means your girlfriend tells you you have sexy abs.

Objectification is focusing on a person's usefulness to you with total disregard for their desires.  In the context of compliments, it's not saying "You turn me on."  It's saying "You turn me on, and whether you want to turn me on is utterly irrelevant."

Saying "nice ass" to a person who's deliberately wiggling their ass at you is a compliment; saying "nice ass" to a person who's just walking by is objectification.  "I want to sleep with her" is expressing desire;  "I'd hit it" is objectification.  "You're sexy" is nice to say on a date because it's a compliment; "you're sexy" is hideously undermining to say at a business meeting because it's objectification.
Q: My guy constantly asks me for cash to pay the bills.  He's going through a rough time and I don't mind helping out, but how can I stop this from being a regular thing? 
A: The fact that he's asking you for financial help--a tough thing for many guys to do--is a sign that he trusts you.

He Said He Wasn't Ready For Kids [...]  One month, I realized I'd forgotten to take my birth control pill... for five days.  I asked Matt if he thought this was a sign.  "I don't think it's time yet," he said.  Three months later, the same thing happened.
Oh shit, I already used my "this will not end well" image.

(In seriousness, sabotaging birth control is a horrible thing to do, both to your partner and your potential child.  It's really not a cutesy-wootsey "tee hee, whoopsy daisy, hint hint" thing to do.  It's pretty highly correlated with domestic violence.)
The Man-Child Meter  
[selected items from a big boring list of stuff like "he's a man-child if he only eats pizza" and "he's a real man if he has nice wineglasses"]
Man-Child: Invites you over to watch a movie, then texts you to pick up a six-pack on the way 
Getting There: Attempts to go down on you (he's trying!) 
Yep, He's A Man: Reaches for a condom before you have to ask
1. What's wrong with asking someone to bring beer?  I guess it's a little demanding, but "hey, honey, I'm out of beer over here, you want to bring some with you?" is really not that out of line if you like to have a beer with your movie.

2. How do you "attempt" to go down on a person?  Was he licking her knee?
"No, sweetie, not there."
"Okay, how about here?  Is this your clitoris now?"
"Sweetie, that's my elbow."

3. I guess this does rank higher than "just going ahead and having unprotected sex unless you stop him," but... significantly lower than "actually discussing protection before 0.4 seconds prior to intercourse."

Many things in my life are about control and domination, but eating should be a submissive experience, where you let down your guard and enjoy the ride.  I don't have much patience for people who are self-conscious about the act of eating, and it irritates me when someone denies themselves the pleasure of a bloody hunk of steak or a pungent French cheese because of some outdated nonsense about what's appropriate or attractive.  Stop worrying about how your breath's going to smell, whether there's beurre blanc on your face, or whether ordering the braised pork belly will make you look fat. [...] It's all about the enjoyment of the moment and the company and the food.  And if you can be yourself slurping spicy peanut noodles in front of another person, you may have a keeper.

This issue has an article by Anthony Bourdain!  What the heck is he doing here?  Anyway, it's awesome.  And not just because he writes with actual voice instead of "frenemy's va-jay-jay sexcapades" Cosmo-diction.  It's awesome because this is the only article in this magazine full of anatomically detailed sex talk that is actually about pleasure.

A Cosmo writer could have written "have fun eating, because men like it when you're not self-conscious, and it'll totally improve your mood!"  But it took an outside voice to say "have fun eating, because food is awesome."

77 comments:

  1. I actually don't like that food article because, holy shit Cosmo, I even eat wrong! I hate getting food on my face, and have a thing about people looking at me when I'm chewing. I really don't enjoy eating with people. It's easy to say "shut up and enjoy the damn food" when you're not the one with weird issues.

    I am too neurotic for the world. Thanks, Cosmo. :(

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    1. Yeah, it does fall into the "more pleasant prescriptivism, instead of actual freedom" thing. :/ I just liked it because even that feels like a breath of fresh air after 150 pages of really miserable prescriptivism.

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    2. Dagnyy, i just wanted to let you know you are not the only one who hates it when others watch you eat. I have the hardest time with that, too, and it can make one feel pretty alienated since people like to gather together for food. Esp when they notice and comment on how i'm not eating. Hope it helps to know you're not alone.

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  2. Why is it KimK chose a stereotyped name for an Asian perfume when the other names had NOTHING similar to the one she selected?

    FFS her nose isn't "perfect, pert" either. And yes, good call on the photoshopping. It looks terrible.

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    1. I noticed that too. Seemed really weird to me. Was it already named and no-one told her, and this was some kind of test or something?

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  3. Every time I see Kim Kardashian, Kanye's "Gold Digger" starts playing in my head.

    How do you forget birth control for five days? Was the person being held hostage? Seriously. I have been on it since I was 17. At one point, my life got hectic, I missed a day, was late another day, so I went and got on the effing ring.

    Humans. Humans.

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    1. I have an absolutely terrible memory for medications and do things like that all the time.

      The difference is that I would disclose it to my boyfriend with a "so we're going to use condoms for the rest of the month and I'm going to take a pregnancy test," not a "nudge nudge, must be a sign!"

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    2. I'm wondering how you forget for five days and there not be BLOOD EVERYWHERE. Because that was what reminded me that I forgot within two days.

      This is why I'm on the implant now.

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    3. Yeah, I got an IUD because that's about the only form of birth control that I trust myself not to fuck up somehow.

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    4. Every time I see Kim Kardashian, Kanye's "Gold Digger" starts playing in my head.

      ...Huh. Not to jump down your throat but - I'm a humorless feminist and all - that seems a little shamy.

      Seriously, I'm not exactly a fan of hers and don't know why she's famous, but you have to admit she was doing pretty damn well financially apart from any of her partners, up to and including Kanye?

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    5. She was. But now she makes even more money. She will be able to market this relationship to the highest bidder. Those baby pics are going to be worth so much money.

      But I am a cynic. Maybe she will keep it all on the DL and not let her mom run the show anymore.

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    6. I'm trying to figure that one out, too. I can see forgetting one day, maybe 2 in a row. But five days in a row seriously smacks of "accidentally on purpose," especially since it's pretty much impossible to ignore the fact that your vagina is BLEEDING.

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    7. I think Kim has plenty of money and Kanye has plenty of money, to the point where it's basically irrelevant, and who knows, maybe they like each other.

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    8. It makes me sad that even in a feminist space there are still people who want to judge another woman they have never met based on some gossip they've heard about the way she conducts her relationships and finances.

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    9. Um, I completely understand how a person could forget to take their bc pill for five days...cause I've done it (a couple times, which is why I've got a ring up in there now). It's because I'm a person who relies HEAVILY on routine to remember things like, oh, showering and eating regularly and all of those little maintenance things that aren't "events" in my day, but need to be done anyway. When my schedule gets disrupted or something "big" happens (life event, lots of stress, etc. ), those maintenance things fall by the wayside. And taking a birth control pill isn't something that's mediated or influenced by other people (like showering and eating at regular intervals are), so it's perfectly possible for me to go to take my pill, look at the package and go "shit, I've missed three of these buggers". And then go to my partner "we're using condoms for the rest of the month" or alternatively "so you know that sex we had yesterday? I'm going to buy some Plan B".

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  4. Just on the offchance that anyone I know is reading, if you try to jump me while I'm sleeping, sex or no sex, I'm very likely to panic and strangle you with the lamp cord, brain you with a glass of water, or otherwise defend myself with anything that happens to be within range. So there's that, for a start.

    Oh wait it's female on male? THAT MUST BE OKAY THEN EL OH EL TEE HEE.

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    1. This made me laugh so much I lost the ability to breathe for a little while.

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    2. Leaving aside that, as Cliff noted, the letters page is of questionable veracity, this is one of those things that works differently in long-term relationships. Not that getting consent is something that can ever be skipped, but more subtle ways of initiating/negotiating sex develop; after an aspect of that process being the same every time for two or three years, you start to take it for granted and assume you'll be told if it's changed.

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    3. So I want to walk this back a little bit, at least to clarify that the fact that you (or, I) can construct a narrative around the specific incident that makes it acceptable doesn't mean the general notion it promotes is ok.

      I was prompted to add this by something I read somewhere else but Cliff actually addressed that idea in December.

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  5. I feel like the Anthony Bourdain article, in the context of the rest of the magazine, reads as "enjoy your food! BUT ONLY IF YOU'RE REALLY SKINNY IF YOU LIKE FOOD AND YOU'RE FAT YOU'RE A HORRIBLE FATASS TURN TO PAGE 155 FOR DIET TIPS." It's not enough to be thin; you have to be effortlessly thin.

    I think "attempt to go down on" possibly means "really terrible oral sex you don't tell him is horrible because you have to preserve his precious manly ego."

    I'm confused by "hookup culture" because half the time it seems to mean "casual sex" and the other half the time it seems to mean "hang out, become friends, have sex, get in a relationship, without having any formal dates." I am confused about why the latter is _bad_. I mean, I'm broke, I can't afford a dinner-and-movie date, and it's way easier to get to know someone as friends than it is to get to know them on a formal date where everyone's on their best behavior.

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    1. Yeah, me too. The Dirty Normal just had a post based on a NYT article about this very thing, and I expressed similar confusion there. IIRC, the NYT comments had many other people expressing bafflement, because how is this even a new thing? There've been articles about the demise of Formal Dating since at least the 1960s.

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    2. I have been out of college for a few years, so that may be why it's odd to me. When I was in college, people often casually dated. People formally dated. Hell, people just had sex sometimes and then would randomly decide they were dating. Half the fun of your early 20s is learning the type of relationships you are willing to have

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    3. Presumably, Cosmo says sex without Formal Dates is bad because it's the Formal Dates (and the money people spend on restaurants, flashy clothes, gifts etc for such dates) that put money in the pockets of Cosmo's sponsors. /cynical

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    4. The latter is how I met my husband. And the two people I dated before him. And...actually, now that I think about it, I don't think I've ever had a relationship that started by formally dating. The whole business sounds horribly awkward and pressuring to me.

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    5. I don't get why the latter is bad or the former is bad. I mean, what's wrong with casual sex? As long as everyone involved is happy with it?

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    6. I'm pro-casual-sex, but I can understand why people would be unhappy if suddenly the only option on the menu is casual sex. (Just like people'd be unhappy if the only option were romantic relationships.) Good thing that's... not the case? At all?

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    7. Hoshit, I hadn't caught the name of the author of the post I replied to! I've read enough of ozymandias' stuff by now to know better than to think ze's condemning casual sex wholesale. Oops. My apologies.

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    8. "I'm confused by "hookup culture" because half the time it seems to mean "casual sex" and the other half the time it seems to mean "hang out, become friends, have sex, get in a relationship, without having any formal dates." I am confused about why the latter is _bad_."

      I wasn't even aware the latter was, like, its own thing that doesn't count as dating. That's pretty much exactly how I got with my current boyfriend (although for us it went "have sex with him and his boyfriend, hang out, become friends, they break up, have sex with him, get in a relationship" -- watch Cosmo's head explode.)

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  6. This issue left me with a particularly sour taste in my mouth.

    Good thing I have some Satanic Caramel to sweeten things up a bit.

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    1. Does it have cute little candied horns? :D

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  7. >sabotaging birth control is a horrible thing to do, both to your partner and your potential child. It's really not a cutesy-wootsey "tee hee, whoopsy daisy, hint hint" thing to do. It's pretty highly correlated with domestic violence.

    Was that meant to read as being as victim-blamey as it did to me? I'd assume not, but I can't figure out how else to read it.

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    1. Sabotaging birth control is highly correlated with committing domestic violence.

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    2. ^...As in, sabotaging birth control is a thing abusive/violent people often do to their partners in order to further enmesh them in the abusive relationship. NOT that one party sabotages the birth control and the other one beats the crap out of them for it.

      Just in case Cliff's wording was still vague.

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  8. "Man-Child: Invites you over to watch a movie, then texts you to pick up a six-pack on the way."
    I genuinely don't understand what's wrong with this. Unless they assume he's expecting you to pay for it? But I don't see what unfair splitting of costs has to do with beer specifically. I suppose it does make marginally more sense if Cosmo is operating under the weird assumption that women don't drink beer (which I have never understood) and therefore he's the only one who'll be drinking it. (Which, by the way, if I'm bringing beer then yes, I do expect to be sharing it tyvm.) But even if the hypothetical 'you' in this scenario doesn't like beer, it's still not that big a deal? Asking someone to pick up something you're out of on the way to theirs is perfectly normal, so long as you pay them back. Maybe they think only man-children drink beer at all. In which case I'm clearly a woman-child.

    (I am definitely overthinking this. I should really just accept that Cosmo writers live in a bizarre and terrible alternate universe and not even bother questioning this.)

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    1. Actually, I asked a guy to bring over some beer one night on his way over. He did and when I went to pay him back, he was flabbergasted. In our late twenties, and I was the first female he had dated who chipped in.

      When I date someone, I tend to make sure I always have their favorite beverage on hand. It cuts down on trips to the store, and gets me brownie points.

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  9. I think Ms Kardashian up there is wearing a 50s-style bikini or undergarment with a cardigan, as far as I can tell.

    Either that or spanx have now become clothing...

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    1. Yeah, I think what is going on here is "we're sticking her into a thinly-veiled 'control garment', because she's not a size zero and ewww there might be some tummy sticking out otherwise!"

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    2. I kinda thought she was pregnant, and fairly far along, so unless that photo has been brewing in their weird, proportionless, rubbery-limbed vat of evil for a while, they have airbrushed out more stomach than was left in. Which is about twelve new kinds of horrible, none of which are surprising because Cosmo.

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  10. Wait so, what's THE SEX MOVE[tm]? Are we pulling on his toes again this month?

    flightless

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  11. I'd love to see Cosmo's take on Not Sounding Ridiculous during dirty talk...
    A.

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  12. She said weapon. She correlated sex with weapon. Like every stereotypical women ever. She's not having sex because she's horny, she's having sex because she thinks she's fat. Sex is like a treadmill to her.

    Everyone currently in college complains about hookup culture making it hard for them to date. Dating culture is making it hard for me to hookup! When I gave in and started looking for an SO is when I started getting more action. But no SO, haha. Maybe it works backwards.

    I'm not sure what the problem is with the real man having a condom. Real men do carry condoms. It means, "I'm serious about safe sex, and I'm not buying this stupid spontaneous sex bullshit." Being the only one to bring condoms is a let-down for me.

    Can't believe Cosmo actually did an article about liking something. And not just liking shopping or makeup (cus we really only do those to please teh menz) but actual food. Food! The whole time I was reading that part, I was expecting you to end it with, "...which is what they could've said. Instead they went with this..."

    -Eva

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    1. I don't think the issue is so much "he brought a condom", that's a good thing! It's more that the article seems to be presenting the ideal situation as "okay, now we're going to have intercourse, oh look! he's going to wear a condom! Yay!", sort of implying that A) you should never talk about sex, but just try to communicate everything through passive-aggressiveness and body-language; and B) asking your sex partner to wear a condom is an unpleasant and awkward thing that you have to try and sneak in at the last minute, rather than a totally normal request.

      Dunno, that was just my reading of it.

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  13. While it's nice to have a "have fun eating, because food is awesome" article, I can't say I like his phrasing. For instance, "I don't have much patience for people who are self-conscious about the act of eating" seems to be pretty casually dismissive of anyone who has issues related to food and body image, and reads to me as "just get over it", which... yeah, no. Not helpful.

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    1. Yeah, I was just about to post about this myself, as someone with a history of disordered eating, hearing someone say "I don't have much patience for people who are self-conscious about the act of eating" is fucking horrible.

      TO be honest, I expect that shit from Cosmo though, I just which Cliff had been a bit more critical of that bit.

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    2. RE: safaraz

      Yeah. Fellow ED guy here, and though eating with other people massively helps me (I'm apparently a minority in that), sometimes, dammit, food is just hard. I will eat slow, or weirdly, and dammit, even with the social assistance, a steak is WAY harder for me to eat than... I dunno. Lentil stew.

      I can't 'just enjoy' my food, a lot of the time. So yeah, that rubbed me the wrong way too.

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    3. I agree, it's very dismissive. I didn't like the "eating should be a submissive experience" part much, either. Like, do we really need there to be a One True Way to enjoy food, Mr. Bourdain?

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    4. Yeah, a man telling women to "enjoy eating" in a women's magazine that promotes eating disorders... that's just part of the pattern of promoting eating disorders. I will not enjoy food just because this self-entitled guy tells me to. If i can't eat properly and worry about my weight, this article is not going to help me, it will only make things worse.

      Considering the critical stance Cosmocking usually takes, I am pretty disappointed Cliff is giving this Bourdain guy a pass, whoever the hell he is (I assume he is big in the kink world, which apparently excuses him for talking about food being a "submissive" act and women NEEDING to stop fretting about food like the silly women they are...)

      Lameballs, Pervocracy. The article is problematic to say the least.

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    5. I totally don't want my eating to be a submissive experience. I think that's a bit like saying 'sex should be a submissive experience, people who can't just go with the flow and let me spank them, really annoy me'. I can enjoy eating in some circumstances, and I'm happy to hear how the author feels about their own experience of food, but telling the readers that they 'should' 'just' do anything is a bit rubbish. Well, very rubbish.

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    6. @ Laura Bird - Just to clarify, to the best of my knowledge, Bourdain has never been involved in the kink world. He was a chef for many years and now makes a living off of being a food personality, mainly through writing, though he did have a Food Network show for a while.

      I suspect that his use of the word "submissive" is more informed by his experience feeding *people* and watching them be picky and squeamish than by notions of How Women Are Supposed To Act. I think he really does just want people to enjoy food, because he really enjoys food.

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  14. Re: The cover. I think they were trying to go for the infamous "boobs and butt" comic pose, but no amount of Photoshop could actually make a picture of a real person do that.



    Also, DEAR COSMO: Not too long ago, I was one of the mysterious creatures you know as College Students. Because of this, I feel qualified to act as ambassador and explain their strange and foreign cultures too you.

    Are you sitting down?

    College Students, despite many popular misconceptions, have highly varied mating behavior. This includes "we're kinda sorta friends and kinda sorta dating and very definitely sleeping together" and "casual sex," as well as "Capital-D-Dates" and "Serious Relationships." I in fact partook in all of these mating behaviors, and witnessed others do the same. And I'm pretty sure no one sawing dating as radical. Just sayin', you might want to check your sources on that one.

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  15. Is cunnilingus ... difficult? Fun fact: the first person I had any sort of sex with claims I was the first partner to get her off orally (I hate that formulation, but you know what I mean). Slight grain of salt, since she hadn't had a lot of partners, but I really think that says less about me than about my predecessors.

    I wouldn't say I'm good, I think I'm average, but if someone is so bad at it that the word "trying" applies, either they really don't care if they're good at it, or there's some kind of neuro-atypicality or physical difficulty going on there.

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    1. As to somebody being so bad that "trying" applies: maybe all their previous sex partners have been brainwashed to believe that they must moan and squirm when someone is giving them oral, whether or it's an ego, because anything else would crush the precious ego? Maybe that's giving too much credit, but I can think of a sex-act or two that I found unpleasant and frustrating with my first partner, because he refused to give any form of useful feedback.

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    2. Huh. I think "people can be radically different in how they function sexually" definitely applies here, so "it's not that difficult" may be a bit flippant. (Though I'm sure that's not how it was intended.) Different people need different things to get them to orgasm, and for a good number of people, the amount of pressure, or speed/frequency of stimulation, or duration of stimulation that is required can be pretty demanding on a tongue (and/or neck muscles, and/or ability to breathe).

      And that's not even getting into "you cannot directly touch my clit, I am hypersensitive and it hurts and kills my arousal" vs. "focused direct stimulation of my clit is absolutely necessary for orgasm", or "some penetration needs to be added to get anywhere" vs. "please no penetration", or... there are plenty of situation where figuring out how to do right by your partner can indeed be difficult, and the word "trying" could apply. Asking for feedback is usually a good idea, but sometimes the person doesn't exactly know what works for them, and trying is almost a necessary part of the process.

      Of course, that would probably be described as "trying to get a partner off by going down on them". "Trying to go down on them" does, as Cliff said, sound a bit like they're failing to even start the process, instead getting sidetracked at the elbow.

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    3. I think there's more to it than you think. The first partner I had who went down on me loved giving oral sex but was way more interested in doing what turned him on than doing what got me off. The first time I got oral from someone who deliberately experimented to see what kind of stimulation worked for me and then did that was a revelation. (Reader, I married him.)

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    4. I read it more like "moves into a position where he can give you oral sex; success equals you not stopping him". I think it's that thing Cosmo-readers and their partners do instead of asking or offering to do things.

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    5. As a person who has difficulty getting off, the word "trying" could be applied during any sexual activity I participate in. However, I like to think that I'm "Experiencing" rather than trying. Because the merit of sexual enjoyment doesn't have to be based on finishing. Trying to go down on me, aka going down on me, feels good, because it feels good, and not necessarily because I come. It makes me wonder how much sexual enjoyment people are losing out on with the idea of finishing on their minds all the time.

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  16. Oh no! My boyfriend is a man-child because he occasionally asks me to bring beer/wine when I come over. But it's okay, because I'm a woman-child who does the same thing. Reciprocity~~~

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    1. My guess is that while beer seems to be designated 'man-child' in Cosmo's eyes, wine is probably designated 'real man' what with being a sophisticated adult drink and all, so maybe it cancels out for your boyfriend? Mind you, with the way Cosmo writes about men, you would expect that they think ALL men are too un-sophisticated to drink wine. Sigh...
      Cosmo would probably be amazed by a woman who would want their boyfriend to bring beer in return because they couldn't imagine a woman drinking beer. Gender stereotypes, what are they?! :O

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  17. Yeah... my partner recently got back from active duty in Afghanistan. Attacking him in his sleep is one of the worst things I can think of to do to him.

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    1. Oh god. No kidding! Not at all sexy morning activity (also, possibly dangerous depending on his level of trauma)

      It's not as screwy if read as initiating sex with a half-awake partner BY FIRST WAKING THEM UP. (And as a lazy person with a high sex drive, sex does make up most of my exercise.)

      Although I assume Cosmo doesn't worry about me exercising because I'm skinny. Heck, my doctor doesn't. Because really, what's a family history of heart attacks in your 50s if you look good?

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  18. "Geisha Garden, for all your feminine pixelization needs."

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  19. (Warning: incoming pet peeve. Heavy sarcasm detected.)

    "If he's facing you directly, you have his full attention."

    Because of course, all humans have exactly the same body language. So, if I should happen to be facing towards and looking at the subject of discussion instead of the person I'm talking to, it's not because that's how I am and how I feel comfortable! No, it's because my full attention is on that boxed TV sitting on the shelf, not the person whose questions about the TV I'm trying to answer. I should definitely be fired for not looking perky enough!

    (Sarcasm has passed; resuming normal commenting.)

    Saying "I want to sleep with her"... I'm not really sure how that feels less objectifying than "I'd hit it". Except maybe for the latter using "it". But then that phrase has always thrown me; there's a part of my mind that associates it with beating someone with a hockey stick, and I just can't imagine how it would even be seen as related to sex.

    I'm not sure I even get this idea of submissiveness to eating, there's not even an active agent there. Unless it's the cook. And then I think that most of the really good food I've had in my life was cooked by one of my parents. Eeew.

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    1. I think you're supposed to submit to the flavour or something.

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    2. I think the key word, so to speak, is "with." It's the difference between mutually fulfilling sex and sex that's centered on one person's fulfillment.

      Because if it's not that, they come across as equally objectifying to me too.

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    3. Well, simply wanting to sleep with a person is just sexual desire, and it can be objectifying, but it can also be "I totally respect her, and I'm physically attracted to her, and if she happens to feel the same way about me, I would be quite happy to sleep with her."

      "I want to sleep with her" doesn't rule out objectification, but it doesn't necessarily imply it either.

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    4. Can "I would tap that even if I got mana burn" still be an okay joke though?

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    5. Well, it'd be a dated one, since they've gotten rid of mana burn.

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  20. I freely admit I stared at Kim's breasts for a full 120 seconds, trying to (a) figure out how those could possibly be real, and (b) resolve it with other pictures of her that I have tried to avoid seeing.

    My final conclusion is that those are the type of completely unreal pneumatic breasts (or breasteses, according to Oprah) I usually see on women in brightly colored spandex with strategic (and equally unrealistic) cutouts in comic books.

    Even porn stars with implants don't have breasts that look like that.

    That right arm just looks weird.

    The panty type thing she's wearing is probably the lower half of a swimsuit. Two-pieces like that are becoming popular, mainly for women who actually want to swim without worrying that their nearly non-existent bikini bottom will come off if they actually get in the water.

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    1. I'd say be a bit careful with the mocking of Kim's body and how much Photoshop that's involved. There's a fine line between photoshop-mocking and body snark here. She looks like a full-busted lady to me. There's a lot of women just having big breasts, without implants. And it's rather difficult to say how they would be positioned naturally, because she is wearing a bra and a cardigan.

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    2. Kim is a full-busted woman. I'm also a full-busted woman. But do you see the line of the cleavage and the lines of the edges of the little cardigan? I guarantee you that it's Photoshopped.

      Also, Cosmo has a well-established reputation for Photoshopping their covers. I'd be surprised to see one that didn't look, at the very least, air-brushed.

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  21. Awww, now I have to go find a copy of this magazine somewhere so that I can read the Anthony Bourdain article!

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  22. Come back, Cliff! I miss your posts :(

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  23. I'm sure I'd trust Cosmo to tell me how to talk dirty without sounding ridiculous...

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  24. What is the Sexiest Thing You Can Do On A Date?

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  25. I read the Anthony Bourdain paragraph in the context of the previous 'Man-Child Meter' post, so I viewed it as a paragraph about eating someone out, not food. Surprisingly good advice! =)

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  26. Something is missing from this picture. Namely, her widely reported-on and very famous baby bump.

    This skeeves me out on so many levels. Is her pregnancy - and therefore, child - so inconvenient to Cosmo that they just airbrushed the bump away? Did they use a photo of her they already had on hand, because, you know, "big belly = bad", whether it's the belly of a naturally large woman or a pregnant woman?

    You can't take a woman who, for better or worse, is world-famous, and pretend she's not pregnant for the sake of a 'good' photograph. It's insulting to her; it's insulting to the child; it's insulting to pregnant women everywhere: and what kind of message does it send to Cosmo's younger readers?

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